Parent proxies - The Polipo Manual
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### 3.10 Parent proxies

Polipo will usually fetch instances directly from source servers as this configuration minimises latency. In some cases, however, it may be useful to have Polipo fetch instances from a parent proxy.

The variable `parentHost` specifies the hostname or IP address of a parent proxy; Polipo will contact this proxy using the port number specified by `parentPort`.

If the parent proxy requires authorisation, the username and password should be specified in the variable `parentAuthCredentials` in the form ``username:password`'. Only Basic authentication is supported, which is vulnerable to replay attacks.

The main application of the parent proxy support is to cross firewalls. Given a machine, say `trurl`, with unrestricted access to the web, the following evades a firewall by using an encrypted compressed `ssh` link:

         $ ssh -f -C -L 8124:localhost:8123 trurl polipo
         $ polipo parentHost=localhost parentPort=8124