Internet Connection Sharing
Background:
With the advent of the World Wide Web, the numbers of computers using Internet connections rose sharply. This led to a problem in residences and small businesses with dial up Internet connections and a single phone line, in that only one computer could connect to the Internet at one time. Rather than purchasing more phone lines, the solution of designating one computer as a kind of Traffic Cop for the network became commonplace. This special computer became known as a Proxy Server. The sole function of a Proxy Server is to run software which takes requests from other computers connected to it via a hub, and route them to it's internet connection.
Network Address Translation:
When proxy servers became more prevalent, companies that were producing Internet and networking gear took notice. These Internet hardware and network hardware manufacturers were already producing devices called routers, which served exactly the same function as a proxy server, and did the job much faster. However, the routers were too expensive, and provided much more processing power than the home and small business market needed. The key to bringing the price down and scaling these routers into something suitable for the average home or business network was a technology called NAT - Network Address Translation.
Proxy servers had been running Network Address Translation services in software for a long time. Once the networking and Internet hardware manufacturers were able to get NAT working in hardware, they started producing Internet connection sharing routers. Now NAT based routers are available for both dial up and broadband Internet connections.
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