MORE About the Proxy Servers

A proxy server is a server that does something for a client computer. Proxy servers are commonly used for
several reasons:
1. To allow a network, notably those on a private IP address range to share an internet connection through a dial
up facility within a small network. There are many proxy server packages available, such including WinProxy
and NetProxy amongst the small and simple packages, right up to MS Proxy server at the complex level, or
packages such as Squid on a Unix machine.
2. Cache and store frequently accessed content, thus reducing internet requests to access the pages or download
files, especially if you have a low bandwidth connection or pay for connection time perhaps on a dialup or ISDN
connection.
3. The final reason for using a proxy server is to provide some form of security to the network, both in terms of
blocking access to undesirable web sites etc, and also any potential hackers following the connection back
would find the proxy machine first rather than the client computer, a lot more difficult to break into than if it is a
Windows PC direct. Having said that, no proxy server is 100% secure.
Proxies are configured through the Internet control panel’s Connections page on a per connection basis, because
different ISP’s use different servers, and using a server not local to your connection can and probably will
significantly slow down your connection.
Proxy servers typically run on port 8000 or 8080 on the host computer, although Squid runs on 3128 by default,
so the chances if you have incoming connections from such a port it is a proxy server making the connection.
In general, if a proxy server is available it is a good idea to use it, but should it be overloaded, e.g. if you have a
consistently slower than expected connection than it could be the server that becomes a bottleneck and it may be
an idea to remove it if possible.