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 contacting SYSTEM "contacting.sgml">
8 <!entity history SYSTEM "history.sgml">
9 <!entity copyright SYSTEM "copyright.sgml">
10 <!entity license SYSTEM "license.sgml">
11 <!entity p-version "3.0.8">
12 <!entity p-status "stable">
13 <!entity % p-not-stable "IGNORE">
14 <!entity % p-stable "INCLUDE">
15 <!entity % p-text "IGNORE"> <!-- define we are not a text only doc -->
16 <!entity % p-doc "INCLUDE"> <!-- and we are a formal doc -->
17 <!entity % p-supp-userman "INCLUDE"> <!-- Include all from supported.sgml -->
18 <!entity my-copy "©"> <!-- kludge for docbook2man -->
19 <!entity % p-newstuff "INCLUDE"> <!-- exclude stuff from devel versions -->
20 <!entity my-app "<application>Privoxy</application>">
23 File : $Source: /cvsroot/ijbswa/current/doc/source/faq.sgml,v $
26 This file belongs into
27 ijbswa.sourceforge.net:/home/groups/i/ij/ijbswa/htdocs/
29 $Id: faq.sgml,v 2.39 2008/02/03 21:37:41 hal9 Exp $
31 Copyright (C) 2001-2008 Privoxy Developers http://www.privoxy.org/
34 Based partially on the Internet Junkbuster FAQ originally written by and
35 Copyright (C) 1997 Anonymous Coders and Junkbusters Corporation.
36 http://www.junkbusters.com/
38 <Qandaset defaultlabel='qanda'>
53 ========================================================================
54 NOTE: Please read developer-manual/documentation.html before touching
57 Please we keep the info in this file as version independent as possible
58 so we only have to maintain one FAQ. Where significant changes are
59 made to Privoxy configuration, please note the change in such a way that
60 it makes sense to both users of older and newer versions.
61 ========================================================================
67 <article id="index" class="faq">
69 <title>Privoxy Frequently Asked Questions</title>
73 <!-- Completely the wrong markup, but very little is allowed -->
74 <!-- in this part of an article. FIXME -->
75 <link linkend="copyright">Copyright</link> &my-copy; 2001-2008 by
76 <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/">Privoxy Developers</ulink>
80 <pubdate>$Id: faq.sgml,v 2.39 2008/02/03 21:37:41 hal9 Exp $</pubdate>
84 Note: this should generate a separate page, and a live link to it.
85 But it doesn't for some mysterious reason. Please leave commented
86 unless it can be fixed proper. For the time being, the copyright
87 statement will be in copyright.smgl.
91 <legalnotice id="legalnotice">
93 text goes here ........
103 <orgname>By: Privoxy Developers</orgname>
112 This is here to keep vim syntax file from breaking :/
113 If I knew enough to fix it, I would.
114 PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE! HB: hal@foobox.net
119 This FAQ gives quick answers to frequently asked questions about
120 <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/">Privoxy</ulink>.
121 It is not a substitute for the
122 <ulink url="../user-manual/index.html"><citetitle>Privoxy User Manual</citetitle></ulink>.
124 This works, at least in some situtations:
125 Test: <ulink url="privoxy-user-manual.pdf"><citetitle>User Manual</citetitle></ulink>.
129 <!-- Include privoxy.sgml boilerplate: -->
130 <para>What is Privoxy?</para> &p-intro;
131 <!-- end boilerplate -->
134 Please note that this document is a work in progress. This copy represents
135 the state at the release of version &p-version;.
136 You can find the latest version of the document at <ulink
137 url="http://www.privoxy.org/faq/">http://www.privoxy.org/faq/</ulink>.
138 Please see the <link linkend="contact">Contact section</link> if you want to
139 contact the developers.
143 <!-- Feel free to send a note to the developers at <email>ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net</email>. -->
149 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
151 <sect1 id="general"><title>General Information</title>
152 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="who-uses"><title>Who should give &my-app; a try?</title>
154 Anyone who is interested in security, privacy, or in
155 finer-grained control over their web and Internet experience.
159 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="bestchoice"><title>Is Privoxy the best choice for
162 &my-app; is certainly a good choice, especially for those who want more
163 control and security. Those with the willingness to read the documentation
164 and the ability to fine-tune their installation will benefit the most.
167 One of <application>Privoxy's</application>
168 strengths is that it is highly configurable giving you the ability to
169 completely personalize your installation. Being familiar with, or at least
170 having an interest in learning about <ulink
171 url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Http">HTTP</ulink> and other networking
172 protocols, <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Html">HTML</ulink>, and
173 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
174 Expressions</quote></ulink>
175 will be a big plus and will help you get the most out of &my-app;.
176 A new installation just includes a very basic configuration. The user
177 should take this as a starting point only, and enhance it as he or she
178 sees fit. In fact, the user is encouraged, and expected to, fine-tune the
182 Much of <application>Privoxy's</application> configuration can be done
183 with a <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_browser">Web browser</ulink>.
184 But there are areas where configuration is done using a
185 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Text_editors">text editor</ulink>
186 to edit configuration files. Also note that the web-based action editor
187 doesn't use authentication and should only be enabled in environments
188 where all clients with access to &my-app; listening port can be trusted.
192 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="proxymoron"><title>What is a <quote>proxy</quote>? How does
193 Privoxy work? </title>
195 A <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server">web proxy</ulink>
196 is a service, based on a software such as
197 <application>Privoxy</application>, that clients (i.e. browsers) can use
198 instead of connecting directly to web servers on the Internet. The
199 clients then ask the proxy to fetch the objects they need (web pages,
200 images, movies etc) on their behalf, and when the proxy has done so, it
201 hands the results back to the client. It is a <quote>go-between</quote>. See
202 the <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server">Wikipedia proxy
203 definition</ulink> for more.
206 There are many reasons to use web proxies, such as security (firewalling),
207 efficiency (caching) and others, and there are any number of proxies
208 to accommodate those needs.
211 <application>Privoxy</application> is a proxy that is primarily focused on privacy
212 protection, ad and junk elimination and freeing the user from restrictions placed on his
213 activities. Sitting between your browser(s) and the Internet,
214 it is in a perfect position to filter outbound personal information that your
215 browser is leaking, as well as inbound junk. It uses a variety of techniques to do
216 this, all of which are under your complete control via the various configuration
217 files and options. Being a proxy also makes it easier to share
218 configurations among multiple browsers and/or users.
222 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="otherstuff">
223 <title>Does Privoxy do anything more than ad blocking?</title>
225 Yes, ad blocking is but one possible use. There are many, many ways &my-app;
226 can be used to sanitize and customize web browsing.
230 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="newjb"><title>What is this new version of
231 <quote><citetitle>Junkbuster</citetitle></quote>?</title>
233 <!-- Include history.sgml -->
240 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
241 <title id="whyprivoxy">Why <quote>Privoxy</quote>? Why change the name from
242 Junkbuster at all?</title>
244 Though outdated, <ulink url="http://junkbusters.com/">Junkbusters Corporation</ulink>
245 continues to offer their original version of the <application>Internet
246 Junkbuster</application>, so publishing our
247 <application> Junkbuster</application>-derived software under the same name
251 There are also potential legal complications from our use of the
252 <application>Junkbuster</application> name, which is a registered trademark of
253 <ulink url="http://junkbusters.com/">Junkbusters Corporation</ulink>.
254 There are, however, no objections from Junkbusters Corporation to the
255 <application>Privoxy</application> project itself, and they, in fact, still
256 share our ideals and goals.
259 The developers also believed that there are so many improvements over the original
260 code, that it was time to make a clean break from the past and make
261 a name in their own right.
264 <application>Privoxy</application> is the
265 <quote><emphasis>Privacy Enhancing Proxy</emphasis></quote>. Also, its content
266 modification and junk suppression gives <emphasis>you</emphasis>, the user, more
267 control, more freedom, and allows you to browse your personal and
268 <quote><emphasis>private</emphasis> edition</quote> of the web.
272 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="differs"><title>How does Privoxy differ
273 from the old Junkbuster?</title>
275 <application>Privoxy</application> picks up where
276 <application>Junkbuster</application> left off. All the old features remain.
277 The new <application>Privoxy</application> still blocks ads and banners,
279 url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>, and still
280 helps protect your privacy. But, most of these features have been enhanced,
281 and many new ones have been added, all in the same vein.
284 <application>Privoxy</application>'s new features include:
287 <!-- Include newfeatures.sgml: -->
293 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="whatsanad">
294 <title id="knows">How does Privoxy know what is
295 an ad, and what is not?</title>
297 <application>Privoxy</application>'s approach to blocking ads is twofold:
300 First, there are certain patterns in the <emphasis>locations</emphasis> (URLs)
301 of banner images. This applies to both the path (you wouldn't guess how many
302 web sites serve their banners from a directory called <quote>banners</quote>!)
303 and the host (blocking the big banner hosting services like doublecklick.net
304 already helps a lot). <application>Privoxy</application> takes advantage of this
305 fact by using <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#AF-PATTERNS">URL
306 patterns</ulink> to sort out and block the requests for things that sound
307 like they would be ads or banners.
310 Second, banners tend to come in certain <emphasis>sizes</emphasis>. But you
311 can't tell the size of an image by its URL without downloading it, and if you
312 do, it's too late to save bandwidth. Therefore, <application>Privoxy</application>
313 also inspects the HTML sources of web pages while they are loaded, and replaces
314 references to images with standard banner sizes by dummy references, so that
315 your browser doesn't request them anymore in the first place.
318 Both of this involves a certain amount of guesswork and is, of course, freely
319 and readily configurable.
323 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
324 <title id="mistakes">Can Privoxy make mistakes?
325 This does not sound very scientific.</title>
327 Actually, it's a black art ;-) And yes, it is always possible to have a broad
328 rule accidentally block or change something by mistake. You will almost surely
329 run into such situations at some point. It is tricky writing rules to
330 cover every conceivable possibility, and not occasionally get false positives.
334 But this should not be a big concern since the
335 <application>Privoxy</application> configuration is very flexible, and
336 includes tools to help identify these types of situations so they can be
337 addressed as needed, allowing you to customize your installation.
338 (<link linkend="badsite">See the Troubleshooting section below</link>.)
