The Chat applet works through any SOCKS proxy server. Many popular firewalls contain a SOCKS server, such as Netscape's Proxy Server, NEC's PrivateNet, IBM's Secure Network Gateway, Aventail's MobileVPN and PartnerVPN, and Deerfield's WinGate.

Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 has SOCKS support for Java applets built into the browser. To enable the support for Internet Explorer 4.0 on Windows 95, 98, or NT 4.0, do the following:

  1. Click the View menu.
  2. Select Internet Options...
  3. Click the Connection tab.
  4. In the Proxy server section, check the box labeled Access the Internet using a proxy server.
  5. Click the Advanced button in the same section.
  6. For Server Type SOCKS, put the IP address of the machine running the SOCKS server under the column labeled, Address of proxy to use, and put the port number of the SOCKS server under the column Port. The default port if left blank is 1080.
  7. Click OK.

Using Internet Explorer 4.0 on the Macintosh, do the following:

  1. Click the Edit menu.
  2. Select Preferences.
  3. Select Network, Proxies.
  4. Select Enabled.
  5. Under Method, select SOCKS.
  6. Enter the name of the SOCKS proxy server after http://.
  7. Enter the port number. The default port is 1080.
  8. Click OK.

For Netscape Communicator, Netscape Navigator, and older versions of Internet Explorer, you can download and install Hummingbird's free SOCKS client in order to allow Java applets to safely traverse the SOCKS server on your firewall. Aventail Corporation provides a commercial version of their automatic SOCKS client program, called AutoSOCKS.

For more information on SOCKS, please see the SOCKS Proxy Protocol page.