`I've Installed WinGate, Now What?
Great, you've installed the best Windows proxy server software around, but now you need to know what to do with it? It's easy if you know how, but if you're not a Networking Wizard then it can be a little daunting at first. So read on to find out what to do after you've installed WinGate, and how to go about configuring your LAN to get your client machines connecting to the Internet.
Logging in
The first time that you log in to WinGate you must log in as the Administrator. When you installed the software you were asked whether you wanted to use the WinGate user database or the Operating System (OS) user database.
If you chose the WinGate user database then you'll need to log in as
USERNAME: administrator
PASSWORD: (blank i.e. no password)
You will then be asked to set a password for the user administrator
If you chose the OS user database then you'll need to log in as the local machine Administrator with the appropriate password.
Activating a License
WinGate v6 requires an activated license before it will work, you can either activate your purchased license or a 30 day free trial license. There is an Activation Wizard that will guide you through the Activation process, if you have any problems then you should contact Customer Support, either through the Reseller that you purchased your license from, or from Qbik Software.
You can deactivate a license if you are moving WinGate to a different machine, this should be done before you uninstall the software.
Setting Up Your Network
Believe it or not, that's the hard part done. WinGate is designed so that it's ready to share and manage your Internet connection as soon as it's installed. As long as WinGate is installed on your Internet Gateway and your LAN adapter is marked as Internal and your Internet adapter is marked as External, then everything is set up and ready to go.
Now all you have to do is set your LAN client machines so that their default gateway and DNS server settings point at the WinGate server. WinGate comes with a built-in DHCP server that will automatically assign IP addresses in the range of the WinGate LAN adapter and set the WinGate server as the default gateway and DNS server, so all you have to do now is reboot your LAN client machines. They should now get an IP address from the WinGate server and have their default gateway and DNS server listed as the WinGate server. Now open a web page on the LAN client machine and check the Activity pane in the GateKeeper User Interface. You should see a connection from that LAN machine to an IP address on the Internet. Woo-hoo, you're good to go! You're now making what we refer to as a NAT connection, basically all Internet traffic from your LAN machines must pass through the WinGate server, this gives you control over what your users are doing and allows you to see what they access.
Proxy and WGIC connections can also be made when the WinGate server is the gateway machine.
Now, there are a few exceptions to the above scenario, the most obvious being if you're running an Active Directory domain. In this case you may already have a DHCP server running on your network and you'll definitely need to set the LAN clients' DNS server settings to point at the AD DNS server. If you're already running DHCP on your network then you can set the default gateway as the WinGate server, this will allow you to make a NAT connection as above. You should stop the WinGate DHCP server if you already have a DHCP server running.
Another common, if not recommended scenario is to have WinGate installed on one of the LAN machines and have all machines connecting to a Router. This means that the LAN traffic cannot be forced through WinGate and will allow users to connect to the Internet without connecting through the WinGate server. While this is a potential security risk in that Internet traffic can not be definitely intercepted, NAT connections will still work and there are two other connection methods available. Clients can make a Proxy connection by entering the IP address of the WinGate server in an Application's proxy server settings, or they can make a WGIC (WinGate Internet Client) connection by installing the WGIC on the LAN machines. The WGIC hooks into the OS of the client machine and redirects all Network traffic to the WinGate server. This method of connection is very popular in Active Directory domains as it gives the Network Administrator an almost unprecedented level of control over the LAN machines.
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