You can use A4Proxy in two ways:
1. Manually choose a single proxy, make it the default and surf through it. You can make the default any one of the proxies on the list by right-clicking the one you like and selecting “Set As Default” from the context menu that will appear. The option “Use a new proxy on each request” (Proxy Options tab) must be disabled for this to work.
Also note that there is a way to switch between proxies with a single click of your mouse if you use the “Favorites” feature. First, choose a few good proxies you like to use and between which you switch often. Highlight them with your mouse. Select “Add to favorites” in the Edit menu of A4Proxy (or just right-click them and select the same command from the context menu). An icon with a smiling face will appear next to the proxy address as an indication that it is a “favorite proxy”. (you can also click on that icon to switch between “favorite”, “disabled” and normal state of the proxy).
Now, all proxies that have smiling faces, are displayed in the Favorites menu of A4Proxy icon in the Windows tray (in the bottom right-hand corner of your screen). Right-click on the program icon, choose Favorites from the context menu – and here you are, all your favorite proxies are listed there. You can click on any of them and it will be set as default automatically. This is very convenient if you often change your default proxy.
Note that it is impossible not to have a default proxy at all. At any given moment there is always a default proxy (but you have full control over which particular proxy is used by default).
2. Alternatively, you can configure A4Proxy so that it will change the proxy automatically for each page. When the option “Use new proxy on each request” (Proxy Options tab) is selected, then the proxies are chosen automatically by the program. In this mode, the program chooses the proxy to use only among those which have a green circle.
Note that you can restrict the range of proxies with the additional option “Use [n] proxies from [x] position”. The proxies are counted from the top of the list downwards. So, if you want to use top 5 proxies, you enter “Use [5] proxies from [0] position” (the top proxy is #0). The best strategy is probably to group all proxies between which you would like to switch at the top of the list. You can do so by sorting the proxies by speed and then by their icon (as the result you will have the fastest green proxies at the top), or manually, by selecting a particular proxy and clicking one of the small buttons on the right, which will move it up or down in the list.
Some questions and answers regarding this mode:
Q. When I am in the ‘choose ten proxies’ mode the default proxy stays with the sign indicating it is the default at the beginning of its name (second column). Is this appropriate?
Yes. There is always a proxy selected as default. However, if you are in the mode where A4Proxy rotates proxies automatically (“use new proxy on each request”), the default one will not be used (despite the fact that it is still displayed as default).
There is an exception, however. Let’s assume you set the program to rotate between ten top proxies (and the “default” one is not among these ten). As long as all these ten proxies are green dots, A4Proxy will randomly switch between them. Now, assume when you check proxies next day, one of those ten turns out to be dead and displayed with a red cross. A4Proxy ignores it and now has only 9 proxies to choose from. It will go on in this way until all 10 proxies are dead. The question is, which proxy to use now? If A4Proxy cannot find a suitable proxy within the range of proxies which you specified for rotation, A4Proxy will use the default one.
Proxies which are not used for automatic rotation include red crosses (non-working or filtered out), black dots (non-anonymous proxies) and those with a “sad face” on the left. Red crosses and black dots reflect the properties of proxies which are detected by A4Proxy automatically. Sad face is something you switch on yourself (right-click on a proxy and choose Disable). The only purpose of the sad face option is to exclude a particular proxy from the set of proxies used for rotation.
Note that when A4Proxy in the default-proxy mode (either because proxy rotation has been switched off, or because there are no suitable proxies within the specified range), the default proxy will be used even if it is Disabled, or Red-crossed, or Black. None of these parameters affect the “defaultness” of the proxy.
Q. How do I ‘undefault’ the name without default assignment of another proxy name?
You can’t do that. There is always a proxy selected as default.
Q. How do I tell the program is actually shifting among the ten proxies I have chosen?
Look at the Proxy Activity tab in A4Proxy. The Proxy IP column displays the IP addresses of the proxies which are currently being used; while the page is loaded, you can see the changing numbers in this column. They should be the IPs of the proxies belonging to your rotation range.