343 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
344 <title id="configornot">Will I have to configure Privoxy
345 before I can use it?</title>
347 That depends on your expectations.
348 The default installation should give you a good starting
349 point, and block <emphasis>most</emphasis> ads and unwanted content,
350 but many of the more advanced features are off by default, and require
351 you to activate them.
354 You do have to set up your browser to use
355 <application>Privoxy</application> (see the <link
356 linkend="firststep">Installation section below</link>).
359 And you will certainly run into situations where there are false positives,
360 or ads not being blocked that you may not want to see. In these cases, you
361 would certainly benefit by customizing <application>Privoxy's</application>
362 configuration to more closely match your individual situation. And we
363 encourage you to do this. This is where the real power of
364 <application>Privoxy</application> lies!
369 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="lan">
370 <title>Can Privoxy run as a server on a network?</title>
372 Yes, &my-app; runs as a server already, and can easily be configured to
373 <quote>serve</quote> more than one client. See <link linkend="lanconfig">
374 How can I set up Privoxy to act as a proxy for my LAN</link> below.
378 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="browsers2"><title>My browser does the same things as
379 Privoxy. Why should I use Privoxy at all?</title>
381 Modern browsers do indeed have <emphasis>some</emphasis> of the same
382 functionality as <application>Privoxy</application>. Maybe this is
383 adequate for you. But <application>Privoxy</application> is very
384 versatile and powerful, and can probably do a number of things
385 your browser just can't.
388 In addition, a proxy is good choice if you use multiple browsers, or
389 have a LAN with multiple computers since &my-app; can run as a server
390 application. This way all the configuration is in one place, and you don't
391 have to maintain a similar configuration for possibly many browsers or
395 Note, however, that it's recommended to leverage both your browser's
396 and <application>Privoxy's</application> privacy enhancing features
397 at the same time. While your browser probably lacks some features
398 &my-app; offers, it should also be able to do some things more
399 reliable, for example restricting and suppressing JavaScript.
403 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="whytrust"><title>Why should I trust Privoxy?</title>
405 The most important reason is because you have access to
406 <emphasis>everything</emphasis>, and you can control everything. You can
407 check every line of every configuration file yourself. You can check every
408 last bit of source code should you desire. And even if you can't read code,
409 there should be some comfort in knowing that <!-- thousands of -->other people can,
410 and do read it. You can build the software from scratch, if you want,
411 so that you know the executable is clean, and that it is
412 <emphasis>yours</emphasis>. In fact, we encourage this level of scrutiny. It
413 is one reason we use &my-app; ourselves.
417 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="license"><title>Is there is a license or fee? What about a
418 warranty? Registration?</title>
420 <application>Privoxy</application> is free software and licensed under the <ulink
421 url="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html">GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2</ulink>.
422 It is free to use, copy, modify or distribute as you wish under the terms of this
423 license. Please see the <link linkend="copyright">Copyright</link> section for more
424 information on the license and copyright. Or the <filename>LICENSE</filename> file
425 that should be included.
428 There is <emphasis>no warranty</emphasis> of any kind, expressed, implied or otherwise.
429 That is something that would cost real money ;-) There is no registration either.
434 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="spyware">
435 <title>Can Privoxy remove spyware? Adware? Viruses?</title>
437 No, at least not reliably enough to trust it. &my-app; is not designed to be
438 a malware removal tool and the default configuration doesn't even try to
439 filter out any malware.
442 &my-app; could help prevent contact from (known) sites that use such
443 tactics with appropriate configuration rules, and thus could conceivably
444 prevent contamination from such sites. However, keeping such a configuration
445 up to date would require a lot of time and effort that would be better spend
446 on keeping your software itself up to date so it doesn't have known
452 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="otherads">
453 <title>Can I use Privoxy with other ad-blocking software?</title>
455 &my-app; should work fine with other proxies and other software in general.
458 But it is probably not necessary to use &my-app; in conjunction with other
459 ad-blocking products, and this could conceivably cause undesirable results.
460 It might be better to choose one software or the other and work a little to
461 tweak its configuration to your liking.
464 Note that this is an advice specific to ad blocking.
468 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="jointeam"><title>I would like to help you, what can I do?</title>
470 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="jointeam-work"><title>Would you like to participate?</title>
472 Well, we <emphasis>always</emphasis> need help. There is something for
473 everybody who wants to help us. We welcome new developers, packagers,
474 testers, documentation writers or really anyone with a desire to help in
475 any way. You <emphasis>DO NOT</emphasis> need to be a
476 <quote>programmer</quote>. There are many other tasks available. In fact,
477 the programmers often can't spend as much time programming because of some
478 of the other, more mundane things that need to be done, like checking the
479 Tracker feedback sections.
482 So first thing, <ulink
483 url="https://sourceforge.net/account/register.php">get an account on SourceForge.net</ulink>
484 and mail your id to the <ulink url="mailto:ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net">developers
485 mailing list</ulink>. Then, please read the <ulink
486 url="../developer-manual/index.html">Developer's Manual</ulink>, at least
487 the pertinent sections.
490 You can also start helping out without SourceForge.net account,
491 simply by showing up on the mailing list, helping out other users,
492 providing general feedback or reporting problems you noticed.
496 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="jointeam-money"><title>Contribute!</title>
498 We, of course, welcome donations and could use money for domain registering,
499 buying software to test <application>Privoxy</application> with, and, of course,
500 for regular world-wide get-togethers (hahaha). If you enjoy the software and feel
501 like helping us with a donation, just <ulink
502 url="mailto: ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net">drop us a note</ulink>
503 and get your name on the list of contributors.
507 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="jointeam-software"><title>Software</title>
509 If you are a vendor of a web-related software like a browser, web server
510 or proxy, and would like us to ensure that <application>Privoxy</application>
511 runs smoothly with your product, you might consider supplying us with a
512 copy or license. We can't, however, guarantee that we will fix all potential
513 compatibility issues as a result.
523 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
525 <sect1 id="installation"><title>Installation</title>
527 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="whichbrowsers">
528 <title>Which browsers are supported by Privoxy?</title>
530 Any browser that can be configured to use a proxy, which
531 should be virtually all browsers, including
532 <application>Firefox</application>, <application>Internet
533 Explorer</application>, <application>Opera</application>, and
534 <application>Safari</application> among others.
535 Direct browser support is not an absolute requirement since
536 <application>Privoxy</application> runs as a separate application and talks
537 to the browser in the standardized HTTP protocol, just like a web server
542 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="whichos">
543 <title>Which operating systems are supported?</title>
545 Include supported.sgml here:
550 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="email-client">
551 <title>Can I use Privoxy with my email client?</title>
553 As long as there is some way to set a HTTP proxy for the client, then yes,
554 any application can be used, whether it is strictly speaking a
555 <quote>browser</quote> or not. Though this may not be the best approach for
556 dealing with some of the common abuses of HTML in email. See <link
557 linkend="outlook">How can I configure <application>Privoxy</application>
558 with <application>Outlook Express</application>?</link> below for more on
562 Be aware that HTML email presents a number of unique security and privacy
563 related issues, that can require advanced skills to overcome. The developers
564 recommend using email clients that can be configured to convert HTML to plain
565 text for these reasons.
569 <!-- Nobody is going to still be doing this!
570 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="newinstall"><title>Can I install
571 Privoxy over Junkbuster?</title>
573 We recommend you un-install <application>Junkbuster</application>
574 first to minimize conflicts and confusion. You may want to
575 save your old configuration files for future reference. The configuration
576 files and syntax have substantially changed, so you will need to manually
577 port your old patterns. See the <ulink url="../user-manual/upgradersnote.html">note
578 to upgraders</ulink> and <ulink url="../user-manual/installation.html">installation
579 chapter</ulink> in the <ulink url="../user-manual/index.html">User Manual</ulink>
583 Note: Some installers may automatically un-install
584 <application>Junkbuster</application>, if present!
590 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="firststep">
591 <title>I just installed Privoxy. Is there anything
592 special I have to do now?</title>
595 All browsers should be told to use <application>Privoxy</application>
596 as a proxy by specifying the correct proxy address and port number
597 in the appropriate configuration area for the browser. It's possible
598 to combine &my-app; with a packet filter to intercept HTTP requests
599 even if the client isn't explicitly configured to use &my-app;,
600 but where possible, configuring the client is recommended. See
601 <ulink url="../user-manual/startup.html">the User Manual for more
602 details</ulink>. You should also flush your browser's memory and disk
603 cache to get rid of any cached junk items, and remove any stored
604 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>.
610 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="localhost"><title>What is the proxy address of Privoxy?</title>
612 If you set up the <application>Privoxy</application> to run on
613 the computer you browse from (rather than your ISP's server or some
614 networked computer on a LAN), the proxy will be on <literal>127.0.0.1</literal>
615 (sometimes referred to as <quote>localhost</quote>,
616 which is the special name used by every computer on the Internet to refer
617 to itself) and the port will be 8118 (unless you used the <ulink
618 url="../user-manual/config.html#LISTEN-ADDRESS">listen-address</ulink>
619 config option to tell <application>Privoxy</application> to run on
623 When configuring your browser's proxy settings you typically enter
624 the word <quote>localhost</quote> or the IP address <quote>127.0.0.1</quote>
625 in the boxes next to <quote>HTTP</quote> and <quote>Secure</quote> (HTTPS) and
626 then the number <quote>8118</quote> for <quote>port</quote>.
627 This tells your browser to send all web requests to <application>Privoxy</application>
628 instead of directly to the Internet.
631 <application>Privoxy</application> can also be used to proxy for
632 a Local Area Network. In this case, your would enter either the IP
633 address of the LAN host where <application>Privoxy</application>
634 is running, or the equivalent hostname, e.g. <literal>192.168.1.1</literal>.
635 Port assignment would be same as above. Note that
636 <application>Privoxy</application> doesn't listen on any LAN interfaces by
640 <application>Privoxy</application> does not currently handle
641 any other protocols such as FTP, SMTP, IM, IRC, ICQ, etc.
645 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="nothing">
646 <title>I just installed Privoxy, and nothing is happening.
