I am looking for system wide proxy changer-configurator

[kartal]

I have proxy server on my laptop. Sometimes I need to use wired connection so my proxy server adress changes on other machines. I was wondering if there is an application that lets me toggle between proxy servers on the fly so that I do not need change proxy settings in every application.

Btw please do not suggest things like "google is your friend". Google is not my friend and I am looking for tested applications

[40hz]

 I use NetSetMan Pro on my laptop. It's not free (€12/$18 US) but it's very reasonable for what it does. There is a free version, but it doesn't handle proxy settings or domains. You can set up as many network profiles as you like and switch activate them at will. Each can be set up totally independently of the others. Perfect tool for road warriors and tech support people who need to keep specific network setups for each of their client's locations. You can even specify a default browser for those benighted locations (i.e. many banks) that require you to use IE.

http://www.netsetman...m/index.php?s=nsmpro

Btw please do not suggest things like "google is your friend".

Yeah, I hear you. That one's right up there with RTFM as far as helpfulness goes.

[kartal]

40hz,

that is one nice suggestion post. Thanks for taking time. I will check it out asap.

Just to make sure thou, this will have a proxy profile that I can use to change system wide proxy settings? I can change proxy settings in firefox, rssowl etc manually but it gets tedious to change in all computers and revert back later. I am hoping that the app I am lookign fro wil be able to change proxy settings of the system(if there is such a thing) rather than browser settings only actually.

[40hz]

Hope I'm understanding what you're asking. 

You could set up two profiles for your NIC. One uses a proxy, the other doesn't.

Then just set all you applications to use your default (i.e. active in NetSetMan) connection and possibly set proxy to "autodiscover" in the individual application if it so requires. That way, your apps should use the proxy if it's active, and ignore (i.e. not find) it if it's not.

Hope this answers your question.

[Chris]

If you are using Internet Explorer look at IEPro http://www.ie7pro.com It enables one to keep a list proxies and one can change proxy very easily. IEPro is free.

Chris
Adelaide
Australia

[perlguy]

ProxySwitcherLite - free. full version is for $$$, but if all you need is quick switcher for proxies, works great.

http://www.proxyswit...er.com/download.html

For most day-to-day home-to-work-and-back situations, I wrote a proxy-auto-config file that uses a name lookup to detect if I was inside the corporate network or not, and set the proxy accordingly.  This works great for anything that supports PAC files. Not so great for those apps  that only understand hostname:port proxy settings.

snippet from my PAC file demostrating the name lookup logic.

[Select]

function FindProxyForURL(url, host)
{
        if (! isResolvable("somehost.somecorp.com")) { return "DIRECT"; }
        // fastest return, with no proxy, if not on corp network

        return "PROXY proxy.domain:8080; proxy2.domain:8080";
}

My actual pac is a few hundred lines long because of really tortuous network routing because of how our overall corp network grew.  So different internal sites need to route differently - some DIRECT, and some thru various internal proxies.  Think multiple cycles of acquisitions and mergers and no corporate wide network overhaul at the end... in some cases, we have multiple nat translations going on to get from one part of the company to another... I get dizzy just thinking about it.

Another option is to use a local proxy on your laptop that can (when appropriate) chain to an upstream proxy - the idea being that all browsers and the O/S itself point at your personal proxy, and you change that one proxy server to go direct, or chain, as needed.  I'd recommend delegate (http://www.delegate.org/).  It can be a bit overwhelming to configure the first time because of all the options... but it's extremely powerful.

There's also proxomitron (http://www.proxomitron.info/ or http://www.sankey.ws/proxomitron.html) - which is no longer actively developed (author discontinued it, and then died a year later), but might suit your needs.

If not for the bizarre network I have to deal with at work, I'd probably stick with 2 different delegate configs, that I switch between. I wrote an AHK script to restart the daemon with the desired configuation - just kills any running delegate.exe processes, and starts up a new one with the config I specify on the command line.  I actually use this method for apps that don't support PAC files (most non-browser network apps).

Whew... that went on much longer than I expected!

If you have any questions on any of my suggestions, I'd be happy to help.

--perlguy

[4wd]

I have proxy server on my laptop. Sometimes I need to use wired connection so my proxy server adress changes on other machines. I was wondering if there is an application that lets me toggle between proxy servers on the fly so that I do not need change proxy settings in every application.

-kartal (September 16, 2008, 08:05 PM)

NetProfiles - Cost nothing, requires .NET

Otherwise, for the always useful, download nothing approach there's the always boring netsh command, included free with every copy of Windows XP.
Here's a way to use it to switch network settings.

please do not suggest things like "google is your friend". Google is not my friend...

Maybe so, but without it, it would be a sh!t load harder to find things......and that's including the manual so you can RTFM.

Google results - Oh look, within the first five results: FreeIP Switcher, NetSetMan FREE (which as said above doesn't do proxies) but gives you NetSetManPro  

Further down you get Network Switcher and buried in the results somewhere I saw how to use netsh.