Understanding how to set up a proxy server has to be done if you don’t want to be held back by limitations. To be a proxy means to be a facilitator, an enabler, something that effectively substitutes for something else. When it comes to the internet, this means using a program that acts like another or otherwise substitutes for it. In computing a proxy server is simply an informational middleman, if you will; it handles exchanges between the requester and the ultimate server. Anything and everything needed has to go through the proxy; no exceptions. What the proxy does is screen all requests against its set of filters, rules by which it can deny requests. For example, one popular filter is to ban IP addresses outright.

When you want to set up a proxy server, it helps to do your homework and thoroughly research all that’s involved. To start off, let’s take a look at something by the name of WinProxy. People really like it because everything’s absolutely invisible to the requester, with nothing to install on the client computer. 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. WinProxy acts just like any other server, dealing with security issues and all the various protocols online – except when it needs to serve as a substitute, a proxy.

Configuration is not hard at all with WinProxy. There’s really no better way to set up a proxy server. Just make sure to take common initial steps such as installing TCP/IP on your network. When all that’s been done, you can go on to WinProxy itself. Which, by the way, is available on-demand as a file download. Now once you fire up WinProxy for the first time, you should use the included setup wizard for ease and peace of mind. Like most such wizards, you’ll be prompted for your produce license serial number right away. Further screens will ascertain the kind of connection you have to access the internet, dial-up or broadband. You need to select the connection’s type and name. Next,it will ask to enter the username and password of the Internet connection. Just leave everything else to the program to handle. Now perhaps the best thing of all is how it will make an internal LAN address into an anonymous IP address. What your ISP assigned for your modem or router winds up being the external address. It is this external address that will be shown to those outside your network, providing the anonymity you need. WinProxy will then prompt the you to disconnect from the Internet,if you are already connected.In the final step, WinProxy verifies all the steps and ensures that all operations have been performed properly.