647 All the ads are there. What's wrong?</title>
650 Did you configure your browser to use <application>Privoxy</application>
651 as a proxy? It does not sound like it. See above. You might also try flushing
652 the browser's caches to force a full re-reading of pages. You can verify
653 that <application>Privoxy</application> is running, and your browser
654 is correctly configured by entering the special URL:
655 <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>.
656 <!-- Use http://p.p/ instead of http://config.privoxy.org/ here because
657 of potential redirect caching problem (see next Q). -->
658 This should take you to a page titled <quote>This is Privoxy..</quote> with
659 access to <application>Privoxy's</application> internal configuration.
660 If you see this, then you are good to go. If you receive a page saying
661 <quote>Privoxy is not running</quote>, then the browser is not set up to use
662 your <application>Privoxy</application> installation.
663 If you receive anything else (probably nothing at all), it could either
664 be that the browser is not set up correctly, or that
665 <application>Privoxy</application> is not running at all. Check the <ulink
666 url="../user-manual/config.html#LOGFILE">log file</ulink>. For instructions
667 on starting <application>Privoxy</application> and browser configuration,
668 see the <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/startup.html">chapter
669 on starting <application>Privoxy</application></ulink> in the
670 <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/">User Manual</ulink>.
675 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="notused">
676 <title>I get a <quote>Privoxy is not being used</quote> dummy page although
677 Privoxy is running and being used.</title>
680 First, make sure that Privoxy is <emphasis>really</emphasis> running and
681 being used by visiting <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>. You
682 should see the <application>Privoxy</application> main page. If not, see
683 the <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/startup.html">chapter
684 on starting <application>Privoxy</application></ulink> in the
685 <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/">User Manual</ulink>.
689 Now if <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink> works for you, but
690 other parts of <application>Privoxy</application>'s web interface show
691 the dummy page, your browser has cached a redirection it encountered before
692 <application>Privoxy</application> was being used. You need to clear your
693 browser's cache. Note that shift-reloading the dummy page won't help, since
694 that'll only refresh the dummy page, not the redirection that lead you there.
698 The procedure for clearing the cache varies from browser to browser. For
699 example, <application>Mozilla/Netscape</application> users would click
700 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> --> <guibutton>Preferences</guibutton> -->
701 <guibutton>Advanced</guibutton> --> <guibutton>Cache</guibutton> and
702 then click both <quote><guibutton>Clear Memory Cache</guibutton></quote>
703 and <quote><guibutton>Clear Disk Cache</guibutton></quote>.
704 In some <application>Firefox</application> versions it's
705 <guibutton>Tools</guibutton> --> <guibutton>Options</guibutton> -->
706 <guibutton>Privacy</guibutton> --> <guibutton>Cache</guibutton> and
707 then click <quote><guibutton>Clear Cache Now</guibutton></quote>.
708 <!-- In my Firefox versions it's the Netscape way. fk 2007-11-19-->
715 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
717 <sect1 id="configuration"><title>Configuration</title>
718 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
719 <title id="actionsfile">What exactly is an <quote>actions</quote> file?</title>
722 &my-app; utilizes the concept of <quote>
723 <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ACTIONS">actions</ulink></quote>
724 that are used to manipulate and control web page data.
725 <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html">Actions files</ulink>
726 are where these <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ACTIONS">actions</ulink>
727 that <application>Privoxy</application> could take while processing a certain
728 request, are configured. Typically, you would define a set of default actions
729 that apply globally to all URLs, then add exceptions to these defaults where needed.
730 There is a wide array of actions available that give the user a high degree
731 of control and flexibility on how to process each and every web page.
735 Actions can be defined on a <ulink
736 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#AF-PATTERNS">URL pattern</ulink> basis, i.e.
737 for single URLs, whole web sites, groups or parts thereof etc. Actions can also be
738 grouped together and then applied to requests matching one or more patterns.
739 There are many possible actions that might apply to any given site. As an example,
740 if you are blocking <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>
741 as one of your default actions, but need to accept cookies from a given site,
742 you would need to define an exception for this site in one of your actions
743 files, preferably in <filename>user.action</filename>.
748 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="actionss">
749 <title>The <quote>actions</quote> concept confuses me. Please list
750 some of these <quote>actions</quote>.</title>
752 For a comprehensive discussion of the actions concept, please refer
753 to the <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html">actions file
754 chapter</ulink> in the <ulink url="../user-manual/index.html">User
755 Manual</ulink>. It includes a <ulink
756 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ACTIONS">list of all actions</ulink>
757 and an <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ACT-EXAMPLES">actions
758 file tutorial</ulink> to get you started.
763 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
764 <title id="actconfig">How are actions files configured? What is the easiest
765 way to do this?</title>
768 Actions files are just text files in a special syntax and can be edited
769 with a text editor. But probably the easiest way is to access
770 <application>Privoxy</application>'s user interface with your web browser
771 at <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
772 (Shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>) and then select
773 <quote><ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">View &
774 change the current configuration</ulink></quote> from the menu. Note
775 that this feature must be explicitly enabled in the main config file
777 url="../user-manual/config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">enable-edit-actions</ulink>).
782 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
783 <title>There are several different <quote>actions</quote> files. What are
784 the differences?</title>
787 are being included by the developers, to be used for
788 different purposes: These are
789 <filename>default.action</filename>, the <quote>main</quote> actions file
790 which is actively maintained by the <application>Privoxy</application>
791 developers and typically sets the default policies, <filename>user.action</filename>, where users are encouraged
792 to make their private customizations, and <filename>standard.action</filename>,
793 which is for internal <application>Privoxy</application> use only.
794 Please see <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html">the actions chapter</ulink>
795 in the <ulink url="../user-manual/index.html">User Manual</ulink> for a more
796 detailed explanation.
800 Earlier versions included three different versions of the
801 <filename>default.action</filename> file. The new scheme allows for
802 greater flexibility of local configuration, and for browser based
803 selection of pre-defined <quote>aggressiveness</quote> levels.
808 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="getupdates"><title>Where can I get updated Actions Files?</title>
810 Based on your feedback and the continuing development, updates of
811 <filename>default.action</filename> will be
812 made available from time to time on the <ulink
813 url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118">files section</ulink> of
814 our <ulink url="http://sf.net/projects/ijbswa/">project page</ulink>.
818 If you wish to receive an email notification whenever we release updates of
819 <application>Privoxy</application> or the actions file, <ulink
820 url="http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ijbswa-announce/">subscribe
821 to our announce mailing list</ulink>, ijbswa-announce@lists.sourceforge.net.
826 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="newconfig"><title>Can I use my old config files?</title>
828 The syntax and purpose of configuration files has remained roughly the
829 same throughout the 3.x series, but backwards compatibility is not guaranteed.
830 Also each release contains updated, <quote>improved</quote> versions and it is
831 therefore strongly recommended to install the newer configuration files
832 and merge back your modifications.
836 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="difficult">
837 <title>Why is the configuration so complicated?</title>
839 <quote>Complicated</quote> is in the eye of the beholder. Those that are
840 familiar with some of the underlying concepts, such as regular expression
841 syntax, take to it like a fish takes to water. Also, software that tries
842 hard to be <quote>user friendly</quote>, often lacks sophistication and
843 flexibility. There is always that trade-off there between power vs.
844 easy-of-use. Furthermore, anyone is welcome to contribute ideas and
845 implementations to enhance &my-app;.
849 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="yahoo"><title>How can I make my Yahoo/Hotmail/Gmail account work?</title>
851 The default configuration shouldn't impact the usability of any of these services.
852 It may, however, make all <ulink
853 url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>
854 temporary, so that your browser will forget your
855 login credentials in between browser sessions. If you would like not to have to log
856 in manually each time you access those websites, simply turn off all cookie handling
857 for them in the <filename>user.action</filename> file. An example for yahoo might
861 <screen># Allow all cookies for Yahoo login:
863 { -<ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</ulink> -<ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</ulink> -<ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</ulink> }
864 .login.yahoo.com</screen>
867 These kinds of sites are often quite complex and heavy with
868 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javascript">Javascript</ulink> and
869 thus <quote>fragile</quote>. So if <emphasis>still</emphasis> a problem,
871 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ALIASES">alias</ulink> just for such
875 <screen># Gmail is a _fragile_ site:
877 { <literal>fragile</literal> }
879 mail.google.com</screen>
882 Be sure to flush your browser's caches whenever making these kinds of
883 changes, just to make sure the changes <quote>take</quote>.
886 Make sure the domain, host and path are appropriate as well. Your browser can
887 tell you where you are specifically and you should use that information for
888 your configuration settings. Note that above it is not referenced as
889 <literal>gmail.com</literal>, which is a valid domain name.
894 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="configfiles"> <title>What's the difference between the
895 <quote>Cautious</quote>, <quote>Medium</quote> and <quote>Advanced</quote> defaults?</title>
897 Configuring <application>Privoxy</application> is not entirely trivial. To
898 help you get started, we provide you with three different default action
899 <quote>profiles</quote> in the web based actions file editor at <ulink
900 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
901 See the <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html"><citetitle>User
902 Manual</citetitle></ulink> for a list of actions, and how the default
907 Where the defaults are likely to break some sites, exceptions for
908 known popular <quote>problem</quote> sites are included, but in
909 general, the more aggressive your default settings are, the more exceptions
910 you will have to make later. New users are best to start off in
911 <quote>Cautious</quote> setting. This is safest and will have the fewest
912 problems. See the <ulink
913 url="../user-manual/index.html"><citetitle>User Manual</citetitle></ulink>
914 for a more detailed discussion.
918 It should be noted that the <quote>Advanced</quote> profile (formerly known
919 as the <quote>Adventuresome</quote> profile) is more
920 aggressive, and will make use of some of
921 <application>Privoxy's</application> advanced features. Use at your own risk!
926 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="browseconfig"> <title>Why can I change the configuration
927 with a browser? Does that not raise security issues?</title>
929 It may seem strange that regular users can edit the config files with their
930 browsers, although the whole <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename> hierarchy
931 belongs to the user <quote>privoxy</quote>, with only 644 permissions.
934 When you use the browser-based editor, <application>Privoxy</application>
935 itself is writing to the config files. Because
936 <application>Privoxy</application> is running as the user <quote>privoxy</quote>,
937 it can update its own config files.
