Local cache server Windows 10

golinux

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Aug 20, 2015
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Long story short the internet at my Squadron's home base is garbage. I have an HP Proliant DL360 G5 server I'm not using. It has plenty of CPU, RAM, and HDD for what I'm proposing (I think).

I want to connect this server to the network and use it to cache certain sites locally, to improve load times. Ideally the server would detect which sites are accessed most often and store those locally, dynamically changing what it has locally based on what people request.

If I can't have it dynamically determine what people use, I can manually specify frequently used sites.

And I want it to be seamless too. For instance, if User A opens www.blahblah.com on their own device, the server should serve up its own copy rather than fetching from WAN. This solution would preferably work even if users are using custom DNS, such as 8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4.

Also ideally the server should determine how often a page changes so it can determine whether or not to serve up the local copy or the WAN copy based on how often the page changes.

Before you quote me military policies and all, I have full security clearance to do this project.



Server specs:

2x Intel Xeon E5440 quad-core @ 2.83 GHz
22GB ECC DDR2 FB-DIMM (4x4GB + 2x2GB + 2x1GB)
~650GB RAID5 array with 6x146GB 15K HDDs
2x700W Redundant PSUs
2x1000BaseT Ethernet
LiO2 interface (sidenote, it would be nice to get this working! I don't know how to make it work)
XFX R5 230
Windows 10 Enterprise

I would prefer to run Windows 10, but I can also run it in a VM on any OS.


This question has also been asked at http://superuser.com/questions/1143844/local-cache-server-windows-10
 
Solution
Your best bet is a proxy server. That is one of their primary function. Their might be one for windows but most the good ones you have to pay for.

Most people doing this themselves run squid under linux. There are prebuilt linux images that have the proxy installed and partially setup. Many commercial proxy are variations of the squid proxy so it is extremely powerful for a free tool.

It will likely do what you want with little configuration, what gets tricky is if you attempt to do content filtering.

Although you can run the proxy in a transparent mode it tend to be easier to block direct access to the internet..ie ports 80 and 443...and the user can then manually set the proxy server.

Be aware many sites on the internet set...
Your best bet is a proxy server. That is one of their primary function. Their might be one for windows but most the good ones you have to pay for.

Most people doing this themselves run squid under linux. There are prebuilt linux images that have the proxy installed and partially setup. Many commercial proxy are variations of the squid proxy so it is extremely powerful for a free tool.

It will likely do what you want with little configuration, what gets tricky is if you attempt to do content filtering.

Although you can run the proxy in a transparent mode it tend to be easier to block direct access to the internet..ie ports 80 and 443...and the user can then manually set the proxy server.

Be aware many sites on the internet set the time web pages expire to a low value and most proxy honor this setting. This prevent the proxy from delivering cached info from days before.
 
Solution


OK. I'm not concerned about content blocking I just need something to speed up access time for certain domains.