1 <!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook V3.1//EN" [
2 <!entity % dummy "IGNORE">
3 <!entity supported SYSTEM "supported.sgml">
4 <!entity newfeatures SYSTEM "newfeatures.sgml">
5 <!entity p-intro SYSTEM "privoxy.sgml">
6 <!entity seealso SYSTEM "seealso.sgml">
7 <!entity buildsource SYSTEM "buildsource.sgml">
8 <!entity contacting SYSTEM "contacting.sgml">
9 <!entity history SYSTEM "history.sgml">
10 <!entity copyright SYSTEM "copyright.sgml">
11 <!entity license SYSTEM "license.sgml">
12 <!entity p-authors SYSTEM "p-authors.sgml">
13 <!entity config SYSTEM "p-config.sgml">
14 <!entity p-version "3.0.11">
15 <!entity p-status "UNRELEASED">
16 <!entity % p-authors-formal "INCLUDE"> <!-- include additional text, etc -->
17 <!entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE">
18 <!entity % p-stable "IGNORE">
19 <!entity % p-text "IGNORE"> <!-- define we are not a text only doc -->
20 <!entity % p-doc "INCLUDE"> <!-- and we are a formal doc -->
21 <!entity % p-readme "IGNORE">
22 <!entity % user-man "IGNORE">
23 <!entity % config-file "IGNORE">
24 <!entity % p-supp-userman "IGNORE"> <!-- Omit some from supported.sgml -->
25 <!entity my-copy "©"> <!-- kludge for docbook2man -->
26 <!entity % draft "IGNORE"> <!-- WIP stuff -->
27 <!entity my-app "<application>Privoxy</application>">
30 File : $Source: /cvsroot/ijbswa/current/doc/source/user-manual.sgml,v $
33 This file belongs into
34 ijbswa.sourceforge.net:/home/groups/i/ij/ijbswa/htdocs/
36 $Id: user-manual.sgml,v 2.86 2008/08/16 10:12:23 fabiankeil Exp $
38 Copyright (C) 2001-2008 Privoxy Developers http://www.privoxy.org/
41 ========================================================================
42 NOTE: Please read developer-manual/documentation.html before touching
43 anything in this, or other Privoxy documentation.
44 ========================================================================
51 <title>Privoxy &p-version; User Manual</title>
55 <!-- Completely the wrong markup, but very little is allowed -->
56 <!-- in this part of an article. FIXME -->
57 <link linkend="copyright">Copyright</link> &my-copy; 2001 - 2008 by
58 <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/">Privoxy Developers</ulink>
62 <pubdate>$Id: user-manual.sgml,v 2.86 2008/08/16 10:12:23 fabiankeil Exp $</pubdate>
66 Note: the following should generate a separate page, and a live link to it,
67 all nicely done. But it doesn't for some mysterious reason. Please leave
68 commented unless it can be fixed proper. For the time being, the
69 copyright/license declarations will be in their own sgml.
82 This is here to keep vim syntax file from breaking :/
83 If I knew enough to fix it, I would.
84 PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE! HB: hal@foobox.net
90 The <citetitle>Privoxy User Manual</citetitle> gives users information on how to
91 install, configure and use <ulink
92 url="http://www.privoxy.org/">Privoxy</ulink>.
95 <!-- Include privoxy.sgml boilerplate: -->
97 <!-- end privoxy.sgml -->
100 You can find the latest version of the <citetitle>Privoxy User Manual</citetitle> at <ulink
101 url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/">http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/</ulink>.
102 Please see the <link linkend="contact">Contact section</link> on how to
103 contact the developers.
107 <!-- Feel free to send a note to the developers at <email>ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net</email>. -->
113 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
114 <sect1 label="1" id="introduction"><title>Introduction</title>
116 This documentation is included with the current &p-status; version of
117 <application>Privoxy</application>, v.&p-version;<![%p-not-stable;[,
118 and is mostly complete at this point. The most up to date reference for the
119 time being is still the comments in the source files and in the individual
120 configuration files. Development of a new version is currently nearing
121 completion, and includes significant changes and enhancements over
122 earlier versions. ]]>.
125 <!-- include only in non-stable versions -->
128 Since this is a &p-status; version, not all new features are well tested. This
129 documentation may be slightly out of sync as a result (especially with
130 CVS sources). And there <emphasis>may be</emphasis> bugs, though hopefully
135 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
136 <sect2 id="features"><title>Features</title>
138 In addition to the core
139 features of ad blocking and
140 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookie</ulink> management,
141 <application>Privoxy</application> provides many supplemental
142 features<![%p-not-stable;[, some of them currently under development]]>,
143 that give the end-user more control, more privacy and more freedom:
145 <!-- Include newfeatures.sgml boilerplate here: -->
147 <!-- end boilerplate -->
152 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
155 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
156 <sect1 id="installation"><title>Installation</title>
159 <application>Privoxy</application> is available both in convenient pre-compiled
160 packages for a wide range of operating systems, and as raw source code.
161 For most users, we recommend using the packages, which can be downloaded from our
162 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ijbswa/">Privoxy Project
168 On some platforms, the installer may remove previously installed versions, if
169 found. (See below for your platform). In any case <emphasis>be sure to backup
170 your old configuration if it is valuable to you.</emphasis> See the <link
171 linkend="upgradersnote">note to upgraders</link> section below.
174 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
175 <sect2 id="installation-packages"><title>Binary Packages</title>
177 How to install the binary packages depends on your operating system:
180 <!-- XXX: The installation sections should be sorted -->
182 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
183 <sect3 id="installation-pack-rpm"><title>Red Hat and Fedora RPMs</title>
186 RPMs can be installed with <literal>rpm -Uvh privoxy-&p-version;-1.rpm</literal>,
187 and will use <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename> for the location
188 of configuration files.
192 Note that on Red Hat, <application>Privoxy</application> will
193 <emphasis>not</emphasis> be automatically started on system boot. You will
194 need to enable that using <command>chkconfig</command>,
195 <command>ntsysv</command>, or similar methods.
199 If you have problems with failed dependencies, try rebuilding the SRC RPM:
200 <literal>rpm --rebuild privoxy-&p-version;-1.src.rpm</literal>. This
201 will use your locally installed libraries and RPM version.
205 Also note that if you have a <application>Junkbuster</application> RPM installed
206 on your system, you need to remove it first, because the packages conflict.
207 Otherwise, RPM will try to remove <application>Junkbuster</application>
208 automatically if found, before installing <application>Privoxy</application>.
212 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
213 <sect3 id="installation-deb"><title>Debian and Ubuntu</title>
215 DEBs can be installed with <literal>apt-get install privoxy</literal>,
216 and will use <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename> for the location of
221 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
222 <sect3 id="installation-pack-win"><title>Windows</title>
225 Just double-click the installer, which will guide you through
226 the installation process. You will find the configuration files
227 in the same directory as you installed <application>Privoxy</application> in.
230 Version 3.0.5 beta introduced full <application>Windows</application> service
231 functionality. On Windows only, the <application>Privoxy</application>
232 program has two new command line arguments to install and uninstall
233 <application>Privoxy</application> as a <emphasis>service</emphasis>.
237 <term>Arguments:</term>
240 <replaceable class="parameter">--install</replaceable>[:<replaceable class="parameter">service_name</replaceable>]
243 <replaceable class="parameter">--uninstall</replaceable>[:<replaceable class="parameter">service_name</replaceable>]
249 After invoking <application>Privoxy</application> with
250 <command>--install</command>, you will need to bring up the
251 <application>Windows</application> service console to assign the user you
252 want <application>Privoxy</application> to run under, and whether or not you
253 want it to run whenever the system starts. You can start the
254 <application>Windows</application> services console with the following
255 command: <command>services.msc</command>. If you do not take the manual step
256 of modifying <application>Privoxy's</application> service settings, it will
257 not start. Note too that you will need to give Privoxy a user account that
258 actually exists, or it will not be permitted to
259 write to its log and configuration files.
264 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
265 <sect3 id="installation-pack-bintgz"><title>Solaris <!--, NetBSD, HP-UX--></title>
268 Create a new directory, <literal>cd</literal> to it, then unzip and
269 untar the archive. For the most part, you'll have to figure out where
270 things go. <!-- FIXME, more info needed? -->
274 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
275 <sect3 id="installation-os2"><title>OS/2</title>
278 First, make sure that no previous installations of
279 <application>Junkbuster</application> and / or
280 <application>Privoxy</application> are left on your
281 system. Check that no <application>Junkbuster</application>
282 or <application>Privoxy</application> objects are in
288 Then, just double-click the WarpIN self-installing archive, which will
289 guide you through the installation process. A shadow of the
290 <application>Privoxy</application> executable will be placed in your
291 startup folder so it will start automatically whenever OS/2 starts.
295 The directory you choose to install <application>Privoxy</application>
296 into will contain all of the configuration files.
300 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
301 <sect3 id="installation-mac"><title>Mac OS X</title>
303 Unzip the downloaded file (you can either double-click on the zip file
304 icon from the Finder, or from the desktop if you downloaded it there).
305 Then, double-click on the package installer icon and follow the
306 installation process.
309 The privoxy service will automatically start after a successful
310 installation (in addition to every time your computer starts up). To
311 prevent the privoxy service from automatically starting when your
312 computer starts up, remove or rename the folder named
313 <literal>/Library/StartupItems/Privoxy</literal>.
316 To manually start or stop the privoxy service, use the Privoxy Utility
317 for Mac OS X. This application controls the privoxy service (e.g.
318 starting and stopping the service as well as uninstalling the software).
322 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
323 <sect3 id="installation-amiga"><title>AmigaOS</title>
325 Copy and then unpack the <filename>lha</filename> archive to a suitable location.
326 All necessary files will be installed into <application>Privoxy</application>
327 directory, including all configuration and log files. To uninstall, just
328 remove this directory.
332 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
333 <sect3 id="installation-tbz"><title>FreeBSD</title>
336 Privoxy is part of FreeBSD's Ports Collection, you can build and install
337 it with <literal>cd /usr/ports/www/privoxy; make install clean</literal>.
340 If you don't use the ports, you can fetch and install
341 the package with <literal>pkg_add -r privoxy</literal>.
344 The port skeleton and the package can also be downloaded from the
345 <ulink url="https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118">File Release
346 Page</ulink>, but there's no reason to use them unless you're interested in the
347 beta releases which are only available there.
351 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
352 <sect3 id="installattion-gentoo"><title>Gentoo</title>
354 Gentoo source packages (Ebuilds) for <application>Privoxy</application> are
355 contained in the Gentoo Portage Tree (they are not on the download page,
356 but there is a Gentoo section, where you can see when a new
357 <application>Privoxy</application> Version is added to the Portage Tree).
360 Before installing <application>Privoxy</application> under Gentoo just do
361 first <literal>emerge rsync</literal> to get the latest changes from the
362 Portage tree. With <literal>emerge privoxy</literal> you install the latest
366 Configuration files are in <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename>, the
367 documentation is in <filename>/usr/share/doc/privoxy-&p-version;</filename>
368 and the Log directory is in <filename>/var/log/privoxy</filename>.
374 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
375 <sect2 id="installation-source"><title>Building from Source</title>
378 The most convenient way to obtain the <application>Privoxy</application> sources
379 is to download the source tarball from our
380 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118&package_id=10571">project download
385 If you like to live on the bleeding edge and are not afraid of using
386 possibly unstable development versions, you can check out the up-to-the-minute
387 version directly from <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=11118">the
388 CVS repository</ulink>.
390 deprecated...out of business.
391 or simply download <ulink
392 url="http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cvstarballs/ijbswa-cvsroot.tar.bz2">the nightly CVS
397 <!-- include buildsource.sgml boilerplate: -->
399 <!-- end boilerplate -->
402 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
403 <sect2 id="installation-keepupdated"><title>Keeping your Installation Up-to-Date</title>
405 As user feedback comes in and development continues, we will make updated versions
406 of both the main <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link> (as a <ulink
407 url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118&release_id=103670">separate
408 package</ulink>) and the software itself (including the actions file) available for
413 If you wish to receive an email notification whenever we release updates of
414 <application>Privoxy</application> or the actions file, <ulink
415 url="http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ijbswa-announce/">subscribe
416 to our announce mailing list</ulink>, ijbswa-announce@lists.sourceforge.net.
420 In order not to lose your personal changes and adjustments when updating
421 to the latest <literal>default.action</literal> file we <emphasis>strongly
422 recommend</emphasis> that you use <literal>user.action</literal> and
423 <literal>user.filter</literal> for your local
424 customizations of <application>Privoxy</application>. See the <link
425 linkend="actions-file">Chapter on actions files</link> for details.
433 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
435 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
436 <sect1 id="whatsnew">
437 <title>What's New in this Release</title>
439 There are many improvements and new features since <application>Privoxy 3.0.8</application>, the last stable release:
446 Added SOCKS5 support (with address resolution done by
447 the SOCKS5 server). Patch provided by Eric M. Hopper.
452 The "blocked" CGI pages include a block reason that was
453 provided as argument to the last-applying block action.
458 If enable-edit-actions is disabled (the default since 3.0.7 beta)
459 the show-status page hides the edit buttons and explains why.
460 Previously the user would get the "this feature has been disabled"
461 message after using the edit button.
466 Forbidden CONNECT requests are treated like blocks by default.
467 The now-pointless treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks action
473 Not enabling limit-connect now allows CONNECT requests to all ports.
474 In previous versions it would only allow CONNECT requests to port 443.
475 Use +limit-connect{443} if you think you need the old default behaviour.
480 The CGI editor gets turned off after three edit requests with invalid
481 file modification timestamps. This makes life harder for attackers
482 who can leverage browser bugs to send fake Referers and intend to
483 brute-force edit URLs.
488 Action settings for multiple patterns in the same section are
489 shared in memory. As a result these sections take up less space
490 (and are loaded slightly faster). Problem reported by Franz Schwartau.
495 Linear white space in HTTP headers will be normalized to single
496 spaces before parsing the header's content, headers split across
497 multiple lines get merged first.
502 Host information is gathered outside the main thread so it's less
503 likely to delay other incoming connections if the host is misconfigured.
508 New config option "hostname" to use a hostname other than
509 the one returned by the operating system. Useful to speed-up responses
510 for CGI requests on misconfigured systems. Requested by Max Khon.
515 The CGI editor supports the "disable all filters of this type"
516 directives "-client-header-filter", "-server-header-filter",
517 "-client-header-tagger" and "-server-header-tagger".
522 Fixed false-positives with the link-by-url filter and URLs that
523 contain the pattern "/jump/".
528 The less-download-windows filter no longer messes
529 "Content-Type: application/x-shockwave-flash" headers up.
534 In the show-url-info page's "Final results" section active and
535 inactive actions are listed separately. Patch provided by Lee.
540 The GNUmakefile supports the DESTDIR variable. Patch for
541 the install target submitted by Radoslaw Zielinski.
546 Embedding the content of configuration files in the show-status
547 page is significantly faster now. For a largish action file (1 MB)
548 a speedup of about 2450 times has been measured. This is mostly
549 interesting if you are using large action files or regularly use
550 Privoxy-Regression-Test while running Privoxy through Valgrind,
551 for stock configuration files it doesn't really matter.
556 If zlib support is unavailable and there are content
557 filters active but the prevent-compression action is disabled,
558 the show-url-info page includes a warning that compression
559 might prevent filtering.
564 The show-url-info page provides an OpenSearch Description that
565 allows to access the page through browser search plugins.
570 The obsolete kill-popups action has been removed as the
571 PCRS-based popup filters can do the same and are slightly
577 The inspect-jpegs action has been removed.
582 The send-wafer and send-vanilla-wafer actions have been removed.
583 They weren't particular useful and their behaviour could be emulated
584 with add-header anyway.
589 Privoxy-Regression-Test has been significantly improved.
594 Most sections in the default.action file contain tests for
595 Privoxy-Regression-Test to verify that they are working as intended.
600 Parts of Privoxy have been refactored to increase maintainability.
605 Building with zlib (if available) is done by default.
610 Ordinary configuration file changes no longer cause program
611 termination on OS/2 if the name of the logfile hasn't been
612 changed as well. This regression probably crept in with the
613 logging improvements in 3.0.7. Reported by Maynard.
618 The img-reorder filter is less likely to mess up JavaScript code in
619 img tags. Problem and solution reported by Glenn Washburn in #2014552.
624 The source tar ball now includes Privoxy-Log-Parser,
625 a syntax-highlighter for Privoxy logs. Documentation is available
626 through perldoc(1), for fancy screenshots see:
627 <ulink url="http://www.fabiankeil.de/sourcecode/privoxy-log-parser/"
628 >http://www.fabiankeil.de/sourcecode/privoxy-log-parser/</ulink>.
635 For a more detailed list of changes please have a look at the ChangeLog.
638 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
640 <sect2 id="upgradersnote">
641 <title>Note to Upgraders</title>
644 A quick list of things to be aware of before upgrading from earlier
645 versions of <application>Privoxy</application>:
653 The recommended way to upgrade &my-app; is to backup your old
654 configuration files, install the new ones, verify that &my-app;
655 is working correctly and finally merge back your changes using
656 <application>diff</application> and maybe <application>patch</application>.
659 There are a number of new features in each &my-app; release and
660 most of them have to be explicitly enabled in the configuration
661 files. Old configuration files obviously don't do that and due
662 to syntax changes using old configuration files with a new
663 &my-app; isn't always possible anyway.
668 Note that some installers remove earlier versions completely,
669 including configuration files, therefore you should really save
670 any important configuration files!
675 On the other hand, other installers don't overwrite existing configuration
676 files, thinking you will want to do that yourself.
681 <filename>standard.action</filename> now only includes the enabled actions.
682 Not all actions as before.
687 In the default configuration only fatal errors are logged now.
688 You can change that in the <link linkend="DEBUG">debug section</link>
689 of the configuration file. You may also want to enable more verbose
690 logging until you verified that the new &my-app; version is working
697 Three other config file settings are now off by default:
698 <link linkend="enable-remote-toggle">enable-remote-toggle</link>,
699 <link linkend="enable-remote-http-toggle">enable-remote-http-toggle</link>,
700 and <link linkend="enable-edit-actions">enable-edit-actions</link>.
701 If you use or want these, you will need to explicitly enable them, and
702 be aware of the security issues involved.
708 The <quote>filter-client-headers</quote> and
709 <quote>filter-server-headers</quote> actions that were introduced with
710 <application>Privoxy 3.0.5</application> to apply content filters to
711 the headers have been removed and replaced with new actions.
713 linkend="whatsnew">What's New section</link> above.
721 What constitutes a <quote>default</quote> configuration has changed,
722 and you may want to review which actions are <quote>on</quote> by
723 default. This is primarily a matter of emphasis, but some features
724 you may have been used to, may now be <quote>off</quote> by default.
725 There are also a number of new actions and filters you may want to
726 consider, most of which are not fully incorporated into the default
727 settings as yet (see above).
734 The default actions setting is now <literal>Cautious</literal>. Previous
735 releases had a default setting of <literal>Medium</literal>. Experienced
736 users may want to adjust this, as it is fairly conservative by &my-app;
737 standards and past practices. See <ulink
738 url="http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default">
739 http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default</ulink>. New users
740 should try the default settings for a while before turning up the volume.
746 The default setting has filtering turned <emphasis>off</emphasis>, which
747 subsequently means that compression is <emphasis>on</emphasis>. Remember
748 that filtering does not work on compressed pages, so if you use, or want to
749 use, filtering, you will need to force compression off. Example:
753 { +<link linkend="filter">filter</link>{google} +<link linkend="prevent-compression">prevent-compression</link> }
757 Or if you use a number of filters, or filter many sites, you may just want
758 to turn off compression for all sites in
759 <filename>default.action</filename> (or
760 <filename>user.action</filename>).
767 Also, <link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> is
768 off by default now. If you've liked this feature in the past, you may want
769 to turn it back on in <filename>user.action</filename> now.
776 Some installers may not automatically start
777 <application>Privoxy</application> after installation.
788 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
789 <sect1 id="quickstart"><title>Quickstart to Using Privoxy</title>
795 Install <application>Privoxy</application>. See the <link
796 linkend="installation">Installation Section</link> below for platform specific
803 Advanced users and those who want to offer <application>Privoxy</application>
804 service to more than just their local machine should check the <link
805 linkend="config">main config file</link>, especially the <link
806 linkend="access-control">security-relevant</link> options. These are
813 Start <application>Privoxy</application>, if the installation program has
814 not done this already (may vary according to platform). See the section
815 <link linkend="startup">Starting <application>Privoxy</application></link>.
821 Set your browser to use <application>Privoxy</application> as HTTP and
822 HTTPS (SSL) <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server">proxy</ulink>
823 by setting the proxy configuration for address of
824 <literal>127.0.0.1</literal> and port <literal>8118</literal>.
825 <emphasis>DO NOT</emphasis> activate proxying for <literal>FTP</literal> or
826 any protocols besides HTTP and HTTPS (SSL) unless you intend to prevent your
827 browser from using these protocols.
833 Flush your browser's disk and memory caches, to remove any cached ad images.
834 If using <application>Privoxy</application> to manage
835 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>,
836 you should remove any currently stored cookies too.
842 A default installation should provide a reasonable starting point for
843 most. There will undoubtedly be occasions where you will want to adjust the
844 configuration, but that can be dealt with as the need arises. Little
845 to no initial configuration is required in most cases, you may want
847 <ulink url="config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">web-based action editor</ulink> though.
848 Be sure to read the warnings first.
851 See the <link linkend="configuration">Configuration section</link> for more
852 configuration options, and how to customize your installation.
853 You might also want to look at the <link
854 linkend="quickstart-ad-blocking">next section</link> for a quick
855 introduction to how <application>Privoxy</application> blocks ads and
862 If you experience ads that slip through, innocent images that are
863 blocked, or otherwise feel the need to fine-tune
864 <application>Privoxy's</application> behavior, take a look at the <link
865 linkend="actions-file">actions files</link>. As a quick start, you might
866 find the <link linkend="act-examples">richly commented examples</link>
867 helpful. You can also view and edit the actions files through the <ulink
868 url="http://config.privoxy.org">web-based user interface</ulink>. The
869 Appendix <quote><link linkend="actionsanat">Troubleshooting: Anatomy of an
870 Action</link></quote> has hints on how to understand and debug actions that
871 <quote>misbehave</quote>.
876 Did anyone test these lately?
880 For easy access to &my-app;'s most important controls, drag the provided
881 <link linkend="bookmarklets">Bookmarklets</link> into your browser's
889 Please see the section <link linkend="contact">Contacting the
890 Developers</link> on how to report bugs, problems with websites or to get
897 Now enjoy surfing with enhanced control, comfort and privacy!
905 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
907 <sect2 id="quickstart-ad-blocking">
908 <title>Quickstart to Ad Blocking</title>
910 NOTE: This section is deliberately redundant for those that don't
911 want to read the whole thing (which is getting lengthy).
914 Ad blocking is but one of <application>Privoxy's</application>
915 array of features. Many of these features are for the technically minded advanced
916 user. But, ad and banner blocking is surely common ground for everybody.
919 This section will provide a quick summary of ad blocking so
920 you can get up to speed quickly without having to read the more extensive
921 information provided below, though this is highly recommended.
924 First a bit of a warning ... blocking ads is much like blocking SPAM: the
925 more aggressive you are about it, the more likely you are to block
926 things that were not intended. And the more likely that some things
927 may not work as intended. So there is a trade off here. If you want
928 extreme ad free browsing, be prepared to deal with more
929 <quote>problem</quote> sites, and to spend more time adjusting the
930 configuration to solve these unintended consequences. In short, there is
931 not an easy way to eliminate <emphasis>all</emphasis> ads. Either take
932 the easy way and settle for <emphasis>most</emphasis> ads blocked with the
933 default configuration, or jump in and tweak it for your personal surfing
934 habits and preferences.
937 Secondly, a brief explanation of <application>Privoxy's </application>
938 <quote>actions</quote>. <quote>Actions</quote> in this context, are
939 the directives we use to tell <application>Privoxy</application> to perform
940 some task relating to HTTP transactions (i.e. web browsing). We tell
941 <application>Privoxy</application> to take some <quote>action</quote>. Each
942 action has a unique name and function. While there are many potential
943 <application>actions</application> in <application>Privoxy's</application>
944 arsenal, only a few are used for ad blocking. <link
945 linkend="actions">Actions</link>, and <link linkend="actions-file">action
946 configuration files</link>, are explained in depth below.
949 Actions are specified in <application>Privoxy's</application> configuration,
950 followed by one or more URLs to which the action should apply. URLs
951 can actually be URL type <link linkend="af-patterns">patterns</link> that use
952 wildcards so they can apply potentially to a range of similar URLs. The
953 actions, together with the URL patterns are called a section.
956 When you connect to a website, the full URL will either match one or more
957 of the sections as defined in <application>Privoxy's</application> configuration,
958 or not. If so, then <application>Privoxy</application> will perform the
959 respective actions. If not, then nothing special happens. Furthermore, web
960 pages may contain embedded, secondary URLs that your web browser will
961 use to load additional components of the page, as it parses the
962 original page's HTML content. An ad image for instance, is just an URL
963 embedded in the page somewhere. The image itself may be on the same server,
964 or a server somewhere else on the Internet. Complex web pages will have many
965 such embedded URLs. &my-app; can deal with each URL individually, so, for
966 instance, the main page text is not touched, but images from such-and-such
971 The most important actions for basic ad blocking are: <literal><link
972 linkend="block">block</link></literal>, <literal><link
973 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal>,
975 linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal>,and
976 <literal><link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>:
984 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> - this is perhaps
985 the single most used action, and is particularly important for ad blocking.
986 This action stops any contact between your browser and any URL patterns
987 that match this action's configuration. It can be used for blocking ads,
988 but also anything that is determined to be unwanted. By itself, it simply
989 stops any communication with the remote server and sends
990 <application>Privoxy</application>'s own built-in BLOCKED page instead to
991 let you now what has happened (with some exceptions, see below).
997 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> -
998 tells <application>Privoxy</application> to treat this URL as an image.
999 <application>Privoxy</application>'s default configuration already does this
1000 for all common image types (e.g. GIF), but there are many situations where this
1001 is not so easy to determine. So we'll force it in these cases. This is particularly
1002 important for ad blocking, since only if we know that it's an image of
1003 some kind, can we replace it with an image of our choosing, instead of the
1004 <application>Privoxy</application> BLOCKED page (which would only result in
1005 a <quote>broken image</quote> icon). There are some limitations to this
1006 though. For instance, you can't just brute-force an image substitution for
1007 an entire HTML page in most situations.
1013 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal> -
1014 sends an empty document instead of <application>Privoxy's</application>
1015 normal BLOCKED HTML page. This is useful for file types that are neither
1016 HTML nor images, such as blocking JavaScript files.
1023 linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal> - tells
1024 <application>Privoxy</application> what to display in place of an ad image that
1025 has hit a block rule. For this to come into play, the URL must match a
1026 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action somewhere in the
1027 configuration, <emphasis>and</emphasis>, it must also match an
1028 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> action.
1031 The configuration options on what to display instead of the ad are:
1035 <emphasis>pattern</emphasis> - a checkerboard pattern, so that an ad
1036 replacement is obvious. This is the default.
1041 <emphasis>blank</emphasis> - A very small empty GIF image is displayed.
1042 This is the so-called <quote>invisible</quote> configuration option.
1047 <emphasis>http://<URL></emphasis> - A redirect to any image anywhere
1048 of the user's choosing (advanced usage).
1057 Advanced users will eventually want to explore &my-app;
1058 <literal><link linkend="filter">filters</link></literal> as well. Filters
1059 are very different from <literal><link
1060 linkend="block">blocks</link></literal>.
1061 A <quote>block</quote> blocks a site, page, or unwanted contented. Filters
1062 are a way of filtering or modifying what is actually on the page. An example
1063 filter usage: a text replacement of <quote>no-no</quote> for
1064 <quote>nasty-word</quote>. That is a very simple example. This process can be
1065 used for ad blocking, but it is more in the realm of advanced usage and has
1066 some pitfalls to be wary off.
1070 The quickest way to adjust any of these settings is with your browser through
1071 the special <application>Privoxy</application> editor at <ulink
1072 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
1073 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/show-status</ulink>). This
1074 is an internal page, and does not require Internet access.
1078 Note that as of <application>Privoxy</application> 3.0.7 beta the
1079 action editor is disabled by default. Check the
1080 <ulink url="config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">enable-edit-actions
1081 section in the configuration file</ulink> to learn why and in which
1082 cases it's safe to enable again.
1086 If you decided to enable the action editor, select the appropriate
1087 <quote>actions</quote> file, and click
1088 <quote><guibutton>Edit</guibutton></quote>. It is best to put personal or
1089 local preferences in <filename>user.action</filename> since this is not
1090 meant to be overwritten during upgrades, and will over-ride the settings in
1091 other files. Here you can insert new <quote>actions</quote>, and URLs for ad
1092 blocking or other purposes, and make other adjustments to the configuration.
1093 <application>Privoxy</application> will detect these changes automatically.
1097 A quick and simple step by step example:
1105 Right click on the ad image to be blocked, then select
1106 <quote><guimenuitem>Copy Link Location</guimenuitem></quote> from the
1114 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
1119 Find <filename>user.action</filename> in the top section, and click
1120 on <quote><guibutton>Edit</guibutton></quote>:
1123 <!-- image of editor and actions files selections -->
1125 <figure pgwide="0" float="0"><title>Actions Files in Use</title>
1128 <imagedata fileref="files-in-use.jpg" format="jpg">
1131 <phrase>[ Screenshot of Actions Files in Use ]</phrase>
1140 You should have a section with only
1141 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> listed under
1142 <quote>Actions:</quote>.
1143 If not, click a <quote><guibutton>Insert new section below</guibutton></quote>
1144 button, and in the new section that just appeared, click the
1145 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> button right under the word <quote>Actions:</quote>.
1146 This will bring up a list of all actions. Find
1147 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> near the top, and click
1148 in the <quote>Enabled</quote> column, then <quote><guibutton>Submit</guibutton></quote>
1149 just below the list.
1154 Now, in the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> actions section,
1155 click the <quote><guibutton>Add</guibutton></quote> button, and paste the URL the
1156 browser got from <quote><guimenuitem>Copy Link Location</guimenuitem></quote>.
