Strictly a newbie, so please be gentle.

I have four Linux distros installed on one computer, so this is not a distro-specific issue.

I'm behind a firewall in an environment that is rabidly and ignorantly pro-Microsoft, so I am not likely to get any help from network admins with this.

I can browse the net with no problem using the network proxy server.

I cannot update or ftp to any sites without using a browser; also cannot ping, traceroute, etc. When I try to use a package manager to update software, I cannot connect.

If I try to connect to a site from a command line, I get the DNS lookup okay but then I get timed out.

Note: I also cannot ping or traceroute from my Windoze computer on the same network, so I think this is a matter of ports being blocked, not really a Linux problem. But, as I said, the admins are not likely to be sympathetic to my wanting to run a Linux package manager.

All the Windoze computers are using something called an ISA Firewall Client to get out. With Linux, I just have to log in to the proxy at the beginning of each session.

So, I guess what I need to know is if I can configure the package managers to use the http proxy port (set at 8888) to get out.

Thanks for any help.

Simple warning: you would be breaking company policy (with all liklihood) and would be fired if you were caught.

Just a forewarning.

Most of the system admins nowadays use ISA SERVER to build up their network since it is easily available and easy to configure. By installing Firewall Client on all the Client computers it saves you from the overhead of some configuration at the client side like manually entering Gateway and DNS settings

Thanks. This suggests that I have to enter these values manually in my network setup in Linux. Okay, done that. But how do I make my updaters etc. work? It seems that they might have to be configured for the http port on the proxy, which is not the standard port 80. How can I do this?

Thanks again.

Not a problem, but thanks anyway.

In my previous company there used to be Micro$oft proxy server 2.
The admins were really happy that I couldn't use my Linux behind this f***ing closed source proxy.
So I installed
http://apserver.sourceforge.net/

And they were pissed off

I don't know about ISA though..
You don't really need to ping someone on Internet I think..

edit:
for apt package management, setting a proxy is done in /etc/apt/apt.conf
Acquire::http::Proxy "http://127.0.0.1:1234"

Thanks very much! I'll fool around with both and see if I can get anywhere.