940 If you run <application>Privoxy</application> for multiple untrusted users (e.g. in
941 a LAN) or aren't entirely in control of your own browser, you will probably want
942 to make sure that the the web-based editor and remote toggle features are
943 <quote>off</quote> by setting <quote><literal><ulink
944 url="../user-manual/config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">enable-edit-actions</ulink>
945 0</literal></quote> and <quote><literal><ulink
946 url="../user-manual/config.html#ENABLE-REMOTE-TOGGLE">enable-remote-toggle</ulink>
947 0</literal></quote> in the <ulink url="../user-manual/config.html">main configuration file</ulink>.
950 As of &my-app; 3.0.7 these options are disabled by default.
955 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
956 <title id="filterfile">What is the <filename>default.filter</filename> file? What is a <quote>filter</quote>?</title>
958 The <ulink url="../user-manual/filter-file.html"><filename>default.filter</filename></ulink>
959 file is where <emphasis>filters</emphasis> as supplied by the developers are defined.
960 Filters are a special subset of actions that can be used to modify or
961 remove web page content or headers on the fly. Content filters can
962 be applied to <emphasis>anything</emphasis> in the page source,
963 header filters can be applied to either server or client headers.
964 Regular expressions are used to accomplish this.
967 There are a number of pre-defined filters to deal with common annoyances. The
968 filters are only defined here, to invoke them, you need to use the
970 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#FILTER"><literal>filter</literal>
971 action</ulink> in one of the actions files. Content filtering is automatically
972 disabled for inappropriate MIME types, but if you now better than Privoxy
973 what should or should not be filtered you can filter any content you like.
977 <emphasis>not</emphasis> be confused with <ulink
978 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK"><literal>blocks</literal></ulink>, which
979 is a completely different action, and is more typically used to block ads and
984 If you are familiar with regular expressions, and HTML, you can look at
985 the provided <filename>default.filter</filename> with a text editor and define
986 your own filters. This is potentially a very powerful feature, but
987 requires some expertise in both regular expressions and HTML/HTTP.
988 <![%p-newstuff;[ You should
989 place any modifications to the default filters, or any new ones you create
990 in a separate file, such as <filename>user.filter</filename>, so they won't
991 be overwritten during upgrades.
992 The ability to define multiple filter files
993 in <filename>config</filename> is a new feature as of v. 3.0.5.]]>
997 There is no GUI editor option for this part of the configuration,
998 but you can disable/enable the various pre-defined filters of the included
999 <filename>default.filter</filename> file with the <ulink
1000 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">web-based actions file editor</ulink>.
1001 Note that the custom actions editor must be explicitly enabled in
1002 the main config file (see <ulink
1003 url="../user-manual/config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">enable-edit-actions</ulink>).
1007 If you intend to develop your own filters, you might want to have a look at
1009 url="http://www.fabiankeil.de/sourcecode/pft/">Privoxy-Filter-Test</ulink>.
1014 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="lanconfig">
1015 <title>How can I set up Privoxy to act as a proxy for my
1018 By default, <application>Privoxy</application> only responds to requests
1019 from <literal>127.0.0.1</literal> (localhost). To have it act as a server for
1020 a network, this needs to be changed in the <ulink
1021 url="../user-manual/config.html">main configuration file</ulink>. Look for
1023 url="../user-manual/config.html#LISTEN-ADDRESS">listen-address</ulink></literal>
1024 option, which may be commented out with a <quote>#</quote> symbol. Make sure
1025 it is uncommented, and assign it the address of the LAN gateway interface,
1026 and port number to use. Assuming your LAN address is 192.168.1.1 and you
1027 wish to run <application>Privoxy</application> on port 8118, this line
1033 listen-address 192.168.1.1:8118</screen>
1037 Save the file, and restart <application>Privoxy</application>. Configure
1038 all browsers on the network then to use this address and port number.
1042 Alternately, you can have <application>Privoxy</application> listen on
1043 all available interfaces:
1048 listen-address :8118</screen>
1052 And then use <application>Privoxy's</application>
1054 url="../user-manual/config.html#PERMIT-ACCESS">permit-access</ulink>
1055 feature to limit connections. A firewall in this situation is recommended
1060 The above steps should be the same for any TCP network, regardless of
1065 If you run <application>Privoxy</application> on a LAN with untrusted users,
1066 we recommend that you double-check the <ulink
1067 url="../user-manual/config.html#ACCESS-CONTROL">access control and security</ulink>
1074 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1075 <title id="noseeum">Instead of ads, now I get a checkerboard pattern. I don't want to see anything.</title>
1077 The replacement for blocked images can be controlled with the <ulink
1078 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><literal>set-image-blocker</literal>
1079 action</ulink>. You have the choice of a checkerboard pattern, a transparent 1x1 GIF
1080 image (aka <quote>blank</quote>), or a redirect to a custom image of your choice.
1081 Note that this choice only has effect for images which are blocked as images, i.e.
1082 whose URLs match both a <literal><ulink
1083 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE">handle-as-image</ulink></literal>
1084 <emphasis>and</emphasis> <literal><ulink
1085 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK">block</ulink></literal> action.
1088 If you want to see nothing, then change the <ulink
1089 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><literal>set-image-blocker</literal>
1090 action</ulink> to <quote>blank</quote>. This can be done by editing the
1091 <filename>user.action</filename> file, or through the <ulink
1092 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">web-based actions file editor</ulink>.
1097 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1098 <title id="whyseeum">Why would anybody want to see a checkerboard pattern?</title>
1100 Remember that <link linkend="whatsanad">telling which image is an ad and which
1101 isn't</link>, is an educated guess. While we hope that the standard configuration
1102 is rather smart, it will make occasional mistakes. The checkerboard image is visually
1103 decent, and it shows you where images have been blocked, which can be very
1104 helpful in case some navigation aid or otherwise innocent image was
1105 erroneously blocked. It is recommended for new users so they can
1106 <quote>see</quote> what is happening. Some people might also enjoy seeing how
1107 many banners they <emphasis>don't</emphasis> have to see.
1112 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1113 <title id="blockedbytext">I see some images being replaced with text
1114 instead of the checkerboard image. Why and how do I get rid of this?</title>
1116 This happens when the banners are not embedded in the HTML code of the
1117 page itself, but in separate HTML (sub)documents that are loaded into (i)frames
1118 or (i)layers, and these external HTML documents are blocked. Being non-images
1119 they get replaced by a substitute HTML page rather than a substitute image,
1120 which wouldn't work out technically, since the browser expects and accepts
1121 only HTML when it has requested an HTML document.
1124 The substitute page adapts to the available space and shows itself as a
1125 miniature two-liner if loaded into small frames, or full-blown with a
1126 large red "BLOCKED" banner if space allows.
1129 If you prefer the banners to be blocked by images, you must see to it that
1130 the HTML documents in which they are embedded are not blocked. Clicking
1131 the <quote>See why</quote> link offered in the substitute page will show
1132 you which rule blocked the page. After changing the rule and un-blocking
1133 the HTML documents, the browser will try to load the actual banner images
1134 and the usual image blocking will (hopefully!) kick in.
1139 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="srvany">
1140 <title>Can Privoxy run as a service
1141 on Win2K/NT/XP?</title>
1144 Yes. Version 3.0.5 introduces full <application>Windows</application> service
1145 functionality. See <ulink url="../user-manual/installation.html#installation-pack-win">
1146 the <citetitle>User Manual</citetitle></ulink> for details on how to install and configure
1147 <application>Privoxy</application> as a service.
1150 Earlier ]]>3.x versions could run as a system service using <command>srvany.exe</command>.
1151 See the discussion at <ulink
1152 url="http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=361118&aid=485617&group_id=11118">http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=361118&aid=485617&group_id=11118</ulink>,
1153 for details, and a sample configuration.
1158 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="otherproxy">
1159 <title>How can I make Privoxy work with other
1160 proxies like Squid or Tor?</title>
1162 This can be done and is often useful to combine the benefits of
1163 <application>Privoxy</application> with those of a another proxy.
1165 url="../user-manual/config.html#FORWARDING">forwarding chapter</ulink>
1166 in the <ulink url="../user-manual/index.html">User Manual</ulink> which
1167 describes how to do this, and the <link linkend="TOR">
1168 How do I use Privoxy together with
1169 Tor</link> section below.
1173 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="port-80">
1174 <title>Can I just set Privoxy to use port 80
1175 and thus avoid individual browser configuration?</title>
1178 No, its more complicated than that. This only works with special kinds
1179 of proxies known as <quote>intercepting</quote> proxies (see below).
1184 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="transparent">
1185 <title>Can Privoxy run as a <quote>transparent
1186 </quote> proxy?</title>
1188 The whole idea of Privoxy is to modify client requests
1189 and server responses in all sorts of ways and therefore
1190 it's not a transparent proxy as described in
1191 <ulink url="http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2616">RFC 2616</ulink>.
1194 However, some people say <quote>transparent proxy</quote> when they
1195 mean <quote>intercepting proxy</quote>. If you are one of them,
1196 please read the <ulink url="#intercepting">next entry</ulink>.
1201 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="intercepting">
1202 <title>Can Privoxy run as a <quote>intercepting</quote> proxy?</title>
1204 <application>Privoxy</application> can't intercept traffic itself,
1205 but it can handle requests that where intercepted and redirected
1206 with a packet filter (like <application>PF</application> or
1207 <application>iptables</application>), as long as the <literal>Host</literal>
1211 As the <literal>Host</literal> header is required by HTTP/1.1 and as most
1212 web sites rely on it anyway, this limitation shouldn't be a problem.
1215 Please refer to your packet filter's documentation to learn how to
1216 intercept and redirect traffic into <application>Privoxy</application>.
1217 Afterward you just have to configure <application>Privoxy</application> to
1218 <ulink url="../user-manual/config.html#ACCEPT-INTERCEPTED-REQUESTS">accept
1219 intercepted requests</ulink>.
1224 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="outlook">
1225 <title>How can I configure Privoxy for use with Outlook
1228 <application>Outlook Express</application> uses <application>Internet Explorer</application>
1229 components to both render HTML, and fetch any HTTP requests that may be embedded in an HTML email.
1230 So however you have <application>Privoxy</application> configured to work
1231 with IE, this configuration should automatically be shared.
