Can't access web server running under WSL on other machines on the LAN

Question

I have a problem connecting to any service/port under wsl2 on my Windows 11 PC. It's running Windows 11 Pro version 23H2 OS build 22631.3085 and I am running WSL2 with Ubuntu 22.04.03 LTS. On the Windows side if I run a simple python web server via "python -m http.server 8080 --bind 0.0.0.0" I can access the index.html file I put in that directory just fine via localhost and also via the IP address. So: http://localhost:8080            Good http://192.168.0.100:8080    Good I can also access it just fine if I go to another machine on my network and access it from there: http://192.168.0.100:8080    Good When I fire up the Ubuntu WSL and issue an ifconfig I can see the eth0 network has an address of 172.26.207.90 I know I have to do a port forward to that 172 address, so on my Windows 11 powershell I issued: netsh interface portproxy add v4tov4 listenport=8080 listenaddress=0.0.0.0 connectport=8080 connectaddress=172.26.207.90 (I have read that I should enter the connectaddress programmatically as the 172 address will change with every restart of wsl, but mine never has ) I confirm this with "netsh interface portproxy show v4tov4" and can see: Address         Port           Address              Port 0.0.0.0            8080         172.26.207.88     8080 Next I went to Windows Defender Firewall and created an inbound rule to allow connectivity over port 8080 for TCP. After that (and have tried rebooting after all that) I go into Ubuntu and issue the same command to bring up a web server on port 8080 with the same index.html file: python -m http.server 8080 --bind 0.0.0.0 Back on my Windows 11 web browser it will come up on localhost but not with the IP address. So: http://localhost:8080            Good http://192.168.0.100:8080    Unable to connect And when I try and access it from another machine on my network using the IP address I get  a failure. http://192.168.0.100:8080     Unable to connect I tried resetting the windows network connections but that didn't help. I also tried going into Start > Settings > Network & internet > Ethernet and switching between Public network and Private network and back again, but again, no help. Also tried disabling firewall on Domain network, Private network and Public network - didn't help. Can anyone suggest something I might have missed or suggest how I can track down where this connection is failing?