Using the Free Comodo Firewall

Introduction

Comodo is an alternative to deadware Kerio Personal Firewall 2.1.5. It's a bit more involved than Kerio because there are two levels of protection: Applications and network. Even if you allow an application to work through the firewall in the Application Monitor section, it won't work until you also have set up the relevant rules in the Network Monitor section.

Setup

Click on the Security icon to get to where the action is:

Tasks

Define a new trusted application
Add a zone (to allow connection with any PC in the same network)

Application Monitor
Network Monitor

Peeves

General

Adding an application in Application Monitor doesn't create ad hoc rules in Network Monitor: For an application to work with remote hosts, ad hoc rules must be created both in AM and NM
Unlike Kerio, no pop-up when an application tries to do something for which no rule has yet been set up ("XYZ from IP:Port is trying to connect out/in to ... : Allow/Deny?")
Not possible to create a set of rules in a file, and import this file so as to make setup easier
Summary page is too full of information
Can't drag 'n drop rules in the list

Network Monitor

Can't name rules
Can't disable a rule: You must remove it altogether
Must go back and forth between NM and Activity > Logs to see what connections were silently stopped and create the ad hoc rules in NM
Can't copy rule in Details into clipboard (useful to send to someone)