using the 'auto configuration Scripting' in IE

[Liam]

At present we use an internet proxy in school in order to grant interenet permission, therefore internet access at home is out of the question. I have read about this autoconfiguration scripting, but to be totally honest its totally over my head. I would be interested to know who/if anyone is using this at the moment. I want to be able to take full advantage of the auto proxy capabilities, it would make life so much easier. If this is possible how do you set it? Is this a group policy setting?

 

Thanks

 

All opinions welcome and any help would be greatly appreciated.

[CyberNerd]

It can be set in GPO to point at an autoconfiguration scrtipt, usually located on an internal webserver

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_auto-config

[Liam]

Thanks.... Scripting is not my strongest point. Where do i start with this. Would this enable users to use their laptops at home for interent use this way then?

[jcollings]

Liam - why can't they use them at home? If it's just the fact you use a proxy at school and they need to be able to untick that box at home so it doesn't use a proxy there's a util on here (can't remember what it's called) that gives the user a big box that says At home or At school and clicking one or t'other checks or unchecks use proxy box.

[tom_newton]

You can also use DHCP option 252 to set IE's proxy - obviously this "goes away" when on a different network.

[Liam]

Permissions get in the way of them doing this.

[rrichmond]

I agree with jcollings. We use a proxy at our school and we have selected to automatically detect network settings. Works well for staff with laptops. They automatically go to our staff proxy and then they are fine at home too,

[CyberNerd]

Thanks.... Scripting is not my strongest point. Where do i start with this.

read the links on the wikipedia

Would this enable users to use their laptops at home for interent use this way then?

yes, provided they have a different network range at home/school the proxy autoconfig script can be told to proxy on/off as appropriate. no box ticking required and it will work on all browsers, not just IE.

[limbo]

If the laptops in question are Toshiba then you can take advantage of ConfigFree to do this - it will recognise a location by the name of the network and then change the proxy settings automatically.

 

Can also change default printer, home page and a few other bits too.

[mortstar]

This is my "proxy.js" file that is web-based (could be local machine based). As long as they don't use the range 10.250.xxx.xxx at home they will not be redirected to the internal proxy.

 

function FindProxyForURL(url, host)
{
if (isInNet(myIpAddress(), "10.250.0.0", "255.255.0.0"))
return "PROXY myschoolproxy:3128";
else
return "DIRECT";
}

 

The link to the file is passed to the teachers' laptops by GPO.