Find Host IP address

Hi All

I have an IP address, say 12.345.67.89

This IP address is for a computer that is hosted on a shared server.

Is it possible to find out the hosting server IP address and name which we know is different from the computer IP address.

I was hoping to be able to use a php script that called up the IP above and then somehow finds the hosting server IP address

Thanks

Depends if they have reverse DNS setup for their IP address. If they do not then you may get close by doing a trace route to that IP address, but that usually only gives you clues about what datacenter the IP address belongs to. There are websites out there that simply visit thousands and thousands of other websites a day and then record the IPs associated with them for reverse lookups later when people need them. That would probably be the most reliable way.

Hi

Thanks for your response

Are you saying then that there is no php script.

Could you point me to the websites that record the IPs

Thanks

just out of wondering why are you wanting to know the host ip address.?

On shared hosting your Client IP and the web server IP are different.

By being able to find the web server IP, if not dedicated, you can then get all the information about the hosting company.

I have many client ip's and I was hoping to be able to determine their web servers

I think this is where I am not following you exactly. On a dedicated server there can be numerous shared hosting accounts that actually do use the main server's IP address. It is true a server can have multiple IP addresses setup on it, but that does not mean that the IP address of a website is using anything other than the main server's IP.

Above I was under the impression you were wanting to do a reverse lookup to see what domains were using that IP address, but now my impression is you are wanting to take an IP address under the assumption there is another main IP address for the server. I believe this thinking is flawed, because in many cases that will already be the main IP address. When many datacenters issue out servers they only provide the hosting company a few IPv4 addresses due to the fact that they are in short supply these days. Typically many hosts will share the main IP, and possibly use dedicated IPs for websites that need SSL (that requires a separate dedicated IP).

So I think the real question for you might be that for any given IP address that a website is hosting on, do other IP addresses exist on the server, and if so, what are they? In some cases its possible that only one IP is even binded to the server.

My first guess is that there is no way to determine the "main" ip address for the server, but there may be a way to determine all of the ip addresses that a server responses to. Regardless, with any given IP address you can usually always determine the datacenter that the IP belongs to, but you may not necessarily be able to determine the hosting company that is leasing servers from that datacenter.

However, like I mentioned before there are bots that go around the internet recording every single IP address associated with a website, and using that could be a way to do a reverse IP lookup to get an idea about what sort of domains are on a server. For example this one does it:

http://www.domaintools.com/research/reverse-ip/

Hi

Thanks for your response

I have a client ip and a client hostname.
If I do a reverse IP for my client IP, I get either my client hostname or nothing, depending on who I use.

If I do a reverse IP for my domain name, then I get the Web server IP and all the other websites hosted for this server IP all the time.

It looks like the only way to get the web server IP is to do a reverse ip of the domain name.
Since I only get client IPs, it looks like it can't be done

Just to confirm, when you say clients, you are talking about the visitors to your website correct? Typically you have servers which serve your content, and clients from remote machines who connect to the server. On this server numerous websites could be sharing one or more IP addresses. Client is referring to the user-end side, that is why you have what is known as server side scripting (PHP, PERL, etc), and clientside scripting (Javascript).

So when you say:



That makes me think from the computer you are actually on typing these messages to the forum (not a server). In your very first post here you say:



See to me that makes no sense, how can a computer be hosted on a server? A server is a computer. That is like saying a computer is hosted on a computer

I just want to make sure we are not confusing terminology here because if we are that may be why I am not answering your question correctly. Please clarify you are meaning what I am saying. Thanks!

Hi

Thanks for your reply.

I know each computer or server has a unique Internet Protocol (IP) address.

My computer has what I call a Client IP.
My web hosting company server has what I call a Server IP, where my domain is located.

I can find them both for my computer and my domain.

When a visitor connects to my site, I can determine their (Client) IP for their computer.

What I would like to find is the IP address of their web hosting server.

I would like the process to be automatic somehow.
I read about pinging, but I am not a programmer so would not know how to set this up automatically.

Hopefully I have made things a little clearer.

I think your thinking is flawed. Just because someone uses the internet doesn't mean they automatically have a web hosting account. Even if they do, it doesn't mean they use the same internet provider for hosting as they do for client use.

If you're just trying to determine the client's ISP, you're going to need a database that maps ISPs to leased IP pools (which changes daily). If you had the time and resources to do so, you might be able to grep out the ISP from the client FQDN, but you'd still need a database that maps FQDNs to ISPs, and even this wouldn't give it all to you because someone may have att and show as rr.com, for example.

I think you should step back and rethink what you're trying to do. Chances are it's been done before utilizing resources that don't go into all this.

Yea he has no idea what he is doing but it looks to me he is fishing for information. But the funny thing is that i don't think he has a lot of experience in Networking or OS.




i usually just keep my comments to myself but this one i did not know either should i laugh or cry, then again this entire post i can not find a point.

Kernel Panic LOL

You are right Zealous, I do not have much experience, which is why I raise the questions.

When you are unfamiliar with an area, the idea is to ask questions so you can get some constructive criticism, not to be laughed at.

When you first started out,how much experience did you have. Did you not learn by asking questions, whether they had a point or not. That is how we learn.

As far as I am concerned, and as I tell everyone else, no question is stupid, no matter how pointless it might sound as the next question will no doubt then be to the point.

Hopefully I made you laugh and not cry

I don't think any of your questions are dumb, if I did I would not be spending my time trying to answer. I am just trying to make sure am understanding exactly what you are saying, so that I can answer your question for how you are intending it to be.

With that said I do think I understand more now.



The first part of that I can understand, and that is easy to do, I think you already know how to do that from my understanding. The second part is that you want to find the IP address of their web hosting server. Do you actually mean their ISP? or are you under the assumption that your visitors all have servers somewhere hosting websites? The way this sounds to me is that if I were to visit one of your websites, you would know my IP, and based off of that you would hope to find all of my servers and websites I run. If that is the case that would be impossible, as there is absolutely zero relations to my computer's IP address and my server's IP addresses and the websites I run.

If you are just trying to find the ISP, then doing a basic whois on the client's IP address should usually be enough to give you a good idea what ISP they are using, such as ATT, Comcast, Cox, Roadrunner, etc, etc.

While this may not be relevant, I am curious to your reasons for wanting to use this information for your script.

yes i know i am being a ass but i do suggest you ask as many questions as possible and i do try and help as many people as possible but once in a while i post something stupid.

And Yes i was once a noob but i read 24/7 book after book and site after site till i could do it.

But yea this is what i get for posting at 6am in the morning hahahaha

But serious mate if you need help with someone send me a pm if you want. More then happy to help anytime with networking and OS help Linux and Windows

Hi Bigwebmaster and Zealous

After I read your responses, it did get me thinking.

I want to know how the visitor got to my website.

I figure it would be one of the following:
1) direct connection
2) referral from a search engine.
3) referral from another website.

For direct connection, it would be strictly the computer IP connecting directly to my website via their browser and there would be no referror.

For search engines, such as Google look up, they would click on the link on the google page.

For other websites, they again would click on a link to my website.

What I need then is the referror url

Once I get the referror URL, I would need to strip it done to get only the domain name and then try to find the Server IP and Server Name.

Not being a great php programmer I would need help for the following:

- I know how to get the referror so no help needed here.
- how to strip the referror URL so that I only get the domain name.
- once I have the domain name, how to convert it to the server IP

Once I have the server IP, I can then easily determine any thing else I want to find out above.

Hopefully my questions now are becoming more to the point which I suppose now is due to the previous questions asked and answered.

Would appreciate your help or guidance