By default, routing is disabled in Windows XP. Moreover, while Windows Server has a separate Routing and Remote Access service that can be installed and enabled through the GUI, in XP it is assumed that this is not needed.
This means there is no item in the control panel or a service you can start that would enable routing.
However, not everyone can afford to buy Windows Server just to route half a dozen computers, and not everyone has the option to dedicate a separate computer as a router on which a Unix system could be installed.
LegalityNot only did I not find anything in the Microsoft Windows XP license mentioning, even indirectly, that this is not allowed, I even found an article on the Microsoft website describing how to solve this exact problem, so everything is fine - there will be no complaints against you for enabling routing.
Enabling itOpen the registry editor (regedit) and open the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters
Change, or if it doesn't exist - create, a DWORD parameter named:
IPEnableRouter
and set its value to 1.
After rebooting the computer, routing will be active and the computer will be able to route packets through itself.
Routing can be managed via the route command.
Managing itAs already mentioned - this is done via route.
In the following example we'll tell the router that all packets for network 10.0.5.0/24 should be sent through router 10.100.100.105:
C:\> route -p add 10.0.5.0 mask 255.255.255.0 10.100.100.105
And with the following command we'll remove the route to network 10.1.20.0/24:
C:\> route -p delete 10.1.20.0
You can display the current routes as in the following example:
C:\> route print
The -p switch tells the utility that the route needs to be saved permanently - i.e. that we want the route to keep working even after the system reboots. By default, if this switch is not specified, the changes made will be lost on reboot.
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