Configuring Netscape to use a cache server

Netscape has its own disk based caching mechanism, but this does not seem to be suitable for sharing between multiple users

In version 1 of Netscape, a fill-out form can be brought up by choosing

  Options
    Preferences
      Proxies

from the menu bar. The current beta releases of Netscape version 2 adopt a slightly difference style based on Windows 95 look and feel:

  Options
    Network...
      Proxies

Netscape version 2 allows the configuration to be set either by filling in a form or by downloading a script. The script approach is more flexible than the form, and allows multiple cache servers to be configured to provide a fall-back capability. For manual configuration click on the button labelled View... and fill out the resulting form as shown below.

Note that only the host name of the cache server should be entered in the boxes on the left hand side of this form, i.e. wwwcache.lnf.infn.it rather than http://wwwcache.lnf.infn.it/

The completed form should look like this:

Configuration files

It is also possible to configure Netscape for caching by editing its configuration file:

Windows The current configuration is saved in the Proxy Information section of netscape.ini, e.g.

  Wais_ProxyPort=
  Ftp_ProxyPort=8080
  Gopher_ProxyPort=8080
  Http_ProxyPort=8080
  No_Proxy=lnf.infn.it
  Gopher_Proxy=wwwcache.lnf.infn.it
  FTP_Proxy=wwwcache.lnf.infn.it
  HTTP_Proxy=wwwcache.lnf.infn.it
  Wais_Proxy=

Unix

The current configuration is saved in the user's home directory as .netscape-preferences in version 1 and .netscape/preferences in version 2. The format looks like this:

  FTP_PROXY:              wwwcache.lnf.infn.it:8080
  HTTP_PROXY:             wwwcache.lnf.infn.it:8080
  GOPHER_PROXY:           wwwcache.lnf.infn.it:8080
  WAIS_PROXY:             
  NO_PROXY:               lnf.infn.it

Macintosh
No idea what's going on here! Help!!

Massimo Carboni / Massimo.Carboni@lnf.infn.it. Last updated: $Date: 1997/02/18 09:37:53 $