NOTE: This story revolves around a couple of porn sites and contains TONS of technical terms. There is also some swearing, hilarity ensuing, and a tiny bit of scatology.
Set Up for Disaster
Lizzie McGuire's school was a bastion of the Microsoft monopoly. Every computer had Windows XP and Office XP. The server system used Windows Server 2003 and Active Directory. Three of the library's five computers had Encarta, and everyone browsed the few websites that
were not blocked by the proxy server (running ISA Server 2004) with Internet Explorer.
This was Bill Gates' wet dream. But it was a nightmare for the school. Toolbars came from nowhere. Start pages would regularly be set to no-name "search engines" with porno pop-ups (which were blocked by the proxy). Re-installs were a common occurrence, as were obscene messages popping up via the "Messenger service". And yet, because the school's technology staff, headed by a tall, lanky guy by the name of Ron, kissed Bill's ass in blissful ignorance, very little was (or could be) done about it.
Despite some of the strictest group policy settings seen outside of a high-security facility, Internet Explorer was the perfect springboard for hilarity to ensue. A nice little site existed on TEH INTARWEB, called "The Bypass", which had a single little ActiveX control in the middle of the canvas, inviting the user to click the "Open a Window" button, thereby opening, you guessed it, a window.
This window was another Web browser, based on a part of Mozilla and using JavaScript buttons for navigation. The great thing about this browser was that it somehow got around both group policies and the blocking proxy, permitting the user to download anything he wanted, be it Firefox (besides Mozilla, the only non-IE browser that could communicate with the school's NTLM-enabled proxy), Atomic Tanks (a "tank wars" game), or anything else, including hardcore porn.
The Bypass came into play during Miranda's Introduction to Business class, where she had to do some research on a company of her choosing. Unfortunately for her, she chose to research CEMCo, a division of which provided tons of fun little downloads (namely an award-winning BASIC interpreter and games that ran in it) that contained profanity, violence, and even some sexual activity. Needless to say, the site had been blocked by the overbearing blocking proxy, and Miranda needed the information today, since the paper was due the next day and she had no Internet connection at home since Larry Tudgeman and his friends came over that one night and ordered $212 in pay-per-view events and porn.
Running out of options, Miranda did a Google search with the query "bypass the proxy server". The third result was a page called "The Bypass, a Goatse gaping hole". The mere mention of Goatse gave her a positive impression that left the two results above it (the first just leading to how to set up a CGI proxy) in the dust, and so she clicked on it, expecting that to be blocked.
But the canvas went white, with no messages referring to the blocking proxy. Then the words "The Bypass -- a Goatse Gaping Hole" popped onto the screen, and two minutes later, the "Open a Window" button appeared. Once Miranda clicked this, a window containing what appeared
to be a lame pseudo-browser popped up. She thought little of this window at first, but when she typed the address for CEMCo into the address bar and hit the Go button, it went straight through and let her collect the information she needed.
After school, Miranda headed over to the Digital Bean to chat with her friends over a few smoothies.
"I found this really cool site today called The Bypass," said Miranda. "It lets you go to any site you want at the school!"
Gordo dismissed this, stating, "That's impossible! How can you get around that proxy server?"
"I don't know, but it works! Honest!" replied Miranda.
Gordo remained skeptical, having not been able to find a way around the blocking proxy through his own research, and skipping right over The Bypass, as it contained a Goatse reference and was therefore an evil site in his opinion. But he would soon discover this
work of magic, the window to all that the Web had to offer.