1157 Remove the <literal>http://</literal> at the beginning of the URL. Then, click
1158 <quote><guibutton>Submit</guibutton></quote> (or
1159 <quote><guibutton>OK</guibutton></quote> if in a pop-up window).
1164 Now go back to the original page, and press <keycap>SHIFT-Reload</keycap>
1165 (or flush all browser caches). The image should be gone now.
1173 This is a very crude and simple example. There might be good reasons to use a
1174 wildcard pattern match to include potentially similar images from the same
1175 site. For a more extensive explanation of <quote>patterns</quote>, and
1176 the entire actions concept, see <link linkend="actions-file">the Actions
1181 For advanced users who want to hand edit their config files, you might want
1182 to now go to the <link linkend="act-examples">Actions Files Tutorial</link>.
1183 The ideas explained therein also apply to the web-based editor.
1186 There are also various
1187 <link linkend="filter">filters</link> that can be used for ad blocking
1188 (filters are a special subset of actions). These
1189 fall into the <quote>advanced</quote> usage category, and are explained in
1190 depth in later sections.
1197 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1200 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1201 <sect1 id="startup">
1202 <title>Starting Privoxy</title>
1204 Before launching <application>Privoxy</application> for the first time, you
1205 will want to configure your browser(s) to use
1206 <application>Privoxy</application> as a HTTP and HTTPS (SSL)
1207 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server">proxy</ulink>. The default is
1208 127.0.0.1 (or localhost) for the proxy address, and port 8118 (earlier versions
1209 used port 8000). This is the one configuration step <emphasis>that must be done
1213 Please note that <application>Privoxy</application> can only proxy HTTP and
1214 HTTPS traffic. It will not work with FTP or other protocols.
1217 <!-- image of Mozilla Proxy configuration -->
1219 <figure pgwide="0" float="0"><title>Proxy Configuration Showing
1220 Mozilla/Netscape HTTP and HTTPS (SSL) Settings</title>
1223 <imagedata fileref="proxy_setup.jpg" format="jpg">
1226 <phrase>[ Screenshot of Mozilla Proxy Configuration ]</phrase>
1234 With <application>Firefox</application>, this is typically set under:
1238 <guibutton>Tools</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Options</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Advanced</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Network</guibutton> -><guibutton>Connection</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Settings</guibutton>
1243 Or optionally on some platforms:
1247 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Preferences</guibutton> -> <guibutton>General</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Connection Settings</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Manual Proxy Configuration</guibutton>
1253 With <application>Netscape</application> (and
1254 <application>Mozilla</application>), this can be set under:
1259 <!-- Mix ascii and gui art, something for everybody -->
1260 <!-- spacing on this is tricky -->
1261 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Preferences</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Advanced</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Proxies</guibutton> -> <guibutton>HTTP Proxy</guibutton>
1266 For <application>Internet Explorer v.5-7</application>:
1270 <guibutton>Tools</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Internet Options</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Connections</guibutton> -> <guibutton>LAN Settings</guibutton>
1274 Then, check <quote>Use Proxy</quote> and fill in the appropriate info
1275 (Address: 127.0.0.1, Port: 8118). Include HTTPS (SSL), if you want HTTPS
1276 proxy support too (sometimes labeled <quote>Secure</quote>). Make sure any
1277 checkboxes like <quote>Use the same proxy server for all protocols</quote> is
1278 <emphasis>UNCHECKED</emphasis>. You want only HTTP and HTTPS (SSL)!
1281 <!-- image of IE Proxy configuration -->
1283 <figure pgwide="0" float="0"><title>Proxy Configuration Showing
1284 Internet Explorer HTTP and HTTPS (Secure) Settings</title>
1287 <imagedata fileref="proxy2.jpg" format="jpg">
1290 <phrase>[ Screenshot of IE Proxy Configuration ]</phrase>
1298 After doing this, flush your browser's disk and memory caches to force a
1299 re-reading of all pages and to get rid of any ads that may be cached. Remove
1300 any <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>,
1301 if you want <application>Privoxy</application> to manage that. You are now
1302 ready to start enjoying the benefits of using
1303 <application>Privoxy</application>!
1307 <application>Privoxy</application> itself is typically started by specifying the
1308 main configuration file to be used on the command line. If no configuration
1309 file is specified on the command line, <application>Privoxy</application>
1310 will look for a file named <filename>config</filename> in the current
1311 directory. Except on Win32 where it will try <filename>config.txt</filename>.
1314 <sect2 id="start-redhat">
1315 <title>Red Hat and Fedora</title>
1317 A default Red Hat installation may not start &my-app; upon boot. It will use
1318 the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename> as its main configuration
1323 # /etc/rc.d/init.d/privoxy start
1331 # service privoxy start
1336 <sect2 id="start-debian">
1337 <title>Debian</title>
1339 We use a script. Note that Debian typically starts &my-app; upon booting per
1340 default. It will use the file
1341 <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename> as its main configuration
1346 # /etc/init.d/privoxy start
1351 <sect2 id="start-windows">
1352 <title>Windows</title>
1354 Click on the &my-app; Icon to start <application>Privoxy</application>. If no configuration file is
1355 specified on the command line, <application>Privoxy</application> will look
1356 for a file named <filename>config.txt</filename>. Note that Windows will
1357 automatically start &my-app; when the system starts if you chose that option
1361 <application>Privoxy</application> can run with full Windows service functionality.
1362 On Windows only, the &my-app; program has two new command line arguments
1363 to install and uninstall &my-app; as a service. See the
1364 <link linkend="installation-pack-win">Windows Installation
1365 instructions</link> for details.
1369 <sect2 id="start-unices">
1370 <title>Solaris, NetBSD, FreeBSD, HP-UX and others</title>
1372 Example Unix startup command:
1376 # /usr/sbin/privoxy /etc/privoxy/config
1381 <sect2 id="start-os2">
1384 During installation, <application>Privoxy</application> is configured to
1385 start automatically when the system restarts. You can start it manually by
1386 double-clicking on the <application>Privoxy</application> icon in the
1387 <application>Privoxy</application> folder.
1391 <sect2 id="start-macosx">
1392 <title>Mac OS X</title>
1394 After downloading the privoxy software, unzip the downloaded file by
1395 double-clicking on the zip file icon. Then, double-click on the
1396 installer package icon and follow the installation process.
1399 The privoxy service will automatically start after a successful
1400 installation. In addition, the privoxy service will automatically
1401 start every time your computer starts up.
1404 To prevent the privoxy service from automatically starting when your
1405 computer starts up, remove or rename the folder named
1406 /Library/StartupItems/Privoxy.
1409 A simple application named Privoxy Utility has been created which
1410 enables administrators to easily start and stop the privoxy service.
1413 In addition, the Privoxy Utility presents a simple way for
1414 administrators to edit the various privoxy config files. A method
1415 to uninstall the software is also available.
1418 An administrator username and password must be supplied in order for
1419 the Privoxy Utility to perform any of the tasks.
1424 <sect2 id="start-amigaos">
1425 <title>AmigaOS</title>
1427 Start <application>Privoxy</application> (with RUN <>NIL:) in your
1428 <filename>startnet</filename> script (AmiTCP), in
1429 <filename>s:user-startup</filename> (RoadShow), as startup program in your
1430 startup script (Genesis), or as startup action (Miami and MiamiDx).
1431 <application>Privoxy</application> will automatically quit when you quit your
1432 TCP/IP stack (just ignore the harmless warning your TCP/IP stack may display that
1433 <application>Privoxy</application> is still running).
1437 <sect2 id="start-gentoo">
1438 <title>Gentoo</title>
1440 A script is again used. It will use the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config
1441 </filename> as its main configuration file.
1445 /etc/init.d/privoxy start
1449 Note that <application>Privoxy</application> is not automatically started at
1450 boot time by default. You can change this with the <literal>rc-update</literal>
1455 rc-update add privoxy default
1463 See the section <link linkend="cmdoptions">Command line options</link> for
1467 must find a better place for this paragraph
1470 The included default configuration files should give a reasonable starting
1471 point. Most of the per site configuration is done in the
1472 <ulink url="actions-file.html"><quote>actions</quote></ulink> files. These are
1473 where various cookie actions are defined, ad and banner blocking, and other
1474 aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> configuration. There are several
1475 such files included, with varying levels of aggressiveness.
1479 You will probably want to keep an eye out for sites for which you may prefer
1480 persistent cookies, and add these to your actions configuration as needed. By
1481 default, most of these will be accepted only during the current browser
1482 session (aka <quote>session cookies</quote>), unless you add them to the
1483 configuration. If you want the browser to handle this instead, you will need
1484 to edit <filename>user.action</filename> (or through the web based interface)
1485 and disable this feature. If you use more than one browser, it would make
1486 more sense to let <application>Privoxy</application> handle this. In which
1487 case, the browser(s) should be set to accept all cookies.
1491 Another feature where you will probably want to define exceptions for trusted
1492 sites is the popup-killing (through <ulink
1493 url="actions-file.html#FILTER-POPUPS"><quote>+filter{popups}</quote></ulink>),
1494 because your favorite shopping, banking, or leisure site may need
1495 popups (explained below).
1499 <application>Privoxy</application> does not support all of the optional HTTP/1.1
1500 features yet. In the unlikely event that you experience inexplicable problems
1501 with browsers that use HTTP/1.1 per default
1502 (like <application>Mozilla</application> or recent versions of I.E.), you might
1503 try to force HTTP/1.0 compatibility. For Mozilla, look under <literal>Edit ->
1504 Preferences -> Debug -> Networking</literal>.
1505 Alternatively, set the <quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote> config option in
1506 <filename>default.action</filename> which will downgrade your browser's HTTP
1507 requests from HTTP/1.1 to HTTP/1.0 before processing them.
1511 After running <application>Privoxy</application> for a while, you can
1512 start to fine tune the configuration to suit your personal, or site,
1513 preferences and requirements. There are many, many aspects that can
1514 be customized. <quote>Actions</quote>
1515 can be adjusted by pointing your browser to
1516 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
1517 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>),
1518 and then follow the link to <quote>View & Change the Current Configuration</quote>.
1519 (This is an internal page and does not require Internet access.)
1523 In fact, various aspects of <application>Privoxy</application>
1524 configuration can be viewed from this page, including
1525 current configuration parameters, source code version numbers,
1526 the browser's request headers, and <quote>actions</quote> that apply
1527 to a given URL. In addition to the actions file
1528 editor mentioned above, <application>Privoxy</application> can also
1529 be turned <quote>on</quote> and <quote>off</quote> (toggled) from this page.
1533 If you encounter problems, try loading the page without
1534 <application>Privoxy</application>. If that helps, enter the URL where
1535 you have the problems into <ulink url="http://p.p/show-url-info">the browser
1536 based rule tracing utility</ulink>. See which rules apply and why, and
1537 then try turning them off for that site one after the other, until the problem
1538 is gone. When you have found the culprit, you might want to turn the rest on
1543 If the above paragraph sounds gibberish to you, you might want to <link
1544 linkend="actions-file">read more about the actions concept</link>
1545 or even dive deep into the <link linkend="actionsanat">Appendix
1550 If you can't get rid of the problem at all, think you've found a bug in
1551 Privoxy, want to propose a new feature or smarter rules, please see the
1552 section <link linkend="contact"><quote>Contacting the
1553 Developers</quote></link> below.
1558 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1559 <sect2 id="cmdoptions">
1560 <title>Command Line Options</title>
1562 <application>Privoxy</application> may be invoked with the following
1563 command-line options:
1571 <emphasis>--version</emphasis>
1574 Print version info and exit. Unix only.
1579 <emphasis>--help</emphasis>
1582 Print short usage info and exit. Unix only.
1587 <emphasis>--no-daemon</emphasis>
1590 Don't become a daemon, i.e. don't fork and become process group
1591 leader, and don't detach from controlling tty. Unix only.
1596 <emphasis>--pidfile FILE</emphasis>
1599 On startup, write the process ID to <emphasis>FILE</emphasis>. Delete the
1600 <emphasis>FILE</emphasis> on exit. Failure to create or delete the
1601 <emphasis>FILE</emphasis> is non-fatal. If no <emphasis>FILE</emphasis>
1602 option is given, no PID file will be used. Unix only.
1607 <emphasis>--user USER[.GROUP]</emphasis>
1610 After (optionally) writing the PID file, assume the user ID of
1611 <emphasis>USER</emphasis>, and if included the GID of GROUP. Exit if the
1612 privileges are not sufficient to do so. Unix only.
1617 <emphasis>--chroot</emphasis>
1620 Before changing to the user ID given in the <emphasis>--user</emphasis> option,
1621 chroot to that user's home directory, i.e. make the kernel pretend to the &my-app;
1622 process that the directory tree starts there. If set up carefully, this can limit
1623 the impact of possible vulnerabilities in &my-app; to the files contained in that hierarchy.
1629 <emphasis>--pre-chroot-nslookup hostname</emphasis>
1632 Specifies a hostname to look up before doing a chroot. On some systems, initializing the
1633 resolver library involves reading config files from /etc and/or loading additional shared
1634 libraries from /lib. On these systems, doing a hostname lookup before the chroot reduces
1635 the number of files that must be copied into the chroot tree.
1638 For fastest startup speed, a good value is a hostname that is not in /etc/hosts but that
1639 your local name server (listed in /etc/resolv.conf) can resolve without recursion
1640 (that is, without having to ask any other name servers). The hostname need not exist,
1641 but if it doesn't, an error message (which can be ignored) will be output.
1647 <emphasis>configfile</emphasis>
1650 If no <emphasis>configfile</emphasis> is included on the command line,
1651 <application>Privoxy</application> will look for a file named
1652 <quote>config</quote> in the current directory (except on Win32
1653 where it will look for <quote>config.txt</quote> instead). Specify
1654 full path to avoid confusion. If no config file is found,
1655 <application>Privoxy</application> will fail to start.
1663 On <application>MS Windows</application> only there are two additional
1664 command-line options to allow <application>Privoxy</application> to install and
1665 run as a <emphasis>service</emphasis>. See the
1666 <link linkend="installation-pack-win">Window Installation section</link>
1674 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1677 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1678 <sect1 id="configuration"><title>Privoxy Configuration</title>
1680 All <application>Privoxy</application> configuration is stored
1681 in text files. These files can be edited with a text editor.
1682 Many important aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> can
1683 also be controlled easily with a web browser.
1687 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1690 <title>Controlling Privoxy with Your Web Browser</title>
1692 <application>Privoxy</application>'s user interface can be reached through the special
1693 URL <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
1694 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>),
1695 which is a built-in page and works without Internet access.
1696 You will see the following section:
1700 <!-- Needs to be put in a table and colorized -->
1703 <bridgehead renderas="sect2"> Privoxy Menu</bridgehead>
1707 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">View & change the current configuration</ulink>
1710 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-version">View the source code version numbers</ulink>
1713 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-request">View the request headers.</ulink>
1716 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">Look up which actions apply to a URL and why</ulink>
1719 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">Toggle Privoxy on or off</ulink>
1722 ▪ <ulink
1723 url="http://www.privoxy.org/&p-version;/user-manual/">Documentation</ulink>
1731 This should be self-explanatory. Note the first item leads to an editor for the
1732 <link linkend="actions-file">actions files</link>, which is where the ad, banner,
1733 cookie, and URL blocking magic is configured as well as other advanced features of
1734 <application>Privoxy</application>. This is an easy way to adjust various
1735 aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> configuration. The actions
1736 file, and other configuration files, are explained in detail below.
1740 <quote>Toggle Privoxy On or Off</quote> is handy for sites that might
1741 have problems with your current actions and filters. You can in fact use
1742 it as a test to see whether it is <application>Privoxy</application>
1743 causing the problem or not. <application>Privoxy</application> continues
1744 to run as a proxy in this case, but all manipulation is disabled, i.e.
1745 <application>Privoxy</application> acts like a normal forwarding proxy. There
1746 is even a toggle <link linkend="bookmarklets">Bookmarklet</link> offered, so
1747 that you can toggle <application>Privoxy</application> with one click from
1752 Note that several of the features described above are disabled by default
1753 in <application>Privoxy</application> 3.0.7 beta and later.
1755 <ulink url="config.html">configuration file</ulink> to learn why
1756 and in which cases it's safe to enable them again.
1761 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1766 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1768 <sect2 id="confoverview">
1769 <title>Configuration Files Overview</title>
1771 For Unix, *BSD and Linux, all configuration files are located in
1772 <filename>/etc/privoxy/</filename> by default. For MS Windows, OS/2, and
1773 AmigaOS these are all in the same directory as the
1774 <application>Privoxy</application> executable. <![%p-not-stable;[ The name
1775 and number of configuration files has changed from previous versions, and is
1776 subject to change as development progresses.]]>
1780 The installed defaults provide a reasonable starting point, though
1781 some settings may be aggressive by some standards. For the time being, the
1782 principle configuration files are:
1790 The <link linkend="config">main configuration file</link> is named <filename>config</filename>
1791 on Linux, Unix, BSD, OS/2, and AmigaOS and <filename>config.txt</filename>
1792 on Windows. This is a required file.
1798 <filename>default.action</filename> (the main <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link>)
1799 is used to define which <quote>actions</quote> relating to banner-blocking, images, pop-ups,
1800 content modification, cookie handling etc should be applied by default. It also defines many
1801 exceptions (both positive and negative) from this default set of actions that enable
1802 <application>Privoxy</application> to selectively eliminate the junk, and only the junk, on
1803 as many websites as possible.
1806 Multiple actions files may be defined in <filename>config</filename>. These
1807 are processed in the order they are defined. Local customizations and locally
1808 preferred exceptions to the default policies as defined in
1809 <filename>default.action</filename> (which you will most probably want
1810 to define sooner or later) are probably best applied in
1811 <filename>user.action</filename>, where you can preserve them across
1812 upgrades. <filename>standard.action</filename> is only for
1813 <application>Privoxy's</application> internal use.
1816 There is also a web based editor that can be accessed from
1818 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
1820 url="http://p.p/show-status">http://p.p/show-status</ulink>) for the
1821 various actions files.
1827 <quote>Filter files</quote> (the <link linkend="filter-file">filter
1828 file</link>) can be used to re-write the raw page content, including
1829 viewable text as well as embedded HTML and JavaScript, and whatever else
1830 lurks on any given web page. The filtering jobs are only pre-defined here;
1831 whether to apply them or not is up to the actions files.
1832 <filename>default.filter</filename> includes various filters made
1833 available for use by the developers. Some are much more intrusive than
1834 others, and all should be used with caution. You may define additional
1835 filter files in <filename>config</filename> as you can with
1836 actions files. We suggest <filename>user.filter</filename> for any
1837 locally defined filters or customizations.
1845 The syntax of the configuration and filter files may change between different
1846 Privoxy versions, unfortunately some enhancements cost backwards compatibility.
1847 <!-- Add link to documentation-->
1851 All files use the <quote><literal>#</literal></quote> character to denote a
1852 comment (the rest of the line will be ignored) and understand line continuation
1853 through placing a backslash ("<literal>\</literal>") as the very last character
1854 in a line. If the <literal>#</literal> is preceded by a backslash, it looses
1855 its special function. Placing a <literal>#</literal> in front of an otherwise
1856 valid configuration line to prevent it from being interpreted is called "commenting
1857 out" that line. Blank lines are ignored.
1861 The actions files and filter files
1862 can use Perl style <link linkend="regex">regular expressions</link> for
1863 maximum flexibility.
1867 After making any changes, there is no need to restart
1868 <application>Privoxy</application> in order for the changes to take
1869 effect. <application>Privoxy</application> detects such changes
1870 automatically. Note, however, that it may take one or two additional
1871 requests for the change to take effect. When changing the listening address
1872 of <application>Privoxy</application>, these <quote>wake up</quote> requests
1873 must obviously be sent to the <emphasis>old</emphasis> listening address.
1878 While under development, the configuration content is subject to change.
1879 The below documentation may not be accurate by the time you read this.
1880 Also, what constitutes a <quote>default</quote> setting, may change, so
1881 please check all your configuration files on important issues.
1887 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1890 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
1892 <!-- **************************************************** -->
1893 <!-- Include config.sgml here -->
1894 <!-- This is where the entire config file is detailed. -->
1896 <!-- end include -->
1899 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1903 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
1905 <sect1 id="actions-file"><title>Actions Files</title>
1908 The actions files are used to define what <emphasis>actions</emphasis>
1909 <application>Privoxy</application> takes for which URLs, and thus determines
1910 how ad images, cookies and various other aspects of HTTP content and
1911 transactions are handled, and on which sites (or even parts thereof).
1912 There are a number of such actions, with a wide range of functionality.
1913 Each action does something a little different.
1914 These actions give us a veritable arsenal of tools with which to exert
1915 our control, preferences and independence. Actions can be combined so that
1916 their effects are aggregated when applied against a given set of URLs.
1920 are three action files included with <application>Privoxy</application> with
1928 <filename>default.action</filename> - is the primary action file
1929 that sets the initial values for all actions. It is intended to
1930 provide a base level of functionality for
1931 <application>Privoxy's</application> array of features. So it is
1932 a set of broad rules that should work reasonably well as-is for most users.
1933 This is the file that the developers are keeping updated, and <link
1934 linkend="installation-keepupdated">making available to users</link>.
1935 The user's preferences as set in <filename>standard.action</filename>,
1936 e.g. either <literal>Cautious</literal> (the default),
1937 <literal>Medium</literal>, or <literal>Advanced</literal> (see
1943 <filename>user.action</filename> - is intended to be for local site
1944 preferences and exceptions. As an example, if your ISP or your bank
1945 has specific requirements, and need special handling, this kind of
1946 thing should go here. This file will not be upgraded.
1951 <filename>standard.action</filename> - is used only by the web based editor
1952 at <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default">
1953 http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default</ulink>,
1954 to set various pre-defined sets of rules for the default actions section
1955 in <filename>default.action</filename>.
1958 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> <guibutton>Set to Cautious</guibutton> <guibutton>Set to Medium</guibutton> <guibutton>Set to Advanced</guibutton>
1961 These have increasing levels of aggressiveness <emphasis>and have no
1962 influence on your browsing unless you select them explicitly in the
1963 editor</emphasis>. A default installation should be pre-set to
1964 <literal>Cautious</literal> (versions prior to 3.0.5 were set to
1965 <literal>Medium</literal>). New users should try this for a while before
1966 adjusting the settings to more aggressive levels. The more aggressive
1967 the settings, then the more likelihood there is of problems such as sites
1968 not working as they should.
1971 The <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> button allows you to turn each
1972 action on/off individually for fine-tuning. The <guibutton>Cautious</guibutton>
1973 button changes the actions list to low/safe settings which will activate
1974 ad blocking and a minimal set of &my-app;'s features, and subsequently
1975 there will be less of a chance for accidental problems. The
1976 <guibutton>Medium</guibutton> button sets the list to a medium level of
1977 other features and a low level set of privacy features. The
1978 <guibutton>Advanced</guibutton> button sets the list to a high level of
1979 ad blocking and medium level of privacy. See the chart below. The latter
1980 three buttons over-ride any changes via with the
1981 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> button. More fine-tuning can be done in the
1982 lower sections of this internal page.
1985 It is not recommend to edit the <filename>standard.action</filename> file
1989 The default profiles, and their associated actions, as pre-defined in
1990 <filename>standard.action</filename> are:
1993 <table frame=all><title>Default Configurations</title>
1994 <tgroup cols=4 align=left colsep=1 rowsep=1>
1995 <colspec colname=c1>
1996 <colspec colname=c2>
1997 <colspec colname=c3>
1998 <colspec colname=c4>
2001 <entry>Feature</entry>
2002 <entry>Cautious</entry>
2003 <entry>Medium</entry>
2004 <entry>Advanced</entry>
2009 <!-- <entry>f1</entry> -->
2010 <!-- <entry>f2</entry> -->
2011 <!-- <entry>f3</entry> -->
2012 <!-- <entry>f4</entry> -->
2018 <entry>Ad-blocking Aggressiveness</entry>
2019 <entry>medium</entry>
2025 <entry>Ad-filtering by size</entry>
2032 <entry>Ad-filtering by link</entry>
2038 <entry>Pop-up killing</entry>
2039 <entry>blocks only</entry>
2040 <entry>blocks only</entry>
2041 <entry>blocks only</entry>
2045 <entry>Privacy Features</entry>
2047 <entry>medium</entry>
2048 <entry>medium/high</entry>
2052 <entry>Cookie handling</entry>
2054 <entry>session-only</entry>
2059 <entry>Referer forging</entry>
2067 <entry>GIF de-animation</entry>
2075 <entry>Fast redirects</entry>
2082 <entry>HTML taming</entry>
2089 <entry>JavaScript taming</entry>
2096 <entry>Web-bug killing</entry>
2103 <entry>Image tag reordering</entry>
2119 The list of actions files to be used are defined in the main configuration
2120 file, and are processed in the order they are defined (e.g.
2121 <filename>default.action</filename> is typically processed before
2122 <filename>user.action</filename>). The content of these can all be viewed and
2124 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
2125 The over-riding principle when applying actions, is that the last action that
2126 matches a given URL wins. The broadest, most general rules go first
2127 (defined in <filename>default.action</filename>),
2128 followed by any exceptions (typically also in
2129 <filename>default.action</filename>), which are then followed lastly by any
2130 local preferences (typically in <emphasis>user</emphasis><filename>.action</filename>).
2131 Generally, <filename>user.action</filename> has the last word.
2135 An actions file typically has multiple sections. If you want to use
2136 <quote>aliases</quote> in an actions file, you have to place the (optional)
2137 <link linkend="aliases">alias section</link> at the top of that file.
2138 Then comes the default set of rules which will apply universally to all
2139 sites and pages (be <emphasis>very careful</emphasis> with using such a
2140 universal set in <filename>user.action</filename> or any other actions file after
2141 <filename>default.action</filename>, because it will override the result
2142 from consulting any previous file). And then below that,
2143 exceptions to the defined universal policies. You can regard
2144 <filename>user.action</filename> as an appendix to <filename>default.action</filename>,
2145 with the advantage that it is a separate file, which makes preserving your
2146 personal settings across <application>Privoxy</application> upgrades easier.
2150 Actions can be used to block anything you want, including ads, banners, or
2151 just some obnoxious URL whose content you would rather not see. Cookies can be accepted
2152 or rejected, or accepted only during the current browser session (i.e. not
2153 written to disk), content can be modified, some JavaScripts tamed, user-tracking
2154 fooled, and much more. See below for a <link linkend="actions">complete list
2158 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2160 <title>Finding the Right Mix</title>
2162 Note that some <link linkend="actions">actions</link>, like cookie suppression
2163 or script disabling, may render some sites unusable that rely on these
2164 techniques to work properly. Finding the right mix of actions is not always easy and
2165 certainly a matter of personal taste. And, things can always change, requiring
2166 refinements in the configuration. In general, it can be said that the more
2167 <quote>aggressive</quote> your default settings (in the top section of the
2168 actions file) are, the more exceptions for <quote>trusted</quote> sites you
2169 will have to make later. If, for example, you want to crunch all cookies per
2170 default, you'll have to make exceptions from that rule for sites that you
2171 regularly use and that require cookies for actually useful purposes, like maybe
2172 your bank, favorite shop, or newspaper.
2176 We have tried to provide you with reasonable rules to start from in the
2177 distribution actions files. But there is no general rule of thumb on these
2178 things. There just are too many variables, and sites are constantly changing.
2179 Sooner or later you will want to change the rules (and read this chapter again :).
2183 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2185 <title>How to Edit</title>
2187 The easiest way to edit the actions files is with a browser by
2188 using our browser-based editor, which can be reached from <ulink
2189 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
2190 Note: the config file option <link
2191 linkend="enable-edit-actions">enable-edit-actions</link> must be enabled for
2192 this to work. The editor allows both fine-grained control over every single
2193 feature on a per-URL basis, and easy choosing from wholesale sets of defaults
2194 like <quote>Cautious</quote>, <quote>Medium</quote> or
2195 <quote>Advanced</quote>. Warning: the <quote>Advanced</quote> setting is more
2196 aggressive, and will be more likely to cause problems for some sites.
2197 Experienced users only!
2201 If you prefer plain text editing to GUIs, you can of course also directly edit the
2202 the actions files with your favorite text editor. Look at
2203 <filename>default.action</filename> which is richly commented with many
2209 <sect2 id="actions-apply">
2210 <title>How Actions are Applied to Requests</title>
2212 Actions files are divided into sections. There are special sections,
2213 like the <quote><link linkend="aliases">alias</link></quote> sections which will
2214 be discussed later. For now let's concentrate on regular sections: They have a
2215 heading line (often split up to multiple lines for readability) which consist
2216 of a list of actions, separated by whitespace and enclosed in curly braces.
2217 Below that, there is a list of URL and tag patterns, each on a separate line.
2221 To determine which actions apply to a request, the URL of the request is
2222 compared to all URL patterns in each <quote>action file</quote>.
2223 Every time it matches, the list of applicable actions for the request is
2224 incrementally updated, using the heading of the section in which the
2225 pattern is located. The same is done again for tags and tag patterns later on.
2229 If multiple applying sections set the same action differently,
2230 the last match wins. If not, the effects are aggregated.
2231 E.g. a URL might match a regular section with a heading line of <literal>{
2232 +<link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link> }</literal>,
2233 then later another one with just <literal>{
2234 +<link linkend="block">block</link> }</literal>, resulting
2235 in <emphasis>both</emphasis> actions to apply. And there may well be
2236 cases where you will want to combine actions together. Such a section then
2242 { +<literal>handle-as-image</literal> +<literal>block{Banner ads.}</literal> }
2243 # Block these as if they were images. Send no block page.
2245 media.example.com/.*banners
2246 .example.com/images/ads/</screen>
2250 You can trace this process for URL patterns and any given URL by visiting <ulink
2251 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>.
2255 Examples and more detail on this is provided in the Appendix, <link linkend="ACTIONSANAT">
2256 Troubleshooting: Anatomy of an Action</link> section.
2260 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2261 <sect2 id="af-patterns">
2262 <title>Patterns</title>
2264 As mentioned, <application>Privoxy</application> uses <quote>patterns</quote>
2265 to determine what <emphasis>actions</emphasis> might apply to which sites and
2266 pages your browser attempts to access. These <quote>patterns</quote> use wild
2267 card type <emphasis>pattern</emphasis> matching to achieve a high degree of
2268 flexibility. This allows one expression to be expanded and potentially match
2269 against many similar patterns.