1235 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="outlook-more">
1236 <title>How can I have separate rules just for HTML mail?</title>
1238 The short answer is, you can't. <application>Privoxy</application> has no way
1239 of knowing which particular application makes a request, so there is no way to
1240 distinguish between web pages and HTML mail.
1241 <application>Privoxy</application> just blindly proxies all requests. In the
1242 case of <application>Outlook Express</application> (see above), OE uses
1243 IE anyway, and there is no way for <application>Privoxy</application> to ever
1244 be able to distinguish between them (nor could any other proxy type application for
1248 For a good discussion of some of the issues involved (including privacy and
1249 security issues), see
1250 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=211118&aid=629518&group_id=11118">http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&atid=211118&aid=629518&group_id=11118</ulink>.
1254 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="sneaky-cookies">
1255 <title>I sometimes notice cookies sneaking through. How?</title>
1258 url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">Cookies</ulink> can be
1259 set in several ways. The classic method is via the
1260 <literal>Set-Cookie</literal> HTTP header. This is straightforward, and an
1261 easy one to manipulate, such as the &my-app; concept of
1262 <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</ulink>.
1263 There is also the possibility of using
1264 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javascript">Javascript</ulink> to
1265 set cookies (&my-app; calls these <literal>content-cookies</literal>). This
1266 is trickier because the syntax can vary widely, and thus requires a certain
1267 amount of guesswork. It is not realistic to catch all of these short of
1268 disabling Javascript, which would break many sites. And lastly, if the
1269 cookies are embedded in a HTTPS/SSL secure session via Javascript, they are beyond
1270 <application>Privoxy's</application> reach.
1273 All in all, &my-app; can help manage cookies in general, can help minimize
1274 the loss of privacy posed by cookies, but can't realistically stop all
1279 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="evil-cookies">
1280 <title>Are all cookies bad? Why?</title>
1282 No, in fact there are many beneficial uses of
1284 url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>. Cookies are just a
1285 method that browsers can use to store data between pages, or between browser
1286 sessions. Sometimes there is a good reason for this, and the user's life is a
1287 bit easier as a result. But there is a long history of some websites taking
1288 advantage of this layer of trust, and using the data they glean from you and
1289 your browsing habits for their own purposes, and maybe to your potential
1290 detriment. Such sites are using you and storing their data on your system.
1291 That is why the privacy conscious watch from whom those cookies come, and why
1292 they really <emphasis>need</emphasis> to be there.
1296 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">Wikipedia cookie
1297 definition</ulink> for more.
1301 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="allow-cookies">
1302 <title>How can I allow permanent cookies for my trusted sites?</title>
1305 There are several actions that relate to cookies. The default behavior is to
1306 allow only <quote>session cookies</quote>, which means the cookies only last
1307 for the current browser session. This eliminates most kinds of abuse related
1308 to cookies. But there may be cases where you want cookies to last.
1311 To disable all cookie actions, so that cookies are allowed unrestricted,
1312 both in and out, for <literal>example.com</literal>:
1316 { -crunch-incoming-cookies -crunch-outgoing-cookies -session-cookies-only -filter{content-cookies} }
1317 .example.com</screen>
1320 Place the above in <filename>user.action</filename>. Note that some of these may
1321 be off by default anyway, so this might be redundant, but there is no harm
1322 being explicit in what you want to happen. <filename>user.action</filename>
1323 includes an alias for this situation, called
1324 <literal>allow-all-cookies</literal>.
1328 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="multiples">
1329 <title>Can I have separate configurations for different users?</title>
1331 Each instance of <application>Privoxy</application> has its own
1332 configuration, including such attributes as the TCP port that it listens on.
1333 What you can do is run multiple instances of <application>Privoxy</application>, each with
1335 <ulink url="../user-manual/config.html#LISTEN-ADDRESS">listen-address</ulink>
1336 configuration setting, and configuration path, and then
1337 each of these can have their own configurations. Think of it as per-port
1341 Simple enough for a few users, but for large installations, consider having
1342 groups of users that might share like configurations.
1346 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="whitelists">
1347 <title>Can I set-up Privoxy as a whitelist of
1348 <quote>good</quote> sites?</title>
1350 Sure. There are a couple of things you can do for simple white-listing.
1351 Here's one real easy one:
1354 ############################################################
1356 ############################################################
1357 { <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK">+block</ulink> }
1358 / # Block *all* URLs
1360 ############################################################
1362 ############################################################
1363 { <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK">-block</ulink> }
1366 games.example.com</screen>
1368 This allows access to only those three sites by first blocking all URLs, and
1369 then subsequently allowing three specific exceptions.
1372 Another approach is <application>Privoxy's</application>
1373 <literal>trustfile</literal> concept, which incorporates the notion of
1374 <quote>trusted referrers</quote>. See the <ulink
1375 url="../user-manual/config.html#TRUSTFILE">Trust documentation</ulink>
1379 These are fairly simple approaches and are not completely foolproof. There
1380 are various other configuration options that should be disabled (described
1381 elsewhere here and in <ulink url="../user-manual/">the User Manual</ulink>)
1382 so that users can't modify their own configuration and easily circumvent the
1387 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="no-adblock">
1388 <title>How can I turn off ad-blocking?</title>
1390 Ad blocking is achieved through a complex application of various &my-app;
1391 <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html">actions</ulink>. These
1392 actions are deployed against simple images, banners, flash animations,
1393 text pages, JavaScript, pop-ups and pop-unders, etc., so its not as simple as
1394 just turning one or two actions off. The various actions that make up
1395 &my-app; ad blocking are hard-coded into the default configuration files. It
1396 has been assumed that everyone using &my-app; is interested in this
1400 If you want to do without this, there are several approaches you can take:
1401 You can manually undo the many block rules in
1402 <filename>default.action</filename>. Or even easier, just create your own
1403 <filename>default.action</filename> file from scratch without the many ad
1404 blocking rules, and corresponding exceptions. Or lastly, if you are not
1405 concerned about the additional blocks that are done for privacy reasons, you
1406 can very easily over-ride <emphasis>all</emphasis> blocking with the
1407 following very simple rule in your <filename>user.action</filename>:
1411 # Unblock everybody, everywhere
1412 { <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK">-block</ulink> }
1413 / # UN-Block *all* URLs</screen>
1416 Or even a more comprehensive reversing of various ad related actions:
1420 # Unblock everybody, everywhere, and turn off appropriate filtering, etc
1421 { <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK">-block</ulink> \
1422 <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#FILTER-BANNERS-BY-SIZE">-filter{banners-by-size}</ulink> \
1423 <ulink url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#FILTER-BANNERS-BY-LINK">-filter{banners-by-link}</ulink> \
1424 <literal>allow-popups</literal> \
1426 / # UN-Block *all* URLs and allow ads</screen>
1429 This last <quote>action</quote> in this compound statement,
1430 <literal>allow-popups</literal>, is an <ulink
1431 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ALIASES">alias</ulink> that disables
1432 various pop-up blocking features.
1436 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="templates">
1437 <title>How can I have custom template pages, like the
1438 <emphasis>BLOCKED</emphasis> page?</title>
1440 &my-app; <quote>templates</quote> are specialized text files utilized by
1441 &my-app; for various purposes and can easily be modified using any text
1442 editor. All the template pages are installed in a sub-directory appropriately
1443 named: <filename>templates</filename>. Knowing something about HTML syntax
1444 will of course be helpful.
1447 Be forewarned that the default templates are subject to being overwritten
1448 during upgrades. You can, however, create completely new templates,
1449 place them in another directory and specify the alternate path in the main
1450 <filename>config</filename>. For details, have a look at the <ulink
1451 url="../user-manual/config.html#templdir">templdir</ulink> option.
1455 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="blockall">
1456 <title>How can I remove the <quote>Go There Anyway</quote> link from
1457 the <emphasis>BLOCKED</emphasis> page?</title>
1459 There is more than one way to do it (although Perl is not involved).
1462 Editing the BLOCKED template page (see above) may dissuade some users, but
1463 this method is easily circumvented. Where you need this level of control, you
1464 might want to build &my-app; from source, and disable various features that are
1465 available as compile-time options. You should
1466 <command>configure</command> the sources as follows:
1470 ./configure --disable-toggle --disable-editor --disable-force</screen>
1473 This will create an executable with hard-coded security features so that
1474 &my-app; does not allow easy bypassing of blocked sites, or changing the
1475 current configuration via any connected user's web browser.
1478 Finally, all of these features can also be toggled on/off via options in
1479 <application>Privoxy's</application> main <ulink
1480 url="../user-manual/config.html#ACCESS-CONTROL">config</ulink> file which
1481 means you don't have to recompile anything.
1487 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1490 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1492 <sect1 id="misc"><title>Miscellaneous</title>
1494 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1495 <title id="slowsme">How much does Privoxy slow my browsing down? This
1496 has to add extra time to browsing.</title>
1498 How much of an impact depends on many things, including the CPU of the host
1499 system, how aggressive the configuration is, which specific actions are being triggered,
1500 the size of the page, the bandwidth of the connection, etc.
1503 Overall, it should not slow you down any in real terms, and may actually help
1504 speed things up since ads, banners and other junk are not typically being
1505 retrieved and displayed. The actual processing time required by
1506 <application>Privoxy</application> itself for each page, is relatively small
1507 in the overall scheme of things, and happens very quickly. This is typically
1508 more than offset by time saved not downloading and rendering ad images and
1509 other junk content (if ad blocking is being used).
1513 <quote>Filtering</quote> content via the <literal><ulink
1514 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#FILTER">filter</ulink></literal> or
1516 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#DEANIMATE-GIFS">deanimate-gifs</ulink></literal>
1517 actions may cause a perceived slowdown, since the entire document
1518 needs to be buffered before displaying. And on very large documents,
1519 filtering may have some measurable impact. How much depends on the page size,
1520 the actual definition of the filter(s), etc. See below. Most other actions
1521 have little to no impact on speed.
1524 Also, when filtering is enabled but zlib support isn't available, compression
1525 is often disabled (see <ulink
1526 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#PREVENT-COMPRESSION">prevent-compression</ulink>).
1527 This can have an impact on speed as well, although it's probably smaller than
1528 you might think. Again, the page size, etc. will determine how much of an impact.
