Online or Offline ?

Blitz3D Forums/Blitz3D Beginners Area/Online or Offline ?

Gui	(Posted 2004) [#1]

Hi all,

I'm trying to get the internet connection state, if the player's computer is online or offline. So I use the code above, but I always get the "Connected" message even if my modem is physically unplugged.

;**************************************

If CallDLL("url.dll","InetIsOffline")
Print "Not connected."
Else
Print "Connected!"
EndIf

WaitKey()

;**************************************

Could someone tell me what's wrong with my code ?
Thanks in advance,
Gui.

Odds On

(Posted 2004) [#2]

You could try creating a TCP connection or similar to a website address and if it succeeds it means the computer is online.

Also, with that code you may need to specify a bank to retrieve data from the DLL.

bnkData		= CreateBank( 4 )
Result		= CallDLL( "url.dll", "InetIsOffline", 0, bnkData )

;Call to DLL succeeded
If Result
	Connected = PeekInt( bnkData, 0 )
	If Connected = True
		Print "Connected!"
	Else
		Print "Not Connected."
	EndIf
Endif

FreeBank bnkData
bnkData = 0

That code is untested though and is only to give a rough idea of what you might need to do to retrieve the data you want.

You could also try using a userlib.

Gui	(Posted 2004) [#3]

Thanks a lot Chris, but it doesn't work. Apparently, the DLL call fails, I don't have any print output (added a waitkey() at the bottom of the code).

Concerning a userlib, I don't know what it is, I'm a newbie ;-)

Beardy

(Posted 2004) [#4]

Could it be that your call to the dll is also failing and that is why it always returns false and displays the connected message?

EOF	(Posted 2004) [#5]

Is this of any use?

; test for an internet connection


; userlibs
; **********************************
; .lib "wininet.decls"
; InternetCheckConnection%(Url$,Flags%,Reserved%):"InternetCheckConnectionA"
; **********************************

Const FORCE_CONNECTION = 1

url$="http://www.blitzbasic.com"

If InternetCheckConnection(url$, FORCE_CONNECTION, 0) = 0
	Notify "Connection NOT present"
Else
	Notify "Connection present"
End If

End

Gui	(Posted 2004) [#6]

Yeah, it seems to work, thanks JimB !

Ian Martin

(Posted 2004) [#7]

Try OpenTCPStream. Check out the example in the Blitz Command Reference. It seems to work, I tested it by running the example with my cable modem on/off and got a "failed" message when it was turned off :)

Warren

(Posted 2004) [#8]

Problems with trying to open a TCP connection are:

a) It's slow. If it's going to fail, it takes several long seconds to do so.

b) If the user is on dial-up, it will pop up the connection dialog.

Rottbott

(Posted 2004) [#9]

c) If the website you try to connect to happens to be down at that moment, it'll say you aren't connected.

Jim Teeuwen

(Posted 2004) [#10]

Userlib

.module "wininet.dll"
InternetGetConnectedState%( Description%, ReservedValue% )

Blitz

Function IsConnected%()
   Local ret% = 0
   Return InternetGetConnectedState( ret, 0 )
End Function

Im not 100% sure the Integer passing will work though. you might wonna change that to a type or bank.
This is the official signature of the function:

bool InternetGetConnectedState( out int Description, int ReservedValue )

skidracer

(Posted 2004) [#11]

Also, you might try GetSystemMetrics(SM_NETWORK) which apparently returns an odd number if the computer is online.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/sysinfo/base/getsystemmetrics.asp