2273 Generally, an URL pattern has the form
2274 <literal><domain>/<path></literal>, where both the
2275 <literal><domain></literal> and <literal><path></literal> are
2276 optional. (This is why the special <literal>/</literal> pattern matches all
2277 URLs). Note that the protocol portion of the URL pattern (e.g.
2278 <literal>http://</literal>) should <emphasis>not</emphasis> be included in
2279 the pattern. This is assumed already!
2282 The pattern matching syntax is different for the domain and path parts of
2283 the URL. The domain part uses a simple globbing type matching technique,
2284 while the path part uses more flexible
2285 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
2286 Expressions</quote></ulink> (POSIX 1003.2).
2291 <term><literal>www.example.com/</literal></term>
2294 is a domain-only pattern and will match any request to <literal>www.example.com</literal>,
2295 regardless of which document on that server is requested. So ALL pages in
2296 this domain would be covered by the scope of this action. Note that a
2297 simple <literal>example.com</literal> is different and would NOT match.
2302 <term><literal>www.example.com</literal></term>
2305 means exactly the same. For domain-only patterns, the trailing <literal>/</literal> may
2311 <term><literal>www.example.com/index.html</literal></term>
2314 matches all the documents on <literal>www.example.com</literal>
2315 whose name starts with <literal>/index.html</literal>.
2320 <term><literal>www.example.com/index.html$</literal></term>
2323 matches only the single document <literal>/index.html</literal>
2324 on <literal>www.example.com</literal>.
2329 <term><literal>/index.html$</literal></term>
2332 matches the document <literal>/index.html</literal>, regardless of the domain,
2333 i.e. on <emphasis>any</emphasis> web server anywhere.
2338 <term><literal>index.html</literal></term>
2341 matches nothing, since it would be interpreted as a domain name and
2342 there is no top-level domain called <literal>.html</literal>. So its
2350 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2351 <sect3><title>The Domain Pattern</title>
2354 The matching of the domain part offers some flexible options: if the
2355 domain starts or ends with a dot, it becomes unanchored at that end.
2361 <term><literal>.example.com</literal></term>
2364 matches any domain with first-level domain <literal>com</literal>
2365 and second-level domain <literal>example</literal>.
2366 For example <literal>www.example.com</literal>,
2367 <literal>example.com</literal> and <literal>foo.bar.baz.example.com</literal>.
2368 Note that it wouldn't match if the second-level domain was <literal>another-example</literal>.
2373 <term><literal>www.</literal></term>
2376 matches any domain that <emphasis>STARTS</emphasis> with
2377 <literal>www.</literal> (It also matches the domain
2378 <literal>www</literal> but most of the time that doesn't matter.)
2383 <term><literal>.example.</literal></term>
2386 matches any domain that <emphasis>CONTAINS</emphasis> <literal>.example.</literal>.
2387 And, by the way, also included would be any files or documents that exist
2388 within that domain since no path limitations are specified. (Correctly
2389 speaking: It matches any FQDN that contains <literal>example</literal> as
2390 a domain.) This might be <literal>www.example.com</literal>,
2391 <literal>news.example.de</literal>, or
2392 <literal>www.example.net/cgi/testing.pl</literal> for instance. All these
2400 Additionally, there are wild-cards that you can use in the domain names
2401 themselves. These work similarly to shell globbing type wild-cards:
2402 <quote>*</quote> represents zero or more arbitrary characters (this is
2404 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
2405 Expression</quote></ulink> based syntax of <quote>.*</quote>),
2406 <quote>?</quote> represents any single character (this is equivalent to the
2407 regular expression syntax of a simple <quote>.</quote>), and you can define
2408 <quote>character classes</quote> in square brackets which is similar to
2409 the same regular expression technique. All of this can be freely mixed:
2414 <term><literal>ad*.example.com</literal></term>
2417 matches <quote>adserver.example.com</quote>,
2418 <quote>ads.example.com</quote>, etc but not <quote>sfads.example.com</quote>
2423 <term><literal>*ad*.example.com</literal></term>
2426 matches all of the above, and then some.
2431 <term><literal>.?pix.com</literal></term>
2434 matches <literal>www.ipix.com</literal>,
2435 <literal>pictures.epix.com</literal>, <literal>a.b.c.d.e.upix.com</literal> etc.
2440 <term><literal>www[1-9a-ez].example.c*</literal></term>
2443 matches <literal>www1.example.com</literal>,
2444 <literal>www4.example.cc</literal>, <literal>wwwd.example.cy</literal>,
2445 <literal>wwwz.example.com</literal> etc., but <emphasis>not</emphasis>
2446 <literal>wwww.example.com</literal>.
2453 While flexible, this is not the sophistication of full regular expression based syntax.
2458 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2461 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2462 <sect3><title>The Path Pattern</title>
2465 <application>Privoxy</application> uses <quote>modern</quote> POSIX 1003.2
2466 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
2467 Expressions</quote></ulink> for matching the path portion (after the slash),
2468 and is thus more flexible.
2472 There is an <link linkend="regex">Appendix</link> with a brief quick-start into regular
2473 expressions, you also might want to have a look at your operating system's documentation
2474 on regular expressions (try <literal>man re_format</literal>).
2478 Note that the path pattern is automatically left-anchored at the <quote>/</quote>,
2479 i.e. it matches as if it would start with a <quote>^</quote> (regular expression speak
2480 for the beginning of a line).
2484 Please also note that matching in the path is <emphasis>CASE INSENSITIVE</emphasis>
2485 by default, but you can switch to case sensitive at any point in the pattern by using the
2486 <quote>(?-i)</quote> switch: <literal>www.example.com/(?-i)PaTtErN.*</literal> will match
2487 only documents whose path starts with <literal>PaTtErN</literal> in
2488 <emphasis>exactly</emphasis> this capitalization.
2493 <term><literal>.example.com/.*</literal></term>
2496 Is equivalent to just <quote>.example.com</quote>, since any documents
2497 within that domain are matched with or without the <quote>.*</quote>
2498 regular expression. This is redundant
2503 <term><literal>.example.com/.*/index.html$</literal></term>
2506 Will match any page in the domain of <quote>example.com</quote> that is
2507 named <quote>index.html</quote>, and that is part of some path. For
2508 example, it matches <quote>www.example.com/testing/index.html</quote> but
2509 NOT <quote>www.example.com/index.html</quote> because the regular
2510 expression called for at least two <quote>/'s</quote>, thus the path
2511 requirement. It also would match
2512 <quote>www.example.com/testing/index_html</quote>, because of the
2513 special meta-character <quote>.</quote>.
2518 <term><literal>.example.com/(.*/)?index\.html$</literal></term>
2521 This regular expression is conditional so it will match any page
2522 named <quote>index.html</quote> regardless of path which in this case can
2523 have one or more <quote>/'s</quote>. And this one must contain exactly
2524 <quote>.html</quote> (but does not have to end with that!).
2529 <term><literal>.example.com/(.*/)(ads|banners?|junk)</literal></term>
2532 This regular expression will match any path of <quote>example.com</quote>
2533 that contains any of the words <quote>ads</quote>, <quote>banner</quote>,
2534 <quote>banners</quote> (because of the <quote>?</quote>) or <quote>junk</quote>.
2535 The path does not have to end in these words, just contain them.
2540 <term><literal>.example.com/(.*/)(ads|banners?|junk)/.*\.(jpe?g|gif|png)$</literal></term>
2543 This is very much the same as above, except now it must end in either
2544 <quote>.jpg</quote>, <quote>.jpeg</quote>, <quote>.gif</quote> or <quote>.png</quote>. So this
2545 one is limited to common image formats.
2552 There are many, many good examples to be found in <filename>default.action</filename>,
2553 and more tutorials below in <link linkend="regex">Appendix on regular expressions</link>.
2558 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2561 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2562 <sect3 id="tag-pattern"><title>The Tag Pattern</title>
2565 Tag patterns are used to change the applying actions based on the
2566 request's tags. Tags can be created with either the
2567 <link linkend="CLIENT-HEADER-TAGGER">client-header-tagger</link>
2568 or the <link linkend="SERVER-HEADER-TAGGER">server-header-tagger</link> action.
2572 Tag patterns have to start with <quote>TAG:</quote>, so &my-app;
2573 can tell them apart from URL patterns. Everything after the colon
2574 including white space, is interpreted as a regular expression with
2575 path pattern syntax, except that tag patterns aren't left-anchored
2576 automatically (&my-app; doesn't silently add a <quote>^</quote>,
2577 you have to do it yourself if you need it).
2581 To match all requests that are tagged with <quote>foo</quote>
2582 your pattern line should be <quote>TAG:^foo$</quote>,
2583 <quote>TAG:foo</quote> would work as well, but it would also
2584 match requests whose tags contain <quote>foo</quote> somewhere.
2585 <quote>TAG: foo</quote> wouldn't work as it requires white space.
2589 Sections can contain URL and tag patterns at the same time,
2590 but tag patterns are checked after the URL patterns and thus
2591 always overrule them, even if they are located before the URL patterns.
2595 Once a new tag is added, Privoxy checks right away if it's matched by one
2596 of the tag patterns and updates the action settings accordingly. As a result
2597 tags can be used to activate other tagger actions, as long as these other
2598 taggers look for headers that haven't already be parsed.
2602 For example you could tag client requests which use the
2603 <literal>POST</literal> method,
2604 then use this tag to activate another tagger that adds a tag if cookies
2605 are sent, and then use a block action based on the cookie tag. This allows
2606 the outcome of one action, to be input into a subsequent action. However if
2607 you'd reverse the position of the described taggers, and activated the
2608 method tagger based on the cookie tagger, no method tags would be created.
2609 The method tagger would look for the request line, but at the time
2610 the cookie tag is created, the request line has already been parsed.
2614 While this is a limitation you should be aware of, this kind of
2615 indirection is seldom needed anyway and even the example doesn't
2616 make too much sense.
2623 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2626 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2628 <sect2 id="actions">
2629 <title>Actions</title>
2631 All actions are disabled by default, until they are explicitly enabled
2632 somewhere in an actions file. Actions are turned on if preceded with a
2633 <quote>+</quote>, and turned off if preceded with a <quote>-</quote>. So a
2634 <literal>+action</literal> means <quote>do that action</quote>, e.g.
2635 <literal>+block</literal> means <quote>please block URLs that match the
2636 following patterns</quote>, and <literal>-block</literal> means <quote>don't
2637 block URLs that match the following patterns, even if <literal>+block</literal>
2638 previously applied.</quote>
2643 Again, actions are invoked by placing them on a line, enclosed in curly braces and
2644 separated by whitespace, like in
2645 <literal>{+some-action -some-other-action{some-parameter}}</literal>,
2646 followed by a list of URL patterns, one per line, to which they apply.
2647 Together, the actions line and the following pattern lines make up a section
2648 of the actions file.
2652 Actions fall into three categories:
2659 Boolean, i.e the action can only be <quote>enabled</quote> or
2660 <quote>disabled</quote>. Syntax:
2664 +<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable> # enable action <replaceable class="parameter">name</replaceable>
2665 -<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable> # disable action <replaceable class="parameter">name</replaceable></screen>
2668 Example: <literal>+handle-as-image</literal>
2675 Parameterized, where some value is required in order to enable this type of action.
2680 +<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable>{<replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>} # enable action and set parameter to <replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>,
2681 # overwriting parameter from previous match if necessary
2682 -<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable> # disable action. The parameter can be omitted</screen>
2685 Note that if the URL matches multiple positive forms of a parameterized action,
2686 the last match wins, i.e. the params from earlier matches are simply ignored.
2689 Example: <literal>+hide-user-agent{Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; FreeBSD i386; en-US; rv:1.8.1.4) Gecko/20070602 Firefox/2.0.0.4}</literal>
2695 Multi-value. These look exactly like parameterized actions,
2696 but they behave differently: If the action applies multiple times to the
2697 same URL, but with different parameters, <emphasis>all</emphasis> the parameters
2698 from <emphasis>all</emphasis> matches are remembered. This is used for actions
2699 that can be executed for the same request repeatedly, like adding multiple
2700 headers, or filtering through multiple filters. Syntax:
2704 +<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable>{<replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>} # enable action and add <replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable> to the list of parameters
2705 -<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable>{<replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>} # remove the parameter <replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable> from the list of parameters
2706 # If it was the last one left, disable the action.
2707 <replaceable class="parameter">-name</replaceable> # disable this action completely and remove all parameters from the list</screen>
2710 Examples: <literal>+add-header{X-Fun-Header: Some text}</literal> and
2711 <literal>+filter{html-annoyances}</literal>
2719 If nothing is specified in any actions file, no <quote>actions</quote> are
2720 taken. So in this case <application>Privoxy</application> would just be a
2721 normal, non-blocking, non-filtering proxy. You must specifically enable the
2722 privacy and blocking features you need (although the provided default actions
2723 files will give a good starting point).
2727 Later defined action sections always over-ride earlier ones of the same type.
2728 So exceptions to any rules you make, should come in the latter part of the file (or
2729 in a file that is processed later when using multiple actions files such
2730 as <filename>user.action</filename>). For multi-valued actions, the actions
2731 are applied in the order they are specified. Actions files are processed in
2732 the order they are defined in <filename>config</filename> (the default
2733 installation has three actions files). It also quite possible for any given
2734 URL to match more than one <quote>pattern</quote> (because of wildcards and
2735 regular expressions), and thus to trigger more than one set of actions! Last
2739 <!-- start actions listing -->
2741 The list of valid <application>Privoxy</application> actions are:
2745 <!-- ********************************************************** -->
2746 <!-- Please note the below defined actions use id's that are -->
2747 <!-- probably linked from other places, so please don't change. -->
2749 <!-- ********************************************************** -->
2752 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2754 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="add-header">
2755 <title>add-header</title>
2759 <term>Typical use:</term>
2761 <para>Confuse log analysis, custom applications</para>
2766 <term>Effect:</term>
2769 Sends a user defined HTTP header to the web server.
2776 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
2778 <para>Multi-value.</para>
2783 <term>Parameter:</term>
2786 Any string value is possible. Validity of the defined HTTP headers is not checked.
2787 It is recommended that you use the <quote><literal>X-</literal></quote> prefix
2797 This action may be specified multiple times, in order to define multiple
2798 headers. This is rarely needed for the typical user. If you don't know what
2799 <quote>HTTP headers</quote> are, you definitely don't need to worry about this
2806 <term>Example usage:</term>
2809 <screen>+add-header{X-User-Tracking: sucks}</screen>
2817 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2818 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="block">
2819 <title>block</title>
2823 <term>Typical use:</term>
2825 <para>Block ads or other unwanted content</para>
2830 <term>Effect:</term>
2833 Requests for URLs to which this action applies are blocked, i.e. the
2834 requests are trapped by &my-app; and the requested URL is never retrieved,
2835 but is answered locally with a substitute page or image, as determined by
2837 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal>,
2839 linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>, and
2841 linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal> actions.
2849 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
2851 <para>Parameterized.</para>
2856 <term>Parameter:</term>
2858 <para>A block reason that should be given to the user.</para>
2866 <application>Privoxy</application> sends a special <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page
2867 for requests to blocked pages. This page contains the block reason given as
2868 parameter, a link to find out why the block action applies, and a click-through
2869 to the blocked content (the latter only if the force feature is available and
2873 A very important exception occurs if <emphasis>both</emphasis>
2874 <literal>block</literal> and <literal><link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal>,
2875 apply to the same request: it will then be replaced by an image. If
2876 <literal><link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>
2877 (see below) also applies, the type of image will be determined by its parameter,
2878 if not, the standard checkerboard pattern is sent.
2881 It is important to understand this process, in order
2882 to understand how <application>Privoxy</application> deals with
2883 ads and other unwanted content. Blocking is a core feature, and one
2884 upon which various other features depend.
2887 The <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal>
2888 action can perform a very similar task, by <quote>blocking</quote>
2889 banner images and other content through rewriting the relevant URLs in the
2890 document's HTML source, so they don't get requested in the first place.
2891 Note that this is a totally different technique, and it's easy to confuse the two.
2897 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
2900 <screen>{+block{No nasty stuff for you.}}
2901 # Block and replace with "blocked" page
2902 .nasty-stuff.example.com
2904 {+block{Doubleclick banners.} +handle-as-image}
2905 # Block and replace with image
2909 {+block{Layered ads.} +handle-as-empty-document}
2910 # Block and then ignore
2911 adserver.example.net/.*\.js$</screen>
2921 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2922 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="client-header-filter">
2923 <title>client-header-filter</title>
2927 <term>Typical use:</term>
2930 Rewrite or remove single client headers.
2936 <term>Effect:</term>
2939 All client headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly through
2940 the specified regular expression based substitutions.
2947 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
2949 <para>Parameterized.</para>
2954 <term>Parameter:</term>
2957 The name of a client-header filter, as defined in one of the
2958 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
2967 Client-header filters are applied to each header on its own, not to
2968 all at once. This makes it easier to diagnose problems, but on the downside
2969 you can't write filters that only change header x if header y's value is z.
2970 You can do that by using tags though.
2973 Client-header filters are executed after the other header actions have finished
2974 and use their output as input.
2977 If the request URL gets changed, &my-app; will detect that and use the new
2978 one. This can be used to rewrite the request destination behind the client's
2979 back, for example to specify a Tor exit relay for certain requests.
2982 Please refer to the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file chapter</link>
2983 to learn which client-header filters are available by default, and how to
2991 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
2995 # Hide Tor exit notation in Host and Referer Headers
2996 {+client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}}
3007 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3008 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="client-header-tagger">
3009 <title>client-header-tagger</title>
3013 <term>Typical use:</term>
3016 Block requests based on their headers.
3022 <term>Effect:</term>
3025 Client headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly through
3026 the specified regular expression based substitutions, the result is used as
3034 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3036 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3041 <term>Parameter:</term>
3044 The name of a client-header tagger, as defined in one of the
3045 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
3054 Client-header taggers are applied to each header on its own,
3055 and as the header isn't modified, each tagger <quote>sees</quote>
3059 Client-header taggers are the first actions that are executed
3060 and their tags can be used to control every other action.
3066 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3070 # Tag every request with the User-Agent header
3071 {+client-header-tagger{user-agent}}
3074 # Tagging itself doesn't change the action
3075 # settings, sections with TAG patterns do:
3077 # If it's a download agent, use a different forwarding proxy,
3078 # show the real User-Agent and make sure resume works.
3079 {+forward-override{forward-socks5 10.0.0.2:2222 .} \
3080 -hide-if-modified-since \
3081 -overwrite-last-modified \
3086 TAG:^User-Agent: NetBSD-ftp/
3087 TAG:^User-Agent: Novell ZYPP Installer
3088 TAG:^User-Agent: RPM APT-HTTP/
3089 TAG:^User-Agent: fetch libfetch/
3090 TAG:^User-Agent: Ubuntu APT-HTTP/
3091 TAG:^User-Agent: MPlayer/
3101 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3102 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="content-type-overwrite">
3103 <title>content-type-overwrite</title>
3107 <term>Typical use:</term>
3109 <para>Stop useless download menus from popping up, or change the browser's rendering mode</para>
3114 <term>Effect:</term>
3117 Replaces the <quote>Content-Type:</quote> HTTP server header.
3124 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3126 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3131 <term>Parameter:</term>
3143 The <quote>Content-Type:</quote> HTTP server header is used by the
3144 browser to decide what to do with the document. The value of this
3145 header can cause the browser to open a download menu instead of
3146 displaying the document by itself, even if the document's format is
3147 supported by the browser.
3150 The declared content type can also affect which rendering mode
3151 the browser chooses. If XHTML is delivered as <quote>text/html</quote>,
3152 many browsers treat it as yet another broken HTML document.
3153 If it is send as <quote>application/xml</quote>, browsers with
3154 XHTML support will only display it, if the syntax is correct.
3157 If you see a web site that proudly uses XHTML buttons, but sets
3158 <quote>Content-Type: text/html</quote>, you can use &my-app;
3159 to overwrite it with <quote>application/xml</quote> and validate
3160 the web master's claim inside your XHTML-supporting browser.
3161 If the syntax is incorrect, the browser will complain loudly.
3164 You can also go the opposite direction: if your browser prints
3165 error messages instead of rendering a document falsely declared
3166 as XHTML, you can overwrite the content type with
3167 <quote>text/html</quote> and have it rendered as broken HTML document.
3170 By default <literal>content-type-overwrite</literal> only replaces
3171 <quote>Content-Type:</quote> headers that look like some kind of text.
3172 If you want to overwrite it unconditionally, you have to combine it with
3173 <literal><link linkend="force-text-mode">force-text-mode</link></literal>.
3174 This limitation exists for a reason, think twice before circumventing it.
3177 Most of the time it's easier to replace this action with a custom
3178 <literal><link linkend="server-header-filter">server-header filter</link></literal>.
3179 It allows you to activate it for every document of a certain site and it will still
3180 only replace the content types you aimed at.
3183 Of course you can apply <literal>content-type-overwrite</literal>
3184 to a whole site and then make URL based exceptions, but it's a lot
3185 more work to get the same precision.
3191 <term>Example usage (sections):</term>
3194 <screen># Check if www.example.net/ really uses valid XHTML
3195 { +content-type-overwrite{application/xml} }
3198 # but leave the content type unmodified if the URL looks like a style sheet
3199 {-content-type-overwrite}
3200 www.example.net/.*\.css$
3201 www.example.net/.*style
3210 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3211 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-client-header">
3215 <title>crunch-client-header</title>
3219 <term>Typical use:</term>
3221 <para>Remove a client header <application>Privoxy</application> has no dedicated action for.</para>
3226 <term>Effect:</term>
3229 Deletes every header sent by the client that contains the string the user supplied as parameter.
3236 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3238 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3243 <term>Parameter:</term>
3255 This action allows you to block client headers for which no dedicated
3256 <application>Privoxy</application> action exists.
3257 <application>Privoxy</application> will remove every client header that
3258 contains the string you supplied as parameter.
3261 Regular expressions are <emphasis>not supported</emphasis> and you can't
3262 use this action to block different headers in the same request, unless
3263 they contain the same string.
3266 <literal>crunch-client-header</literal> is only meant for quick tests.
3267 If you have to block several different headers, or only want to modify
3268 parts of them, you should use a
3269 <literal><link linkend="client-header-filter">client-header filter</link></literal>.
3273 Don't block any header without understanding the consequences.
3280 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3283 <screen># Block the non-existent "Privacy-Violation:" client header
3284 { +crunch-client-header{Privacy-Violation:} }
3294 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3295 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-if-none-match">
3296 <title>crunch-if-none-match</title>
3302 <term>Typical use:</term>
3304 <para>Prevent yet another way to track the user's steps between sessions.</para>
3309 <term>Effect:</term>
3312 Deletes the <quote>If-None-Match:</quote> HTTP client header.
3319 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3321 <para>Boolean.</para>
3326 <term>Parameter:</term>
3338 Removing the <quote>If-None-Match:</quote> HTTP client header
3339 is useful for filter testing, where you want to force a real
3340 reload instead of getting status code <quote>304</quote> which
3341 would cause the browser to use a cached copy of the page.
3344 It is also useful to make sure the header isn't used as a cookie
3345 replacement (unlikely but possible).
3348 Blocking the <quote>If-None-Match:</quote> header shouldn't cause any
3349 caching problems, as long as the <quote>If-Modified-Since:</quote> header
3350 isn't blocked or missing as well.
3353 It is recommended to use this action together with
3354 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hide-if-modified-since</link></literal>
3356 <literal><link linkend="overwrite-last-modified">overwrite-last-modified</link></literal>.
3362 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3365 <screen># Let the browser revalidate cached documents but don't
3366 # allow the server to use the revalidation headers for user tracking.
3367 {+hide-if-modified-since{-60} \
3368 +overwrite-last-modified{randomize} \
3369 +crunch-if-none-match}
3378 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3379 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-incoming-cookies">
3380 <title>crunch-incoming-cookies</title>
3384 <term>Typical use:</term>
3387 Prevent the web server from setting HTTP cookies on your system
3393 <term>Effect:</term>
3396 Deletes any <quote>Set-Cookie:</quote> HTTP headers from server replies.
3403 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3405 <para>Boolean.</para>
3410 <term>Parameter:</term>
3422 This action is only concerned with <emphasis>incoming</emphasis> HTTP cookies. For
3423 <emphasis>outgoing</emphasis> HTTP cookies, use
3424 <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal>.
3425 Use <emphasis>both</emphasis> to disable HTTP cookies completely.
3428 It makes <emphasis>no sense at all</emphasis> to use this action in conjunction
3429 with the <literal><link linkend="session-cookies-only">session-cookies-only</link></literal> action,
3430 since it would prevent the session cookies from being set. See also
3431 <literal><link linkend="filter-content-cookies">filter-content-cookies</link></literal>.
3437 <term>Example usage:</term>
3440 <screen>+crunch-incoming-cookies</screen>
3448 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3449 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-server-header">
3450 <title>crunch-server-header</title>
3456 <term>Typical use:</term>
3458 <para>Remove a server header <application>Privoxy</application> has no dedicated action for.</para>
3463 <term>Effect:</term>
3466 Deletes every header sent by the server that contains the string the user supplied as parameter.
3473 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3475 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3480 <term>Parameter:</term>
3492 This action allows you to block server headers for which no dedicated
3493 <application>Privoxy</application> action exists. <application>Privoxy</application>
3494 will remove every server header that contains the string you supplied as parameter.
3497 Regular expressions are <emphasis>not supported</emphasis> and you can't
3498 use this action to block different headers in the same request, unless
3499 they contain the same string.
3502 <literal>crunch-server-header</literal> is only meant for quick tests.
3503 If you have to block several different headers, or only want to modify
3504 parts of them, you should use a custom
3505 <literal><link linkend="server-header-filter">server-header filter</link></literal>.
3509 Don't block any header without understanding the consequences.
3516 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3519 <screen># Crunch server headers that try to prevent caching
3520 { +crunch-server-header{no-cache} }
3529 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3530 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-outgoing-cookies">
3531 <title>crunch-outgoing-cookies</title>
3535 <term>Typical use:</term>
3538 Prevent the web server from reading any HTTP cookies from your system
3544 <term>Effect:</term>
3547 Deletes any <quote>Cookie:</quote> HTTP headers from client requests.
3554 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3556 <para>Boolean.</para>
3561 <term>Parameter:</term>
3573 This action is only concerned with <emphasis>outgoing</emphasis> HTTP cookies. For
3574 <emphasis>incoming</emphasis> HTTP cookies, use
3575 <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal>.
3576 Use <emphasis>both</emphasis> to disable HTTP cookies completely.
3579 It makes <emphasis>no sense at all</emphasis> to use this action in conjunction
3580 with the <literal><link linkend="session-cookies-only">session-cookies-only</link></literal> action,
3581 since it would prevent the session cookies from being read.
3587 <term>Example usage:</term>
3590 <screen>+crunch-outgoing-cookies</screen>
3599 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3600 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="deanimate-gifs">
3601 <title>deanimate-gifs</title>
3605 <term>Typical use:</term>
3607 <para>Stop those annoying, distracting animated GIF images.</para>
3612 <term>Effect:</term>
3615 De-animate GIF animations, i.e. reduce them to their first or last image.
3622 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3624 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3629 <term>Parameter:</term>
3632 <quote>last</quote> or <quote>first</quote>
3641 This will also shrink the images considerably (in bytes, not pixels!). If
3642 the option <quote>first</quote> is given, the first frame of the animation
3643 is used as the replacement. If <quote>last</quote> is given, the last
3644 frame of the animation is used instead, which probably makes more sense for
3645 most banner animations, but also has the risk of not showing the entire
3646 last frame (if it is only a delta to an earlier frame).
3649 You can safely use this action with patterns that will also match non-GIF
3650 objects, because no attempt will be made at anything that doesn't look like
3657 <term>Example usage:</term>
3660 <screen>+deanimate-gifs{last}</screen>
3667 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3668 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="downgrade-http-version">
3669 <title>downgrade-http-version</title>
3673 <term>Typical use:</term>
3675 <para>Work around (very rare) problems with HTTP/1.1</para>
3680 <term>Effect:</term>
3683 Downgrades HTTP/1.1 client requests and server replies to HTTP/1.0.
3690 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3692 <para>Boolean.</para>
3697 <term>Parameter:</term>
3709 This is a left-over from the time when <application>Privoxy</application>
3710 didn't support important HTTP/1.1 features well. It is left here for the
3711 unlikely case that you experience HTTP/1.1 related problems with some server
3712 out there. Not all HTTP/1.1 features and requirements are supported yet,
3713 so there is a chance you might need this action.
3719 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3722 <screen>{+downgrade-http-version}
3723 problem-host.example.com</screen>
3731 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3732 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="fast-redirects">
3733 <title>fast-redirects</title>
3737 <term>Typical use:</term>
3739 <para>Fool some click-tracking scripts and speed up indirect links.</para>
3744 <term>Effect:</term>
3747 Detects redirection URLs and redirects the browser without contacting
3748 the redirection server first.
3755 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3757 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3762 <term>Parameter:</term>
3767 <quote>simple-check</quote> to just search for the string <quote>http://</quote>
3768 to detect redirection URLs.
3773 <quote>check-decoded-url</quote> to decode URLs (if necessary) before searching
3774 for redirection URLs.
3785 Many sites, like yahoo.com, don't just link to other sites. Instead, they
3786 will link to some script on their own servers, giving the destination as a
3787 parameter, which will then redirect you to the final target. URLs
3788 resulting from this scheme typically look like:
3789 <quote>http://www.example.org/click-tracker.cgi?target=http%3a//www.example.net/</quote>.
3792 Sometimes, there are even multiple consecutive redirects encoded in the
3793 URL. These redirections via scripts make your web browsing more traceable,
3794 since the server from which you follow such a link can see where you go
3795 to. Apart from that, valuable bandwidth and time is wasted, while your
3796 browser asks the server for one redirect after the other. Plus, it feeds
3800 This feature is currently not very smart and is scheduled for improvement.
3801 If it is enabled by default, you will have to create some exceptions to
3802 this action. It can lead to failures in several ways:
3805 Not every URLs with other URLs as parameters is evil.
3806 Some sites offer a real service that requires this information to work.
3807 For example a validation service needs to know, which document to validate.
3808 <literal>fast-redirects</literal> assumes that every URL parameter that
3809 looks like another URL is a redirection target, and will always redirect to
3810 the last one. Most of the time the assumption is correct, but if it isn't,
3811 the user gets redirected anyway.