1534 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="loadingtimes"><title>I notice considerable
1535 delays in page requests. What's wrong?</title>
1537 If you use any <literal><ulink
1538 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#FILTER">filter</ulink></literal> action,
1539 such as filtering banners by size, web-bugs etc, or the <literal><ulink
1540 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#DEANIMATE-GIFS">deanimate-gifs</ulink></literal>
1541 action, the entire document must be loaded into memory in order for the filtering
1542 mechanism to work, and nothing is sent to the browser during this time.
1545 The loading time typically does not really change much in real numbers, but
1546 the feeling is different, because most browsers are able to start rendering
1547 incomplete content, giving the user a feeling of "it works". This effect is
1548 more noticeable on slower dialup connections. Extremely large documents
1549 may have some impact on the time to load the page where there is filtering
1550 being done. But overall, the difference should be very minimal. If there is a
1551 big impact, then probably some other situation is contributing (like
1552 anti-virus software).
1555 Filtering is automatically disabled for inappropriate MIME types. But note
1556 that if the web server mis-reports the MIME type, then content that should
1557 not be filtered, could be. <application>Privoxy</application> only knows how
1558 to differentiate filterable content because of the MIME type as reported by
1559 the server, or because of some configuration setting that enables/disables
1564 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="configurl"><title>What are "http://config.privoxy.org/" and
1565 "http://p.p/"?</title>
1567 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink> is the
1568 address of <application>Privoxy</application>'s built-in user interface, and
1569 <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink> is a shortcut for it.
1572 Since <application>Privoxy</application> sits between your web browser and the Internet,
1573 it can simply intercept requests for these addresses and answer them with its built-in
1574 <quote>web server</quote>.
1577 This also makes for a good test for your browser configuration: If entering the
1578 URL <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
1579 takes you to a page saying <quote>This is Privoxy ...</quote>, everything is OK.
1580 If you get a page saying <quote>Privoxy is not working</quote> instead, then
1581 your browser didn't use <application>Privoxy</application> for the request,
1582 hence it could not be intercepted, and you have accessed the <emphasis>real</emphasis>
1583 web site at config.privoxy.org.
1589 out of date 09/02/06 HB
1590 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="blocklist"><title>Do you still maintain the blocklists?</title>
1592 No. The patterns for blocking now reside (among other things) in the <ulink
1593 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html">actions files</ulink>, which are
1594 actively maintained instead. See next question ...
1598 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="newads"><title>How can I submit new ads, or report
1601 Please see the <link linkend="contact">Contact section</link> for
1602 various ways to interact with the developers.
1607 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="newads2"><title>If I do submit missed ads, will
1608 they be included in future updates?</title>
1610 Whether such submissions are eventually included in the
1611 <filename>default.action</filename> configuration file depends on how
1612 significant the issue is. We of course want to address any potential
1613 problem with major, high-profile sites such as <citetitle>Google</citetitle>,
1614 <citetitle>Yahoo</citetitle>, etc. Any site with global or regional reach,
1615 has a good chance of being a candidate. But at the other end of the spectrum
1616 are any number of smaller, low-profile sites such as for local clubs or
1617 schools. Since their reach and impact are much less, they are best handled by
1618 inclusion in the user's <filename>user.action</filename>, and thus would be
1619 unlikely to be included.
1625 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="noonecares"><title>Why doesn't anyone answer my support
1628 Rest assured that it has been read and considered. Why it is not answered,
1629 could be for various reasons, including no one has a good answer for it, no
1630 one has had time to yet investigate it thoroughly, it has been reported
1631 numerous times already, or because not enough information was provided to help
1632 us help you. Your efforts are not wasted, and we do appreciate them.
1638 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="ip"><title>How can I hide my IP address?</title>
1640 If you run both the browser and &my-app; locally, you cannot hide your IP
1641 address with <application>Privoxy</application> or ultimately any other
1642 software alone. The server needs to know your IP address so that it knows
1643 where to send the responses back.
1646 There are many publicly usable "anonymous" proxies out there, which
1647 provide a further level of indirection between you and the web server.
1650 However, these proxies are called "anonymous" because you don't need
1651 to authenticate, not because they would offer any real anonymity.
1652 Most of them will log your IP address and make it available to the
1653 authorities in case you violate the law of the country they run in. In fact
1654 you can't even rule out that some of them only exist to *collect* information
1655 on (those suspicious) people with a more than average preference for privacy.
1658 If you want to hide your IP address from most adversaries,
1659 you should consider chaining <application>Privoxy</application>
1660 with <ulink url="http://tor.eff.org/">Tor</ulink>.
1661 The configuration details can be found in
1662 <ulink url="#TOR">How do I use <application>Privoxy</application> together
1663 with <application>Tor</application> section</ulink>
1668 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1669 <title id="anonforsure">Can Privoxy guarantee I am anonymous?</title>
1671 No. Your chances of remaining anonymous are improved, but unless you
1672 <ulink url="#TOR">chain <application>Privoxy</application> with <application>Tor</application></ulink>
1673 or a similar proxy and know what you're doing when it comes to configuring
1674 the rest of your system, you should assume that everything you do
1675 on the Web can be traced back to you.
1678 <application>Privoxy</application> can remove various information about you,
1679 and allows <emphasis>you</emphasis> more freedom to decide which sites
1680 you can trust, and what details you want to reveal. But it neither
1681 hides your IP address, nor can it guarantee that the rest of the system
1682 behaves correctly. There are several possibilities how a web sites can find
1683 out who you are, even if you are using a strict <application>Privoxy</application>
1684 configuration and chained it with <application>Tor</application>.
1687 Most of <application>Privoxy's</application> privacy-enhancing features can be easily subverted
1688 by an insecure browser configuration, therefore you should use a browser that can
1689 be configured to only execute code from trusted sites, and be careful which sites you trust.
1690 For example there is no point in having <application>Privoxy</application>
1691 modify the User-Agent header, if websites can get all the information they want
1692 through JavaScript, ActiveX, Flash, Java etc.
1695 A few browsers disclose the user's email address in certain situations, such
1696 as when transferring a file by FTP. <application>Privoxy</application>
1697 does not filter FTP. If you need this feature, or are concerned about the
1698 mail handler of your browser disclosing your email address, you might
1699 consider products such as <application>NSClean</application>.
1702 Browsers available only as binaries could use non-standard headers to give
1703 out any information they can have access to: see the manufacturer's license
1704 agreement. It's impossible to anticipate and prevent every breach of privacy
1705 that might occur. The professionally paranoid prefer browsers available as
1706 source code, because anticipating their behavior is easier. Trust the source,
1712 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1713 <title id="proxytest">A test site says I am not using a Proxy.</title>
1715 Good! Actually, they are probably testing for some other kinds of proxies.
1716 Hiding yourself completely would require additional steps.
1720 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="tor"><title>How do I use Privoxy
1721 together with Tor?</title>
1723 Before you configure <application>Privoxy</application> to use
1724 <ulink url="https://www.torproject.org/">Tor</ulink>,
1725 please follow the <citetitle>User Manual</citetitle> chapters
1726 <ulink url="../user-manual/installation.html">2. Installation</ulink> and
1727 <ulink url="../user-manual/startup.html">5. Startup</ulink> to make sure
1728 <application>Privoxy</application> itself is setup correctly.
1731 If it is, refer to <ulink url="https://www.torproject.org/documentation.html">Tor's
1732 extensive documentation</ulink> to learn how to install <application>Tor</application>,
1733 and make sure <application>Tor</application>'s logfile says that
1734 <quote>Tor has successfully opened a circuit</quote> and it
1735 <quote>looks like client functionality is working</quote>.
1738 If either <application>Tor</application> or <application>Privoxy</application>
1739 isn't working, their combination most likely will neither. Testing them on their
1740 own will also help you to direct problem reports to the right audience.
1741 If <application>Privoxy</application> isn't working, don't bother the
1742 <application>Tor</application> developers. If <application>Tor</application>
1743 isn't working, don't send bug reports to the <application>Privoxy</application> Team.
1746 If you verified that <application>Privoxy</application> and <application>Tor</application>
1747 are working, it is time to connect them. As far as <application>Privoxy</application>
1748 is concerned, <application>Tor</application> is just another proxy that can be reached
1749 by socks4 or socks4a. Most likely you are interested in <application>Tor</application>
1750 to increase your anonymity level, therefore you should use socks4a, to make sure DNS requests are
1751 done through <application>Tor</application> and thus invisible to your local network.
1756 Since <application>Privoxy</application> 3.0.5, its
1757 <ulink url="../user-manual/config.html">main configuration file</ulink>
1758 is already prepared for <application>Tor</application>, if you are using a
1759 default <application>Tor</application> configuration and run it on the same
1760 system as &my-app;, you just have to edit the
1761 <ulink url="../user-manual/config.html#FORWARDING">forwarding section</ulink>
1762 and uncomment the line:
1766 # forward-socks4a / 127.0.0.1:9050 .
1770 This is enough to reach the Internet, but additionally you might want to
1771 uncomment the following forward rules, to make sure your local network is still
1772 reachable through Privoxy:
1776 # forward 192.168.*.*/ .
1777 # forward 10.*.*.*/ .
1778 # forward 127.*.*.*/ .
1782 Unencrypted connections to systems in these address ranges will
1783 be as (un)secure as the local network is, but the alternative is
1784 that your browser can't reach the network at all. Then again,
1785 that may actually be desired and if you don't know for sure
1786 that your browser has to be able to reach the local network,
1787 there's no reason to allow it.
1790 If you want your browser to be able to reach servers in your local
1791 network by using their names, you will need additional exceptions
1792 that look like this:
1796 # forward localhost/ .
1800 Save the modified configuration file and open
1801 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status/</ulink>
1802 in your browser, confirm that <application>Privoxy</application> has reloaded its configuration
1803 and that there are no other forward lines, unless you know that you need them. If everything looks good,
1805 <ulink url="https://wiki.torproject.org/wiki/TheOnionRouter/TorFAQ#head-0e1cc2ac330ede8c6ad1ac0d0db0ac163b0e6143">Tor
1806 Faq 4.2</ulink> to learn how to verify that you are really using <application>Tor</application>.
1809 Afterward, please take the time to at least skim through the rest
1810 of <application>Tor's</application> documentation. Make sure you understand
1811 what <application>Tor</application> does, why it is no replacement for
1812 application level security, and why you probably don't want to
1813 use it for unencrypted logins.
