Tweaking timeouts to get a connection

Qubes-Whonix
1

Hello,

I am using whonix-16 On Qubes-4.1.

Most of the time, when I try to go on a particular website, I wait 90 seconds and get a timeout:

Unable to connect.
An error occurred during a connection to [redacted website name].
…

During those 90 seconds, in the “Onions Circuits” in the “Tor Control Panel” of the whonix gateway, I noticed that a new circuit was build about every 15 seconds.

My workaround is then to CTRL-SHIFT-L every 5 seconds until I get a connection to my website, which can sometimes take a very long time.
Looks like that particular website drops packets initiated by many of the tor exit nodes until it finally accepts a connection from one of them.

Consequently, which configuration(s) should I change and where to:

  • have a timout after, say, 900 seconds (instead of 90 seconds)?
  • have whonix trying a new circuit to my website every 5 seconds (instead of every 15 seconds)?

I understand those configurations would imitate me hitting CTRL-SHIFT-L every 5 seconds until success.

Obviously, if you have a better actionable solution than those configs changes, I’m all ears!

Thanks!

2

Old version.

Just relase upgrade Qubes and Whonix. “But…” No, no, no… For real. Do the release upgrade. Qubes weirdly is stuck in “RC” land but it’s stable, good enough and nothing going to explode. Worth a try.

3

Thanks for answering.

According to https://www.whonix.org/wiki/Qubes/Install, I have the correct version (16) of Whonix corresponding to my Qubes (4.1) version.

Moreover, the current whonix-16 timeouts (90s / about 15s) look perfectly legit to me and consequently I don’t think upgrading my whole Qubes system to support whonix-17 would change anything.

I’d just want to know where and how to change those (90s / 15s) timeouts to solve my particular problem (and learn a bit more about firefox & whonix at the same time).

Any other/better actionable solution welcome!

Thanks!!

NB: Since I run Qubes, I will create a new whonix client/gateway for this website so that my other traffic is not impacted, but that’s totally another point.

4

It’s an ancient Tor version. I am not surprised. Qubes 4.2 with newer Whonix works great for me.

You can nitpick about stable vs rc and stay on ancient or release upgrade.

5

Sorry if I was not clear but:

  • Both Qubes & Whonix works perfectly fine for me. This is not the point of this post.
  • I would just like to know where and how to reconfigure some timeout values in Whonix so that I could more easily access a very particular website which – I understand – filter most of Tor exit nodes.
  • Upgrading Qubes and/or Whonix won’t help me knowing where and how to reconfigure those default timeout values.
6

No idea.

The usual answer is:
Tor Browser Essentials chapter Tor Censorship in Whonix wiki
…which is non-ideal but difficult to improve soon (easier tunnel support).

What you are attempting could be resolved as per:

If you can figure out how to do this with system Tor on Debian then this solution could be replicated with Whonix. I am suggesting to remove the Whonix specific part of your question and to redirect it elsewhere, to Tor.

Unspecific to Whonix:

7

Thanks for your reply, Patrick.

I understand your point that my question is not specific to Whonix.

I have already spent a long time on the internet trying to find the right values to tweak in about:config.

I will now try to post my message on the Tor Forum.

Thanks again!

8

Sorry for offtopic.

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