3814 Another failure occurs if the URL contains other parameters after the URL parameter.
3816 <quote>http://www.example.org/?redirect=http%3a//www.example.net/&foo=bar</quote>.
3817 contains the redirection URL <quote>http://www.example.net/</quote>,
3818 followed by another parameter. <literal>fast-redirects</literal> doesn't know that
3819 and will cause a redirect to <quote>http://www.example.net/&foo=bar</quote>.
3820 Depending on the target server configuration, the parameter will be silently ignored
3821 or lead to a <quote>page not found</quote> error. You can prevent this problem by
3822 first using the <literal><link linkend="redirect">redirect</link></literal> action
3823 to remove the last part of the URL, but it requires a little effort.
3826 To detect a redirection URL, <literal>fast-redirects</literal> only
3827 looks for the string <quote>http://</quote>, either in plain text
3828 (invalid but often used) or encoded as <quote>http%3a//</quote>.
3829 Some sites use their own URL encoding scheme, encrypt the address
3830 of the target server or replace it with a database id. In theses cases
3831 <literal>fast-redirects</literal> is fooled and the request reaches the
3832 redirection server where it probably gets logged.
3838 <term>Example usage:</term>
3842 { +fast-redirects{simple-check} }
3845 { +fast-redirects{check-decoded-url} }
3846 another.example.com/testing</screen>
3855 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3856 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="filter">
3857 <title>filter</title>
3861 <term>Typical use:</term>
3863 <para>Get rid of HTML and JavaScript annoyances, banner advertisements (by size),
3864 do fun text replacements, add personalized effects, etc.</para>
3869 <term>Effect:</term>
3872 All instances of text-based type, most notably HTML and JavaScript, to which
3873 this action applies, can be filtered on-the-fly through the specified regular
3874 expression based substitutions. (Note: as of version 3.0.3 plain text documents
3875 are exempted from filtering, because web servers often use the
3876 <literal>text/plain</literal> MIME type for all files whose type they don't know.)
3883 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3885 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3890 <term>Parameter:</term>
3893 The name of a content filter, as defined in the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file</link>.
3894 Filters can be defined in one or more files as defined by the
3895 <literal><link linkend="filterfile">filterfile</link></literal>
3896 option in the <link linkend="config">config file</link>.
3897 <filename>default.filter</filename> is the collection of filters
3898 supplied by the developers. Locally defined filters should go
3899 in their own file, such as <filename>user.filter</filename>.
3902 When used in its negative form,
3903 and without parameters, <emphasis>all</emphasis> filtering is completely disabled.
3912 For your convenience, there are a number of pre-defined filters available
3913 in the distribution filter file that you can use. See the examples below for
3917 Filtering requires buffering the page content, which may appear to
3918 slow down page rendering since nothing is displayed until all content has
3919 passed the filters. (It does not really take longer, but seems that way
3920 since the page is not incrementally displayed.) This effect will be more
3921 noticeable on slower connections.
3924 <quote>Rolling your own</quote>
3925 filters requires a knowledge of
3926 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
3927 Expressions</quote></ulink> and
3928 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Html"><quote>HTML</quote></ulink>.
3929 This is very powerful feature, and potentially very intrusive.
3930 Filters should be used with caution, and where an equivalent
3931 <quote>action</quote> is not available.
3934 The amount of data that can be filtered is limited to the
3935 <literal><link linkend="buffer-limit">buffer-limit</link></literal>
3936 option in the main <link linkend="config">config file</link>. The
3937 default is 4096 KB (4 Megs). Once this limit is exceeded, the buffered
3938 data, and all pending data, is passed through unfiltered.
3941 Inappropriate MIME types, such as zipped files, are not filtered at all.
3942 (Again, only text-based types except plain text). Encrypted SSL data
3943 (from HTTPS servers) cannot be filtered either, since this would violate
3944 the integrity of the secure transaction. In some situations it might
3945 be necessary to protect certain text, like source code, from filtering
3946 by defining appropriate <literal>-filter</literal> exceptions.
3949 Compressed content can't be filtered either, unless &my-app;
3950 is compiled with zlib support (requires at least &my-app; 3.0.7),
3951 in which case &my-app; will decompress the content before filtering
3955 If you use a &my-app; version without zlib support, but want filtering to work on
3956 as much documents as possible, even those that would normally be sent compressed,
3957 you must use the <literal><link linkend="prevent-compression">prevent-compression</link></literal>
3958 action in conjunction with <literal>filter</literal>.
3961 Content filtering can achieve some of the same effects as the
3962 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>
3963 action, i.e. it can be used to block ads and banners. But the mechanism
3964 works quite differently. One effective use, is to block ad banners
3965 based on their size (see below), since many of these seem to be somewhat
3969 <link linkend="contact">Feedback</link> with suggestions for new or
3970 improved filters is particularly welcome!
3973 The below list has only the names and a one-line description of each
3974 predefined filter. There are <link linkend="predefined-filters">more
3975 verbose explanations</link> of what these filters do in the <link
3976 linkend="filter-file">filter file chapter</link>.
3982 <term>Example usage (with filters from the distribution <filename>default.filter</filename> file).
3983 See <link linkend="PREDEFINED-FILTERS">the Predefined Filters section</link> for
3984 more explanation on each:</term>
3987 <anchor id="filter-js-annoyances">
3988 <screen>+filter{js-annoyances} # Get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse.</screen>
3991 <anchor id="filter-js-events">
3992 <screen>+filter{js-events} # Kill all JS event bindings and timers (Radically destructive! Only for extra nasty sites).</screen>
3995 <anchor id="filter-html-annoyances">
3996 <screen>+filter{html-annoyances} # Get rid of particularly annoying HTML abuse.</screen>
3999 <anchor id="filter-content-cookies">
4000 <screen>+filter{content-cookies} # Kill cookies that come in the HTML or JS content.</screen>
4003 <anchor id="filter-refresh-tags">
4004 <screen>+filter{refresh-tags} # Kill automatic refresh tags (for dial-on-demand setups).</screen>
4007 <anchor id="filter-unsolicited-popups">
4008 <screen>+filter{unsolicited-popups} # Disable only unsolicited pop-up windows. Useful if your browser lacks this ability.</screen>
4011 <anchor id="filter-all-popups">
4012 <screen>+filter{all-popups} # Kill all popups in JavaScript and HTML. Useful if your browser lacks this ability.</screen>
4015 <anchor id="filter-img-reorder">
4016 <screen>+filter{img-reorder} # Reorder attributes in <img> tags to make the banners-by-* filters more effective.</screen>
4019 <anchor id="filter-banners-by-size">
4020 <screen>+filter{banners-by-size} # Kill banners by size.</screen>
4023 <anchor id="filter-banners-by-link">
4024 <screen>+filter{banners-by-link} # Kill banners by their links to known clicktrackers.</screen>
4027 <anchor id="filter-webbugs">
4028 <screen>+filter{webbugs} # Squish WebBugs (1x1 invisible GIFs used for user tracking).</screen>
4031 <anchor id="filter-tiny-textforms">
4032 <screen>+filter{tiny-textforms} # Extend those tiny textareas up to 40x80 and kill the hard wrap.</screen>
4035 <anchor id="filter-jumping-windows">
4036 <screen>+filter{jumping-windows} # Prevent windows from resizing and moving themselves.</screen>
4039 <anchor id="filter-frameset-borders">
4040 <screen>+filter{frameset-borders} # Give frames a border and make them resizable.</screen>
4043 <anchor id="filter-demoronizer">
4044 <screen>+filter{demoronizer} # Fix MS's non-standard use of standard charsets.</screen>
4047 <anchor id="filter-shockwave-flash">
4048 <screen>+filter{shockwave-flash} # Kill embedded Shockwave Flash objects.</screen>
4051 <anchor id="filter-quicktime-kioskmode">
4052 <screen>+filter{quicktime-kioskmode} # Make Quicktime movies saveable.</screen>
4055 <anchor id="filter-fun">
4056 <screen>+filter{fun} # Text replacements for subversive browsing fun!</screen>
4059 <anchor id="filter-crude-parental">
4060 <screen>+filter{crude-parental} # Crude parental filtering. Note that this filter doesn't work reliably.</screen>
4063 <anchor id="filter-ie-exploits">
4064 <screen>+filter{ie-exploits} # Disable some known Internet Explorer bug exploits.</screen>
4067 <anchor id="filter-site-specifics">
4068 <screen>+filter{site-specifics} # Cure for site-specific problems. Don't apply generally!</screen>
4071 <anchor id="filter-no-ping">
4072 <screen>+filter{no-ping} # Removes non-standard ping attributes in <a> and <area> tags.</screen>
4075 <anchor id="filter-google">
4076 <screen>+filter{google} # CSS-based block for Google text ads. Also removes a width limitation and the toolbar advertisement.</screen>
4079 <anchor id="filter-yahoo">
4080 <screen>+filter{yahoo} # CSS-based block for Yahoo text ads. Also removes a width limitation.</screen>
4083 <anchor id="filter-msn">
4084 <screen>+filter{msn} # CSS-based block for MSN text ads. Also removes tracking URLs and a width limitation.</screen>
4087 <anchor id="filter-blogspot">
4088 <screen>+filter{blogspot} # Cleans up some Blogspot blogs. Read the fine print before using this.</screen>
4096 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4097 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="force-text-mode">
4098 <title>force-text-mode</title>
4104 <term>Typical use:</term>
4106 <para>Force <application>Privoxy</application> to treat a document as if it was in some kind of <emphasis>text</emphasis> format. </para>
4111 <term>Effect:</term>
4114 Declares a document as text, even if the <quote>Content-Type:</quote> isn't detected as such.
4121 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4123 <para>Boolean.</para>
4128 <term>Parameter:</term>
4140 As explained <literal><link linkend="filter">above</link></literal>,
4141 <application>Privoxy</application> tries to only filter files that are
4142 in some kind of text format. The same restrictions apply to
4143 <literal><link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite</link></literal>.
4144 <literal>force-text-mode</literal> declares a document as text,
4145 without looking at the <quote>Content-Type:</quote> first.
4149 Think twice before activating this action. Filtering binary data
4150 with regular expressions can cause file damage.
4157 <term>Example usage:</term>
4170 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4171 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="forward-override">
4172 <title>forward-override</title>
4178 <term>Typical use:</term>
4180 <para>Change the forwarding settings based on User-Agent or request origin</para>
4185 <term>Effect:</term>
4188 Overrules the forward directives in the configuration file.
4195 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4197 <para>Multi-value.</para>
4202 <term>Parameter:</term>
4206 <para><quote>forward .</quote> to use a direct connection without any additional proxies.</para>
4210 <quote>forward 127.0.0.1:8123</quote> to use the HTTP proxy listening at 127.0.0.1 port 8123.
4215 <quote>forward-socks4a 127.0.0.1:9050 .</quote> to use the socks4a proxy listening at
4216 127.0.0.1 port 9050. Replace <quote>forward-socks4a</quote> with <quote>forward-socks4</quote>
4217 to use a socks4 connection (with local DNS resolution) instead, use <quote>forward-socks5</quote>
4218 for socks5 connections (with remote DNS resolution).
4223 <quote>forward-socks4a 127.0.0.1:9050 proxy.example.org:8000</quote> to use the socks4a proxy
4224 listening at 127.0.0.1 port 9050 to reach the HTTP proxy listening at proxy.example.org port 8000.
4225 Replace <quote>forward-socks4a</quote> with <quote>forward-socks4</quote> to use a socks4 connection
4226 (with local DNS resolution) instead, use <quote>forward-socks5</quote>
4227 for socks5 connections (with remote DNS resolution).
4238 This action takes parameters similar to the
4239 <link linkend="forwarding">forward</link> directives in the configuration
4240 file, but without the URL pattern. It can be used as replacement, but normally it's only
4241 used in cases where matching based on the request URL isn't sufficient.
4245 Please read the description for the <link linkend="forwarding">forward</link> directives before
4246 using this action. Forwarding to the wrong people will reduce your privacy and increase the
4247 chances of man-in-the-middle attacks.
4250 If the ports are missing or invalid, default values will be used. This might change
4251 in the future and you shouldn't rely on it. Otherwise incorrect syntax causes Privoxy
4255 Use the <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">show-url-info CGI page</ulink>
4256 to verify that your forward settings do what you thought the do.
4263 <term>Example usage:</term>
4267 # Always use direct connections for requests previously tagged as
4268 # <quote>User-Agent: fetch libfetch/2.0</quote> and make sure
4269 # resuming downloads continues to work.
4270 # This way you can continue to use Tor for your normal browsing,
4271 # without overloading the Tor network with your FreeBSD ports updates
4272 # or downloads of bigger files like ISOs.
4273 # Note that HTTP headers are easy to fake and therefore their
4274 # values are as (un)trustworthy as your clients and users.
4275 {+forward-override{forward .} \
4276 -hide-if-modified-since \
4277 -overwrite-last-modified \
4279 TAG:^User-Agent: fetch libfetch/2\.0$
4288 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4289 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="handle-as-empty-document">
4290 <title>handle-as-empty-document</title>
4296 <term>Typical use:</term>
4298 <para>Mark URLs that should be replaced by empty documents <emphasis>if they get blocked</emphasis></para>
4303 <term>Effect:</term>
4306 This action alone doesn't do anything noticeable. It just marks URLs.
4307 If the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action <emphasis>also applies</emphasis>,
4308 the presence or absence of this mark decides whether an HTML <quote>BLOCKED</quote>
4309 page, or an empty document will be sent to the client as a substitute for the blocked content.
4310 The <emphasis>empty</emphasis> document isn't literally empty, but actually contains a single space.
4317 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4319 <para>Boolean.</para>
4324 <term>Parameter:</term>
4336 Some browsers complain about syntax errors if JavaScript documents
4337 are blocked with <application>Privoxy's</application>
4338 default HTML page; this option can be used to silence them.
4339 And of course this action can also be used to eliminate the &my-app;
4340 BLOCKED message in frames.
4343 The content type for the empty document can be specified with
4344 <literal><link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite{}</link></literal>,
4345 but usually this isn't necessary.
4351 <term>Example usage:</term>
4354 <screen># Block all documents on example.org that end with ".js",
4355 # but send an empty document instead of the usual HTML message.
4356 {+block{Blocked JavaScript} +handle-as-empty-document}
4366 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4367 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="handle-as-image">
4368 <title>handle-as-image</title>
4372 <term>Typical use:</term>
4374 <para>Mark URLs as belonging to images (so they'll be replaced by images <emphasis>if they do get blocked</emphasis>, rather than HTML pages)</para>
4379 <term>Effect:</term>
4382 This action alone doesn't do anything noticeable. It just marks URLs as images.
4383 If the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action <emphasis>also applies</emphasis>,
4384 the presence or absence of this mark decides whether an HTML <quote>blocked</quote>
4385 page, or a replacement image (as determined by the <literal><link
4386 linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal> action) will be sent to the
4387 client as a substitute for the blocked content.
4394 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4396 <para>Boolean.</para>
4401 <term>Parameter:</term>
4413 The below generic example section is actually part of <filename>default.action</filename>.
4414 It marks all URLs with well-known image file name extensions as images and should
4418 Users will probably only want to use the handle-as-image action in conjunction with
4419 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>, to block sources of banners, whose URLs don't
4420 reflect the file type, like in the second example section.
4423 Note that you cannot treat HTML pages as images in most cases. For instance, (in-line) ad
4424 frames require an HTML page to be sent, or they won't display properly.
4425 Forcing <literal>handle-as-image</literal> in this situation will not replace the
4426 ad frame with an image, but lead to error messages.
4432 <term>Example usage (sections):</term>
4435 <screen># Generic image extensions:
4438 /.*\.(gif|jpg|jpeg|png|bmp|ico)$
4440 # These don't look like images, but they're banners and should be
4441 # blocked as images:
4443 {+block{Nasty banners.} +handle-as-image}
4444 nasty-banner-server.example.com/junk.cgi\?output=trash
4453 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4454 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-accept-language">
4455 <title>hide-accept-language</title>
4461 <term>Typical use:</term>
4463 <para>Pretend to use different language settings.</para>
4468 <term>Effect:</term>
4471 Deletes or replaces the <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> HTTP header in client requests.
4478 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4480 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4485 <term>Parameter:</term>
4488 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
4497 Faking the browser's language settings can be useful to make a
4498 foreign User-Agent set with
4499 <literal><link linkend="hide-user-agent">hide-user-agent</link></literal>
4503 However some sites with content in different languages check the
4504 <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> to decide which one to take by default.
4505 Sometimes it isn't possible to later switch to another language without
4506 changing the <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> header first.
4509 Therefore it's a good idea to either only change the
4510 <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> header to languages you understand,
4511 or to languages that aren't wide spread.
4514 Before setting the <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> header
4515 to a rare language, you should consider that it helps to
4516 make your requests unique and thus easier to trace.
4517 If you don't plan to change this header frequently,
4518 you should stick to a common language.
4524 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
4527 <screen># Pretend to use Canadian language settings.
4528 {+hide-accept-language{en-ca} \
4529 +hide-user-agent{Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; OpenBSD i386; en-CA; rv:1.8.0.4) Gecko/20060628 Firefox/1.5.0.4} \
4539 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4540 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-content-disposition">
4541 <title>hide-content-disposition</title>
4547 <term>Typical use:</term>
4549 <para>Prevent download menus for content you prefer to view inside the browser.</para>
4554 <term>Effect:</term>
4557 Deletes or replaces the <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> HTTP header set by some servers.
4564 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4566 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4571 <term>Parameter:</term>
4574 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
4583 Some servers set the <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> HTTP header for
4584 documents they assume you want to save locally before viewing them.
4585 The <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> header contains the file name
4586 the browser is supposed to use by default.
4589 In most browsers that understand this header, it makes it impossible to
4590 <emphasis>just view</emphasis> the document, without downloading it first,
4591 even if it's just a simple text file or an image.
4594 Removing the <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> header helps
4595 to prevent this annoyance, but some browsers additionally check the
4596 <quote>Content-Type:</quote> header, before they decide if they can
4597 display a document without saving it first. In these cases, you have
4598 to change this header as well, before the browser stops displaying
4602 It is also possible to change the server's file name suggestion
4603 to another one, but in most cases it isn't worth the time to set
4607 This action will probably be removed in the future,
4608 use server-header filters instead.
4614 <term>Example usage:</term>
4617 <screen># Disarm the download link in Sourceforge's patch tracker
4619 +content-type-overwrite{text/plain}\
4620 +hide-content-disposition{block} }
4621 .sourceforge.net/tracker/download\.php</screen>
4629 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4630 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-if-modified-since">
4631 <title>hide-if-modified-since</title>
4637 <term>Typical use:</term>
4639 <para>Prevent yet another way to track the user's steps between sessions.</para>
4644 <term>Effect:</term>
4647 Deletes the <quote>If-Modified-Since:</quote> HTTP client header or modifies its value.
4654 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4656 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4661 <term>Parameter:</term>
4664 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or a user defined value that specifies a range of hours.
4673 Removing this header is useful for filter testing, where you want to force a real
4674 reload instead of getting status code <quote>304</quote>, which would cause the
4675 browser to use a cached copy of the page.
4678 Instead of removing the header, <literal>hide-if-modified-since</literal> can
4679 also add or subtract a random amount of time to/from the header's value.
4680 You specify a range of minutes where the random factor should be chosen from and
4681 <application>Privoxy</application> does the rest. A negative value means
4682 subtracting, a positive value adding.
4685 Randomizing the value of the <quote>If-Modified-Since:</quote> makes
4686 it less likely that the server can use the time as a cookie replacement,
4687 but you will run into caching problems if the random range is too high.
4690 It is a good idea to only use a small negative value and let
4691 <literal><link linkend="overwrite-last-modified">overwrite-last-modified</link></literal>
4692 handle the greater changes.
4695 It is also recommended to use this action together with
4696 <literal><link linkend="crunch-if-none-match">crunch-if-none-match</link></literal>,
4697 otherwise it's more or less pointless.
4703 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
4706 <screen># Let the browser revalidate but make tracking based on the time less likely.
4707 {+hide-if-modified-since{-60} \
4708 +overwrite-last-modified{randomize} \
4709 +crunch-if-none-match}
4718 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4719 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-forwarded-for-headers">
4720 <title>hide-forwarded-for-headers</title>
4723 <term>Typical use:</term>
4725 <para>Improve privacy by not forwarding the source of the request in the HTTP headers.</para>
4730 <term>Effect:</term>
4733 Deletes any existing <quote>X-Forwarded-for:</quote> HTTP header from client requests.
4740 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4742 <para>Boolean.</para>
4747 <term>Parameter:</term>
4759 It is safe and recommended to leave this on.
4765 <term>Example usage:</term>
4768 <screen>+hide-forwarded-for-headers</screen>
4776 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4777 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-from-header">
4778 <title>hide-from-header</title>
4782 <term>Typical use:</term>
4784 <para>Keep your (old and ill) browser from telling web servers your email address</para>
4789 <term>Effect:</term>
4792 Deletes any existing <quote>From:</quote> HTTP header, or replaces it with the
4800 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4802 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4807 <term>Parameter:</term>
4810 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
4819 The keyword <quote>block</quote> will completely remove the header
4820 (not to be confused with the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>
4824 Alternately, you can specify any value you prefer to be sent to the web
4825 server. If you do, it is a matter of fairness not to use any address that
4826 is actually used by a real person.
4829 This action is rarely needed, as modern web browsers don't send
4830 <quote>From:</quote> headers anymore.
4836 <term>Example usage:</term>
4839 <screen>+hide-from-header{block}</screen> or
4840 <screen>+hide-from-header{spam-me-senseless@sittingduck.example.com}</screen>
4848 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4849 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-referrer">
4850 <title>hide-referrer</title>
4851 <anchor id="hide-referer">
4854 <term>Typical use:</term>
4856 <para>Conceal which link you followed to get to a particular site</para>
4861 <term>Effect:</term>
4864 Deletes the <quote>Referer:</quote> (sic) HTTP header from the client request,
4865 or replaces it with a forged one.
4872 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4874 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4879 <term>Parameter:</term>
4883 <para><quote>conditional-block</quote> to delete the header completely if the host has changed.</para>
4886 <para><quote>conditional-forge</quote> to forge the header if the host has changed.</para>
4889 <para><quote>block</quote> to delete the header unconditionally.</para>
4892 <para><quote>forge</quote> to pretend to be coming from the homepage of the server we are talking to.</para>
4895 <para>Any other string to set a user defined referrer.</para>
4905 <literal>conditional-block</literal> is the only parameter,
4906 that isn't easily detected in the server's log file. If it blocks the
4907 referrer, the request will look like the visitor used a bookmark or
4908 typed in the address directly.
4911 Leaving the referrer unmodified for requests on the same host
4912 allows the server owner to see the visitor's <quote>click path</quote>,
4913 but in most cases she could also get that information by comparing
4914 other parts of the log file: for example the User-Agent if it isn't
4915 a very common one, or the user's IP address if it doesn't change between
4919 Always blocking the referrer, or using a custom one, can lead to
4920 failures on servers that check the referrer before they answer any
4921 requests, in an attempt to prevent their content from being
4922 embedded or linked to elsewhere.
4925 Both <literal>conditional-block</literal> and <literal>forge</literal>
4926 will work with referrer checks, as long as content and valid referring page
4927 are on the same host. Most of the time that's the case.
4930 <literal>hide-referer</literal> is an alternate spelling of
4931 <literal>hide-referrer</literal> and the two can be can be freely
4932 substituted with each other. (<quote>referrer</quote> is the
4933 correct English spelling, however the HTTP specification has a bug - it
4934 requires it to be spelled as <quote>referer</quote>.)
4940 <term>Example usage:</term>
4943 <screen>+hide-referrer{forge}</screen> or
4944 <screen>+hide-referrer{http://www.yahoo.com/}</screen>
4952 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4953 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-user-agent">
4954 <title>hide-user-agent</title>
4958 <term>Typical use:</term>
4960 <para>Try to conceal your type of browser and client operating system</para>
4965 <term>Effect:</term>
4968 Replaces the value of the <quote>User-Agent:</quote> HTTP header
4969 in client requests with the specified value.
4976 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4978 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4983 <term>Parameter:</term>
4986 Any user-defined string.
4996 This can lead to problems on web sites that depend on looking at this header in
4997 order to customize their content for different browsers (which, by the
4998 way, is <emphasis>NOT</emphasis> the right thing to do: good web sites
4999 work browser-independently).
5003 Using this action in multi-user setups or wherever different types of
5004 browsers will access the same <application>Privoxy</application> is
5005 <emphasis>not recommended</emphasis>. In single-user, single-browser
5006 setups, you might use it to delete your OS version information from
5007 the headers, because it is an invitation to exploit known bugs for your
5008 OS. It is also occasionally useful to forge this in order to access
5009 sites that won't let you in otherwise (though there may be a good
5010 reason in some cases). Example of this: some MSN sites will not
5011 let <application>Mozilla</application> enter, yet forging to a
5012 <application>Netscape 6.1</application> user-agent works just fine.
5013 (Must be just a silly MS goof, I'm sure :-).
5016 More information on known user-agent strings can be found at
5017 <ulink url="http://www.user-agents.org/">http://www.user-agents.org/</ulink>
5019 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent</ulink>.
5025 <term>Example usage:</term>
5028 <screen>+hide-user-agent{Netscape 6.1 (X11; I; Linux 2.4.18 i686)}</screen>
5036 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5037 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="limit-connect">
5038 <title>limit-connect</title>
5042 <term>Typical use:</term>
5044 <para>Prevent abuse of <application>Privoxy</application> as a TCP proxy relay or disable SSL for untrusted sites</para>
5049 <term>Effect:</term>
5052 Specifies to which ports HTTP CONNECT requests are allowable.
5059 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5061 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5066 <term>Parameter:</term>
5069 A comma-separated list of ports or port ranges (the latter using dashes, with the minimum
5070 defaulting to 0 and the maximum to 65K).
5079 By default, i.e. if no <literal>limit-connect</literal> action applies,
5080 <application>Privoxy</application> allows HTTP CONNECT requests to all
5081 ports. Use <literal>limit-connect</literal> if fine-grained control
5082 is desired for some or all destinations.
5085 The CONNECT methods exists in HTTP to allow access to secure websites
5086 (<quote>https://</quote> URLs) through proxies. It works very simply:
5087 the proxy connects to the server on the specified port, and then
5088 short-circuits its connections to the client and to the remote server.
5089 This means CONNECT-enabled proxies can be used as TCP relays very easily.
5092 <application>Privoxy</application> relays HTTPS traffic without seeing
5093 the decoded content. Websites can leverage this limitation to circumvent &my-app;'s
5094 filters. By specifying an invalid port range you can disable HTTPS entirely.
5100 <term>Example usages:</term>
5102 <!-- I had trouble getting the spacing to look right in my browser -->
5103 <!-- I probably have the wrong font setup, bollocks. -->
5104 <!-- Apparently the emphasis tag uses a proportional font no matter what -->
5106 <screen>+limit-connect{443} # Port 443 is OK.
5107 +limit-connect{80,443} # Ports 80 and 443 are OK.
5108 +limit-connect{-3, 7, 20-100, 500-} # Ports less than 3, 7, 20 to 100 and above 500 are OK.
5109 +limit-connect{-} # All ports are OK
5110 +limit-connect{,} # No HTTPS/SSL traffic is allowed</screen>
5117 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5118 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="prevent-compression">
5119 <title>prevent-compression</title>
5123 <term>Typical use:</term>
5126 Ensure that servers send the content uncompressed, so it can be
5127 passed through <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal>s.
5133 <term>Effect:</term>
5136 Removes the Accept-Encoding header which can be used to ask for compressed transfer.
5143 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5145 <para>Boolean.</para>
5150 <term>Parameter:</term>
5162 More and more websites send their content compressed by default, which
5163 is generally a good idea and saves bandwidth. But the <literal><link
5164 linkend="filter">filter</link></literal> and
5165 <literal><link linkend="deanimate-gifs">deanimate-gifs</link></literal>
5166 actions need access to the uncompressed data.
5169 When compiled with zlib support (available since &my-app; 3.0.7), content that should be
5170 filtered is decompressed on-the-fly and you don't have to worry about this action.
5171 If you are using an older &my-app; version, or one that hasn't been compiled with zlib
5172 support, this action can be used to convince the server to send the content uncompressed.
5175 Most text-based instances compress very well, the size is seldom decreased by less than 50%,
5176 for markup-heavy instances like news feeds saving more than 90% of the original size isn't
5180 Not using compression will therefore slow down the transfer, and you should only
5181 enable this action if you really need it. As of &my-app; 3.0.7 it's disabled in all
5182 predefined action settings.
5185 Note that some (rare) ill-configured sites don't handle requests for uncompressed
5186 documents correctly. Broken PHP applications tend to send an empty document body,
5187 some IIS versions only send the beginning of the content. If you enable
5188 <literal>prevent-compression</literal> per default, you might want to add
5189 exceptions for those sites. See the example for how to do that.
5195 <term>Example usage (sections):</term>
5199 # Selectively turn off compression, and enable a filter
5201 { +filter{tiny-textforms} +prevent-compression }
5202 # Match only these sites
5207 # Or instead, we could set a universal default:
5209 { +prevent-compression }
5212 # Then maybe make exceptions for broken sites:
5214 { -prevent-compression }
5215 .compusa.com/</screen>
5224 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5225 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="overwrite-last-modified">
5226 <title>overwrite-last-modified</title>
5232 <term>Typical use:</term>
5234 <para>Prevent yet another way to track the user's steps between sessions.</para>
5239 <term>Effect:</term>
5242 Deletes the <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> HTTP server header or modifies its value.
5249 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5251 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5256 <term>Parameter:</term>
5259 One of the keywords: <quote>block</quote>, <quote>reset-to-request-time</quote>
5260 and <quote>randomize</quote>
5269 Removing the <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header is useful for filter
5270 testing, where you want to force a real reload instead of getting status
5271 code <quote>304</quote>, which would cause the browser to reuse the old
5272 version of the page.
5275 The <quote>randomize</quote> option overwrites the value of the
5276 <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header with a randomly chosen time
5277 between the original value and the current time. In theory the server
5278 could send each document with a different <quote>Last-Modified:</quote>
5279 header to track visits without using cookies. <quote>Randomize</quote>
5280 makes it impossible and the browser can still revalidate cached documents.
