Configuring Windows Firewall in WIndows 7

Windows Firewall has been part of the Windows package since XP. Before XP Service Pack 2, it was called Internet Connection Firewall, disabled by default and all of the configuration options were hidden away where users never looked at them.Throughout 2004 there was an ongoing prevalance of worm infections and many unpatched computers were affected in minutes. Because of this, along with accusations that Microsoft was not doing enough to protect its customers from these threats, from XP service pack 2 onwards, Microsoft improved the functionality of their firewall, as well as the interface and rebranded it as Windows Firewall.
Today I'm going to show you how to confgure Windows Firewall.
To access the Windows Firewall you need to open the Control Panel and select Windows Firewall.


Depending on where you use your computer you can configure settings for home, work and public networks. This is handy if you have a laptop that you often use in public places, such as cafes. On the home screen of the Windows Firewall you can see the state of the Firewall, i.e whether its on or off, the incoming connections, the active home, work or public network, and the type of notifications you receive.


On the sidebar there are options to configure options such as what programs are allowed through the firewall, what notifications you want to recieve, turning Windows Firewall on and off, restoring defaults, advanced settings and troubleshooting.

Allowing programs through theWindows Firewall is a fairly easy task, you will first need to click on the change settings button, and then tick or untick the box of the program you want to allow through the firewall, or block from travelling through the firewall.

If you would like to allow through a program that is not on the list, you need to click on the Allow another program button and select the program you are looking for from a secondary list.

Once you're done you just click cancel and Ok, and you've addeda program to, or removed a program from, the allowed programs list.

If you would like to configure which notifications you receive you need to click on the link in the sidebar. From here you can choose to be notified when the firewall blocks a new program, choose to block all incoming connections, and also choose to turn Windows Firewall off.


Clicking on the Turn Windows Firewall on or off takes you to the same screen as above, and clicking the reset defaults button gives you the option to reset all options to default.
If you click on the advanced settings link you get a screen that looks like this:

From here you can configure outbound and inbound rules, connection security rules and monitoring. However, these settings rarely need to be played with.

If you are having network problems you can also troubleshoot your network from here.
And there you go, your firewall is configured!