Sharing an Internet connection is not a problem with the abundance of solutions available on the market. Windows Internet Connection Sharing, consumer and business grade stand-alone routers and dedicated Unix-based servers can be used to manage Internet connections and share a single outgoing link among multiple users.

These solutions, however, do not provide enough flexibility when used in corporate environments. Plagued with stability, reliability, security and management issues, consumer-grade technologies may be offering an easy start but prohibit future development. None of the listed connectivity methods allow traffic shaping, logging of user activities or advanced group or user-based access policies.

A business-grade gateway could be used as a plug-and-play yet customizable alternative. However, a device like that would cost a small fortune and still lack any extensibility unless you are willing to invest a large fortune to start with.

A dedicated PC-based server is a viable alternative to dedicated network appliances. The market today is dominated by Unix-based solutions, often free ones. While being perfect connectivity solutions based on their paper specs, the Unix-based servers lack easy management and require an experienced network administrator for configuration, patching, security management and even routine maintenance.

A Windows server combined with dedicated connection management software provides the better of the two worlds. There is no patching to be done by the network administrator as Windows downloads and installs updates automatically. While Internet Connection Sharing built into many versions of Windows is a great consumer technology, corporate use requires a different solution.

UserGate security server provides all necessary features, and is easily configurable, upgradeable and extensible by an ordinary system administrator via a simple graphical user interface.

UserGate is easy to configure on the server, and the best part is that it requires zero changes on the side of network users. Thanks to the built-in DHCP server, UserGate configures connections for local hosts within a local area network completely automatically. The DHCP server allows network administrators to configure network parameters such as IP addresses, network masks, default gateways and DNS servers just once on the server side. The local network users will catch up with the changes completely automatically without involving manual adjustments.

By using automated DHCP configuration, UserGate makes LAN management easier and with less maintenance. All network settings are configured on the server, without the need to access individual workstations.

UserGate distributes Internet connectivity as a NAT server with port mapping, or acts as a caching proxy server. The use of the proxy server offers significant bandwidth savings thanks to the automated caching of content, while increasing average access speed for the LAN users.

UserGate is inherently secure, as there is no way for the network users to make an Internet connection bypassing UserGate software. The built-in firewall, advanced filtering rules and built-in anti-virus make your network as secure as ever possible. Not convinced? Try the free evaluation download at: http://www.entensys.com