5283 <quote>reset-to-request-time</quote> overwrites the value of the
5284 <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header with the current time. You could use
5285 this option together with
5286 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hided-if-modified-since</link></literal>
5287 to further customize your random range.
5290 The preferred parameter here is <quote>randomize</quote>. It is safe
5291 to use, as long as the time settings are more or less correct.
5292 If the server sets the <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header to the time
5293 of the request, the random range becomes zero and the value stays the same.
5294 Therefore you should later randomize it a second time with
5295 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hided-if-modified-since</link></literal>,
5299 It is also recommended to use this action together with
5300 <literal><link linkend="crunch-if-none-match">crunch-if-none-match</link></literal>.
5306 <term>Example usage:</term>
5309 <screen># Let the browser revalidate without being tracked across sessions
5310 { +hide-if-modified-since{-60} \
5311 +overwrite-last-modified{randomize} \
5312 +crunch-if-none-match}
5321 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5322 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="redirect">
5323 <title>redirect</title>
5329 <term>Typical use:</term>
5332 Redirect requests to other sites.
5338 <term>Effect:</term>
5341 Convinces the browser that the requested document has been moved
5342 to another location and the browser should get it from there.
5349 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5351 <para>Parameterized</para>
5356 <term>Parameter:</term>
5359 An absolute URL or a single pcrs command.
5368 Requests to which this action applies are answered with a
5369 HTTP redirect to URLs of your choosing. The new URL is
5370 either provided as parameter, or derived by applying a
5371 single pcrs command to the original URL.
5374 This action will be ignored if you use it together with
5375 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>.
5376 It can be combined with
5377 <literal><link linkend="fast-redirects">fast-redirects{check-decoded-url}</link></literal>
5378 to redirect to a decoded version of a rewritten URL.
5381 Use this action carefully, make sure not to create redirection loops
5382 and be aware that using your own redirects might make it
5383 possible to fingerprint your requests.
5386 In case of problems with your redirects, or simply to watch
5387 them working, enable <link linkend="DEBUG">debug 128</link>.
5393 <term>Example usages:</term>
5396 <screen># Replace example.com's style sheet with another one
5397 { +redirect{http://localhost/css-replacements/example.com.css} }
5398 example.com/stylesheet\.css
5400 # Create a short, easy to remember nickname for a favorite site
5401 # (relies on the browser accept and forward invalid URLs to &my-app;)
5402 { +redirect{http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/actions-file.html} }
5405 # Always use the expanded view for Undeadly.org articles
5406 # (Note the $ at the end of the URL pattern to make sure
5407 # the request for the rewritten URL isn't redirected as well)
5408 {+redirect{s@$@&mode=expanded@}}
5409 undeadly.org/cgi\?action=article&sid=\d*$
5411 # Redirect Google search requests to MSN
5412 {+redirect{s@^http://[^/]*/search\?q=([^&]*).*@http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q=$1@}}
5415 # Redirect MSN search requests to Yahoo
5416 {+redirect{s@^http://[^/]*/results\.aspx\?q=([^&]*).*@http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=$1@}}
5417 search.msn.com//results\.aspx\?q=
5419 # Redirect remote requests for this manual
5420 # to the local version delivered by Privoxy
5421 {+redirect{s@^http://www@http://config@}}
5422 www.privoxy.org/user-manual/</screen>
5431 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5432 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="server-header-filter">
5433 <title>server-header-filter</title>
5437 <term>Typical use:</term>
5440 Rewrite or remove single server headers.
5446 <term>Effect:</term>
5449 All server headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly
5450 through the specified regular expression based substitutions.
5457 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
5459 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5464 <term>Parameter:</term>
5467 The name of a server-header filter, as defined in one of the
5468 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
5477 Server-header filters are applied to each header on its own, not to
5478 all at once. This makes it easier to diagnose problems, but on the downside
5479 you can't write filters that only change header x if header y's value is z.
5480 You can do that by using tags though.
5483 Server-header filters are executed after the other header actions have finished
5484 and use their output as input.
5487 Please refer to the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file chapter</link>
5488 to learn which server-header filters are available by default, and how to
5495 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
5499 {+server-header-filter{html-to-xml}}
5500 example.org/xml-instance-that-is-delivered-as-html
5502 {+server-header-filter{xml-to-html}}
5503 example.org/instance-that-is-delivered-as-xml-but-is-not
5513 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5514 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="server-header-tagger">
5515 <title>server-header-tagger</title>
5519 <term>Typical use:</term>
5522 Enable or disable filters based on the Content-Type header.
5528 <term>Effect:</term>
5531 Server headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly through
5532 the specified regular expression based substitutions, the result is used as
5540 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
5542 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5547 <term>Parameter:</term>
5550 The name of a server-header tagger, as defined in one of the
5551 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
5560 Server-header taggers are applied to each header on its own,
5561 and as the header isn't modified, each tagger <quote>sees</quote>
5565 Server-header taggers are executed before all other header actions
5566 that modify server headers. Their tags can be used to control
5567 all of the other server-header actions, the content filters
5568 and the crunch actions (<link linkend="redirect">redirect</link>
5569 and <link linkend="block">block</link>).
5572 Obviously crunching based on tags created by server-header taggers
5573 doesn't prevent the request from showing up in the server's log file.
5580 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
5584 # Tag every request with the content type declared by the server
5585 {+server-header-tagger{content-type}}
5596 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5597 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="session-cookies-only">
5598 <title>session-cookies-only</title>
5602 <term>Typical use:</term>
5605 Allow only temporary <quote>session</quote> cookies (for the current
5606 browser session <emphasis>only</emphasis>).
5612 <term>Effect:</term>
5615 Deletes the <quote>expires</quote> field from <quote>Set-Cookie:</quote>
5616 server headers. Most browsers will not store such cookies permanently and
5617 forget them in between sessions.
5624 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5626 <para>Boolean.</para>
5631 <term>Parameter:</term>
5643 This is less strict than <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal> /
5644 <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal> and allows you to browse
5645 websites that insist or rely on setting cookies, without compromising your privacy too badly.
5648 Most browsers will not permanently store cookies that have been processed by
5649 <literal>session-cookies-only</literal> and will forget about them between sessions.
5650 This makes profiling cookies useless, but won't break sites which require cookies so
5651 that you can log in for transactions. This is generally turned on for all
5652 sites, and is the recommended setting.
5655 It makes <emphasis>no sense at all</emphasis> to use <literal>session-cookies-only</literal>
5656 together with <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal> or
5657 <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal>. If you do, cookies
5658 will be plainly killed.
5661 Note that it is up to the browser how it handles such cookies without an <quote>expires</quote>
5662 field. If you use an exotic browser, you might want to try it out to be sure.
5665 This setting also has no effect on cookies that may have been stored
5666 previously by the browser before starting <application>Privoxy</application>.
5667 These would have to be removed manually.
5670 <application>Privoxy</application> also uses
5671 the <link linkend="filter-content-cookies">content-cookies filter</link>
5672 to block some types of cookies. Content cookies are not effected by
5673 <literal>session-cookies-only</literal>.
5679 <term>Example usage:</term>
5682 <screen>+session-cookies-only</screen>
5690 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5691 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="set-image-blocker">
5692 <title>set-image-blocker</title>
5696 <term>Typical use:</term>
5698 <para>Choose the replacement for blocked images</para>
5703 <term>Effect:</term>
5706 This action alone doesn't do anything noticeable. If <emphasis>both</emphasis>
5707 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> <emphasis>and</emphasis> <literal><link
5708 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> <emphasis>also</emphasis>
5709 apply, i.e. if the request is to be blocked as an image,
5710 <emphasis>then</emphasis> the parameter of this action decides what will be
5711 sent as a replacement.
5718 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5720 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5725 <term>Parameter:</term>
5730 <quote>pattern</quote> to send a built-in checkerboard pattern image. The image is visually
5731 decent, scales very well, and makes it obvious where banners were busted.
5736 <quote>blank</quote> to send a built-in transparent image. This makes banners disappear
5737 completely, but makes it hard to detect where <application>Privoxy</application> has blocked
5738 images on a given page and complicates troubleshooting if <application>Privoxy</application>
5739 has blocked innocent images, like navigation icons.
5744 <quote><replaceable class="parameter">target-url</replaceable></quote> to
5745 send a redirect to <replaceable class="parameter">target-url</replaceable>. You can redirect
5746 to any image anywhere, even in your local filesystem via <quote>file:///</quote> URL.
5747 (But note that not all browsers support redirecting to a local file system).
5750 A good application of redirects is to use special <application>Privoxy</application>-built-in
5751 URLs, which send the built-in images, as <replaceable class="parameter">target-url</replaceable>.
5752 This has the same visual effect as specifying <quote>blank</quote> or <quote>pattern</quote> in
5753 the first place, but enables your browser to cache the replacement image, instead of requesting
5754 it over and over again.
5765 The URLs for the built-in images are <quote>http://config.privoxy.org/send-banner?type=<replaceable
5766 class="parameter">type</replaceable></quote>, where <replaceable class="parameter">type</replaceable> is
5767 either <quote>blank</quote> or <quote>pattern</quote>.
5770 There is a third (advanced) type, called <quote>auto</quote>. It is <emphasis>NOT</emphasis> to be
5771 used in <literal>set-image-blocker</literal>, but meant for use from <link linkend="filter-file">filters</link>.
5772 Auto will select the type of image that would have applied to the referring page, had it been an image.
5778 <term>Example usage:</term>
5784 <screen>+set-image-blocker{pattern}</screen>
5787 Redirect to the BSD daemon:
5790 <screen>+set-image-blocker{http://www.freebsd.org/gifs/dae_up3.gif}</screen>
5793 Redirect to the built-in pattern for better caching:
5796 <screen>+set-image-blocker{http://config.privoxy.org/send-banner?type=pattern}</screen>
5804 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5806 <title>Summary</title>
5808 Note that many of these actions have the potential to cause a page to
5809 misbehave, possibly even not to display at all. There are many ways
5810 a site designer may choose to design his site, and what HTTP header
5811 content, and other criteria, he may depend on. There is no way to have hard
5812 and fast rules for all sites. See the <link
5813 linkend="ACTIONSANAT">Appendix</link> for a brief example on troubleshooting
5819 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5820 <sect2 id="aliases">
5821 <title>Aliases</title>
5823 Custom <quote>actions</quote>, known to <application>Privoxy</application>
5824 as <quote>aliases</quote>, can be defined by combining other actions.
5825 These can in turn be invoked just like the built-in actions.
5826 Currently, an alias name can contain any character except space, tab,
5828 <quote>{</quote> and <quote>}</quote>, but we <emphasis>strongly
5829 recommend</emphasis> that you only use <quote>a</quote> to <quote>z</quote>,
5830 <quote>0</quote> to <quote>9</quote>, <quote>+</quote>, and <quote>-</quote>.
5831 Alias names are not case sensitive, and are not required to start with a
5832 <quote>+</quote> or <quote>-</quote> sign, since they are merely textually
5836 Aliases can be used throughout the actions file, but they <emphasis>must be
5837 defined in a special section at the top of the file!</emphasis>
5838 And there can only be one such section per actions file. Each actions file may
5839 have its own alias section, and the aliases defined in it are only visible
5843 There are two main reasons to use aliases: One is to save typing for frequently
5844 used combinations of actions, the other one is a gain in flexibility: If you
5845 decide once how you want to handle shops by defining an alias called
5846 <quote>shop</quote>, you can later change your policy on shops in
5847 <emphasis>one</emphasis> place, and your changes will take effect everywhere
5848 in the actions file where the <quote>shop</quote> alias is used. Calling aliases
5849 by their purpose also makes your actions files more readable.
5852 Currently, there is one big drawback to using aliases, though:
5853 <application>Privoxy</application>'s built-in web-based action file
5854 editor honors aliases when reading the actions files, but it expands
5855 them before writing. So the effects of your aliases are of course preserved,
5856 but the aliases themselves are lost when you edit sections that use aliases
5861 Now let's define some aliases...
5866 # Useful custom aliases we can use later.
5868 # Note the (required!) section header line and that this section
5869 # must be at the top of the actions file!
5873 # These aliases just save typing later:
5874 # (Note that some already use other aliases!)
5876 +crunch-all-cookies = +<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> +<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
5877 -crunch-all-cookies = -<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> -<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
5878 +block-as-image = +block{Blocked image.} +handle-as-image
5879 allow-all-cookies = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> -<link linkend="FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">filter{content-cookies}</link>
5881 # These aliases define combinations of actions
5882 # that are useful for certain types of sites:
5884 fragile = -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link> -<link linkend="HIDE-REFERER">hide-referrer</link> -<link linkend="PREVENT-COMPRESSION">prevent-compression</link>
5886 shop = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{all-popups}</link>
5888 # Short names for other aliases, for really lazy people ;-)
5890 c0 = +crunch-all-cookies
5891 c1 = -crunch-all-cookies</screen>
5895 ...and put them to use. These sections would appear in the lower part of an
5896 actions file and define exceptions to the default actions (as specified further
5897 up for the <quote>/</quote> pattern):
5902 # These sites are either very complex or very keen on
5903 # user data and require minimal interference to work:
5906 .office.microsoft.com
5907 .windowsupdate.microsoft.com
5908 # Gmail is really mail.google.com, not gmail.com
5912 # Allow cookies (for setting and retrieving your customer data)
5916 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
5919 # These shops require pop-ups:
5921 {-filter{all-popups} -filter{unsolicited-popups}}
5923 .overclockers.co.uk</screen>
5927 Aliases like <quote>shop</quote> and <quote>fragile</quote> are typically used for
5928 <quote>problem</quote> sites that require more than one action to be disabled
5929 in order to function properly.
5935 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5936 <sect2 id="act-examples">
5937 <title>Actions Files Tutorial</title>
5939 The above chapters have shown <link linkend="actions-file">which actions files
5940 there are and how they are organized</link>, how actions are <link
5941 linkend="actions">specified</link> and <link linkend="actions-apply">applied
5942 to URLs</link>, how <link linkend="af-patterns">patterns</link> work, and how to
5943 define and use <link linkend="aliases">aliases</link>. Now, let's look at an
5944 example <filename>default.action</filename> and <filename>user.action</filename>
5945 file and see how all these pieces come together:
5948 <sect3><title>default.action</title>
5951 Every config file should start with a short comment stating its purpose:
5955 <screen># Sample default.action file <ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net></screen>
5959 Then, since this is the <filename>default.action</filename> file, the
5960 first section is a special section for internal use that you needn't
5961 change or worry about:
5966 ##########################################################################
5967 # Settings -- Don't change! For internal Privoxy use ONLY.
5968 ##########################################################################
5971 for-privoxy-version=3.0</screen>
5975 After that comes the (optional) alias section. We'll use the example
5976 section from the above <link linkend="aliases">chapter on aliases</link>,
5977 that also explains why and how aliases are used:
5982 ##########################################################################
5984 ##########################################################################
5987 # These aliases just save typing later:
5988 # (Note that some already use other aliases!)
5990 +crunch-all-cookies = +<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> +<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
5991 -crunch-all-cookies = -<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> -<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
5992 +block-as-image = +block{Blocked image.} +handle-as-image
5993 mercy-for-cookies = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> -<link linkend="FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">filter{content-cookies}</link>
5995 # These aliases define combinations of actions
5996 # that are useful for certain types of sites:
5998 fragile = -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link> -<link linkend="HIDE-REFERER">hide-referrer</link>
5999 shop = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{all-popups}</link></screen>
6003 Now come the regular sections, i.e. sets of actions, accompanied
6004 by URL patterns to which they apply. Remember <emphasis>all actions
6005 are disabled when matching starts</emphasis>, so we have to explicitly
6006 enable the ones we want.
6010 The first regular section is probably the most important. It has only
6011 one pattern, <quote><literal>/</literal></quote>, but this pattern
6012 <link linkend="af-patterns">matches all URLs</link>. Therefore, the
6013 set of actions used in this <quote>default</quote> section <emphasis>will
6014 be applied to all requests as a start</emphasis>. It can be partly or
6015 wholly overridden by later matches further down this file, or in user.action,
6016 but it will still be largely responsible for your overall browsing
6021 Again, at the start of matching, all actions are disabled, so there is
6022 no need to disable any actions here. (Remember: a <quote>+</quote>
6023 preceding the action name enables the action, a <quote>-</quote> disables!).
6024 Also note how this long line has been made more readable by splitting it into
6025 multiple lines with line continuation.
6030 ##########################################################################
6031 # "Defaults" section:
6032 ##########################################################################
6034 +<link linkend="DEANIMATE-GIFS">deanimate-gifs</link> \
6035 +<link linkend="FILTER-HTML-ANNOYANCES">filter{html-annoyances}</link> \
6036 +<link linkend="FILTER-REFRESH-TAGS">filter{refresh-tags}</link> \
6037 +<link linkend="FILTER-WEBBUGS">filter{webbugs}</link> \
6038 +<link linkend="FILTER-IE-EXPLOITS">filter{ie-exploits}</link> \
6039 +<link linkend="HIDE-FORWARDED-FOR-HEADERS">hide-forwarded-for-headers</link> \
6040 +<link linkend="HIDE-FROM-HEADER">hide-from-header{block}</link> \
6041 +<link linkend="HIDE-REFERER">hide-referrer{forge}</link> \
6042 +<link linkend="PREVENT-COMPRESSION">prevent-compression</link> \
6043 +<link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> \
6044 +<link linkend="SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER">set-image-blocker{pattern}</link> \
6046 / # forward slash will match *all* potential URL patterns.</screen>
6050 The default behavior is now set.
6052 This needs rewording, but it can wait for now.
6055 Note that some actions, like not hiding
6056 the user agent, are part of a <quote>general policy</quote> that applies
6057 universally and won't get any exceptions defined later. Other choices,
6058 like not blocking (which is <emphasis>understandably</emphasis> the
6059 default!) need exceptions, i.e. we need to specify explicitly what we
6060 want to block in later sections.
6065 The first of our specialized sections is concerned with <quote>fragile</quote>
6066 sites, i.e. sites that require minimum interference, because they are either
6067 very complex or very keen on tracking you (and have mechanisms in place that
6068 make them unusable for people who avoid being tracked). We will simply use
6069 our pre-defined <literal>fragile</literal> alias instead of stating the list
6070 of actions explicitly:
6075 ##########################################################################
6076 # Exceptions for sites that'll break under the default action set:
6077 ##########################################################################
6079 # "Fragile" Use a minimum set of actions for these sites (see alias above):
6082 .office.microsoft.com # surprise, surprise!
6083 .windowsupdate.microsoft.com
6084 mail.google.com</screen>
6088 Shopping sites are not as fragile, but they typically
6089 require cookies to log in, and pop-up windows for shopping
6090 carts or item details. Again, we'll use a pre-defined alias:
6099 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
6101 .scan.co.uk</screen>
6104 <!-- No longer needed BEGIN OF COMMENTED OUT BLOCK
6107 Then, there are sites which rely on pop-up windows (yuck!) to work.
6108 Since we made pop-up-killing our default above, we need to make exceptions
6109 now. <ulink url="http://www.mozilla.org/">Mozilla</ulink> users, who
6110 can turn on smart handling of unwanted pop-ups in their browsers, can
6112 -<literal><link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{popups}</link></literal> above
6113 and hence don't need this section. Anyway, disabling an already disabled
6114 action doesn't hurt, so we'll define our exceptions regardless of what was
6115 chosen in the defaults section:
6120 # These sites require pop-ups too :(
6122 { -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{popups}</link> }
6125 .deutsche-bank-24.de</screen>
6128 END OF COMMENTED OUT BLOCK -->
6131 The <literal><link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link></literal>
6132 action, which we enabled per default above, breaks some sites. So disable
6133 it for popular sites where we know it misbehaves:
6138 { -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link> }
6142 .altavista.com/.*(like|url|link):http
6143 .altavista.com/trans.*urltext=http
6144 .nytimes.com</screen>
6148 It is important that <application>Privoxy</application> knows which
6149 URLs belong to images, so that <emphasis>if</emphasis> they are to
6150 be blocked, a substitute image can be sent, rather than an HTML page.
6151 Contacting the remote site to find out is not an option, since it
6152 would destroy the loading time advantage of banner blocking, and it
6153 would feed the advertisers (in terms of money <emphasis>and</emphasis>
6154 information). We can mark any URL as an image with the <literal><link
6155 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> action,
6156 and marking all URLs that end in a known image file extension is a
6162 ##########################################################################
6164 ##########################################################################
6166 # Define which file types will be treated as images, in case they get
6167 # blocked further down this file:
6169 { +<link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE">handle-as-image</link> }
6170 /.*\.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp|ico)$</screen>
6174 And then there are known banner sources. They often use scripts to
6175 generate the banners, so it won't be visible from the URL that the
6176 request is for an image. Hence we block them <emphasis>and</emphasis>
6177 mark them as images in one go, with the help of our
6178 <literal>+block-as-image</literal> alias defined above. (We could of
6179 course just as well use <literal>+<link linkend="block">block</link>
6180 +<link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> here.)
6181 Remember that the type of the replacement image is chosen by the
6182 <literal><link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>
6183 action. Since all URLs have matched the default section with its
6184 <literal>+<link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link>{pattern}</literal>
6185 action before, it still applies and needn't be repeated:
6190 # Known ad generators:
6195 .ad.*.doubleclick.net
6196 .a.yimg.com/(?:(?!/i/).)*$
6197 .a[0-9].yimg.com/(?:(?!/i/).)*$
6203 One of the most important jobs of <application>Privoxy</application>
6204 is to block banners. Many of these can be <quote>blocked</quote>
6205 by the <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link>{banners-by-size}</literal>
6206 action, which we enabled above, and which deletes the references to banner
6207 images from the pages while they are loaded, so the browser doesn't request
6208 them anymore, and hence they don't need to be blocked here. But this naturally
6209 doesn't catch all banners, and some people choose not to use filters, so we
6210 need a comprehensive list of patterns for banner URLs here, and apply the
6211 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action to them.
6214 First comes many generic patterns, which do most of the work, by
6215 matching typical domain and path name components of banners. Then comes
6216 a list of individual patterns for specific sites, which is omitted here
6217 to keep the example short:
6222 ##########################################################################
6223 # Block these fine banners:
6224 ##########################################################################
6225 { <link linkend="BLOCK">+block{Banner ads.}</link> }
6233 /.*count(er)?\.(pl|cgi|exe|dll|asp|php[34]?)
6234 /(?:.*/)?(publicite|werbung|rekla(ma|me|am)|annonse|maino(kset|nta|s)?)/
6236 # Site-specific patterns (abbreviated):
6238 .hitbox.com</screen>
6242 It's quite remarkable how many advertisers actually call their banner
6243 servers ads.<replaceable>company</replaceable>.com, or call the directory
6244 in which the banners are stored simply <quote>banners</quote>. So the above
6245 generic patterns are surprisingly effective.
6248 But being very generic, they necessarily also catch URLs that we don't want
6249 to block. The pattern <literal>.*ads.</literal> e.g. catches
6250 <quote>nasty-<emphasis>ads</emphasis>.nasty-corp.com</quote> as intended,
6251 but also <quote>downlo<emphasis>ads</emphasis>.sourcefroge.net</quote> or
6252 <quote><emphasis>ads</emphasis>l.some-provider.net.</quote> So here come some
6253 well-known exceptions to the <literal>+<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link></literal>
6257 Note that these are exceptions to exceptions from the default! Consider the URL
6258 <quote>downloads.sourcefroge.net</quote>: Initially, all actions are deactivated,
6259 so it wouldn't get blocked. Then comes the defaults section, which matches the
6260 URL, but just deactivates the <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">block</link></literal>
6261 action once again. Then it matches <literal>.*ads.</literal>, an exception to the
6262 general non-blocking policy, and suddenly
6263 <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">+block</link></literal> applies. And now, it'll match
6264 <literal>.*loads.</literal>, where <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">-block</link></literal>
6265 applies, so (unless it matches <emphasis>again</emphasis> further down) it ends up
6266 with no <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">block</link></literal> action applying.
6271 ##########################################################################
6272 # Save some innocent victims of the above generic block patterns:
6273 ##########################################################################
6277 { -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> }
6278 adv[io]*. # (for advogato.org and advice.*)
6279 adsl. # (has nothing to do with ads)
6280 adobe. # (has nothing to do with ads either)
6281 ad[ud]*. # (adult.* and add.*)
6282 .edu # (universities don't host banners (yet!))
6283 .*loads. # (downloads, uploads etc)
6291 www.globalintersec.com/adv # (adv = advanced)
6292 www.ugu.com/sui/ugu/adv</screen>
6296 Filtering source code can have nasty side effects,
6297 so make an exception for our friends at sourceforge.net,
6298 and all paths with <quote>cvs</quote> in them. Note that
6299 <literal>-<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link></literal>
6300 disables <emphasis>all</emphasis> filters in one fell swoop!
6305 # Don't filter code!
6307 { -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> }
6312 .sourceforge.net</screen>
6316 The actual <filename>default.action</filename> is of course much more
6317 comprehensive, but we hope this example made clear how it works.
6322 <sect3><title>user.action</title>
6325 So far we are painting with a broad brush by setting general policies,
6326 which would be a reasonable starting point for many people. Now,
6327 you might want to be more specific and have customized rules that
6328 are more suitable to your personal habits and preferences. These would
6329 be for narrowly defined situations like your ISP or your bank, and should
6330 be placed in <filename>user.action</filename>, which is parsed after all other
6331 actions files and hence has the last word, over-riding any previously
6332 defined actions. <filename>user.action</filename> is also a
6333 <emphasis>safe</emphasis> place for your personal settings, since
6334 <filename>default.action</filename> is actively maintained by the
6335 <application>Privoxy</application> developers and you'll probably want
6336 to install updated versions from time to time.
6340 So let's look at a few examples of things that one might typically do in
6341 <filename>user.action</filename>:
6345 <!-- brief sample user.action here -->
6349 # My user.action file. <fred@example.com></screen>
6353 As <link linkend="aliases">aliases</link> are local to the actions
6354 file that they are defined in, you can't use the ones from
6355 <filename>default.action</filename>, unless you repeat them here:
6360 # Aliases are local to the file they are defined in.
6361 # (Re-)define aliases for this file:
6365 # These aliases just save typing later, and the alias names should
6366 # be self explanatory.
6368 +crunch-all-cookies = +crunch-incoming-cookies +crunch-outgoing-cookies
6369 -crunch-all-cookies = -crunch-incoming-cookies -crunch-outgoing-cookies
6370 allow-all-cookies = -crunch-all-cookies -session-cookies-only
6371 allow-popups = -filter{all-popups}
6372 +block-as-image = +block{Blocked as image.} +handle-as-image
6373 -block-as-image = -block
6375 # These aliases define combinations of actions that are useful for
6376 # certain types of sites:
6378 fragile = -block -crunch-all-cookies -filter -fast-redirects -hide-referrer
6379 shop = -crunch-all-cookies allow-popups
6381 # Allow ads for selected useful free sites:
6383 allow-ads = -block -filter{banners-by-size} -filter{banners-by-link}
6385 # Alias for specific file types that are text, but might have conflicting
6386 # MIME types. We want the browser to force these to be text documents.
6387 handle-as-text = -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> +-<link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite{text/plain}</link> +-<link linkend="FORCE-TEXT-MODE">force-text-mode</link> -<link linkend="HIDE-CONTENT-DISPOSITION">hide-content-disposition</link></screen>
6392 Say you have accounts on some sites that you visit regularly, and
6393 you don't want to have to log in manually each time. So you'd like
6394 to allow persistent cookies for these sites. The
6395 <literal>allow-all-cookies</literal> alias defined above does exactly
6396 that, i.e. it disables crunching of cookies in any direction, and the
6397 processing of cookies to make them only temporary.
6402 { allow-all-cookies }
6406 .redhat.com</screen>
6410 Your bank is allergic to some filter, but you don't know which, so you disable them all:
6415 { -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> }
6416 .your-home-banking-site.com</screen>
6420 Some file types you may not want to filter for various reasons:
6425 # Technical documentation is likely to contain strings that might
6426 # erroneously get altered by the JavaScript-oriented filters:
6431 # And this stupid host sends streaming video with a wrong MIME type,
6432 # so that Privoxy thinks it is getting HTML and starts filtering:
6434 stupid-server.example.com/</screen>
6438 Example of a simple <link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> action. Say you've
6439 seen an ad on your favourite page on example.com that you want to get rid of.
6440 You have right-clicked the image, selected <quote>copy image location</quote>
6441 and pasted the URL below while removing the leading http://, into a
6442 <literal>{ +block{} }</literal> section. Note that <literal>{ +handle-as-image
6443 }</literal> need not be specified, since all URLs ending in
6444 <literal>.gif</literal> will be tagged as images by the general rules as set
6445 in default.action anyway:
6450 { +<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link>{Nasty ads.} }
6451 www.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor\.gif
6452 another.example.net/more/junk/here/</screen>
6456 The URLs of dynamically generated banners, especially from large banner
6457 farms, often don't use the well-known image file name extensions, which
6458 makes it impossible for <application>Privoxy</application> to guess
6459 the file type just by looking at the URL.
6460 You can use the <literal>+block-as-image</literal> alias defined above for
6462 Note that objects which match this rule but then turn out NOT to be an
6463 image are typically rendered as a <quote>broken image</quote> icon by the
6464 browser. Use cautiously.
6473 ar.atwola.com/</screen>
6477 Now you noticed that the default configuration breaks Forbes Magazine,
6478 but you were too lazy to find out which action is the culprit, and you
6479 were again too lazy to give <link linkend="contact">feedback</link>, so
6480 you just used the <literal>fragile</literal> alias on the site, and
6481 -- <emphasis>whoa!</emphasis> -- it worked. The <literal>fragile</literal>
6482 aliases disables those actions that are most likely to break a site. Also,
6483 good for testing purposes to see if it is <application>Privoxy</application>
6484 that is causing the problem or not. We later find other regular sites
6485 that misbehave, and add those to our personalized list of troublemakers:
6493 .mybank.com</screen>
6497 You like the <quote>fun</quote> text replacements in <filename>default.filter</filename>,
6498 but it is disabled in the distributed actions file.
