Automatically enable / disable the IE proxy

It’s rather annoying that enabling and disabling the proxy is no less than a half dozen clicks on the average Windows PC. Many of my clients have laptops and most of them are only just savvy enough to not put their passwords on a sticky note on the palm rests. I needed it to be simpler.

History:

I had originally written a very simple app (in AutoIt) that poked values into the registry to enable or disable the proxy. That approach required the browser to be restarted and, to the end user, that’s a hassle. Although it’s still shorter that the six-ish clicks to do it in IE, older versions of IE don’t remember the tabs, and therefore the clients have to dig into the history to re-open previously open sites and log in again.

Then I tried to script out the menu and button clicks. That led to a lot of menu flashes —at least one dialog box was not hide-able. The flashes were especially noticeable if the monitored hostname became unreachable but then immediately returned, making the script run twice in quick succession.

After letting it sit without updates for a few years, I found a solution that would refresh the proxy settings in Windows but not need a restart of Windows or any apps. ProxySwitch finally didn’t suck!

Usage:

Specify a hostname as a command line argument to specify what the app should ping to determine if it’s inside or outside the network. Otherwise it will prompt for one. You could use an IP address but it’s not recommended: if that IP is ping-able inside another network, the proxy will be enabled even though it’s inaccessible.

<path>\ProxySwitch.exe <hostname>

The About box will tell you what host is being monitored. The notification (tray) icon will change colors whether the proxy is enabled or not.

Download:

Get it here in 32- or 64-bit versions.

Disclaimer

As usual, use this app at your own risk. There’s not a lot in the way of error checking. Not that there’s much that could go wrong.  That said, I offer neither warranties nor guarantees.

The app is written in AutoIt 3. It is virus and malware free. Since it is written in AutoIt, some AV scanners flag it as a false positive. When run through VirusTotal on 6/25/2019, 58/69 AV engines found it to be clean. See the report here.

Peace and victory,

rsn

Supporting this site

The apps and scripts available here are free-ish and include support. Here at GB/2 Labs, we really like the idea of Pay What You Want. If you find ProxySwitch useful, you can set your own price for a license based on what you feel the functionality is worth to you or your organization. If your business requires it, contact us for a proper invoice. Otherwise, please consider a donation below.