Setup servers plz help

Hi guys, so i wanna host a world for me and a few friends, i have installed the server on a windows machine (running win7) fires up ok and seems to work, then i read that i need a master server ??? looked in the guide regarding master server and it says install from source, i am not a linux buff so can someone tell me using cygwin how i download and install a master server ? also how do i then edit the client to connect to that server from outside my lan ? on my server i have mysql running, apache as webserver (xxamp) so i guuess all i need is the howto for the above,

1 - download and setup master server using cygwin

2 - edit the client to connect to that master server

3 - the database setup for the master server ? (the main server had a mysql script so what fields do i need ie db name etc etc)

Plz help its driving me nuts ;-) (link to any pages explaining all the above would be great)

Thanks
Kurt

welcome to the mess! er.. i mean multiverse lol , anyway ,


at presant running a master server is the only way for remote clients to connect, I and a few others have been fighting our way through the setup and I have nearly got the process down to a reliable state. If you can be patent for a few days I will have a better setup guide posted on this forum that should work with cygwin as well as linux, but for now, If you look at all my posts it should give you an idea what to fix and where until i can get my guide posted.

That would be awesome mate I really wanna give this a try just I installed everything on my server damn it all I need to do is connect lol anyway I will look at your posts plz drop me a mail when you have done the how to I'm struggling a fair bit with this but I wanna persevere

Thanks
Kurt
Ps drop me a mail at ki@pacomms.co.uk when you have done it , thanks so much

should only be a day or so longer , but I will defanatly send you a email about it