From: Indraneel Majumdar <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Friday, August 11, 2000 12:57 AM
>What is a "proxy server" supposed to do? And what is a
>"masquerading machine" supposed to do?
A proxy server is supposed tomask the addresses of a private
Lan while connecting to an external network, to which it is the
sole link. Any request from a client(s) is sent via the proxy to the
external network, which masks the clients ip address in the lan.
i.e it masquerades for every client in the network in a way.
On receiving replys for the requests from the server, it resolves
back the reply's to the client who sent it.
(you'll observe most cybercafes use this feature for obvious reasons....)
Now the above process can easily be modified according to
some preset rules, i.e blocking out requests for certain sites
(filtering) or blocking out unknown or hostile ip addresses
( these will be in the config file for the proxy)etc. This is what
makes it a firewall.
>And how come "Winproxy" and "Netscape proxy
>server" do both if they are actually separate services? Is it just a
>"what's in a name?" case or is it OK to call something a "proxy"
>even if it does both ?
I expect the reason is more for the marketing aspect !
Can MS call their proxy Netscape proxy or vice versa ? ... ;-)
Every proxy server in the world is built on the above principals.
I've worked on a VPN project a while back where I learnt the ropes....
Bye
Kaushik
Women stated that computer should be referred to in the
masculine gender because:
1. They have a lot of data, but are still clueless;
2. They are supposed to help you solve problems but half the
time they are the problem.
Men conclude that computers should be referred to in the feminine
gender because:
1. The native language they use to communicate with other
computers is incomprehensible to everyone else;
2. Even your smallest mistakes are stored in long-term memory
for later retrieval.
----------------------------------------------
LIH is all for free speech. But it was created
for a purpose. Violations of the rules of
this list will result in stern action.
