IP based access has stopped working

Recently, IP based access has ceased working. How do we go about debugging this as username/password logins work on the system. Thanks!

Hi @radjr,

Which application and what version of it are you using? (Please include this information in your posts.)

Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team

OJS version 2.4.8.1

Thank you.

Additional Information. It seems that it is journal dependent. For example, we have set up an institutional subscription for us with our ip ranges. It works on three of four journals. The fourth requires username/password login. IP based access was working but has gone away recently however nothing else (user/subscription/etc) on the system has changed

Does an individual subscription override an institutional subscription? eg if the user has a individual subscription as well as being part of an institutional subscription…which takes precedence? Thanks.

Hi @radjr,

The best way to test IP-based subscriptions is to log out entirely; that way you can be sure that it’s not an interaction between a user-based and IP-based subscription.

Has anything changed on your server, to your knowledge, that might have caused the problem? A PHP upgrade, or the introduction of a proxy, or something similar might cause this.

Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team

Yes, we logged out completely. Expired the user sessions and cleared the data caches. I also cleared the browser cache to no avail. Other journals on this installation DO show IP based access works which is what makes this unusual.

Hi @radjr,

It sounds to me like the IP address in the subscription simply doesn’t match the one that OJS is seeing. I’d suggest checking your access log when that user accesses the site to see what IP address Apache thinks the user is coming from, and ensuring that it’s the same one that’s entered in the subscription.

Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team

In this case, it is our subscription and it works on other journals. Is it possible that special characters are embedded? Do you do any checking for non-ascii text in that field? thanks.

Brain Damage or Sun Spots…it has to be the cause! Someone fat fingered the subscription type and had entered a print only subscription… No! It was gremlins!

Bottom line is all is good and the world is round again. Thanks!

Hi @radjr,

Glad to hear it’s working again! We get sun spots here too.

Regards,
Alec Smecher
Public Knowledge Project Team