Proxy Service Home Page

Proxy Server Setup Instructions

Frequently Asked Questions

Known Service Problems
(Macintosh users, IE 4 or IE 5 users please read)

Troubleshooting Checklist

Resources that are unavailable through the Proxy Server

Proxy Server Problem Report Form

How Automatic Proxy Configuration Works

Automatic Proxy Configuration causes your browser to request only the Library's licensed electronic resources through the proxy server, and lets the browser send all other requests directly over the internet. The user configures the browser with a URL for the proxy server's automatic configuration script. Once the browser has been so configured, this is what happens:

• When the browser starts up, it requests the configuration script (viz., proxy.pac) from the proxy server and stores it. This is a javascript program in which are encoded the URL's or internet domains of the Library's licensed resources.
  
  
• When you request a webpage, the browser first runs the configuration script which compares your request to every URL or domain name it knows about.
  
  
• If the page you are requesting belongs to one of the licensed resources known to the script, the browser requests the page via the proxy server. (If this is the first time during your current browser session that you've requested a licensed resource, the proxy server will require you to authenticate before requesting the resource for you.)
  
  
• If the page you are requesting does not correspond to a licensed resource, then the browser requests the page directly over the internet; it does not burden the proxy server with an unnecessary request.

Other modes of proxy server configuration cause the browser to send every request for every webpage through the proxy server. Not only Library resources, but all your entertainment web surfing, your banking, your internet shopping -- everything -- is directed through the proxy server. The resulting high volume of requests slows the proxy server's response, resulting in degraded performance for everybody. For this reason, we request that users use only Automatic Proxy Configuration while accessing the Library's proxy service.