Squid: The Definitive Guide

Appendix E. Squid on Windows

Squid has been designed to run on Unix, but you can also get it to run on Microsoft Windows. Perhaps the easiest way is to use Red Hat’s Cygwin emulation layer. It gives a Windows box everything it needs to run a variety of Unix applications. Another option is to use SquidNT. This is a version of the source code that has been modified to compile under a native Windows C compiler.

Cygwin

Cygwin is a Unix emulation package for Microsoft Windows. It provides an environment that allows you to build and run software primarily designed for Unix. You can also download and install a number of precompiled binary packages, including Squid.

Cygwin runs on Windows 95, 98, ME, NT, 2000, and XP. The Cygwin FAQ, however, makes this disclaimer:

Keep in mind that Cygwin can only do as much as the underlying OS supports. Because of this, Cygwin will behave differently, and exhibit different limitations, on the various versions of Windows.

When writing this appendix, I installed Cygwin Version 1.3.21 on Windows 2000.

Installing Cygwin

The first step is to install Cygwin on your Windows system. Visit the http://www.cygwin.com/ site and click on the Install Cygwin link. After running Cygwin Setup, you’ll have the base environment with a number of standard Unix tools. You might want to spend a little time playing with it to see how it works. Once you’re comfortable with the Cygwin environment, decide if you’d like to use the precompiled package or compile Squid from its source. ...