A question about XAMPP from a friend

A friend writes:

Hi John,

I note that your are going to give a presentation on XAMPP at the March meeting of BCUG. My question is why would a typical Windows computer user want to install XAMPP on their computer? Also, Comcast is my ISP and [I believe], in their agreement that I am prohibited from setting up a web server on a system connected to their system. Is this not so?

Regards, a friend.

To which I responded:

Hi, Friend – great question. Using XAMPP is about producing a set of services, but they do not have to be available to the world.

For example, you may want to run a blog on your home network so that you can keep a central project repository, like a ‘honeydo’ list that’s available from any computer on your network, but not available from the outside world.

You might also want to run an MP3 server, like Jinzora, a learning management system, like Moodle, a discussion board, like Vanilla, a photo gallery, like Singapore, a wiki, like MediaWiki or many other applications right from your home network. Most of these are available using nothing more than XAMPP as a base.

Comcast probably does not want you making services available outside of your home network, but turning on XAMPP inside your home network is not quite the same thing.

You might have to introduce or play with Dynamic DNS, router configurations, firewall configurations, DMZ settings, or others in order to really begin to use your local services in the outside world effectively. You might also want to modify your router and firewall settings to confirm that only your internal network is able to get to your local services.

Either way, unless you are specifically making an effort (e.g. advertising, popularizing) to make your services available and known to the outside world, Comcast isn’t going to care very much. You should still take some steps to keep people off of your internal network, but that’s a whole different talk.

John.

Thanks to my friend for providing some content for today’s post. John.