1817 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1818 <title id="sitebreak">Might some things break because header information or
1819 content is being altered?</title>
1822 Definitely. It is common for sites to use browser type, browser version,
1823 HTTP header content, and various other techniques in order to dynamically
1824 decide what to display and how to display it. What you see, and what I see,
1825 might be very different. There are many, many ways that this can be handled,
1826 so having hard and fast rules, is tricky.
1830 The <quote>User-Agent</quote> is sometimes used in this way to identify
1831 the browser, and adjust content accordingly.
1835 Also, different browsers use different encodings of non-English
1836 characters, certain web servers convert pages on-the-fly according to the
1837 User Agent header. Giving a <quote>User Agent</quote> with the wrong
1838 operating system or browser manufacturer causes some sites in these languages
1839 to be garbled; Surfers to Eastern European sites should change it to
1840 something closer. And then some page access counters work by looking at the
1841 <quote>Referer</quote> header; they may fail or break if unavailable. The
1842 weather maps of Intellicast have been blocked by their server when no
1843 <quote>Referer</quote> or cookie is provided, is another example. (But you
1844 can forge both headers without giving information away). There are
1845 many other ways things can go wrong when trying to fool a web server. The
1846 results of which could inadvertently cause pages to load incorrectly,
1847 partially, or even not at all. And there may be no obvious clues as to just
1848 what went wrong, or why. Nowhere will there be a message that says
1849 <quote><emphasis>Turn off <literal>fast-redirects</literal> or else!</emphasis>
1854 Similar thoughts apply to modifying JavaScript, and, to a lesser degree,
1859 If you have problems with a site, you will have to adjust your configuration
1860 accordingly. Cookies are probably the most likely adjustment that may
1861 be required, but by no means the only one.
1867 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1868 <title id="caching">Can Privoxy act as a <quote>caching</quote> proxy to
1869 speed up web browsing?</title>
1871 No, it does not have this ability at all. You want something like
1872 <ulink url="http://www.squid-cache.org/">Squid</ulink> or
1873 <ulink url="http://www.pps.jussieu.fr/~jch/software/polipo/">Polipo</ulink> for this.
1874 And, yes, before you ask, <application>Privoxy</application> can co-exist
1875 with other kinds of proxies like <application>Squid</application>.
1876 See the <ulink url="../user-manual/config.html#FORWARDING">forwarding
1877 chapter</ulink> in the <ulink url="../user-manual/index.html">user
1878 manual</ulink> for details.
1882 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1883 <title id="firewall">What about as a firewall? Can Privoxy protect me?</title>
1885 Not in the way you mean, or in the way some firewall vendors claim they can.
1886 <application>Privoxy</application> can help protect your privacy, but can't
1887 protect your system from intrusion attempts. It is, of course, perfectly possible
1888 to use <emphasis>both</emphasis>.
1892 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1893 <title id="wasted">I have large empty spaces / a checkerboard pattern now where
1894 ads used to be. Why?</title>
1896 It is technically possible to eliminate banners and ads in a way that frees
1897 their allocated page space. This could easily be done by blocking with
1898 <application>Privoxy's</application> filters,
1899 and eliminating the <emphasis>entire</emphasis> image references from the
1903 But, this would consume considerably more CPU resources (IOW, slow things
1904 down), would likely destroy the layout of some web pages which rely on the
1905 banners utilizing a certain amount of page space, and might fail in other
1906 cases, where the screen space is reserved (e.g. by HTML tables for instance).
1907 Also, making ads and banners disappear without any trace complicates
1908 troubleshooting, and would sooner or later be problematic.
1911 The better alternative is to instead let them stay, and block the resulting
1912 requests for the banners themselves as is now the case. This leaves either
1913 empty space, or the familiar checkerboard pattern.
1916 So the developers won't support this in the default configuration, but you
1917 can of course define appropriate filters yourself to achieve this.
1921 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1922 <title id="ssl">How can Privoxy filter Secure (HTTPS) URLs?</title>
1924 Since secure HTTP connections are encrypted SSL sessions between your browser
1925 and the secure site, and are meant to be reliably <emphasis>secure</emphasis>,
1926 there is little that <application>Privoxy</application> can do but hand the raw
1927 gibberish data though from one end to the other unprocessed.
1930 The only exception to this is blocking by host patterns, as the client needs
1931 to tell <application>Privoxy</application> the name of the remote server,
1932 so that <application>Privoxy</application> can establish the connection.
1933 If that name matches a host-only pattern, the connection will be blocked.
1936 As far as ad blocking is concerned, this is less of a restriction than it may
1937 seem, since ad sources are often identifiable by the host name, and often
1938 the banners to be placed in an encrypted page come unencrypted nonetheless
1939 for efficiency reasons, which exposes them to the full power of
1940 <application>Privoxy</application>'s ad blocking.
1943 <quote>Content cookies</quote> (those that are embedded in the actual HTML or
1944 JS page content, see <literal><ulink
1945 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">filter{content-cookies}</ulink></literal>),
1946 in an SSL transaction will be impossible to block under these conditions.
1947 Fortunately, this does not seem to be a very common scenario since most
1948 cookies come by traditional means.
1953 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
1954 <title id="secure">Privoxy runs as a <quote>server</quote>. How
1955 secure is it? Do I need to take any special precautions?</title>
1957 On Unix-like systems, <application>Privoxy</application> can run as a non-privileged
1958 user, which is how we recommend it be run. Also, by default
1959 <application>Privoxy</application> listens to requests from <quote>localhost</quote>
1963 The server aspect of <application>Privoxy</application> is not itself directly
1964 exposed to the Internet in this configuration. If you want to have
1965 <application>Privoxy</application> serve as a LAN proxy, this will have to
1966 be opened up to allow for LAN requests. In this case, we'd recommend
1967 you specify only the LAN gateway address, e.g. 192.168.1.1, in the main
1968 <application>Privoxy</application> configuration file and check all <ulink
1969 url="../user-manual/config.html#ACCESS-CONTROL">access control and security
1970 options</ulink>. All LAN hosts can then use this as their proxy address
1971 in the browser proxy configuration, but <application>Privoxy</application>
1972 will not listen on any external interfaces. ACLs can be defined in addition,
1973 and using a firewall is always good too. Better safe than sorry.
1978 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="turnoff">
1979 <title>Can I temporarily disable Privoxy?</title>
1981 &my-app; doesn't have a transparent proxy mode,
1982 but you can toggle off blocking and content filtering.
1985 The easiest way to do that is to point your browser
1986 to the remote toggle URL: <ulink
1987 url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle</ulink>.
1990 See the <ulink url="../user-manual/appendix.html#BOOKMARKLETS">Bookmarklets section</ulink>
1991 of the <citetitle>User Manual</citetitle> for an easy way to access this
1992 feature. Note that this is a feature that may need to be enabled in the main
1993 <filename>config</filename> file.
1998 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="reallyoff">
1999 <title>When <quote>disabled</quote> is Privoxy totally
2000 out of the picture?</title>
2002 No, this just means all optional filtering and actions are disabled.
2003 <application>Privoxy</application> is still acting as a proxy, but just
2004 doing less of the things that <application>Privoxy</application> would
2005 normally be expected to do. It is still a <quote>middle-man</quote> in
2006 the interaction between your browser and web sites. See below to bypass
2011 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="turnoff2">
2012 <title>How can I tell Privoxy to totally ignore certain sites?</title>
2014 Bypassing a proxy, or proxying based on arbitrary criteria, is purely a browser
2015 configuration issue, not a &my-app; issue. Modern browsers typically do have
2016 settings for not proxying certain sites. Check your browser's help files.
2021 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="crunch">
2022 <title>My logs show Privoxy <quote>crunches</quote>
2023 ads, but also its own internal CGI pages. What is a <quote>crunch</quote>?</title>
2025 A <quote>crunch</quote> simply means <application>Privoxy</application> intercepted
2026 <emphasis>something</emphasis>, nothing more. Often this is indeed ads or
2027 banners, but <application>Privoxy</application> uses the same mechanism for
2028 trapping requests for its own internal pages. For instance, a request for
2029 <application>Privoxy's</application> configuration page at: <ulink
2030 url="http://config.privoxy.org">http://config.privoxy.org</ulink>, is
2031 intercepted (i.e. it does not go out to the 'net), and the familiar CGI
2032 configuration is returned to the browser, and the log consequently will show
2033 a <quote>crunch</quote>.
2036 Since version 3.0.7, Privoxy will also log the crunch reason.
2037 If you are using an older version you might want to upgrade.
2041 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="downloads">
2042 <title>Can Privoxy effect files that I download
2043 from a webserver? FTP server?</title>
2045 From the webserver's perspective, there is no difference between
2046 viewing a document (i.e. a page), and downloading a file. The same is true of
2047 <application>Privoxy</application>. If there is a match for a <literal><ulink
2048 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#BLOCK">block</ulink></literal> pattern,
2049 it will still be blocked, and of course this is obvious.
2052 Filtering is potentially more of a concern since the results are not always
2053 so obvious, and the effects of filtering are there whether the file is simply
2054 viewed, or downloaded. And potentially whether the content is some obnoxious
2055 advertisement, or Mr. Jimmy's latest/greatest source code jewel. Of course,
2056 one of these presumably is <quote>bad</quote> content that we don't want, and
2057 the other is <quote>good</quote> content that we do want.
2058 <application>Privoxy</application> is blind to the differences, and can only
2059 distinguish <quote>good from bad</quote> by the configuration parameters
2060 <emphasis>we</emphasis> give it.
2063 <application>Privoxy</application> knows the differences in files according
2064 to the <quote>Content Type</quote> as reported by the webserver. If this is
2065 reported accurately (e.g. <quote>application/zip</quote> for a zip archive),
2066 then <application>Privoxy</application> knows to ignore these where
2067 appropriate. <application>Privoxy</application> potentially can filter HTML
2068 as well as plain text documents, subject to configuration parameters of
2069 course. Also, documents that are of an unknown type (generally assumed to be
2070 <quote>text/plain</quote>) can be filtered, as will those that might be
2071 incorrectly reported by the webserver. If such a file is a downloaded file
2072 that is intended to be saved to disk, then any content that might have been
2073 altered by filtering, will be saved too, for these (probably rare) cases.
