Set Up a Proxy Server the Easy Way

Learning to set up a proxy server is important if you ever want to become a power user. In simple terms, proxy usually means acting as a substitute or an agent. In case of telecommunication, it is used for a device or program empowered to act for another. In computer networks, a proxy server is a server,which acts as a mediator for requests from clients seeking resources from other servers. Anything and everything needed has to go through the proxy; no exceptions. The proxy server analyzes the request according to its filtering rules. Perhaps the most common such rule is banning access by clients on certain IP addresses.

To properly set up a proxy server, a wide variety of choices exist out there. To start off, let’s take a look at something by the name of WinProxy. The main reason for its popularity is that no software needs to be installed on the client systems. Another reason is NAT, or Network Address Translation, since WinProxy is what’s known as a transparent proxy. That means that the client side doesn’t even know it’s dealing with a proxy server in the first place. Apart from caching and the usual security features like filtering, WinProxy supports important protocols like HTTP, FTP, Telnet, Secure Sockets and DNS.

Configuration is not hard at all with WinProxy. It’s a great option when you want to set up a proxy server. Before you begin setting up WinProxy, install the TCP/IP protocol on all systems connected to the network. Then, install WinProxy on the system, which you want to act as the proxy server. You can purchase this the traditional way in a store or through a simple download. When you begin the installation, you get the option to run the Install Wizard. Be sure to have your product key handy, as that’s going to be the very first input required of you. Further screens will ascertain the kind of connection you have to access the internet, dial-up or broadband. Sometimes you’ll have to tell the program yourself. Next,it will ask to enter the username and password of the Internet connection. Most other things, you can let WinPoxy deal with. Now what’s really interesting is how it turn internal LAN addresses into unique IP addys. What your ISP assigned for your modem or router winds up being the external address. The external address is the IP address,which will be displayed to a user from another network,when his system interacts with any device from your network. And that’s it! WinProxy will handle everything else. Simple, just like that.