Was the firewall blocking traffic? Identifying active firewall rules using registry analysis.
I came across this question recently in relation to claims that access to a Windows 8 host via Windows Remote Desktop Protocol was blocked by the firewall configuration. This post describes my research into the registry artefacts related to answering the question, and provides a patch to RegRipper to assist in analysis.
Theory of operation Windows 8 uses the same firewall configuration entries used by Windows 7. Windows ships with a number of firewall rules enabled, and these may be added to or modified by the user, for example using the windows firewall control panel applet.