6499 So you'd like to turn it on in your private,
6500 update-safe config, once and for all:
6505 { +<link linkend="filter-fun">filter{fun}</link> }
6506 / # For ALL sites!</screen>
6510 Note that the above is not really a good idea: There are exceptions
6511 to the filters in <filename>default.action</filename> for things that
6512 really shouldn't be filtered, like code on CVS->Web interfaces. Since
6513 <filename>user.action</filename> has the last word, these exceptions
6514 won't be valid for the <quote>fun</quote> filtering specified here.
6518 You might also worry about how your favourite free websites are
6519 funded, and find that they rely on displaying banner advertisements
6520 to survive. So you might want to specifically allow banners for those
6521 sites that you feel provide value to you:
6533 Note that <literal>allow-ads</literal> has been aliased to
6534 <literal>-<link linkend="block">block</link></literal>,
6535 <literal>-<link linkend="filter-banners-by-size">filter{banners-by-size}</link></literal>, and
6536 <literal>-<link linkend="filter-banners-by-link">filter{banners-by-link}</link></literal> above.
6540 Invoke another alias here to force an over-ride of the MIME type <literal>
6541 application/x-sh</literal> which typically would open a download type
6542 dialog. In my case, I want to look at the shell script, and then I can save
6543 it should I choose to.
6553 <filename>user.action</filename> is generally the best place to define
6554 exceptions and additions to the default policies of
6555 <filename>default.action</filename>. Some actions are safe to have their
6556 default policies set here though. So let's set a default policy to have a
6557 <quote>blank</quote> image as opposed to the checkerboard pattern for
6558 <emphasis>ALL</emphasis> sites. <quote>/</quote> of course matches all URL
6564 { +<link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker{blank}</link> }
6565 / # ALL sites</screen>
6571 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
6575 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
6577 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
6579 <sect1 id="filter-file">
6580 <title>Filter Files</title>
6583 On-the-fly text substitutions need
6584 to be defined in a <quote>filter file</quote>. Once defined, they
6585 can then be invoked as an <quote>action</quote>.
6589 &my-app; supports three different filter actions:
6590 <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal> to
6591 rewrite the content that is send to the client,
6592 <literal><link linkend="client-header-filter">client-header-filter</link></literal>
6593 to rewrite headers that are send by the client, and
6594 <literal><link linkend="server-header-filter">server-header-filter</link></literal>
6595 to rewrite headers that are send by the server.
6599 &my-app; also supports two tagger actions:
6600 <literal><link linkend="client-header-tagger">client-header-tagger</link></literal>
6602 <literal><link linkend="server-header-tagger">server-header-tagger</link></literal>.
6603 Taggers and filters use the same syntax in the filter files, the difference
6604 is that taggers don't modify the text they are filtering, but use a rewritten
6605 version of the filtered text as tag. The tags can then be used to change the
6606 applying actions through sections with <link linkend="tag-pattern">tag-patterns</link>.
6611 Multiple filter files can be defined through the <literal> <link
6612 linkend="filterfile">filterfile</link></literal> config directive. The filters
6613 as supplied by the developers are located in
6614 <filename>default.filter</filename>. It is recommended that any locally
6615 defined or modified filters go in a separately defined file such as
6616 <filename>user.filter</filename>.
6620 Common tasks for content filters are to eliminate common annoyances in
6621 HTML and JavaScript, such as pop-up windows,
6622 exit consoles, crippled windows without navigation tools, the
6623 infamous <BLINK> tag etc, to suppress images with certain
6624 width and height attributes (standard banner sizes or web-bugs),
6625 or just to have fun.
6629 Enabled content filters are applied to any content whose
6630 <quote>Content Type</quote> header is recognised as a sign
6631 of text-based content, with the exception of <literal>text/plain</literal>.
6632 Use the <link linkend="FORCE-TEXT-MODE">force-text-mode</link> action
6633 to also filter other content.
6637 Substitutions are made at the source level, so if you want to <quote>roll
6638 your own</quote> filters, you should first be familiar with HTML syntax,
6639 and, of course, regular expressions.
6643 Just like the <link linkend="actions-file">actions files</link>, the
6644 filter file is organized in sections, which are called <emphasis>filters</emphasis>
6645 here. Each filter consists of a heading line, that starts with one of the
6646 <emphasis>keywords</emphasis> <literal>FILTER:</literal>,
6647 <literal>CLIENT-HEADER-FILTER:</literal> or <literal>SERVER-HEADER-FILTER:</literal>
6648 followed by the filter's <emphasis>name</emphasis>, and a short (one line)
6649 <emphasis>description</emphasis> of what it does. Below that line
6650 come the <emphasis>jobs</emphasis>, i.e. lines that define the actual
6651 text substitutions. By convention, the name of a filter
6652 should describe what the filter <emphasis>eliminates</emphasis>. The
6653 comment is used in the <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">web-based
6654 user interface</ulink>.
6658 Once a filter called <replaceable>name</replaceable> has been defined
6659 in the filter file, it can be invoked by using an action of the form
6660 +<literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link>{<replaceable>name</replaceable>}</literal>
6661 in any <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link>.
6665 Filter definitions start with a header line that contains the filter
6666 type, the filter name and the filter description.
6667 A content filter header line for a filter called <quote>foo</quote> could look
6672 <screen>FILTER: foo Replace all "foo" with "bar"</screen>
6676 Below that line, and up to the next header line, come the jobs that
6677 define what text replacements the filter executes. They are specified
6678 in a syntax that imitates <ulink url="http://www.perl.org/">Perl</ulink>'s
6679 <literal>s///</literal> operator. If you are familiar with Perl, you
6680 will find this to be quite intuitive, and may want to look at the
6681 PCRS documentation for the subtle differences to Perl behaviour. Most
6682 notably, the non-standard option letter <literal>U</literal> is supported,
6683 which turns the default to ungreedy matching.
6688 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
6689 Expressions</quote></ulink>, you might want to take a look at
6690 the <link linkend="regex">Appendix on regular expressions</link>, and
6691 see the <ulink url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">Perl
6693 <ulink url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlop.html">the
6694 <literal>s///</literal> operator's syntax</ulink> and <ulink
6695 url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">Perl-style regular
6696 expressions</ulink> in general.
6697 The below examples might also help to get you started.
6701 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
6703 <sect2><title>Filter File Tutorial</title>
6705 Now, let's complete our <quote>foo</quote> content filter. We have already defined
6706 the heading, but the jobs are still missing. Since all it does is to replace
6707 <quote>foo</quote> with <quote>bar</quote>, there is only one (trivial) job
6712 <screen>s/foo/bar/</screen>
6716 But wait! Didn't the comment say that <emphasis>all</emphasis> occurrences
6717 of <quote>foo</quote> should be replaced? Our current job will only take
6718 care of the first <quote>foo</quote> on each page. For global substitution,
6719 we'll need to add the <literal>g</literal> option:
6723 <screen>s/foo/bar/g</screen>
6727 Our complete filter now looks like this:
6730 <screen>FILTER: foo Replace all "foo" with "bar"
6731 s/foo/bar/g</screen>
6735 Let's look at some real filters for more interesting examples. Here you see
6736 a filter that protects against some common annoyances that arise from JavaScript
6737 abuse. Let's look at its jobs one after the other:
6743 FILTER: js-annoyances Get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse
6745 # Get rid of JavaScript referrer tracking. Test page: http://www.randomoddness.com/untitled.htm
6747 s|(<script.*)document\.referrer(.*</script>)|$1"Not Your Business!"$2|Usg</screen>
6751 Following the header line and a comment, you see the job. Note that it uses
6752 <literal>|</literal> as the delimiter instead of <literal>/</literal>, because
6753 the pattern contains a forward slash, which would otherwise have to be escaped
6754 by a backslash (<literal>\</literal>).
6758 Now, let's examine the pattern: it starts with the text <literal><script.*</literal>
6759 enclosed in parentheses. Since the dot matches any character, and <literal>*</literal>
6760 means: <quote>Match an arbitrary number of the element left of myself</quote>, this
6761 matches <quote><script</quote>, followed by <emphasis>any</emphasis> text, i.e.
6762 it matches the whole page, from the start of the first <script> tag.
6766 That's more than we want, but the pattern continues: <literal>document\.referrer</literal>
6767 matches only the exact string <quote>document.referrer</quote>. The dot needed to
6768 be <emphasis>escaped</emphasis>, i.e. preceded by a backslash, to take away its
6769 special meaning as a joker, and make it just a regular dot. So far, the meaning is:
6770 Match from the start of the first <script> tag in a the page, up to, and including,
6771 the text <quote>document.referrer</quote>, if <emphasis>both</emphasis> are present
6772 in the page (and appear in that order).
6776 But there's still more pattern to go. The next element, again enclosed in parentheses,
6777 is <literal>.*</script></literal>. You already know what <literal>.*</literal>
6778 means, so the whole pattern translates to: Match from the start of the first <script>
6779 tag in a page to the end of the last <script> tag, provided that the text
6780 <quote>document.referrer</quote> appears somewhere in between.
6784 This is still not the whole story, since we have ignored the options and the parentheses:
6785 The portions of the page matched by sub-patterns that are enclosed in parentheses, will be
6786 remembered and be available through the variables <literal>$1, $2, ...</literal> in
6787 the substitute. The <literal>U</literal> option switches to ungreedy matching, which means
6788 that the first <literal>.*</literal> in the pattern will only <quote>eat up</quote> all
6789 text in between <quote><script</quote> and the <emphasis>first</emphasis> occurrence
6790 of <quote>document.referrer</quote>, and that the second <literal>.*</literal> will
6791 only span the text up to the <emphasis>first</emphasis> <quote></script></quote>
6792 tag. Furthermore, the <literal>s</literal> option says that the match may span
6793 multiple lines in the page, and the <literal>g</literal> option again means that the
6794 substitution is global.
6798 So, to summarize, the pattern means: Match all scripts that contain the text
6799 <quote>document.referrer</quote>. Remember the parts of the script from
6800 (and including) the start tag up to (and excluding) the string
6801 <quote>document.referrer</quote> as <literal>$1</literal>, and the part following
6802 that string, up to and including the closing tag, as <literal>$2</literal>.
6806 Now the pattern is deciphered, but wasn't this about substituting things? So
6807 lets look at the substitute: <literal>$1"Not Your Business!"$2</literal> is
6808 easy to read: The text remembered as <literal>$1</literal>, followed by
6809 <literal>"Not Your Business!"</literal> (<emphasis>including</emphasis>
6810 the quotation marks!), followed by the text remembered as <literal>$2</literal>.
6811 This produces an exact copy of the original string, with the middle part
6812 (the <quote>document.referrer</quote>) replaced by <literal>"Not Your
6813 Business!"</literal>.
6817 The whole job now reads: Replace <quote>document.referrer</quote> by
6818 <literal>"Not Your Business!"</literal> wherever it appears inside a
6819 <script> tag. Note that this job won't break JavaScript syntax,
6820 since both the original and the replacement are syntactically valid
6821 string objects. The script just won't have access to the referrer
6822 information anymore.
6826 We'll show you two other jobs from the JavaScript taming department, but
6827 this time only point out the constructs of special interest:
6832 # The status bar is for displaying link targets, not pointless blahblah
6834 s/window\.status\s*=\s*(['"]).*?\1/dUmMy=1/ig</screen>
6838 <literal>\s</literal> stands for whitespace characters (space, tab, newline,
6839 carriage return, form feed), so that <literal>\s*</literal> means: <quote>zero
6840 or more whitespace</quote>. The <literal>?</literal> in <literal>.*?</literal>
6841 makes this matching of arbitrary text ungreedy. (Note that the <literal>U</literal>
6842 option is not set). The <literal>['"]</literal> construct means: <quote>a single
6843 <emphasis>or</emphasis> a double quote</quote>. Finally, <literal>\1</literal> is
6844 a back-reference to the first parenthesis just like <literal>$1</literal> above,
6845 with the difference that in the <emphasis>pattern</emphasis>, a backslash indicates
6846 a back-reference, whereas in the <emphasis>substitute</emphasis>, it's the dollar.
6850 So what does this job do? It replaces assignments of single- or double-quoted
6851 strings to the <quote>window.status</quote> object with a dummy assignment
6852 (using a variable name that is hopefully odd enough not to conflict with
6853 real variables in scripts). Thus, it catches many cases where e.g. pointless
6854 descriptions are displayed in the status bar instead of the link target when
6855 you move your mouse over links.
6860 # Kill OnUnload popups. Yummy. Test: http://www.zdnet.com/zdsubs/yahoo/tree/yfs.html
6862 s/(<body [^>]*)onunload(.*>)/$1never$2/iU</screen>
6867 <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-DOM-Level-2-Events-20001113/events.html#Events-eventgroupings-htmlevents">OnUnload
6868 event binding</ulink> in the HTML DOM was a <emphasis>CRIME</emphasis>.
6869 When I close a browser window, I want it to close and die. Basta.
6870 This job replaces the <quote>onunload</quote> attribute in
6871 <quote><body></quote> tags with the dummy word <literal>never</literal>.
6872 Note that the <literal>i</literal> option makes the pattern matching
6873 case-insensitive. Also note that ungreedy matching alone doesn't always guarantee
6874 a minimal match: In the first parenthesis, we had to use <literal>[^>]*</literal>
6875 instead of <literal>.*</literal> to prevent the match from exceeding the
6876 <body> tag if it doesn't contain <quote>OnUnload</quote>, but the page's
6881 The last example is from the fun department:
6886 FILTER: fun Fun text replacements
6888 # Spice the daily news:
6890 s/microsoft(?!\.com)/MicroSuck/ig</screen>
6894 Note the <literal>(?!\.com)</literal> part (a so-called negative lookahead)
6895 in the job's pattern, which means: Don't match, if the string
6896 <quote>.com</quote> appears directly following <quote>microsoft</quote>
6897 in the page. This prevents links to microsoft.com from being trashed, while
6898 still replacing the word everywhere else.
6903 # Buzzword Bingo (example for extended regex syntax)
6905 s* industry[ -]leading \
6907 | customer[ -]focused \
6908 | market[ -]driven \
6909 | award[ -]winning # Comments are OK, too! \
6910 | high[ -]performance \
6911 | solutions[ -]based \
6915 *<font color="red"><b>BINGO!</b></font> \
6920 The <literal>x</literal> option in this job turns on extended syntax, and allows for
6921 e.g. the liberal use of (non-interpreted!) whitespace for nicer formatting.
6929 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
6931 <sect2 id="predefined-filters"><title>The Pre-defined Filters</title>
6935 Note each filter is also listed in the +filter action section above. Please
6936 keep these listings in sync.
6941 The distribution <filename>default.filter</filename> file contains a selection of
6942 pre-defined filters for your convenience:
6947 <term><emphasis>js-annoyances</emphasis></term>
6950 The purpose of this filter is to get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse.
6955 replaces JavaScript references to the browser's referrer information
6956 with the string "Not Your Business!". This compliments the <literal><link
6957 linkend="hide-referrer">hide-referrer</link></literal> action on the content level.
6962 removes the bindings to the DOM's
6963 <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-DOM-Level-2-Events-20001113/events.html#Events-eventgroupings-htmlevents">unload
6964 event</ulink> which we feel has no right to exist and is responsible for most <quote>exit consoles</quote>, i.e.
6965 nasty windows that pop up when you close another one.
6970 removes code that causes new windows to be opened with undesired properties, such as being
6971 full-screen, non-resizeable, without location, status or menu bar etc.
6977 Use with caution. This is an aggressive filter, and can break sites that
6978 rely heavily on JavaScript.
6984 <term><emphasis>js-events</emphasis></term>
6987 This is a very radical measure. It removes virtually all JavaScript event bindings, which
6988 means that scripts can not react to user actions such as mouse movements or clicks, window
6989 resizing etc, anymore. Use with caution!
6992 We <emphasis>strongly discourage</emphasis> using this filter as a default since it breaks
6993 many legitimate scripts. It is meant for use only on extra-nasty sites (should you really
7000 <term><emphasis>html-annoyances</emphasis></term>
7003 This filter will undo many common instances of HTML based abuse.
7006 The <literal>BLINK</literal> and <literal>MARQUEE</literal> tags
7007 are neutralized (yeah baby!), and browser windows will be created as
7008 resizeable (as of course they should be!), and will have location,
7009 scroll and menu bars -- even if specified otherwise.
7015 <term><emphasis>content-cookies</emphasis></term>
7018 Most cookies are set in the HTTP dialog, where they can be intercepted
7020 <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal>
7021 and <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal>
7022 actions. But web sites increasingly make use of HTML meta tags and JavaScript
7023 to sneak cookies to the browser on the content level.
7026 This filter disables most HTML and JavaScript code that reads or sets
7027 cookies. It cannot detect all clever uses of these types of code, so it
7028 should not be relied on as an absolute fix. Use it wherever you would also
7029 use the cookie crunch actions.
7035 <term><emphasis>refresh tags</emphasis></term>
7038 Disable any refresh tags if the interval is greater than nine seconds (so
7039 that redirections done via refresh tags are not destroyed). This is useful
7040 for dial-on-demand setups, or for those who find this HTML feature
7047 <term><emphasis>unsolicited-popups</emphasis></term>
7050 This filter attempts to prevent only <quote>unsolicited</quote> pop-up
7051 windows from opening, yet still allow pop-up windows that the user
7052 has explicitly chosen to open. It was added in version 3.0.1,
7053 as an improvement over earlier such filters.
7056 Technical note: The filter works by redefining the window.open JavaScript
7057 function to a dummy function, <literal>PrivoxyWindowOpen()</literal>,
7058 during the loading and rendering phase of each HTML page access, and
7059 restoring the function afterward.
7062 This is recommended only for browsers that cannot perform this function
7063 reliably themselves. And be aware that some sites require such windows
7064 in order to function normally. Use with caution.
7070 <term><emphasis>all-popups</emphasis></term>
7073 Attempt to prevent <emphasis>all</emphasis> pop-up windows from opening.
7074 Note this should be used with even more discretion than the above, since
7075 it is more likely to break some sites that require pop-ups for normal
7076 usage. Use with caution.
7082 <term><emphasis>img-reorder</emphasis></term>
7085 This is a helper filter that has no value if used alone. It makes the
7086 <literal>banners-by-size</literal> and <literal>banners-by-link</literal>
7087 (see below) filters more effective and should be enabled together with them.
7093 <term><emphasis>banners-by-size</emphasis></term>
7096 This filter removes image tags purely based on what size they are. Fortunately
7097 for us, many ads and banner images tend to conform to certain standardized
7098 sizes, which makes this filter quite effective for ad stripping purposes.
7101 Occasionally this filter will cause false positives on images that are not ads,
7102 but just happen to be of one of the standard banner sizes.
7105 Recommended only for those who require extreme ad blocking. The default
7106 block rules should catch 95+% of all ads <emphasis>without</emphasis> this filter enabled.
7112 <term><emphasis>banners-by-link</emphasis></term>
7115 This is an experimental filter that attempts to kill any banners if
7116 their URLs seem to point to known or suspected click trackers. It is currently
7117 not of much value and is not recommended for use by default.
7123 <term><emphasis>webbugs</emphasis></term>
7126 Webbugs are small, invisible images (technically 1X1 GIF images), that
7127 are used to track users across websites, and collect information on them.
7128 As an HTML page is loaded by the browser, an embedded image tag causes the
7129 browser to contact a third-party site, disclosing the tracking information
7130 through the requested URL and/or cookies for that third-party domain, without
7131 the user ever becoming aware of the interaction with the third-party site.
7132 HTML-ized spam also uses a similar technique to verify email addresses.
7135 This filter removes the HTML code that loads such <quote>webbugs</quote>.
7141 <term><emphasis>tiny-textforms</emphasis></term>
7144 A rather special-purpose filter that can be used to enlarge textareas (those
7145 multi-line text boxes in web forms) and turn off hard word wrap in them.
7146 It was written for the sourceforge.net tracker system where such boxes are
7147 a nuisance, but it can be handy on other sites, too.
7150 It is not recommended to use this filter as a default.
7156 <term><emphasis>jumping-windows</emphasis></term>
7159 Many consider windows that move, or resize themselves to be abusive. This filter
7160 neutralizes the related JavaScript code. Note that some sites might not display
7161 or behave as intended when using this filter. Use with caution.
7167 <term><emphasis>frameset-borders</emphasis></term>
7170 Some web designers seem to assume that everyone in the world will view their
7171 web sites using the same browser brand and version, screen resolution etc,
7172 because only that assumption could explain why they'd use static frame sizes,
7173 yet prevent their frames from being resized by the user, should they be too
7174 small to show their whole content.
7177 This filter removes the related HTML code. It should only be applied to sites
7184 <term><emphasis>demoronizer</emphasis></term>
7187 Many Microsoft products that generate HTML use non-standard extensions (read:
7188 violations) of the ISO 8859-1 aka Latin-1 character set. This can cause those
7189 HTML documents to display with errors on standard-compliant platforms.
7192 This filter translates the MS-only characters into Latin-1 equivalents.
7193 It is not necessary when using MS products, and will cause corruption of
7194 all documents that use 8-bit character sets other than Latin-1. It's mostly
7195 worthwhile for Europeans on non-MS platforms, if weird garbage characters
7196 sometimes appear on some pages, or user agents that don't correct for this on
7199 My version of Mozilla (ancient) shows litte square boxes for quote
7200 characters, and apostrophes on moronized pages. So many pages have this, I
7201 can read them fine now. HB 08/27/06
7208 <term><emphasis>shockwave-flash</emphasis></term>
7211 A filter for shockwave haters. As the name suggests, this filter strips code
7212 out of web pages that is used to embed shockwave flash objects.
7220 <term><emphasis>quicktime-kioskmode</emphasis></term>
7223 Change HTML code that embeds Quicktime objects so that kioskmode, which
7224 prevents saving, is disabled.
7230 <term><emphasis>fun</emphasis></term>
7233 Text replacements for subversive browsing fun. Make fun of your favorite
7234 Monopolist or play buzzword bingo.
7240 <term><emphasis>crude-parental</emphasis></term>
7243 A demonstration-only filter that shows how <application>Privoxy</application>
7244 can be used to delete web content on a keyword basis.
7250 <term><emphasis>ie-exploits</emphasis></term>
7253 An experimental collection of text replacements to disable malicious HTML and JavaScript
7254 code that exploits known security holes in Internet Explorer.
7257 Presently, it only protects against Nimda and a cross-site scripting bug, and
7258 would need active maintenance to provide more substantial protection.
7264 <term><emphasis>site-specifics</emphasis></term>
7267 Some web sites have very specific problems, the cure for which doesn't apply
7268 anywhere else, or could even cause damage on other sites.
7271 This is a collection of such site-specific cures which should only be applied
7272 to the sites they were intended for, which is what the supplied
7273 <filename>default.action</filename> file does. Users shouldn't need to change
7274 anything regarding this filter.
7280 <term><emphasis>google</emphasis></term>
7283 A CSS based block for Google text ads. Also removes a width limitation
7284 and the toolbar advertisement.
7290 <term><emphasis>yahoo</emphasis></term>
7293 Another CSS based block, this time for Yahoo text ads. And removes
7294 a width limitation as well.
7300 <term><emphasis>msn</emphasis></term>
7303 Another CSS based block, this time for MSN text ads. And removes
7304 tracking URLs, as well as a width limitation.
7310 <term><emphasis>blogspot</emphasis></term>
7313 Cleans up some Blogspot blogs. Read the fine print before using this one!
7316 This filter also intentionally removes some navigation stuff and sets the
7317 page width to 100%. As a result, some rounded <quote>corners</quote> would
7318 appear to early or not at all and as fixing this would require a browser
7319 that understands background-size (CSS3), they are removed instead.
7325 <term><emphasis>xml-to-html</emphasis></term>
7328 Server-header filter to change the Content-Type from xml to html.
7334 <term><emphasis>html-to-xml</emphasis></term>
7337 Server-header filter to change the Content-Type from html to xml.
7343 <term><emphasis>no-ping</emphasis></term>
7346 Removes the non-standard <literal>ping</literal> attribute from
7347 anchor and area HTML tags.
7353 <term><emphasis>hide-tor-exit-notation</emphasis></term>
7356 Client-header filter to remove the <command>Tor</command> exit node notation
7357 found in Host and Referer headers.
7360 If &my-app; and <command>Tor</command> are chained and &my-app;
7361 is configured to use socks4a, one can use <quote>http://www.example.org.foobar.exit/</quote>
7362 to access the host <quote>www.example.org</quote> through the
7363 <command>Tor</command> exit node <quote>foobar</quote>.
7366 As the HTTP client isn't aware of this notation, it treats the
7367 whole string <quote>www.example.org.foobar.exit</quote> as host and uses it
7368 for the <quote>Host</quote> and <quote>Referer</quote> headers. From the
7369 server's point of view the resulting headers are invalid and can cause problems.
7372 An invalid <quote>Referer</quote> header can trigger <quote>hot-linking</quote>
7373 protections, an invalid <quote>Host</quote> header will make it impossible for
7374 the server to find the right vhost (several domains hosted on the same IP address).
7377 This client-header filter removes the <quote>foo.exit</quote> part in those headers
7378 to prevent the mentioned problems. Note that it only modifies
7379 the HTTP headers, it doesn't make it impossible for the server
7380 to detect your <command>Tor</command> exit node based on the IP address
7381 the request is coming from.
7388 <term><emphasis> </emphasis></term>
7402 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7406 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7408 <sect1 id="templates">
7409 <title>Privoxy's Template Files</title>
7411 All <application>Privoxy</application> built-in pages, i.e. error pages such as the
7412 <ulink url="http://show-the-404-error.page"><quote>404 - No Such Domain</quote>
7413 error page</ulink>, the <ulink
7414 url="http://ads.bannerserver.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor.html"><quote>BLOCKED</quote>
7416 and all pages of its <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">web-based
7417 user interface</ulink>, are generated from <emphasis>templates</emphasis>.
7418 (<application>Privoxy</application> must be running for the above links to work as
7423 These templates are stored in a subdirectory of the <link linkend="confdir">configuration
7424 directory</link> called <filename>templates</filename>. On Unixish platforms,
7426 <ulink url="file:///etc/privoxy/templates/"><filename>/etc/privoxy/templates/</filename></ulink>.
7430 The templates are basically normal HTML files, but with place-holders (called symbols
7431 or exports), which <application>Privoxy</application> fills at run time. It
7432 is possible to edit the templates with a normal text editor, should you want
7433 to customize them. (<emphasis>Not recommended for the casual
7434 user</emphasis>). Should you create your own custom templates, you should use
7435 the <filename>config</filename> setting <link linkend="templdir">templdir</link>
7436 to specify an alternate location, so your templates do not get overwritten
7440 Note that just like in configuration files, lines starting
7441 with <literal>#</literal> are ignored when the templates are filled in.
7445 The place-holders are of the form <literal>@name@</literal>, and you will
7446 find a list of available symbols, which vary from template to template,
7447 in the comments at the start of each file. Note that these comments are not
7448 always accurate, and that it's probably best to look at the existing HTML
7449 code to find out which symbols are supported and what they are filled in with.
7453 A special application of this substitution mechanism is to make whole
7454 blocks of HTML code disappear when a specific symbol is set. We use this
7455 for many purposes, one of them being to include the beta warning in all
7456 our user interface (CGI) pages when <application>Privoxy</application>
7457 is in an alpha or beta development stage:
7462 <!-- @if-unstable-start -->
7464 ... beta warning HTML code goes here ...
7466 <!-- if-unstable-end@ --></screen>
7470 If the "unstable" symbol is set, everything in between and including
7471 <literal>@if-unstable-start</literal> and <literal>if-unstable-end@</literal>
7472 will disappear, leaving nothing but an empty comment:
7476 <screen><!-- --></screen>
7480 There's also an if-then-else construct and an <literal>#include</literal>
7481 mechanism, but you'll sure find out if you are inclined to edit the
7486 All templates refer to a style located at
7487 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/send-stylesheet"><literal>http://config.privoxy.org/send-stylesheet</literal></ulink>.
7488 This is, of course, locally served by <application>Privoxy</application>
7489 and the source for it can be found and edited in the
7490 <filename>cgi-style.css</filename> template.
7495 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7499 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7501 <sect1 id="contact"><title>Contacting the Developers, Bug Reporting and Feature
7504 <!-- Include contacting.sgml boilerplate: -->
7506 <!-- end boilerplate -->
7510 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7513 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7514 <sect1 id="copyright"><title>Privoxy Copyright, License and History</title>
7516 <!-- Include copyright.sgml: -->
7518 <!-- end copyright -->
7520 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7521 <sect2><title>License</title>
7522 <!-- Include copyright.sgml: -->
7524 <!-- end copyright -->
7526 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7529 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7531 <sect2 id="history"><title>History</title>
7532 <!-- Include history.sgml: -->
7534 <!-- end history -->
7537 <sect2 id="authors"><title>Authors</title>
7538 <!-- Include p-authors.sgml: -->
7540 <!-- end authors -->
7545 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7548 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7549 <sect1 id="seealso"><title>See Also</title>
7550 <!-- Include seealso.sgml: -->
7552 <!-- end seealso -->
7557 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7558 <sect1 id="appendix"><title>Appendix</title>
7561 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7563 <title>Regular Expressions</title>
7565 <application>Privoxy</application> uses Perl-style <quote>regular
7566 expressions</quote> in its <link linkend="actions-file">actions
7567 files</link> and <link linkend="filter-file">filter file</link>,
7568 through the <ulink url="http://www.pcre.org/">PCRE</ulink> and
7571 <ulink url="http://www.oesterhelt.org/pcrs/">PCRS</ulink> libraries.
7573 <application>PCRS</application> libraries.
7577 If you are reading this, you probably don't understand what <quote>regular
7578 expressions</quote> are, or what they can do. So this will be a very brief
7579 introduction only. A full explanation would require a <ulink
7580 url="http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/regex/">book</ulink> ;-)
7584 Regular expressions provide a language to describe patterns that can be
7585 run against strings of characters (letter, numbers, etc), to see if they
7586 match the string or not. The patterns are themselves (sometimes complex)
7587 strings of literal characters, combined with wild-cards, and other special
7588 characters, called meta-characters. The <quote>meta-characters</quote> have
7589 special meanings and are used to build complex patterns to be matched against.
7590 Perl Compatible Regular Expressions are an especially convenient
7591 <quote>dialect</quote> of the regular expression language.
7595 To make a simple analogy, we do something similar when we use wild-card
7596 characters when listing files with the <command>dir</command> command in DOS.
