Internal error - Tourbox needs acces to TCP ports, but failed to make a connection

[driesr3059280]

on my mac I'm having this bug 'Tourbox needs acces to TCP ports, but failed to make a connection' and my tourbox input device doesn't work anymore. What could it be? It's not tourbox related because it's working fine outside of lightroom, and I also get the error 'Loupedeck needs acces to TCP ports, but failed to make a connection'.

[dj_paige]

Is this a question about Lightroom Classic?

[Conrad_C]

I recently got a TourBox which I use on a Mac with various apps including Lightroom Classic, and have never seen this error. 

However, looking at the screen shot you posted of the error alert message, we see some potential clues. One is that it shows a Lightroom Classic icon, so it’s definitely related to Lightroom Classic in some way. Also, it mentions TCP ports, which are related to networking and communications. 

The other interesting thing you said is that Lightroom Classic is having the same problem with LoupeDeck (a similar control surface that I’ve never used), and that the TourBox works fine outside Lightroom Classic.

Based on all of that, my guess is that this might be related to the Lightroom Classic plug-in that TourBox installs to integrate that control surface with Lightroom Classic, and that the same problem is affecting a similar hardware integration plug-in for LoupeDeck.

With that in mind, here are some ways you might try to troubleshoot that:

Check the plug-in:

1. Open the Lightroom Classic Plug-in Manager (choose the command File > Plug-in Manager). 

2. In the list of plug-ins, look at LoupeDeck and TourBox. Are they installed and listed as “Installed and Running” (not missing or disabled)? If not running, click the Enable button. 

3. Try clicking the Reload Plug-In button. 

4. Go to the website of each plug-in to see if there is newer software. My version of TourBox Console is 5.7.9, which matches the latest version on the TourBox Console download page. I don’t remember having to install the TourBox plug-in for Lightroom Classic, so that probably means TourBox Console automatically installs the Lightroom Classic plug-in if it notices the plug-in isn’t already there.

I’m not sure if this will help, but because the error mentions failing to gain access to TCP ports:

If you are running third-party anti-malware software or network firewall software, and if they are currently set to block the network connections of Lightroom Classic, LoupeDeck, or TourBox, try unblocking those applications. (I don’t think the firewall built into macOS can affect this, but I suppose you could check that too.) 

What version of Lightroom Classic and macOS are you running? On my Mac where TourBox is working well, it’s macOS 14.7.4 and Lightroom Classic 14.2.

[Conrad_C]

One more thing I just thought of: Because TourBox and LoupeDeck are complaining about the same TCP ports, and they do very similar things, try disabling one of them in the Plug-in Manager and then see if that lets the other one work. This tests for a possible conflict between the two.

I’d like to think that the Lightroom Classic plug-in API wouldn’t allow for a conflict between two control surface plug-ins trying to talk to Lightroom Classic at the same time, but I don’t know enough about the Lightroom Classic plug-in API. Maybe @johnrellis would know if that’s even a possibility?

[johnrellis]

"I’d like to think that the Lightroom Classic plug-in API wouldn’t allow for a conflict between two control surface plug-ins trying to talk to Lightroom Classic at the same time, but I don’t know enough about the Lightroom Classic plug-in API. Maybe @johnrellis would know if that’s even a possibility?"

There's a possibility for conflict if both plugins choose the same port number on which to listen for connections from their respective external apps.  So disabling one of the plugins is a good way to test for that.

It's also possible there's a bug in LrSocket, but that seems unlikely too.

Seeing the precise error message from Loupedeck could help clarify things.  

Running pirated copies of software sometimes involves modifying the /etc/hosts file to prevent the software from phoning home, and depending on how the hosts file was modified, a side effect could be to disable the proper operation of "localhost", the loopback address LrSocket would use to connect to other apps' sockets on the computer. So seeing the contents of /etc/hosts could eliminite this possibility.

[johnrellis]

If Conrad's good suggestions don't help, please post a full-resolution screenshot  of the Loupedeck error message. It may be similar to the Tourbox error message, but I'm skeptical it's identical.

[johnrellis]

Another troubleshooting step:

1. In Finder, do the menu command Go > Go To Folder.

2. Type "/etc" and hit return.

3. Right-click the "hosts" file and do Open With > Textedit.

4. The file contents should be:

##
# Host Database
#
# localhost is used to configure the loopback interface
# when the system is booting.  Do not change this entry.
##
127.0.0.1	localhost
255.255.255.255	broadcasthost
::1             localhost

5. If the contents are anything else, copy and paste it here.

[driesr3059280]

Hi all, Thanks for the quick and helpfull replies.
While trying to fix another problem I had -Pictime galleries that didn't want to upload- the tourbox issue went away too. I think because of re-installing the pic-time external uploader?

What I still find weird, I don't have a loopdeck plugin. I also did a complete re-install of everything adobe (really thorough). When re-installing lightroom and re-installing the tourbox plugin, i immedieatly got the TCP error again for tourbox and loopdeck. But I don't have loopdeck or any programms that have anything to do with loopdeck installed... and @johnrellis, the two tcp errors were identical and given at the exact same moment. Attached you can find all the errors I had at a certain moment 🙂

But yeah, for now it seems to work again.. hopefully it stays working and it was because of a faulty pic-time plugin..

[johnrellis]

Re the Loupedeck error messsages, the evidence strongly indicates that the Tourbox developer copied the Loupedeck plugin code and forgot to change one instance of "Loupedeck" to "TourBox" in an error message. Oops,

Details

The Tourbox and Loupedeck error messages are both coming from the Tourbox plugin's file InitPlugin.lua:

$ strings Tourbox.lrplugin/InitPlugin.lua | grep "needs access"
Loupedeck needs access to tcp ports, but failed to make a connection.
TourBox needs access to tcp ports, but failed to make a connection.

The Loupedeck plugin (now called "logiplugin" after their acquisition by Logitech) has very similar error messagew for its InitPlugin.lua:

$ grep "needs access" logiplugin.lrplugin/InitPlugin.lua 
LrDialogs.showError("Logi Plugin needs access to tcp ports, but failed to make a connection.")
LrDialogs.showError("Logi Plugin needs access to tcp ports, but failed to make a connection.")

The Loupedeck plugin doesn't compile its source-code files, so it's easy for another developer to copy the source code. Tourbox compiles its code, making it harder for another developer to copy the source code.

It sure looks like the Tourbox developer copied the Loupedeck code and neglected to change "Loupedeck" to "TourBox" in one of the error messages.

[johnrellis]

"re-installing the pic-time external uploader ... a faulty pic-time plugin"

There's clearly a conflict between the two plugins, but you can't conclude from this that the Pic-Time plugin is at fault. It may be simply that reinstalling the Pic-Time plugin changed the order in which LR loaded the two plugins, and that there is some issue inside LR with respect to TCP sockets.