Ever since my host changed servers, I've been unable to send trackback pings (receiving is fine). I turned off the automatic pinging of weblogs.com and blo.gs when I post because I get the same error every time:

Ping 'http://www.somesite.com/tb?id=somenumber' failed: HTTP error: 500 Can't connect to www.somesite.com:80 (Bad protocol 'tcp')

This, however, applies to manual trackback pings as well. The troubleshooting FAQ has not helped, nor can I find a definitive solution on the web or in these forums. Any ideas of what is wrong and how to fix? Thanks in advance.

it is entirely possible that some of the Perl modules required for TBs and pings that were installed on the old server aren't installed on the new server.

I would run mt-check.cgi to make sure it is finding all the modules it needs.

Nope. Checked that. All the old Perl modules on the last server are installed on this one, except the Image::Magick one, which I don't use :-) and anyway shouldn't apply to pinging.

Hi!
I have the same problem, you could solve it?

Ping 'http://www.gotoAndPlay.ca/mt-tb.cgi/147' failed: HTTP error: 500 Can't connect to www.gotoAndPlay.ca:80 (Bad protocol 'tcp')

Thanks

I have the same problem too. I use uplinkearth as a host and I know they have gotten more and more paranoid about security and having outsiders using their servers to spread spam so I suspect they flipped some switch that makes it impossible to autocontact other sites. When I asked, they didn't really explain anything but I'm not so sure they understood what I was asking. They say the only change they made was to remove passive ftp'ing. I guess if the pings are sent 'passively' that may be the problem.

I had the same problem before I changed servers. I could never send any pings, even to Movable Type with a key. I always got that error message.

When I upgraded to a new server I paid Six Apart do the install, unlike the first installation which I did myself. After the new installation, I had no more ping problems other than an occassional time out.

My guess is that since I had no idea what I was doing, I didn't do the original installation optimally - perhaps well enough to work, but not well enough to work perfectly.

Checking the difference in mt.cfg files for both the installation where the pings didn't work and the one that did, I discovered a difference.

In the mt.cfg file that didn't do trackback pings, my CGI Path was: Jasper is the server at Hurricane Electric, where my site is hosted.

The CGI path for the installation that did work was:

The old installation used Berkeley DB, the new one used MySQL.

The only other difference was the URL/path for the mt-static files. The original installation was:
and the new one was simply

Nothing else was different. Both installations functioned with the exception of the first one not able to do any trackback pings and always getting the error message that has been talked about in this thread.

I don't know if this is helpful at all, but since I had encountered the same problem and it was resolved upon a new installation (same MT version), I thought I would mention it.

Thanks for trying to help! In my case, my pings used to work fine but then suddenly quit working in November. So I don't think it's an installation problem for me. I suspect in your case it was the new server that fixed your problem. Since the server is designed specifically for Moveable Type I'm not surprised everything works.

I suspect it's my host's new server. I had no problems with pinging on my last one...

I have the same problem. Same ping error.

Did you manage to figure this out?

Knowledge Base: Bad Protocol 'tcp' When Sending Pings