On 15/08/11 03:36, Walter Hurry wrote:
:-) Sometimes referred to as the APK approach (a famous troll) who devoted his life to promoting the hosts file as a cure for everything - more than just a filter - it's a firewall - it's an antivirus - it stops spyware, fixes your car, and makes you look thin! Last I heard *his* hosts files were around the 12MB mark! Hosts files work fine I guess (they certainly keep you busy!) - though they lack the fine grain control (wildcards, selected fileextensions, regular expressions) of AdBlock Plus, protection against cross-site scripting, element hiding, the ability to block flash and java elements - and the reporting ability. And it's easy to write new extensions for it. You could probably import the basis of a host block list from an AdBlock subscription. NoScript combined with AdBlock (they're both in the repositories) allow you to remove the mouse-overs and the embedded (javascript writen) ads as well. Host files will only remove some ads, and they can't do squat about floating divs or javascript document writes. I haven't seen any ads in some years - it's always a wake up when I see other peoples screens. :-( I prefer to keep my hosts files as small, simple static DNS lists. But another weapon against unwanted ads is a good thing. I certainly used them for many years to block sites ads - I still use them to stop people from loading sites the networks have banned (saves the desktop/network/firewall department wars). It's a constant war of escalation between Adblock and the advertisers - the outcome is certain, so I'm just going to enjoy it while I can.On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 02:28:27 +1000, Scott Ferguson wrote:Adblock - leave the ads on the server where they belong. Unless they pay me to view their advertising they can just go and try reproduce with themselves.Just to comment on a possible alternative approach: I don't need any Firefox plugins to block unwanted advertising; I just use a hosts file. I download the one from<http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/ hosts.zip> nightly, use dos2unix on it, and then merge it with my 'stub' hosts file. Works very well indeed.
Cheers --“We gotta come to some new ideas about life folks ok? I'm not being blase about abortion, it might be a real issue, it might not, doesn't matter to me. What matters is that if you believe in the sanctity of life then you believe it for life of all ages. That's what I hate about this child-worship syndrome going on. "Save the children! They're killing children! How many children were at Waco? They're killing children!" What does that mean? They reach a certain age and they're off your [beep] love-list? [beep] your children, if that's the way you think then [beep] you too. You either love all people of all ages or you shut the [beep] up.”
~ Bill Hicks