If you use a proxy server on your network you can sometimes find the Automatic Updates via the scheduled Windows Update feature do not work.

You would expect that Windows Update would pick up your Proxy Settings from Internet Explorer, but it doesn't happen. The Windows Update Client runs as a system service and doesn't have the ability to look at User Settings (like those in IE), when run automatically. When you manually go to Windows Update it works because you initiate the Updates from Internet Explorer and that has properly configured proxy server entries.

Thus you need to add a proxy Server entry for the Windows Update Client.

In Windows Vista, the WinHttp proxy and tracing configuration tools, proxycfg.exe and winhttptracecfg.exe respectively, have been replaced with netsh commands. All the WinHttp related netsh commands live under the “winhttp” netsh context. To navigate to it, open an administrator command prompt and type “netsh” then “winhttp”:

C:\Windows\system32>netsh

netsh>winhttp

netsh winhttp>

You can type “?” in this context and display the list of available commands there. You can also type “?” at the end of any command to get a detailed description of the command syntax.

Displaying current settings and restoring the defaults

You can use the “show” netsh commands to display the current settings. “show proxy” will display the current proxy settings, while “show tracing” will display the current tracing settings. You can also use the “reset” netsh command to restore the default settings. “reset proxy” will set the WinHttp proxy settings to DIRECT, while “reset tracing” will disable the tracing.

Setting WinHttp proxy settings

Use the “set proxy” command to configure the proxy settings. You can type the command followed by a question mark to see the syntax:

netsh winhttp>set proxy /?

Usage: set proxy [proxy-server=]<server name> [bypass-list=]<hosts list>

Parameters:

  Tag              Value

  proxy-server   - proxy server for use for http and/or
                   https protocol

  bypass-list    - a list of sites that should be visited
                   bypassing the proxy (use "<local>" to
                   bypass all short name hosts)

Examples:

  set proxy myproxy

  set proxy myproxy:80 "<local>bar"

  set proxy proxy-server="http=myproxy;https=sproxy:88" bypass-list="*.foo.com"

Just follow the examples listed in the samples above to set your proxy settings.

Note that importing proxy settings from IE is now accomplished by the “import” command (importing from IE is the only available option there):

netsh winhttp>import proxy /?

Usage: import proxy [source=]ie

Parameters:

  Tag       Value

  source  - from where the setting is imported

Examples:

  import proxy source=ie