Hello! I am happy to see the development of your product making progress. Often when security software companies start working on implementing a firewall into their product, they really seem to rush it. I have used just about every firewall over the years, and can honestly say that for every one product that gets a feature right, 10 other products fail on that same feature. It is very hard to find a solution that 'checks all the boxes' and has a nice graphical user interface to go along with it.
Here is what I would recommend you focus on:
1. Don't rush the production of the firewall module, take your time and get it right. There are tons of them out there. I recommend focusing on making one that stands out.
2. Take a very close look at Little Snitch (for MacOS)
Little Snitch 4 and try to implement all of the beneficial user interface features you can. There are very few firewalls for Windows that have the features that LittleSnitch does. Another one to take a look at is Glasswire (
GlassWire - Personal Firewall & Network Monitor). A lot of the people using Glasswire are trying to find a Windows version of LittleSnitch, but it fails them in a lot of ways. If you could successfully implement all of the interface features these have, you would really have something that would appeal to a lot of people, I am certain of this. If you are willing to take the time to read through this list of Glasswire user feature requests, and focus on some of those, it would help you get a good idea of what people are looking for:
Future Feature Requests! Unfortunately, the Glasswire developers really seem to ignore a lot of the requests, even though they are sorely needed.
3. Include quality stateful packet filtering, fragmented traffic, protocol analysis, anti-arp spoofing, ipv6, anti-DDOS, etc. Many 'firewalls' now days are really weak in this regard and don't do much other than allow/black programs access to the internet. I think it is really important to have very strong packet filtering. It needs to be stronger than Windows Firewall, or people will switch to any of the number of WFW management software already out there (Private Winten, Windows Firewall Control, Glasswire, etc.). It is good to have a nice interface to allow/black, but incoming packet filtering is very important.
4. Offer alternative modes. Some users will want to be able to be prompted and customize the rules on-the-fly using the prompt, while other users will want to simply allow or block access. Take a close look at the differences between ESET firewall, Kaspersky firewall, Comodo firewall, etc. Glean what you can from them and come up with something powerful, yet sleek. The default prompt should be very simple, but it should also have a button somewhere in the prompt that expands the prompt and displays more detailed information, and allows for greater customization.
5. Integrate it into some sort of white-list, but allow users to enable/disable this feature. Some users will love the majority of software they use being auto-whitelisted and not getting prompts, while other users will want to opt-out and handle the prompts themselves. Kaspersky firewall/application control is really nice in that it not only does this, but also clearly displays the user-ratings for the program in question. If someone is 95% sure they want to allow something, and sees that over 1,000 other users also allowed it, and that it is very common software, it is very re-assuring. Comodo and other firewalls also allow automatic white-listing of software that are signed by certain software companies, such as Microsoft, etc. It is a nice feature to have for the average user, and greatly reduces pop-ups.
6. I really believe that the more you interact with users in forums like these, as you develop the firewall, and really listen to user-feedback and ideas, you will end up with a rock-solid firewall. Sadly, a lot of software development companies start off doing this, and when they start getting some sales, they quickly loose interest. If you can maintain an active relationship with the forum security communities, you will be in really good hands. The majority of users that bother reading/posting in these forums have a lot of experience with a wide variety of firewall software and will have a lot of good ideas for the interface. Unfortunately, a lot of developers seem to be working on a really nice firewall, and part way through get burned out. I am no programmer, but I really think that firewalls are a lot more work than most developers originally think. Unless you are willing to go the extra mile, it is probably a complete waste of time to bother at all, since there are so many alternative solutions out there. Your WiseVector seems to have some unique attributes going for it, so the firewall should stand out as well, especially if you want it to be the reason people are willing to pay for your software.
