Help needed to setup replication from SCRATCH

Hi,
I have tried and tried to solve my problems without any success.
Here I go...
I have 2 SBS 2000 Servers (Server A and Server B) in different offices 20
miles from each other.
SQL SP4 on each with ISA Ports open to 14446 (dont like 1433).
ODBC connects from my workstation to each server on port 14446 so
communication to database is ok.
I have only one database (800mb) in size that I need MERGE replication.
I have setup the client utility (in think) in server A (subscriber) with an
alias name of server B. Server B (distributor) simply wont talk to server
A? even though I know the connection is valid.
What I need is from scratch a walkthough on how to setup replication on both
servers. I have searched the net for weeks now, posted questions and read MS
articles but I'm not getting anywhere...
Please help.
TIM
Hopefully this article will help clarify things a bit:
http://www.replicationanswers.com/InternetArticle.asp
Cheers,
Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
|||Hi,
Have read that article and undertand most of it but there are 2 things
missing.
1. Client Network setup (alias setup on the subscriber). Do you have to do
this on the publisher as well?.
2. FTP...Seen a lot of this. Do I need to setup FTP on both servers as
well!...
Sorry but its not sinking in yet...
"Paul Ibison" wrote:

> Hopefully this article will help clarify things a bit:
> http://www.replicationanswers.com/InternetArticle.asp
> Cheers,
> Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
>
>
|||I think these questions really relate to push/pull. The article refers to a
pull subscription. For push, the merge agent needs to see the subscriber so
set up the alias on the publisher. I'm reasoning this out as I don't have a
test environment here at present. For the FTP, the ports need to be opened
in your firewalls, but the FTP snapshot files reside on the publisher ie the
FTP ServerName referred to is the publisher's server name.
Cheers,
Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
|||OK thanks.
Whats the correct way to complete the client network utility (IP/Computer
Name/Server Name etc).
Regards
"Paul Ibison" wrote:

> I think these questions really relate to push/pull. The article refers to a
> pull subscription. For push, the merge agent needs to see the subscriber so
> set up the alias on the publisher. I'm reasoning this out as I don't have a
> test environment here at present. For the FTP, the ports need to be opened
> in your firewalls, but the FTP snapshot files reside on the publisher ie the
> FTP ServerName referred to is the publisher's server name.
> Cheers,
> Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
>
>
>
|||There's an example on my article - the only thing to be careful of is to set
it up for TCP/IP and use the actual server name as the alias name.
Cheers,
Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
|||Hi Paul,
Thanks for the reply but I've tried everything now and i'm still not any
connection from the subscriber to the publisher!!!!!.
I'm gonna spend a few more days on this and then give up...........
Thanks
TIM
"Paul Ibison" wrote:

> There's an example on my article - the only thing to be careful of is to set
> it up for TCP/IP and use the actual server name as the alias name.
> Cheers,
> Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
>
>
|||It sounds like firewall issues ie ports not opened, or opened in one
direction only, or your IP address not being in the allowed list etc.
Can you get a connection using SSMS/EM using the alias?
Cheers,
Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
|||Hi Paul,
Thanks for the reply.
On the ISA firewall i have set port 14446 as my default sql server port and
disabled 1433. I then published the server using this rule to forward to the
external interface (2 nics). I then set a new protocol def (14446) and bound
the rule to this.
Now I can access sql database using ODBC from my XP using this
port/password/username so I can only assume that the correct ports and comms
are getting through.
Now my SBS server computer name is CLIFT.Local and my alias for SQL is
CLIFTSERVER.
I have changed the service startup accounts to a user i created in AD giving
FULL admin rights. All services including the agent is running fine.
I have created a distributor/publisher on CLIFT server.
I have created the alias to CLIFTSERVER on my BROADSERVER (other SBS Server)
and in the client network utility it asks for computer name and server name
but I'v every possible combination and it still wont connect.
My routers are set to not respond to PING but when I disable this function
PING works so there is a connection there.
Is there anything else I need to do before I setup the subscriber?.
Please help...
"Paul Ibison" wrote:

> It sounds like firewall issues ie ports not opened, or opened in one
> direction only, or your IP address not being in the allowed list etc.
> Can you get a connection using SSMS/EM using the alias?
> Cheers,
> Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .
>
>
>
|||OK - for the replication setup, the alias needs to be CLIFT. The server name
needs to be the IP address and you also specify the port, the network lib is
tcp/ip. Once set up like that, just try to register in SSMS using CLIFT as
the server name to test.
For the initialization you'll need to set up FTP or do a nosync
initialization.
Cheers,
Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .