Cannot Pair To Mac Outside Local network

Question

I'm trying to set up a mac mini in a remote location so that I can pair to mac in Visual Studio 2022. Everything works fine when I'm in that location and on the local network, but when I leave and try to connect via an ip address, I get a "Couldn't resolve Mac "xxx"" error. I have forwarded ports 5900 for VNC, 22 for SSH, and 5000 and 50530 for Xamarin messaging. I can ssh and vnc into the machine from outside the local network just fine. When I connect to pair with mac, I put in the subdomain pointing to the public ip address as "xxx.xxx.com" and get the error. If I put in the ip address it also just fails "xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx". Both machines are up to date with latest versions of Visual Studio (for windows and mac) and Xamarin. What am I doing wrong? Basically, I'm trying to set up Pair to Mac for IOS development over the internet and not a local network. What extra steps are involved, what ports need forwarded, etc?

Answer 1

I don't think the feature Pair to Mac is smart enough; which is why directions specify that it must be on a local network.

After reviewing the traffic with Wireshark I noticed that on a local network setup the initial call was TCP, but on a remote network setup the initial call was NBNS.

My specific issue is that ATT forced their hardware on me and I have my own router behind that. So there was a snag on the passthrough setup to my router for the forwarding to work correctly.

Once I got passed this I realized the easiest way to get Pair to Mac working remotely (based on what I've read on it) would be to set up a tunnel on the computer connecting to the mac with Windows PowerShell:

ssh -L <local_port>:localhost:<remote_port> username@public-ip-address

Then log in with localhost:<local_port> in the Pair to Mac window and everything connected perfectly.

Good luck.

Answer 2

while the Mac needs internet access to download packages, etc the visual studio connection only needs a working SSH and the proper tools installed on the Mac.

First I'd get the local network to work. then try internet access. the typical issue with access a Mac with SSH over the internet is the reverser dns lookup. you may need to disable this.

Answer 3

Hello,

Ensuring that both machines are on the same Local Network is the premise to pair. Please check the step7 in this Remote Login Doc.

I have to say, it's a question in network level, and you have to solve the local area network configuration between the 2 computers.

Best Regards,

Wenyan Zhang

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