Help!! server adming Help needed please...

[avallado]

Hello, I have a huge problem going on the server at my office!!! But first let me give a little inside of how i ended up on this mess. I have been working on It for like a year, mostly doing win install and small LAN troubleshooting I worked with another guy that was in charge of the IT department. He did all the major stuff. Like 2 week ago I decided to quit and I got stuck with all the work while they get someone else....

but today as I was cleaning up use programs for our server I erased the Proxy server!!!(This was by mistake, I knew that?s how we connected to the internet,,,) And now there is no way to share the internet connection!!! And I can?t download proxy server form the net cause is no longer available...

So please I need help! I could loose my job come Monday... Is there another way to share my internet connection? We are running a win2000 server, on and were also running some admin programs of the server son I cant change anything on it, we use static?s IPn every machine... there?s like 40 machines. There is no problem on the lan connection and file sharing is ok....

So how can I share the internet connection, is connected to the server using a second lan card....

Can I connect it directly to the hub do I need a router for that?


Help Please!!!

Thanks in advance...

Miguel.

 

[avallado]

Bump... sorry guys...

 

[Atheus]

*shakes head*

What _exactly_ did you do to the server? How did you manage to erase the proxy software?

Were you running the old 'Microsoft Proxy server' or 'ISA server'? If it really is deleted, where are your install CDs? Surely a business would have such things... If you don't, you won't be able to download the proxy anyway, as it's not free.

You should still have an internet connection from the server itself, have you tried this? In the worst case you could simply bridge the two ethernet ports, but this will provide _no security_ at all, and won't please the boss. You will be able to get on the net from clients though...

About loosing your job - your boss can't expect you to take care of this stuff, as you're clearly not a trained/experienced server admin, why is this your responsibiliy anyway?

And if you want others to read your post, edit it for spelling and grammer, I had to read it 3 times... you probably have no replies because everyone gave up after the first line.

 

[Solema]

Originally posted by: Atheus
*shakes head*

What _exactly_ did you do to the server? How did you manage to erase the proxy software?

Were you running the old 'Microsoft Proxy server' or 'ISA server'? If it really is deleted, where are your install CDs? Surely a business would have such things... If you don't, you won't be able to download the proxy anyway, as it's not free.

You should still have an internet connection from the server itself, have you tried this? In the worst case you could simply bridge the two ethernet ports, but this will provide _no security_ at all, and won't please the boss. You will be able to get on the net from clients though...

About loosing your job - your boss can't expect you to take care of this stuff, as you're clearly not a trained/experienced server admin, why is this your responsibiliy anyway?

And if you want others to read your post, edit it for spelling and grammer, I had to read it 3 times... you probably have no replies because everyone gave up after the first line.

What he said. We need more details, and need them presented clearly. Even if English is not your first language, type up your response in Word and spell/grammar check it. It will help everyone out.

Nick

 

[avallado]

Sorry for all the spelling error, English is not my primary language. And thanks for your post Atheus...

We were running out of space on the c: drive of the server and i was un installing some programs but got a phone call and was doing some troubleshooting over the phone, and un-installed the proxy instead of the program that was above it.

I?m In charge of the server because they have not yet found somebody that can do the job...( they don pay that much that one of the reasons why the my supervisor left). I can find none of the proxy cds on the office, and even the win2000 server cd its only and upgrade from winNT server... the server does have the internet connection, so how would I go about doing the bridge in the two Ethernet ports? How about getting a router and connecting it to the switch? Would this be an issue given the fact that we use static IP address? I guess I will connect the router to the first port on the switch, but were would I connect the server then?

Once more thanks Atheus for the reply

 

[avallado]

Oh and there is a couple of MAC?s pc on the network. What other kind of details do you need?.

 

[Atheus]

Originally posted by: avallado
How about getting a router and connecting it to the switch?

You have a router? Well that's a good temporary solution.

Plug the internet line into router's WAN port. Plug the server and the switch into two of the router's LAN ports. You will now have a link to the internet from the client machines, but they will likely complain about not finding the proxy - you will have to turn this option off in the browsers.

One of the main reasons to have a proxy in an environment like yours is to control user access to the net - specifically only allowing the web. You can do something similar on the router by blocking access to all ports except 80, or better still, all protocols except HTTP.

You _really_ want to get those CDs though...

 

[avallado]

Excellent! Actually I?m going to get one on Monday,(any brand recommendation on the router?) if that?s what it takes to share the internet; by the way there is no restriction when it comes to users? access to the internet. Messenger, download the policy of the company is that users have full access,
I will do my best to find the cd?

Thanks for the advice and the quick reply,

PD. given that there is no restriction on the connection, will the bridge on the Ethernet ports work better than the switch? Certainly it will be less expensive?.

 

[Atheus]

Originally posted by: avallado
PD. given that there is no restriction on the connection, will the bridge on the Ethernet ports work better than the switch? Certainly it will be less expensive?.

No, it won't be better, it will leave your server vulnerable... although it sounds like it was pretty exposed to begin with. At least a cheap router will give you NAT.

Actually I?m going to get one on Monday,(any brand recommendation on the router?)

Depends on how much traffic you push. If it's only a few users viewing HTML pages and sending emails then just about anything by Netgear, Linksys, etc will do the trick. If there's significant traffic, post in the network forum for recommendations.

...

All that said, I'm going to be honest with you - your network sounds like a complete shambles. I don't want to offend you, but you're really struggling here, if I owned this company I would just pay Cisco to come and set everything up.

 

[avallado]

Thanks for the reply.
No offence taken, i agree with you! the thing is this is sort of a non profit organization so The don?t spend a lot of money on computers....I agree this network is pretty bad...I will try to get the router then on Monday. However just in case I cant get the money do you have a link or a guide of how to set the bridge between the Ethernet cards?

Thanks once more, Im the first to admit that I should not be in charge of this whole network but that all I can do for now... thanks once more....