For a long time I've got use to the "right-click and block images from.." function in Mozilla and Firefox. Though Opera is a fine browser it doesn't offer this from the GUI. Anyhow I own a copy of Opera, and I was having an unrelated problem, and mentioned this lack of a feature to the techie, and they suggested the built-in filtering kit. There is no GUI control for it, but it's simply a case of creating a filter file, and switching it on from the master config, and lots of adverts simply disappear!
http://www.schrode.net/opera/url_filtering/.
Poor IE it just don't have the features I want, you get no tabs, and poor xhtml/css support, and instead you get pop-ups, adverts galore, backdoors, and spyware...
I know I could hack my hosts file to force lots of ad servers onto my loopback too, which works quite well, but as I run a web server on my main machine, it does rather fill up the Apache error log. I've used this technique on other machines, where it's quite effective at cutting out adverts and "undesireable" content.
Re:don't point to 127.0.0.1
ajt on 2004-08-06T21:19:21
I've used 127.0.0.2 in the past, but you have to configure Apache to not to listen to it, as it does by default. Plus you have to do a search and replace on any spam blocking host file you get hold of (they are usually set to 127.0.0.1). I know it's easy to do, but it's an extra step to mess with.
I use this method on any machine not running a web server, and I've done it for friends too. Overall I'd have to say it's quite effective and simple. Friends like it, as it blocks most "adult" content on their machines too, at the moment their children aren't old enough or wise enough to figure out why...
Given the clulessness of most of our staff, and their ability to pick up malware, I've suggested that our IT department set up blocking hosts files for our staff in the past. So far my suggestions have fallen on deaf ears, but the recent round of spyware/adware/viruses may have strengethend my case.
Even better than right-click block is adblock. It also blocks javascript and flash. It's very nifty.
-Dom
Re:adblock
ajt on 2004-08-06T21:26:08
I've tried it once on an older install of Firefox. I don't recall much about it, and when I upgraded to a newer version, I didn't re-install it.
Looking at adblock again, I see it's actually very similar to the Opera URL filtering rules. As you can use wildcards it gives you quite a bit of flexibility and considerable power to kill exactly what you want. The Opera version is built in, though not obvious from the GUI, and only supports simple wildcards, not full RegEx.
However you look at it, Firefox/Mozilla or Opera, they both beat IE into a bloody pulp. I don't use Knoqueror or Safari, but I assume they are better than IE too, thesedays just about everything is...
