I want to install Mandriva One 2007 (with KDE) on my laptop. When I am using this at work I connect to the web via a proxy server. However, when I am travelling I usually connect direct, via a hotel broadband or wi-fi etc.

It is a real pain to have to keep changing the connection settings for Konqueror & Firefox. So can I set up two different connection profiles that I can select as required?
Or do I have to set up two different users?
Or is there a better option?

I bet you could write a shell script, that you could just run when required, that will quickly rewrite the config files for Konqueror and Firefox. Sorry I'm no expert at writing bash scripts, but that's how I would do it.

Alternatively, you could ask your network administrator at work to add a redirect rule that automatically sends all port 80 traffic to the Internet to your proxy at work. This way you would never have to change the proxy settings in Firefox and Konqueror, just leave it as "no proxy"/Direct Connection to the Internet

I like the sound of that option. I will see what I can do. TVM.