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The 7 must-have pillars for a network

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CIOL Bureau
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There’s no mystery behind these essential elements. We’ve all heard of

them at one point of time or another. The first one we talk of is the DHCP

service, which is used to automatically allocate IP addresses to all the

machines on a network. Not only that, but a DHCP server can also automatically

assign the Internet gateway, DNS server and domain name information, and much

more to all the clients on the network. Name resolution service is the second

essential for any network. You can’t browse the Net without contacting a name

server. Smaller companies can use their ISP’s name server, while larger ones

can set up their own. Name servers can also be used for resolving local machine

names on a network. We cover how to do so in this story.

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Almost everyone has e-mail, but is your mail setup configured to optimally

utilize your Internet bandwidth? That’s where our third essential, local-mail

routing, comes into play. Companies having their mail servers in the US, need

some sort of a mail setup on their network that will keep all internal mail

within the network. Local mail routing isn’t the only element to conserve

Internet bandwidth. That’s where proxy servers come in as our fourth

essential. You need to choose the right proxy server, and then know what’s the

best way to set one up for your company’s needs. You may need to cascade two

proxies, or create a reverse proxy.






Firewalls have become another must these days, both for the network and
individual desktops. They remain the fourth essential along with the proxy

servers, as they also control your Internet access. I recently configured my

personal firewall to warn me of any website trying to place a cookie on my

machine, and of any machine trying to access any port on my machine. The results

were no less than surprising.

While on the subject, viruses and spam mail have become a menace, forming the

fifth essential for any network. Everyday there’s news of a new virus breaking

loose, causing major financial losses to companies. That’s why a proper

implementation of a corporate anti-virus solution has become essential. The

other nuisance on the Internet is spam. Most of you must clean your mailbox

every day of all the junk mail that arrives by the dozen. That’s where a

proper content security solution comes into the picture.

To read the full article click here.

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