We're running dnsmasq on a linux box inside our network for DHCP and DNS.I would like to add a download accelerator like IPCop's (http://blockouttraffic.de/ua_index.php) but without having IPCop as we do have firewalls already. I've looked into polipo and squid but those are only browser proxies as far as I can see. What we would like to have cached is:Mac OS UpdatesOffice for Mac UpdatesaptWindows Updatesother HTTP/HTTPS downloads like ISO files etc.As the linux box running dnsmasq is already the gateway the other computers are using to connect to the internet I think it must be possible to add caching somehow.Does anyone know a solution for this?
Linux Gateway as Download Accelerator like IPCop's
linux;cache;download
I don't know about Mac OS, Office and Windows Updates.Apt can go via an HTTP proxy and that would speed things up. However, using a proxy like squid will not cache the deb files but the URIs. I.e. it won't do any good if you're downloading the same .deb from different repos. Using an apt-specific proxy like approx is a far better solution and works really well.HTTP is simple and squid will do magic with it.Your biggest problem is HTTPS and everything that uses SSL. By definition, SSL is there so that you cannot have man-in-the-middle attacks and network traffic sniffing. Unfortunately this is exactly the opposite of what you are trying to do: You are looking for something that will stand between the two endpoints and will inspect the traffic, serving cached objects.So, by definition, you cannot use a proxy for SSL traffic unless you are hacking around it. Your only solution would be a service-specific solution like approx, that doesn't work as a proxy.And if you are wondering about how HTTPS proxies work: They don't cache. HTTPS is using a simple CONNECT command that practically tunnels traffic through the proxy. The reason is that the traffic is encrypted and the remote end is verified using their SSL certificate and key, which the proxy doesn't possess.