7597 <literal>*.*</literal> matches all filenames. The <quote>special</quote>
7598 character here is the asterisk which matches any and all characters. We can be
7599 more specific and use <literal>?</literal> to match just individual
7600 characters. So <quote>dir file?.text</quote> would match
7601 <quote>file1.txt</quote>, <quote>file2.txt</quote>, etc. We are pattern
7602 matching, using a similar technique to <quote>regular expressions</quote>!
7606 Regular expressions do essentially the same thing, but are much, much more
7607 powerful. There are many more <quote>special characters</quote> and ways of
7608 building complex patterns however. Let's look at a few of the common ones,
7609 and then some examples:
7614 <emphasis>.</emphasis> - Matches any single character, e.g. <quote>a</quote>,
7615 <quote>A</quote>, <quote>4</quote>, <quote>:</quote>, or <quote>@</quote>.
7617 </simplelist></para>
7621 <emphasis>?</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ZERO or ONE
7624 </simplelist></para>
7628 <emphasis>+</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ONE or MORE
7631 </simplelist></para>
7635 <emphasis>*</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ZERO or MORE
7638 </simplelist></para>
7642 <emphasis>\</emphasis> - The <quote>escape</quote> character denotes that
7643 the following character should be taken literally. This is used where one of the
7644 special characters (e.g. <quote>.</quote>) needs to be taken literally and
7645 not as a special meta-character. Example: <quote>example\.com</quote>, makes
7646 sure the period is recognized only as a period (and not expanded to its
7647 meta-character meaning of any single character).
7649 </simplelist></para>
7653 <emphasis>[ ]</emphasis> - Characters enclosed in brackets will be matched if
7654 any of the enclosed characters are encountered. For instance, <quote>[0-9]</quote>
7655 matches any numeric digit (zero through nine). As an example, we can combine
7656 this with <quote>+</quote> to match any digit one of more times: <quote>[0-9]+</quote>.
7658 </simplelist></para>
7662 <emphasis>( )</emphasis> - parentheses are used to group a sub-expression,
7663 or multiple sub-expressions.
7665 </simplelist></para>
7669 <emphasis>|</emphasis> - The <quote>bar</quote> character works like an
7670 <quote>or</quote> conditional statement. A match is successful if the
7671 sub-expression on either side of <quote>|</quote> matches. As an example:
7672 <quote>/(this|that) example/</quote> uses grouping and the bar character
7673 and would match either <quote>this example</quote> or <quote>that
7674 example</quote>, and nothing else.
7676 </simplelist></para>
7679 These are just some of the ones you are likely to use when matching URLs with
7680 <application>Privoxy</application>, and is a long way from a definitive
7681 list. This is enough to get us started with a few simple examples which may
7682 be more illuminating:
7686 <emphasis><literal>/.*/banners/.*</literal></emphasis> - A simple example
7687 that uses the common combination of <quote>.</quote> and <quote>*</quote> to
7688 denote any character, zero or more times. In other words, any string at all.
7689 So we start with a literal forward slash, then our regular expression pattern
7690 (<quote>.*</quote>) another literal forward slash, the string
7691 <quote>banners</quote>, another forward slash, and lastly another
7692 <quote>.*</quote>. We are building
7693 a directory path here. This will match any file with the path that has a
7694 directory named <quote>banners</quote> in it. The <quote>.*</quote> matches
7695 any characters, and this could conceivably be more forward slashes, so it
7696 might expand into a much longer looking path. For example, this could match:
7697 <quote>/eye/hate/spammers/banners/annoy_me_please.gif</quote>, or just
7698 <quote>/banners/annoying.html</quote>, or almost an infinite number of other
7699 possible combinations, just so it has <quote>banners</quote> in the path
7704 And now something a little more complex:
7708 <emphasis><literal>/.*/adv((er)?ts?|ertis(ing|ements?))?/</literal></emphasis> -
7709 We have several literal forward slashes again (<quote>/</quote>), so we are
7710 building another expression that is a file path statement. We have another
7711 <quote>.*</quote>, so we are matching against any conceivable sub-path, just so
7712 it matches our expression. The only true literal that <emphasis>must
7713 match</emphasis> our pattern is <application>adv</application>, together with
7714 the forward slashes. What comes after the <quote>adv</quote> string is the
7719 Remember the <quote>?</quote> means the preceding expression (either a
7720 literal character or anything grouped with <quote>(...)</quote> in this case)
7721 can exist or not, since this means either zero or one match. So
7722 <quote>((er)?ts?|ertis(ing|ements?))</quote> is optional, as are the
7723 individual sub-expressions: <quote>(er)</quote>,
7724 <quote>(ing|ements?)</quote>, and the <quote>s</quote>. The <quote>|</quote>
7725 means <quote>or</quote>. We have two of those. For instance,
7726 <quote>(ing|ements?)</quote>, can expand to match either <quote>ing</quote>
7727 <emphasis>OR</emphasis> <quote>ements?</quote>. What is being done here, is an
7728 attempt at matching as many variations of <quote>advertisement</quote>, and
7729 similar, as possible. So this would expand to match just <quote>adv</quote>,
7730 or <quote>advert</quote>, or <quote>adverts</quote>, or
7731 <quote>advertising</quote>, or <quote>advertisement</quote>, or
7732 <quote>advertisements</quote>. You get the idea. But it would not match
7733 <quote>advertizements</quote> (with a <quote>z</quote>). We could fix that by
7734 changing our regular expression to:
7735 <quote>/.*/adv((er)?ts?|erti(s|z)(ing|ements?))?/</quote>, which would then match
7740 <emphasis><literal>/.*/advert[0-9]+\.(gif|jpe?g)</literal></emphasis> - Again
7741 another path statement with forward slashes. Anything in the square brackets
7742 <quote>[ ]</quote> can be matched. This is using <quote>0-9</quote> as a
7743 shorthand expression to mean any digit one through nine. It is the same as
7744 saying <quote>0123456789</quote>. So any digit matches. The <quote>+</quote>
7745 means one or more of the preceding expression must be included. The preceding
7746 expression here is what is in the square brackets -- in this case, any digit
7747 one through nine. Then, at the end, we have a grouping: <quote>(gif|jpe?g)</quote>.
7748 This includes a <quote>|</quote>, so this needs to match the expression on
7749 either side of that bar character also. A simple <quote>gif</quote> on one side, and the other
7750 side will in turn match either <quote>jpeg</quote> or <quote>jpg</quote>,
7751 since the <quote>?</quote> means the letter <quote>e</quote> is optional and
7752 can be matched once or not at all. So we are building an expression here to
7753 match image GIF or JPEG type image file. It must include the literal
7754 string <quote>advert</quote>, then one or more digits, and a <quote>.</quote>
7755 (which is now a literal, and not a special character, since it is escaped
7756 with <quote>\</quote>), and lastly either <quote>gif</quote>, or
7757 <quote>jpeg</quote>, or <quote>jpg</quote>. Some possible matches would
7758 include: <quote>//advert1.jpg</quote>,
7759 <quote>/nasty/ads/advert1234.gif</quote>,
7760 <quote>/banners/from/hell/advert99.jpg</quote>. It would not match
7761 <quote>advert1.gif</quote> (no leading slash), or
7762 <quote>/adverts232.jpg</quote> (the expression does not include an
7763 <quote>s</quote>), or <quote>/advert1.jsp</quote> (<quote>jsp</quote> is not
7764 in the expression anywhere).
7768 We are barely scratching the surface of regular expressions here so that you
7769 can understand the default <application>Privoxy</application>
7770 configuration files, and maybe use this knowledge to customize your own
7771 installation. There is much, much more that can be done with regular
7772 expressions. Now that you know enough to get started, you can learn more on
7777 More reading on Perl Compatible Regular expressions:
7778 <ulink url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html</ulink>
7782 For information on regular expression based substitutions and their applications
7783 in filters, please see the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file tutorial</link>
7788 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7791 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7793 <title>Privoxy's Internal Pages</title>
7796 Since <application>Privoxy</application> proxies each requested
7797 web page, it is easy for <application>Privoxy</application> to
7798 trap certain special URLs. In this way, we can talk directly to
7799 <application>Privoxy</application>, and see how it is
7800 configured, see how our rules are being applied, change these
7801 rules and other configuration options, and even turn
7802 <application>Privoxy's</application> filtering off, all with
7808 The URLs listed below are the special ones that allow direct access
7809 to <application>Privoxy</application>. Of course,
7810 <application>Privoxy</application> must be running to access these. If
7811 not, you will get a friendly error message. Internet access is not
7824 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
7828 There is a shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink> (But it
7829 doesn't provide a fall-back to a real page, in case the request is not
7830 sent through <application>Privoxy</application>)
7836 Show information about the current configuration, including viewing and
7837 editing of actions files:
7841 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
7848 Show the source code version numbers:
7852 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-version">http://config.privoxy.org/show-version</ulink>
7859 Show the browser's request headers:
7863 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-request">http://config.privoxy.org/show-request</ulink>
7870 Show which actions apply to a URL and why:
7874 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
7881 Toggle Privoxy on or off. This feature can be turned off/on in the main
7882 <filename>config</filename> file. When toggled <quote>off</quote>, <quote>Privoxy</quote>
7883 continues to run, but only as a pass-through proxy, with no actions taking
7888 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle</ulink>
7892 Short cuts. Turn off, then on:
7896 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=disable">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=disable</ulink>
7901 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=enable">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=enable</ulink>
7910 These may be bookmarked for quick reference. See next.
7914 <sect3 id="bookmarklets">
7915 <title>Bookmarklets</title>
7917 Below are some <quote>bookmarklets</quote> to allow you to easily access a
7918 <quote>mini</quote> version of some of <application>Privoxy's</application>
7919 special pages. They are designed for MS Internet Explorer, but should work
7920 equally well in Netscape, Mozilla, and other browsers which support
7921 JavaScript. They are designed to run directly from your bookmarks - not by
7922 clicking the links below (although that should work for testing).
7925 To save them, right-click the link and choose <quote>Add to Favorites</quote>
7926 (IE) or <quote>Add Bookmark</quote> (Netscape). You will get a warning that
7927 the bookmark <quote>may not be safe</quote> - just click OK. Then you can run the
7928 Bookmarklet directly from your favorites/bookmarks. For even faster access,
7929 you can put them on the <quote>Links</quote> bar (IE) or the <quote>Personal
7930 Toolbar</quote> (Netscape), and run them with a single click.
7939 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y&set=enabled','ijbstatus','width=250,height=100,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Enable</ulink>
7946 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y&set=disabled','ijbstatus','width=250,height=100,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Disable</ulink>
7953 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y&set=toggle','ijbstatus','width=250,height=100,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Toggle Privoxy</ulink> (Toggles between enabled and disabled)
7960 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y','ijbstatus','width=250,height=2,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy- View Status</ulink>
7966 <ulink url="javascript:w=Math.floor(screen.width/2);h=Math.floor(screen.height*0.9);void(window.open('http://www.privoxy.org/actions/index.php?url='+escape(location.href),'Feedback','screenx='+w+',width='+w+',height='+h+',scrollbars=yes,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Submit Actions File Feedback</ulink>
7972 <ulink url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info?url='+escape(location.href),'Why').focus());">Privoxy - Why?</ulink>
7979 Credit: The site which gave us the general idea for these bookmarklets is
7980 <ulink url="http://www.bookmarklets.com/">www.bookmarklets.com</ulink>. They
7981 have more information about bookmarklets.
7990 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7992 <title>Chain of Events</title>
7994 Let's take a quick look at how some of <application>Privoxy's</application>
7995 core features are triggered, and the ensuing sequence of events when a web
7996 page is requested by your browser:
8003 First, your web browser requests a web page. The browser knows to send
8004 the request to <application>Privoxy</application>, which will in turn,
8005 relay the request to the remote web server after passing the following
8011 <application>Privoxy</application> traps any request for its own internal CGI
8012 pages (e.g <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>) and sends the CGI page back to the browser.
8017 Next, <application>Privoxy</application> checks to see if the URL
8019 linkend="BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></link> patterns. If
8020 so, the URL is then blocked, and the remote web server will not be contacted.
8021 <link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></link>
8023 <link linkend="HANDLE-AS-EMPTY-DOCUMENT"><quote>+handle-as-empty-document</quote></link>
8024 are then checked, and if there is no match, an
8025 HTML <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page is sent back to the browser. Otherwise, if
8026 it does match, an image is returned for the former, and an empty text
8027 document for the latter. The type of image would depend on the setting of
8028 <link linkend="SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><quote>+set-image-blocker</quote></link>
8029 (blank, checkerboard pattern, or an HTTP redirect to an image elsewhere).
8034 Untrusted URLs are blocked. If URLs are being added to the
8035 <filename>trust</filename> file, then that is done.
8040 If the URL pattern matches the <link
8041 linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS"><quote>+fast-redirects</quote></link> action,
8042 it is then processed. Unwanted parts of the requested URL are stripped.
8047 Now the rest of the client browser's request headers are processed. If any
8048 of these match any of the relevant actions (e.g. <link
8049 linkend="HIDE-USER-AGENT"><quote>+hide-user-agent</quote></link>,
8050 etc.), headers are suppressed or forged as determined by these actions and
8056 Now the web server starts sending its response back (i.e. typically a web
8062 First, the server headers are read and processed to determine, among other
8063 things, the MIME type (document type) and encoding. The headers are then
8064 filtered as determined by the
8065 <link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES"><quote>+crunch-incoming-cookies</quote></link>,
8066 <link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></link>,
8067 and <link linkend="DOWNGRADE-HTTP-VERSION"><quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote></link>
8073 If any <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> action
8075 linkend="DEANIMATE-GIFS"><quote>+deanimate-gifs</quote></link>
8076 action applies (and the document type fits the action), the rest of the page is
8077 read into memory (up to a configurable limit). Then the filter rules (from
8078 <filename>default.filter</filename> and any other filter files) are
8079 processed against the buffered content. Filters are applied in the order
8080 they are specified in one of the filter files. Animated GIFs, if present,
8081 are reduced to either the first or last frame, depending on the action
8082 setting.The entire page, which is now filtered, is then sent by
8083 <application>Privoxy</application> back to your browser.
8086 If neither a <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> action
8088 linkend="DEANIMATE-GIFS"><quote>+deanimate-gifs</quote></link>
8089 matches, then <application>Privoxy</application> passes the raw data through
8090 to the client browser as it becomes available.
8095 As the browser receives the now (possibly filtered) page content, it
8096 reads and then requests any URLs that may be embedded within the page
8097 source, e.g. ad images, stylesheets, JavaScript, other HTML documents (e.g.
8098 frames), sounds, etc. For each of these objects, the browser issues a
8099 separate request (this is easily viewable in <application>Privoxy's</application>
8100 logs). And each such request is in turn processed just as above. Note that a
8101 complex web page will have many, many such embedded URLs. If these
8102 secondary requests are to a different server, then quite possibly a very
8103 differing set of actions is triggered.
8110 NOTE: This is somewhat of a simplistic overview of what happens with each URL
8111 request. For the sake of brevity and simplicity, we have focused on
8112 <application>Privoxy's</application> core features only.
8118 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8119 <sect2 id="actionsanat">
8120 <title>Troubleshooting: Anatomy of an Action</title>
8123 The way <application>Privoxy</application> applies
8124 <link linkend="ACTIONS">actions</link> and <link linkend="FILTER">filters</link>
8125 to any given URL can be complex, and not always so
8126 easy to understand what is happening. And sometimes we need to be able to
8127 <emphasis>see</emphasis> just what <application>Privoxy</application> is
8128 doing. Especially, if something <application>Privoxy</application> is doing
8129 is causing us a problem inadvertently. It can be a little daunting to look at
8130 the actions and filters files themselves, since they tend to be filled with
8131 <link linkend="regex">regular expressions</link> whose consequences are not
8136 One quick test to see if <application>Privoxy</application> is causing a problem
8137 or not, is to disable it temporarily. This should be the first troubleshooting
8138 step. See <link linkend="bookmarklets">the Bookmarklets</link> section on a quick
8139 and easy way to do this (be sure to flush caches afterward!). Looking at the
8140 logs is a good idea too. (Note that both the toggle feature and logging are
8141 enabled via <filename>config</filename> file settings, and may need to be
8142 turned <quote>on</quote>.)
8145 Another easy troubleshooting step to try is if you have done any
8146 customization of your installation, revert back to the installed
8147 defaults and see if that helps. There are times the developers get complaints
8148 about one thing or another, and the problem is more related to a customized
8149 configuration issue.
8153 <application>Privoxy</application> also provides the
8154 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
8155 page that can show us very specifically how <application>actions</application>
8156 are being applied to any given URL. This is a big help for troubleshooting.
8160 First, enter one URL (or partial URL) at the prompt, and then
8161 <application>Privoxy</application> will tell us
8162 how the current configuration will handle it. This will not
8163 help with filtering effects (i.e. the <link
8164 linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> action) from
8165 one of the filter files since this is handled very
8166 differently and not so easy to trap! It also will not tell you about any other
8167 URLs that may be embedded within the URL you are testing. For instance, images
8168 such as ads are expressed as URLs within the raw page source of HTML pages. So
8169 you will only get info for the actual URL that is pasted into the prompt area
8170 -- not any sub-URLs. If you want to know about embedded URLs like ads, you
8171 will have to dig those out of the HTML source. Use your browser's <quote>View
8172 Page Source</quote> option for this. Or right click on the ad, and grab the
8177 Let's try an example, <ulink url="http://google.com">google.com</ulink>,
8178 and look at it one section at a time in a sample configuration (your real
8179 configuration may vary):
8184 Matches for http://www.google.com:
8186 In file: default.action <guibutton>[ View ]</guibutton> <guibutton>[ Edit ]</guibutton>
8188 {+deanimate-gifs {last}
8189 +fast-redirects {check-decoded-url}
8190 +filter {refresh-tags}
8191 +filter {img-reorder}
8192 +filter {banners-by-size}
8194 +filter {jumping-windows}
8195 +filter {ie-exploits}
8196 +hide-forwarded-for-headers
8197 +hide-from-header {block}
8198 +hide-referrer {forge}
8199 +session-cookies-only
8200 +set-image-blocker {pattern}
8203 { -session-cookies-only }
8209 In file: user.action <guibutton>[ View ]</guibutton> <guibutton>[ Edit ]</guibutton>
8210 (no matches in this file)
8215 This is telling us how we have defined our
8216 <link linkend="ACTIONS"><quote>actions</quote></link>, and
8217 which ones match for our test case, <quote>google.com</quote>.
8218 Displayed is all the actions that are available to us. Remember,
8219 the <literal>+</literal> sign denotes <quote>on</quote>. <literal>-</literal>
8220 denotes <quote>off</quote>. So some are <quote>on</quote> here, but many
8221 are <quote>off</quote>. Each example we try may provide a slightly different
8222 end result, depending on our configuration directives.
8226 is for our <filename>default.action</filename> file. The large, multi-line
8227 listing, is how the actions are set to match for all URLs, i.e. our default
8228 settings. If you look at your <quote>actions</quote> file, this would be the
8229 section just below the <quote>aliases</quote> section near the top. This
8230 will apply to all URLs as signified by the single forward slash at the end
8231 of the listing -- <quote> / </quote>.
8235 But we have defined additional actions that would be exceptions to these general
8236 rules, and then we list specific URLs (or patterns) that these exceptions
8237 would apply to. Last match wins. Just below this then are two explicit
8238 matches for <quote>.google.com</quote>. The first is negating our previous
8239 cookie setting, which was for <link
8240 linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></link>
8241 (i.e. not persistent). So we will allow persistent cookies for google, at
8242 least that is how it is in this example. The second turns
8243 <emphasis>off</emphasis> any <link
8244 linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS"><quote>+fast-redirects</quote></link>
8245 action, allowing this to take place unmolested. Note that there is a leading
8246 dot here -- <quote>.google.com</quote>. This will match any hosts and
8247 sub-domains, in the google.com domain also, such as
8248 <quote>www.google.com</quote> or <quote>mail.google.com</quote>. But it would not
8249 match <quote>www.google.de</quote>! So, apparently, we have these two actions
8250 defined as exceptions to the general rules at the top somewhere in the lower
8251 part of our <filename>default.action</filename> file, and
8252 <quote>google.com</quote> is referenced somewhere in these latter sections.
8256 Then, for our <filename>user.action</filename> file, we again have no hits.
8257 So there is nothing google-specific that we might have added to our own, local
8258 configuration. If there was, those actions would over-rule any actions from
8259 previously processed files, such as <filename>default.action</filename>.
8260 <filename>user.action</filename> typically has the last word. This is the
8261 best place to put hard and fast exceptions,
8265 And finally we pull it all together in the bottom section and summarize how
8266 <application>Privoxy</application> is applying all its <quote>actions</quote>
8267 to <quote>google.com</quote>:
8278 -client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}
8279 -content-type-overwrite
8280 -crunch-client-header
8281 -crunch-if-none-match
8282 -crunch-incoming-cookies
8283 -crunch-outgoing-cookies
8284 -crunch-server-header
8285 +deanimate-gifs {last}
8286 -downgrade-http-version
8289 -filter {content-cookies}
8290 -filter {all-popups}
8291 -filter {banners-by-link}
8292 -filter {tiny-textforms}
8293 -filter {frameset-borders}
8294 -filter {demoronizer}
8295 -filter {shockwave-flash}
8296 -filter {quicktime-kioskmode}
8298 -filter {crude-parental}
8299 -filter {site-specifics}
8300 -filter {js-annoyances}
8301 -filter {html-annoyances}
8302 +filter {refresh-tags}
8303 -filter {unsolicited-popups}
8304 +filter {img-reorder}
8305 +filter {banners-by-size}
8307 +filter {jumping-windows}
8308 +filter {ie-exploits}
8315 -handle-as-empty-document
8317 -hide-accept-language
8318 -hide-content-disposition
8319 +hide-forwarded-for-headers
8320 +hide-from-header {block}
8321 -hide-if-modified-since
8322 +hide-referrer {forge}
8325 -overwrite-last-modified
8326 -prevent-compression
8328 -server-header-filter{xml-to-html}
8329 -server-header-filter{html-to-xml}
8330 -session-cookies-only
8331 +set-image-blocker {pattern} </screen>
8335 Notice the only difference here to the previous listing, is to
8336 <quote>fast-redirects</quote> and <quote>session-cookies-only</quote>,
8337 which are activated specifically for this site in our configuration,
8338 and thus show in the <quote>Final Results</quote>.
8342 Now another example, <quote>ad.doubleclick.net</quote>:
8348 { +block{Domains starts with "ad"} }
8351 { +block{Domain contains "ad"} }
8354 { +block{Doubleclick banner server} +handle-as-image }
8355 .[a-vx-z]*.doubleclick.net
8360 We'll just show the interesting part here - the explicit matches. It is
8361 matched three different times. Two <quote>+block{}</quote> sections,
8362 and a <quote>+block{} +handle-as-image</quote>,
8363 which is the expanded form of one of our aliases that had been defined as:
8364 <quote>+block-as-image</quote>. (<link
8365 linkend="ALIASES"><quote>Aliases</quote></link> are defined in
8366 the first section of the actions file and typically used to combine more
8371 Any one of these would have done the trick and blocked this as an unwanted
8372 image. This is unnecessarily redundant since the last case effectively
8373 would also cover the first. No point in taking chances with these guys
8374 though ;-) Note that if you want an ad or obnoxious
8375 URL to be invisible, it should be defined as <quote>ad.doubleclick.net</quote>
8376 is done here -- as both a <link
8377 linkend="BLOCK"><quote>+block{}</quote></link>
8378 <emphasis>and</emphasis> an
8379 <link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></link>.
8380 The custom alias <quote><literal>+block-as-image</literal></quote> just
8381 simplifies the process and make it more readable.
8385 One last example. Let's try <quote>http://www.example.net/adsl/HOWTO/</quote>.
8386 This one is giving us problems. We are getting a blank page. Hmmm ...
8392 Matches for http://www.example.net/adsl/HOWTO/:
8394 In file: default.action <guibutton>[ View ]</guibutton> <guibutton>[ Edit ]</guibutton>
8398 -client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}
8399 -content-type-overwrite
8400 -crunch-client-header
8401 -crunch-if-none-match
8402 -crunch-incoming-cookies
8403 -crunch-outgoing-cookies
8404 -crunch-server-header
8406 -downgrade-http-version
8407 +fast-redirects {check-decoded-url}
8409 -filter {content-cookies}
8410 -filter {all-popups}
8411 -filter {banners-by-link}
8412 -filter {tiny-textforms}
8413 -filter {frameset-borders}
8414 -filter {demoronizer}
8415 -filter {shockwave-flash}
8416 -filter {quicktime-kioskmode}
8418 -filter {crude-parental}
8419 -filter {site-specifics}
8420 -filter {js-annoyances}
8421 -filter {html-annoyances}
8422 +filter {refresh-tags}
8423 -filter {unsolicited-popups}
8424 +filter {img-reorder}
8425 +filter {banners-by-size}
8427 +filter {jumping-windows}
8428 +filter {ie-exploits}
8435 -handle-as-empty-document
8437 -hide-accept-language
8438 -hide-content-disposition
8439 +hide-forwarded-for-headers
8440 +hide-from-header{block}
8441 +hide-referer{forge}
8443 -overwrite-last-modified
8444 +prevent-compression
8446 -server-header-filter{xml-to-html}
8447 -server-header-filter{html-to-xml}
8448 +session-cookies-only
8449 +set-image-blocker{blank} }
8452 { +block{Path contains "ads".} +handle-as-image }
8458 Ooops, the <quote>/adsl/</quote> is matching <quote>/ads</quote> in our
8459 configuration! But we did not want this at all! Now we see why we get the
8460 blank page. It is actually triggering two different actions here, and
8461 the effects are aggregated so that the URL is blocked, and &my-app; is told
8462 to treat the block as if it were an image. But this is, of course, all wrong.
8463 We could now add a new action below this (or better in our own
8464 <filename>user.action</filename> file) that explicitly
8465 <emphasis>un</emphasis> blocks (
8466 <link linkend="BLOCK"><quote>{-block}</quote></link>) paths with
8467 <quote>adsl</quote> in them (remember, last match in the configuration
8468 wins). There are various ways to handle such exceptions. Example:
8480 Now the page displays ;-)
8481 Remember to flush your browser's caches when making these kinds of changes to
8482 your configuration to insure that you get a freshly delivered page! Or, try
8483 using <literal>Shift+Reload</literal>.
8487 But now what about a situation where we get no explicit matches like
8494 { +block{Path starts with "ads".} +handle-as-image }
8500 That actually was very helpful and pointed us quickly to where the problem
8501 was. If you don't get this kind of match, then it means one of the default
8502 rules in the first section of <filename>default.action</filename> is causing
8503 the problem. This would require some guesswork, and maybe a little trial and
8504 error to isolate the offending rule. One likely cause would be one of the
8505 <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> actions.
8506 These tend to be harder to troubleshoot.
8507 Try adding the URL for the site to one of aliases that turn off
8508 <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link>:
8516 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
8524 <quote><literal>{ shop }</literal></quote> is an <quote>alias</quote> that expands to
8525 <quote><literal>{ -filter -session-cookies-only }</literal></quote>.
8526 Or you could do your own exception to negate filtering:
8534 # Disable ALL filter actions for sites in this section
8542 This would turn off all filtering for these sites. This is best
8543 put in <filename>user.action</filename>, for local site
8544 exceptions. Note that when a simple domain pattern is used by itself (without
8545 the subsequent path portion), all sub-pages within that domain are included
8546 automatically in the scope of the action.
8550 Images that are inexplicably being blocked, may well be hitting the
8551 <link linkend="FILTER-BANNERS-BY-SIZE"><quote>+filter{banners-by-size}</quote></link>
8553 that images of certain sizes are ad banners (works well
8554 <emphasis>most of the time</emphasis> since these tend to be standardized).
8558 <quote><literal>{ fragile }</literal></quote> is an alias that disables most
8559 actions that are the most likely to cause trouble. This can be used as a
8560 last resort for problem sites.
8566 # Handle with care: easy to break
8568 mybank.example.com</screen>
8573 <emphasis>Remember to flush caches!</emphasis> Note that the
8574 <literal>mail.google</literal> reference lacks the TLD portion (e.g.
8575 <quote>.com</quote>). This will effectively match any TLD with
8576 <literal>google</literal> in it, such as <literal>mail.google.de.</literal>,
8580 If this still does not work, you will have to go through the remaining
8581 actions one by one to find which one(s) is causing the problem.
8590 This program is free software; you can redistribute it
8591 and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
8592 Public License as published by the Free Software
8593 Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at
8594 your option) any later version.
8596 This program is distributed in the hope that it will
8597 be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the
8598 implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
8599 PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public
8600 License for more details.
8602 The GNU General Public License should be included with
8603 this file. If not, you can view it at
8604 http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
8605 or write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
8606 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301,
8609 $Log: user-manual.sgml,v $
8610 Revision 2.86 2008/08/16 10:12:23 fabiankeil
8611 Merge two sentences and move the URL to the end of the item.
8613 Revision 2.85 2008/08/16 10:04:59 fabiankeil
8614 Some more syntax fixes. This version actually builds.
8616 Revision 2.84 2008/08/16 09:42:45 fabiankeil
8617 Turns out building docs works better if the syntax is valid.
8619 Revision 2.83 2008/08/16 09:32:02 fabiankeil
8620 Mention changes since 3.0.9 beta.
8622 Revision 2.82 2008/08/16 09:00:52 fabiankeil
8623 Fix example URL pattern (once more with feeling).
8625 Revision 2.81 2008/08/16 08:51:28 fabiankeil
8626 Update version-related entities.
8628 Revision 2.80 2008/07/18 16:54:30 fabiankeil
8629 Remove erroneous whitespace in documentation link.
8630 Reported by John Chronister in #2021611.
8632 Revision 2.79 2008/06/27 18:00:53 markm68k
8633 remove outdated startup information for mac os x
8635 Revision 2.78 2008/06/21 17:03:03 fabiankeil
8638 Revision 2.77 2008/06/14 13:45:22 fabiankeil
8639 Re-add a colon I unintentionally removed a few revisions ago.
8641 Revision 2.76 2008/06/14 13:21:28 fabiankeil
8642 Prepare for the upcoming 3.0.9 beta release.
8644 Revision 2.75 2008/06/13 16:06:48 fabiankeil
8645 Update the "What's New in this Release" section with
8646 the ChangeLog entries changelog2doc.pl could handle.
