Ashley

Yep, so if they’re able to access npm via the ip this is likely it.

Right. Can you access your npm server via the ip in your browser? Even if it’s not docmost that it returns?

If you can, it’s probably your browser using its own dns so you’ll have to change that to adguard as well.

NAT Loopback can be a bit finicky but once you set it up there’s no tinkering, it’ll just work forever. The only problem (which really doesn’t matter a bit with a document sharing platform) is that packets first have to go through the router. If your server and client are on the same network then they can communicate directly with each other instead.

I’ll start from the beginning.

You’re hosting a service on your LAN, and using port forwarding to expose this service to the internet on your public ip.

The problem is accessing your public ip from your private network. There are two ways to solve this.

a) NAT Loopback, which is a setting or rule you may be able to enable or create on your router to forward packets destined for your public ip (the ones from your private network) to your private server

b) Split horizon DNS, which is actually what you’re doing. Where you set it up so in one network (in this case the internet) you get one result, and on another network (your LAN) you get a different result.

If I had to guess, what’s happening is your dns isn’t resolving properly, and when your computer is trying to reach out to your public ip. The thing with dns is it’s a bit finicky, there are many different places to set your dns server.

First, you should check if it’s resolving correctly. It’ll show you the ip it resolves to when you ping it. If it resolves to your public ip, make sure your dns settings aren’t being overridden by your operating system, and try clearing the cache