8648 Revision 2.74 2008/05/26 15:55:46 fabiankeil
8649 - Update "default profiles" table.
8650 - Add some more pcrs redirect examples and note that
8651 enabling debug 128 helps to get redirects working.
8653 Revision 2.73 2008/05/23 14:43:18 fabiankeil
8654 Remove previously out-commented block that caused syntax problems.
8656 Revision 2.72 2008/05/12 10:26:14 fabiankeil
8657 Synchronize content filter descriptions with the ones in default.filter.
8659 Revision 2.71 2008/04/10 17:37:16 fabiankeil
8660 Actually we use "modern" POSIX 1003.2 regular
8661 expressions in path patterns, not PCRE.
8663 Revision 2.70 2008/04/10 15:59:12 fabiankeil
8664 Add another section to the client-header-tagger example that shows
8665 how to actually change the action settings once the tag is created.
8667 Revision 2.69 2008/03/29 12:14:25 fabiankeil
8668 Remove send-wafer and send-vanilla-wafer actions.
8670 Revision 2.68 2008/03/28 15:13:43 fabiankeil
8671 Remove inspect-jpegs action.
8673 Revision 2.67 2008/03/27 18:31:21 fabiankeil
8674 Remove kill-popups action.
8676 Revision 2.66 2008/03/06 16:33:47 fabiankeil
8677 If limit-connect isn't used, don't limit CONNECT requests to port 443.
8679 Revision 2.65 2008/03/04 18:30:40 fabiankeil
8680 Remove the treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks action. We now
8681 use the "blocked" page for forbidden CONNECT requests by default.
8683 Revision 2.64 2008/03/01 14:10:28 fabiankeil
8684 Use new block syntax. Still needs some polishing.
8686 Revision 2.63 2008/02/22 05:50:37 markm68k
8689 Revision 2.62 2008/02/11 11:52:23 hal9
8690 Fix entity ... s/&/&
8692 Revision 2.61 2008/02/11 03:41:47 markm68k
8693 more updates for mac os x
8695 Revision 2.60 2008/02/11 03:40:25 markm68k
8696 more updates for mac os x
8698 Revision 2.59 2008/02/11 00:52:34 markm68k
8699 reflect new changes for mac os x
8701 Revision 2.58 2008/02/03 21:37:40 hal9
8702 Apply patch from Mark: s/OSX/OS X/
8704 Revision 2.57 2008/02/03 19:10:14 fabiankeil
8705 Mention forward-socks5.
8707 Revision 2.56 2008/01/31 19:11:35 fabiankeil
8708 Let the +client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation} example apply
8709 to all requests as "tainted" Referers aren't limited to exit TLDs.
8711 Revision 2.55 2008/01/19 21:26:37 hal9
8712 Add IE7 to configuration section per Gerry.
8714 Revision 2.54 2008/01/19 17:52:39 hal9
8715 Re-commit to fix various minor issues for new release.
8717 Revision 2.53 2008/01/19 15:03:05 hal9
8718 Doc sources tagged for 3.0.8 release.
8720 Revision 2.52 2008/01/17 01:49:51 hal9
8721 Change copyright notice for docs s/2007/2008/. All these will be rebuilt soon
8724 Revision 2.51 2007/12/23 16:48:24 fabiankeil
8725 Use more precise example descriptions for the mysterious domain patterns.
8727 Revision 2.50 2007/12/08 12:44:36 fabiankeil
8728 - Remove already commented out pre-3.0.7 changes.
8729 - Update the "new log defaults" paragraph.
8731 Revision 2.49 2007/12/06 18:21:55 fabiankeil
8732 Update hide-forwarded-for-headers description.
8734 Revision 2.48 2007/11/24 19:07:17 fabiankeil
8735 - Mention request rewriting.
8736 - Enable the conditional-forge paragraph.
8739 Revision 2.47 2007/11/18 14:59:47 fabiankeil
8740 A few "Note to Upgraders" updates.
8742 Revision 2.46 2007/11/17 17:24:44 fabiankeil
8743 - Use new action defaults.
8744 - Minor fixes and rewordings.
8746 Revision 2.45 2007/11/16 11:48:46 hal9
8747 Fix one typo, and add a couple of small refinements.
8749 Revision 2.44 2007/11/15 03:30:20 hal9
8750 Results of spell check.
8752 Revision 2.43 2007/11/14 18:45:39 fabiankeil
8753 - Mention some more contributors in the "New in this Release" list.
8756 Revision 2.42 2007/11/12 03:32:40 hal9
8757 Updates for "What's New" and "Notes to Upgraders". Various other changes in
8758 preparation for new release. User Manual is almost ready.
8760 Revision 2.41 2007/11/11 16:32:11 hal9
8761 This is primarily syncing What's New and Note to Upgraders sections with the many
8762 new features and changes (gleaned from memory but mostly from ChangeLog).
8764 Revision 2.40 2007/11/10 17:10:59 fabiankeil
8765 In the first third of the file, mention several times that
8766 the action editor is disabled by default in 3.0.7 beta and later.
8768 Revision 2.39 2007/11/05 02:34:49 hal9
8769 Various changes in preparation for the upcoming release. Much yet to be done.
8771 Revision 2.38 2007/09/22 16:01:42 fabiankeil
8772 Update embedded show-url-info output.
8774 Revision 2.37 2007/08/27 16:09:55 fabiankeil
8775 Fix pre-chroot-nslookup description which I failed to
8776 copy and paste properly. Reported by Stephen Gildea.
8778 Revision 2.36 2007/08/26 16:47:14 fabiankeil
8779 Add Stephen Gildea's pre-chroot-nslookup patch [#1276666],
8780 extensive comments moved to user manual.
8782 Revision 2.35 2007/08/26 14:59:49 fabiankeil
8783 Minor rewordings and fixes.
8785 Revision 2.34 2007/08/05 15:19:50 fabiankeil
8786 - Don't claim HTTP/1.1 compliance.
8787 - Use $ in some of the path pattern examples.
8788 - Use a hide-user-agent example argument without
8789 leading and trailing space.
8790 - Make it clear that the cookie actions work with
8792 - Rephrase the inspect-jpegs text to underline
8793 that it's only meant to protect against a single
8796 Revision 2.33 2007/07/27 10:57:35 hal9
8797 Add references for user-agent strings for hide-user-agenet
8799 Revision 2.32 2007/06/07 12:36:22 fabiankeil
8800 Apply Roland's 29_usermanual.dpatch to fix a bunch
8801 of syntax errors I collected over the last months.
8803 Revision 2.31 2007/06/02 14:01:37 fabiankeil
8804 Start to document forward-override{}.
8806 Revision 2.30 2007/04/25 15:10:36 fabiankeil
8807 - Describe installation for FreeBSD.
8808 - Start to document taggers and tag patterns.
8809 - Don't confuse devils and daemons.
8811 Revision 2.29 2007/04/05 11:47:51 fabiankeil
8812 Some updates regarding header filtering,
8813 handling of compressed content and redirect's
8814 support for pcrs commands.
8816 Revision 2.28 2006/12/10 23:42:48 hal9
8817 Fix various typos reported by Adam P. Thanks.
8819 Revision 2.27 2006/11/14 01:57:47 hal9
8820 Dump all docs prior to 3.0.6 release. Various minor changes to faq and user
8823 Revision 2.26 2006/10/24 11:16:44 hal9
8826 Revision 2.25 2006/10/18 10:50:33 hal9
8827 Add note that since filters are off in Cautious, compression is ON. Turn off
8828 compression to make filters work on all sites.
8830 Revision 2.24 2006/10/03 11:13:54 hal9
8831 More references to the new filters. Include html this time around.
8833 Revision 2.23 2006/10/02 22:43:53 hal9
8834 Contains new filter definitions from Fabian, and few other miscellaneous
8837 Revision 2.22 2006/09/22 01:27:55 hal9
8838 Final commit of probably various minor changes here and there. Unless
8839 something changes this should be ready for pending release.
8841 Revision 2.21 2006/09/20 03:21:36 david__schmidt
8842 Just the tiniest tweak. Wafer thin!
8844 Revision 2.20 2006/09/10 14:53:54 hal9
8845 Results of spell check. User manual has some updates to standard.actions file
8848 Revision 2.19 2006/09/08 12:19:02 fabiankeil
8849 Adjust hide-if-modified-since example values
8850 to reflect the recent changes.
8852 Revision 2.18 2006/09/08 02:38:57 hal9
8854 -Fix a number of broken links.
8855 -Migrate the new Windows service command line options, and reference as
8857 -Rebuild so that can be used with the new "user-manual" config capabilities.
8860 Revision 2.17 2006/09/05 13:25:12 david__schmidt
8861 Add Windows service invocation stuff (duplicated) in FAQ and in user manual under Windows startup. One probably ought to reference the other.
8863 Revision 2.16 2006/09/02 12:49:37 hal9
8864 Various small updates for new actions, filterfiles, etc.
8866 Revision 2.15 2006/08/30 11:15:22 hal9
8867 More work on the new actions, especially filter-*-headers, and What's New
8868 section. User Manual is close to final form for 3.0.4 release. Some tinkering
8869 and proof reading left to do.
8871 Revision 2.14 2006/08/29 10:59:36 hal9
8872 Add a "Whats New in this release" Section. Further work on multiple filter
8873 files, and assorted other minor changes.
8875 Revision 2.13 2006/08/22 11:04:59 hal9
8876 Silence warnings and errors. This should build now. New filters were only
8877 stubbed in. More to be done.
8879 Revision 2.12 2006/08/14 08:40:39 fabiankeil
8880 Documented new actions that were part of
8881 the "minor Privoxy improvements".
8883 Revision 2.11 2006/07/18 14:48:51 david__schmidt
8884 Reorganizing the repository: swapping out what was HEAD (the old 3.1 branch)
8885 with what was really the latest development (the v_3_0_branch branch)
8887 Revision 1.123.2.43 2005/05/23 09:59:10 hal9
8890 Revision 1.123.2.42 2004/12/04 14:39:57 hal9
8891 Fix two minor typos per bug SF report.
8893 Revision 1.123.2.41 2004/03/23 12:58:42 oes
8896 Revision 1.123.2.40 2004/02/27 12:48:49 hal9
8897 Add comment re: redirecting to local file system for set-image-blocker may
8898 is dependent on browser.
8900 Revision 1.123.2.39 2004/01/30 22:31:40 oes
8901 Added a hint re bookmarklets to Quickstart section
8903 Revision 1.123.2.38 2004/01/30 16:47:51 oes
8904 Some minor clarifications
8906 Revision 1.123.2.37 2004/01/29 22:36:11 hal9
8907 Updates for no longer filtering text/plain, and demoronizer default settings,
8908 and copyright notice dates.
8910 Revision 1.123.2.36 2003/12/10 02:26:26 hal9
8911 Changed the demoronizer filter description.
8913 Revision 1.123.2.35 2003/11/06 13:36:37 oes
8914 Updated link to nightly CVS tarball
8916 Revision 1.123.2.34 2003/06/26 23:50:16 hal9
8917 Add a small bit on filtering and problems re: source code being corrupted.
8919 Revision 1.123.2.33 2003/05/08 18:17:33 roro
8920 Use apt-get instead of dpkg to install Debian package, which is more
8921 solid, uses the correct and most recent Debian version automatically.
8923 Revision 1.123.2.32 2003/04/11 03:13:57 hal9
8924 Add small note about only one filterfile (as opposed to multiple actions
8927 Revision 1.123.2.31 2003/03/26 02:03:43 oes
8928 Updated hard-coded copyright dates
8930 Revision 1.123.2.30 2003/03/24 12:58:56 hal9
8931 Add new section on Predefined Filters.
8933 Revision 1.123.2.29 2003/03/20 02:45:29 hal9
8934 More problems with \-\-chroot causing markup problems :(
8936 Revision 1.123.2.28 2003/03/19 00:35:24 hal9
8937 Manual edit of revision log because 'chroot' (even inside a comment) was
8938 causing Docbook to hang here (due to double hyphen and the processor thinking
8941 Revision 1.123.2.27 2003/03/18 19:37:14 oes
8942 s/Advanced|Radical/Adventuresome/g to avoid complaints re fun filter
8944 Revision 1.123.2.26 2003/03/17 16:50:53 oes
8945 Added documentation for new chroot option
8947 Revision 1.123.2.25 2003/03/15 18:36:55 oes
8948 Adapted to the new filters
8950 Revision 1.123.2.24 2002/11/17 06:41:06 hal9
8951 Move default profiles table from FAQ to U-M, and other minor related changes.
8954 Revision 1.123.2.23 2002/10/21 02:32:01 hal9
8955 Updates to the user.action examples section. A few new ones.
8957 Revision 1.123.2.22 2002/10/12 00:51:53 hal9
8958 Add demoronizer to filter section.
8960 Revision 1.123.2.21 2002/10/10 04:09:35 hal9
8961 s/Advanced/Radical/ and added very brief note.
8963 Revision 1.123.2.20 2002/10/10 03:49:21 hal9
8964 Add notes to session-cookies-only and Quickstart about pre-existing
8965 cookies. Also, note content-cookies work differently.
8967 Revision 1.123.2.19 2002/09/26 01:25:36 hal9
8968 More explanation on Privoxy patterns, more on content-cookies and SSL.
8970 Revision 1.123.2.18 2002/08/22 23:47:58 hal9
8971 Add 'Documentation' to Privoxy Menu shot in Configuration section to match
8974 Revision 1.123.2.17 2002/08/18 01:13:05 hal9
8975 Spell checked (only one typo this time!).
8977 Revision 1.123.2.16 2002/08/09 19:20:54 david__schmidt
8978 Update to Mac OS X startup script name
8980 Revision 1.123.2.15 2002/08/07 17:32:11 oes
8981 Converted some internal links from ulink to link for PDF creation; no content changed
8983 Revision 1.123.2.14 2002/08/06 09:16:13 oes
8984 Nits re: actions file download
8986 Revision 1.123.2.13 2002/08/02 18:23:19 g_sauthoff
8987 Just 2 small corrections to the Gentoo sections
8989 Revision 1.123.2.12 2002/08/02 18:17:21 g_sauthoff
8990 Added 2 Gentoo sections
8992 Revision 1.123.2.11 2002/07/26 15:20:31 oes
8993 - Added version info to title
8994 - Added info on new filters
8995 - Revised parts of the filter file tutorial
8996 - Added info on where to get updated actions files
8998 Revision 1.123.2.10 2002/07/25 21:42:29 hal9
8999 Add brief notes on not proxying non-HTTP protocols.
9001 Revision 1.123.2.9 2002/07/11 03:40:28 david__schmidt
9003 Updated Mac OS X sections due to installation location change
9005 Revision 1.123.2.8 2002/06/09 16:36:32 hal9
9006 Clarifications on filtering and MIME. Hardcode 'latest release' in index.html.
9008 Revision 1.123.2.7 2002/06/09 00:29:34 hal9
9009 Touch ups on filtering, in actions section and Anatomy.
9011 Revision 1.123.2.6 2002/06/06 23:11:03 hal9
9012 Fix broken link. Linkchecked all docs.
9014 Revision 1.123.2.5 2002/05/29 02:01:02 hal9
9015 This is break out of the entire config section from u-m, so it can
9016 eventually be used to generate the comments, etc in the main config file
9017 so that these are in sync with each other.
9019 Revision 1.123.2.4 2002/05/27 03:28:45 hal9
9020 Ooops missed something from David.
9022 Revision 1.123.2.3 2002/05/27 03:23:17 hal9
9023 Fix FIXMEs for OS2 and Mac OS X startup. Fix Redhat typos (should be Red Hat).
9024 That's a wrap, I think.
9026 Revision 1.123.2.2 2002/05/26 19:02:09 hal9
9027 Move Amiga stuff around to take of FIXME in start up section.
9029 Revision 1.123.2.1 2002/05/26 17:04:25 hal9
9030 -Spellcheck, very minor edits, and sync across branches
9032 Revision 1.123 2002/05/24 23:19:23 hal9
9033 Include new image (Proxy setup). More fun with guibutton.
9034 Minor corrections/clarifications here and there.
9036 Revision 1.122 2002/05/24 13:24:08 oes
9037 Added Bookmarklet for one-click pre-filled access to show-url-info
9039 Revision 1.121 2002/05/23 23:20:17 oes
9040 - Changed more (all?) references to actions to the
9041 <literal><link> style.
9042 - Small fixes in the actions chapter
9043 - Small clarifications in the quickstart to ad blocking
9044 - Removed <emphasis> from <title>s since the new doc CSS
9045 renders them red (bad in TOC).
9047 Revision 1.120 2002/05/23 19:16:43 roro
9048 Correct Debian specials (installation and startup).
9050 Revision 1.119 2002/05/22 17:17:05 oes
9053 Revision 1.118 2002/05/21 04:54:55 hal9
9054 -New Section: Quickstart to Ad Blocking
9055 -Reformat Actions Anatomy to match new CGI layout
9057 Revision 1.117 2002/05/17 13:56:16 oes
9058 - Reworked & extended Templates chapter
9059 - Small changes to Regex appendix
9060 - #included authors.sgml into (C) and hist chapter
9062 Revision 1.116 2002/05/17 03:23:46 hal9
9063 Fixing merge conflict in Quickstart section.
9065 Revision 1.115 2002/05/16 16:25:00 oes
9066 Extended the Filter File chapter & minor fixes
9068 Revision 1.114 2002/05/16 09:42:50 oes
9069 More ulink->link, added some hints to Quickstart section
9071 Revision 1.113 2002/05/15 21:07:25 oes
9072 Extended and further commented the example actions files
9074 Revision 1.112 2002/05/15 03:57:14 hal9
9075 Spell check. A few minor edits here and there for better syntax and
9078 Revision 1.111 2002/05/14 23:01:36 oes
9081 Revision 1.110 2002/05/14 19:10:45 oes
9082 Restored alphabetical order of actions
9084 Revision 1.109 2002/05/14 17:23:11 oes
9085 Renamed the prevent-*-cookies actions, extended aliases section and moved it before the example AFs
9087 Revision 1.108 2002/05/14 15:29:12 oes
9088 Completed proofreading the actions chapter
9090 Revision 1.107 2002/05/12 03:20:41 hal9
9091 Small clarifications for 127.0.0.1 vs localhost for listen-address since this
9092 apparently an important distinction for some OS's.
9094 Revision 1.106 2002/05/10 01:48:20 hal9
9095 This is mostly proposed copyright/licensing additions and changes. Docs
9096 are still GPL, but licensing and copyright are more visible. Also, copyright
9097 changed in doc header comments (eliminate references to JB except FAQ).
9099 Revision 1.105 2002/05/05 20:26:02 hal9
9100 Sorting out license vs copyright in these docs.
9102 Revision 1.104 2002/05/04 08:44:45 swa
9105 Revision 1.103 2002/05/04 00:40:53 hal9
9106 -Remove the TOC first page kludge. It's fixed proper now in ldp.dsl.in.
9107 -Some minor additions to Quickstart.
9109 Revision 1.102 2002/05/03 17:46:00 oes
9110 Further proofread & reactivated short build instructions
9112 Revision 1.101 2002/05/03 03:58:30 hal9
9113 Move the user-manual config directive to top of section. Add note about
9114 Privoxy needing read permissions for configs, and write for logs.
9116 Revision 1.100 2002/04/29 03:05:55 hal9
9117 Add clarification on differences of new actions files.
9119 Revision 1.99 2002/04/28 16:59:05 swa
9120 more structure in starting section
9122 Revision 1.98 2002/04/28 05:43:59 hal9
9123 This is the break up of configuration.html into multiple files. This
9124 will probably break links elsewhere :(
9126 Revision 1.97 2002/04/27 21:04:42 hal9
9127 -Rewrite of Actions File example.
9128 -Add section for user-manual directive in config.
9130 Revision 1.96 2002/04/27 05:32:00 hal9
9131 -Add short section to Filter Files to tie in with +filter action.
9132 -Start rewrite of examples in Actions Examples (not finished).
9134 Revision 1.95 2002/04/26 17:23:29 swa
9135 bookmarks cleaned, changed structure of user manual, screen and programlisting cleanups, and numerous other changes that I forgot
9137 Revision 1.94 2002/04/26 05:24:36 hal9
9138 -Add most of Andreas suggestions to Chain of Events section.
9139 -A few other minor corrections and touch up.
9141 Revision 1.92 2002/04/25 18:55:13 hal9
9142 More catchups on new actions files, and new actions names.
9143 Other assorted cleanups, and minor modifications.
9145 Revision 1.91 2002/04/24 02:39:31 hal9
9146 Add 'Chain of Events' section.
9148 Revision 1.90 2002/04/23 21:41:25 hal9
9149 Linuxconf is deprecated on RH, substitute chkconfig.
9151 Revision 1.89 2002/04/23 21:05:28 oes
9152 Added hint for startup on Red Hat
9154 Revision 1.88 2002/04/23 05:37:54 hal9
9155 Add AmigaOS install stuff.
9157 Revision 1.87 2002/04/23 02:53:15 david__schmidt
9158 Updated Mac OS X installation section
9159 Added a few English tweaks here an there
9161 Revision 1.86 2002/04/21 01:46:32 hal9
9162 Re-write actions section.
9164 Revision 1.85 2002/04/18 21:23:23 hal9
9165 Fix ugly typo (mine).
9167 Revision 1.84 2002/04/18 21:17:13 hal9
9168 Spell Redhat correctly (ie Red Hat). A few minor grammar corrections.
9170 Revision 1.83 2002/04/18 18:21:12 oes
9171 Added RPM install detail
9173 Revision 1.82 2002/04/18 12:04:50 oes
9176 Revision 1.81 2002/04/18 11:50:24 oes
9177 Extended Install section - needs fixing by packagers
9179 Revision 1.80 2002/04/18 10:45:19 oes
9180 Moved text to buildsource.sgml, renamed some filters, details
9182 Revision 1.79 2002/04/18 03:18:06 hal9
9183 Spellcheck, and minor touchups.
9185 Revision 1.78 2002/04/17 18:04:16 oes
9188 Revision 1.77 2002/04/17 13:51:23 oes
9189 Proofreading, part one
9191 Revision 1.76 2002/04/16 04:25:51 hal9
9192 -Added 'Note to Upgraders' and re-ordered the 'Quickstart' section.
9193 -Note about proxy may need requests to re-read config files.
9195 Revision 1.75 2002/04/12 02:08:48 david__schmidt
9196 Remove OS/2 building info... it is already in the developer-manual
9198 Revision 1.74 2002/04/11 00:54:38 hal9
9199 Add small section on submitting actions.
9201 Revision 1.73 2002/04/10 18:45:15 swa
9204 Revision 1.72 2002/04/10 04:06:19 hal9
9205 Added actions feedback to Bookmarklets section
9207 Revision 1.71 2002/04/08 22:59:26 hal9
9208 Version update. Spell chkconfig correctly :)
9210 Revision 1.70 2002/04/08 20:53:56 swa
9213 Revision 1.69 2002/04/06 05:07:29 hal9
9214 -Add privoxy-man-page.sgml, for man page.
9215 -Add authors.sgml for AUTHORS (and p-authors.sgml)
9216 -Reworked various aspects of various docs.
9217 -Added additional comments to sub-docs.
9219 Revision 1.68 2002/04/04 18:46:47 swa
9220 consistent look. reuse of copyright, history et. al.
9222 Revision 1.67 2002/04/04 17:27:57 swa
9223 more single file to be included at multiple points. make maintaining easier
9225 Revision 1.66 2002/04/04 06:48:37 hal9
9226 Structural changes to allow for conditional inclusion/exclusion of content
9227 based on entity toggles, e.g. 'entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE"'. And
9228 definition of internal entities, e.g. 'entity p-version "2.9.13"' that will
9229 eventually be set by Makefile.
9230 More boilerplate text for use across multiple docs.
9232 Revision 1.65 2002/04/03 19:52:07 swa
9233 enhance squid section due to user suggestion
9235 Revision 1.64 2002/04/03 03:53:43 hal9
9236 A few minor bug fixes, and touch ups. Ready for review.
9238 Revision 1.63 2002/04/01 16:24:49 hal9
9239 Define entities to include boilerplate text. See doc/source/*.
9241 Revision 1.62 2002/03/30 04:15:53 hal9
9242 - Fix privoxy.org/config links.
9243 - Paste in Bookmarklets from Toggle page.
9244 - Move Quickstart nearer top, and minor rework.
9246 Revision 1.61 2002/03/29 01:31:08 hal9
9249 Revision 1.60 2002/03/27 01:57:34 hal9
9250 Added more to Anatomy section.
9252 Revision 1.59 2002/03/27 00:54:33 hal9
9253 Touch up intro for new name.
9255 Revision 1.58 2002/03/26 22:29:55 swa
9256 we have a new homepage!
9258 Revision 1.57 2002/03/24 20:33:30 hal9
9259 A few minor catch ups with name change.
9261 Revision 1.56 2002/03/24 16:17:06 swa
9262 configure needs to be generated.
9264 Revision 1.55 2002/03/24 16:08:08 swa
9265 we are too lazy to make a block-built
9266 privoxy logo. hence removed the option.
9268 Revision 1.54 2002/03/24 15:46:20 swa
9269 name change related issue.
9271 Revision 1.53 2002/03/24 11:51:00 swa
9272 name change. changed filenames.
9274 Revision 1.52 2002/03/24 11:01:06 swa
9277 Revision 1.51 2002/03/23 15:13:11 swa
9278 renamed every reference to the old name with foobar.
9279 fixed "application foobar application" tag, fixed
9280 "the foobar" with "foobar". left junkbustser in cvs
9281 comments and remarks to history untouched.
9283 Revision 1.50 2002/03/23 05:06:21 hal9
9286 Revision 1.49 2002/03/21 17:01:05 hal9
9287 New section in Appendix.
9289 Revision 1.48 2002/03/12 06:33:01 hal9
9290 Catching up to Andreas and re_filterfile changes.
9292 Revision 1.47 2002/03/11 13:13:27 swa
9293 correct feedback channels
9295 Revision 1.46 2002/03/10 00:51:08 hal9
9296 Added section on JB internal pages in Appendix.
9298 Revision 1.45 2002/03/09 17:43:53 swa
9301 Revision 1.44 2002/03/09 17:08:48 hal9
9302 New section on Jon's actions file editor, and move some stuff around.
9304 Revision 1.43 2002/03/08 00:47:32 hal9
9305 Added imageblock{pattern}.
9307 Revision 1.42 2002/03/07 18:16:55 swa
9310 Revision 1.41 2002/03/07 16:46:43 hal9
9311 Fix a few markup problems for jade.
9313 Revision 1.40 2002/03/07 16:28:39 swa
9314 provide correct feedback channels
9316 Revision 1.39 2002/03/06 16:19:28 hal9
9317 Note on perceived filtering slowdown per FR.
9319 Revision 1.38 2002/03/05 23:55:14 hal9
9320 Stupid I did it again. Double hyphen in comment breaks jade.
9322 Revision 1.37 2002/03/05 23:53:49 hal9
9323 jade barfs on '- -' embedded in comments. - -user option broke it.
9325 Revision 1.36 2002/03/05 22:53:28 hal9
9326 Add new - - user option.
9328 Revision 1.35 2002/03/05 00:17:27 hal9
9329 Added section on command line options.
9331 Revision 1.34 2002/03/04 19:32:07 oes
9332 Changed default port to 8118
9334 Revision 1.33 2002/03/03 19:46:13 hal9
9335 Emphasis on where/how to report bugs, etc
9337 Revision 1.32 2002/03/03 09:26:06 joergs
9338 AmigaOS changes, config is now loaded from PROGDIR: instead of
9339 AmiTCP:db/junkbuster/ if no configuration file is specified on the
9342 Revision 1.31 2002/03/02 22:45:52 david__schmidt
9345 Revision 1.30 2002/03/02 22:00:14 hal9
9346 Updated 'New Features' list. Ran through spell-checker.
9348 Revision 1.29 2002/03/02 20:34:07 david__schmidt
9349 Update OS/2 build section
9351 Revision 1.28 2002/02/24 14:34:24 jongfoster
9352 Formatting changes. Now changing the doctype to DocBook XML 4.1
9353 will work - no other changes are needed.
9355 Revision 1.27 2002/01/11 14:14:32 hal9
9356 Added a very short section on Templates
9358 Revision 1.26 2002/01/09 20:02:50 hal9
9359 Fix bug re: auto-detect config file changes.
9361 Revision 1.25 2002/01/09 18:20:30 hal9
9362 Touch ups for *.action files.
9364 Revision 1.24 2001/12/02 01:13:42 hal9
9367 Revision 1.23 2001/12/02 00:20:41 hal9
9368 Updates for recent changes.
9370 Revision 1.22 2001/11/05 23:57:51 hal9
9371 Minor update for startup now daemon mode.
9373 Revision 1.21 2001/10/31 21:11:03 hal9
9374 Correct 2 minor errors
9376 Revision 1.18 2001/10/24 18:45:26 hal9
9377 *** empty log message ***
9379 Revision 1.17 2001/10/24 17:10:55 hal9
9380 Catching up with Jon's recent work, and a few other things.
9382 Revision 1.16 2001/10/21 17:19:21 swa
9383 wrong url in documentation
9385 Revision 1.15 2001/10/14 23:46:24 hal9
9386 Various minor changes. Fleshed out SEE ALSO section.
9388 Revision 1.13 2001/10/10 17:28:33 hal9
9391 Revision 1.12 2001/09/28 02:57:04 hal9
9394 Revision 1.11 2001/09/28 02:25:20 hal9
9397 Revision 1.9 2001/09/27 23:50:29 hal9
9398 A few changes. A short section on regular expression in appendix.
9400 Revision 1.8 2001/09/25 00:34:59 hal9
9401 Some additions, and re-arranging.
9403 Revision 1.7 2001/09/24 14:31:36 hal9
9406 Revision 1.6 2001/09/24 14:10:32 hal9
9407 Including David's OS/2 installation instructions.
9409 Revision 1.2 2001/09/13 15:27:40 swa
9412 Revision 1.1 2001/09/12 15:36:41 swa
9413 source files for junkbuster documentation
9415 Revision 1.3 2001/09/10 17:43:59 swa
9416 first proposal of a structure.
9418 Revision 1.2 2001/06/13 14:28:31 swa
9419 docs should have an author.
9421 Revision 1.1 2001/06/13 14:20:37 swa
9422 first import of project's documentation for the webserver.