2076 Note that versions later than 3.0.2 do NOT filter document types reported as
2077 <quote>text/plain</quote>. Prior to this, <application>Privoxy</application>
2078 did filter this document type.
2081 In short, filtering is <quote>ON</quote> if a) the content type as reported
2082 by the webserver is appropriate <emphasis>and</emphasis> b) the configuration
2083 allows it (or at least does not disallow it). That's it. There is no magic
2084 cookie anywhere to say this is <quote>good</quote> and this is
2085 <quote>bad</quote>. It's the configuration that lets it all happen or not.
2088 If you download text files, you probably do not want these to be filtered,
2089 particularly if the content is source code, or other critical content. Source
2090 code sometimes might be mistaken for Javascript (i.e. the kind that might
2091 open a pop-up window). It is recommended to turn off filtering for download
2092 sites (particularly if the content may be plain text files and you are using
2093 version 3.0.2 or earlier) in your <filename>user.action</filename> file. And
2094 also, for any site or page where making <emphasis>any</emphasis> changes at
2095 all to the content is to be avoided.
2098 <application>Privoxy</application> does not do FTP at all, only HTTP
2099 and HTTPS (SSL) protocols, so please don't try.
2103 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="downloads2">
2104 <title>I just downloaded a Perl script, and Privoxy
2105 altered it! Yikes, what is wrong!</title>
2111 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="hostsfile">
2112 <title>Should I continue to use a <quote>HOSTS</quote> file for ad-blocking?</title>
2114 One time-tested technique to defeat common ads is to trick the local DNS
2115 system by giving a phony IP address for the ad generator in the local
2116 <filename>HOSTS</filename> file, typically using <literal>127.0.0.1</literal>, aka
2117 <literal>localhost</literal>. This effectively blocks the ad.
2120 There is no reason to use this technique in conjunction with
2121 <application>Privoxy</application>. <application>Privoxy</application>
2122 does essentially the same thing, much more elegantly and with much more
2123 flexibility. A large <filename>HOSTS</filename> file, in fact, not only
2124 duplicates effort, but may get in the way and seriously slow down your system.
2125 It is recommended to remove such entries from your <filename>HOSTS</filename> file. If you think
2126 your hosts list is neglected by <application>Privoxy's </application>
2127 configuration, consider adding your list to your <filename>user.action</filename> file:
2134 ads.galore.example.com
2135 etc.example.com</screen>
2139 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="seealso">
2140 <title>Where can I find more information about Privoxy
2141 and related issues?</title>
2142 <!-- Include seealso.sgml boilerplate: -->
2144 <!-- end boilerplate -->
2149 <ulink url="../user-manual/seealso.html">user-manual</ulink> for
2155 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="microsuck">
2156 <title>I've noticed that Privoxy changes <quote>Microsoft</quote> to
2157 <quote>MicroSuck</quote>! Why are you manipulating my browsing?</title>
2160 We're not. The text substitutions that you are seeing are disabled
2161 in the default configuration as shipped. You have either manually
2162 activated the <quote><literal>fun</literal></quote> filter which
2163 is clearly labeled <quote>Text replacements for subversive browsing
2164 fun!</quote> or you are using an older Privoxy version and have implicitly
2165 activated it by choosing the <quote>Adventuresome</quote> profile in the
2166 web-based editor. Please upgrade.
2170 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="valid">
2171 <title>Does Privoxy produce <quote>valid</quote> HTML (or XHTML)?</title>
2174 Privoxy generates HTML in both its own <quote>templates</quote>, and possibly
2175 whenever there are text substitutions via a &my-app; filter. While this
2176 should always conform to the HTML 4.01 specifications, it has not been
2177 validated against this or any other standard.
2185 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2187 <sect1 id="trouble">
2188 <title>Troubleshooting</title>
2190 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
2191 <title id="refused">I cannot connect to any websites. Or, I am getting
2192 <quote>connection refused</quote> message with every web page. Why?</title>
2194 There are several possibilities:
2199 <application>Privoxy</application> is not running. Solution: verify
2200 that &my-app; is installed correctly, has not crashed, and is indeed running.
2201 Turn on <application>Privoxy's</application> logging, and look at the logs to see what they say.
2203 <listitem><para>Or your browser is configured for a different port than what
2204 <application>Privoxy</application> is using. Solution: verify that &my-app;
2205 and your browser are set to the same port (<literal>listen-address</literal>).
2207 <listitem><para>Or if using a forwarding rule, you have a configuration problem or a
2208 problem with a host in the forwarding chain. Solution: temporarily alter your
2209 configuration and take the forwarders out of the equation.
2212 Or you have a firewall that is interfering and blocking you. Solution:
2213 try disabling or removing the firewall as a simple test.
2220 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2221 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="error503">
2222 <title>Why am I getting a 503 Error (WSAECONNREFUSED) on every page?</title>
2224 More than likely this is a problem with your TCP/IP networking. ZoneAlarm has
2225 been reported to cause this symptom -- even if not running! The solution is
2226 to either fight the ZA configuration, or uninstall ZoneAlarm, and then find
2227 something better behaved in its place. Other personal firewall type products
2228 may cause similar type problems if not configured correctly.
2232 <sect2 renderas="sect3">
2233 <title id="flushit">I just added a new rule, but the steenkin ad is
2234 still getting through. How?</title>
2236 If the ad had been displayed before you added its URL, it will probably be
2237 held in the browser's cache for some time, so it will be displayed without
2238 the need for any request to the server, and <application>Privoxy</application>
2239 will not be involved. Flush the browser's caches, and then try again.
2243 If this doesn't help, you probably have an error in the rule you
2244 applied. Try pasting the full URL of the offending ad into <ulink
2245 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
2246 and see if it really matches your new rule. Blocking ads is like blocking
2247 spam: a lot of tinkering is required to stay ahead of the game. And
2248 remember you need to block the URL of the ad in question, which may be
2249 entirely different from the site URL itself. Most ads are hosted on different
2250 servers than the main site itself. If you right-click on the ad, you should
2251 be able to get all the relevant information you need. Alternately, you can
2252 find the correct URL by looking at <application>Privoxy's</application> logs
2253 (you may need to enable logging in the main config file if its disabled).
2256 Below is a slightly modified real-life log snippet that originates with one
2257 requested URL: <literal>www.example.com</literal> (name of site was changed
2258 for this example, the number of requests is real). You can see in this the
2259 complexity of what goes into making up this one <quote>page</quote>. There
2260 are eight different domains involved here, with thirty two separate URLs
2261 requested in all, making up all manner of images, Shockwave Flash,
2262 JavaScript, CSS stylesheets, scripts, and other related content. Some of this
2263 content is obviously <quote>good</quote> or <quote>bad</quote>, but not all.
2264 Many of the more questionable looking requests, are going to outside domains
2265 that seem to be identifying themselves with suspicious looking names, making
2266 our job a little easier. &my-app; has <quote>crunched</quote> (meaning caught
2267 and BLOCKED) quite a few items in this example, but perhaps missed a few as well.
2272 Request: www.example.com/
2273 Request: www.example.com/favicon.ico
2274 Request: img.example.com/main.css
2275 Request: img.example.com/sr.js
2276 Request: example.betamarker.com/example.html
2277 Request: www.lik-sang.com/Banners/bestsellers/skyscraper.php?likref=BSellers
2278 Request: img.example.com/pb.png
2279 Request: www.google-analytics.com/urchin.js crunch! (Blocked)
2280 Request: www.advertising-department.com/ats/switch.ps.php?26856 crunch! (Blocked)
2281 Request: img.example.com/p.gif
2282 Request: www.popuptraffic.com/assign.php?l=example&mode=behind crunch! (Blocked)
2283 Request: www.popuptraffic.com/scripts/popup.php?hid=5c3cf&tmpl=PBa.tmpl crunch! (Blocked)
2284 Request: www.popuptraffic.com/assign.php?l=example crunch! (Blocked)
2285 Request: www.lik-sang.com/Banners/best_sellers/best_sellers.css
2286 Request: www.adtrak.net/adx.js crunch! (Blocked)
2287 Request: img.example.com/hbg.gif
2288 Request: img.example.com/example.jpg
2289 Request: img.example.com/mt.png
2290 Request: img.example.com/mm.png
2291 Request: img.example.com/mb.png
2292 Request: www.popuptraffic.com/scripts/popup.php?hid=a71b91fa5&tmpl=Ua.tmp crunch! (Blocked)
2293 Request: www.example.com/tracker.js
2294 Request: www.lik-sang.com/Banners/best_sellers/lsi_head.gif
2295 Request: www.adtrak.net/adjs.php?n=020548130&what=zone:61 crunch! (Blocked)
2296 Request: www.adtrak.net/adjs.php?n=463594413&what=zone:58&source=Ua crunch! (Blocked)
2297 Request: www.lik-sang.com/Banners/best_sellers/bottomani.swf
2298 Request: mmm.elitemediagroup.net/install.php?allowpop=no&popupmincook=0&allowsp2=1 crunch! (Blocked)
2299 Request: www.example.com/tracker.js?screen=1400x1050&win=962x693
2300 Request: www.adtrak.net/adlog.php?bannerid=1309&clientid=439&zoneid=61 crunch! (Blocked)
2301 Request: 66.70.21.80/scripts/click.php?hid=5c3cf599a9efd0320d26&si
2302 Request: 66.70.21.80/img/pixel.gif
2303 Request: www.adtrak.net/adlog.php?bannerid=1309&clientid=439&zoneid=58&source=Ua&block=86400 crunch! (Blocked)
2304 Request: 66.70.21.80/scripts/click.php?hid=a71b9f6504b0c5681fa5&si=Ua
2309 Despite 12 out of 32 requests being blocked, the page looked, and seemed to
2310 behave perfectly <quote>normal</quote> (minus some ads, of course).
2315 <sect2 id="badsite" renderas="sect3">
2316 <title >One of my favorite sites does not work with Privoxy.
2317 What can I do?</title>
2320 First verify that it is indeed a <application>Privoxy</application> problem,
2321 by toggling off <application>Privoxy</application> through <ulink
2322 url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle</ulink>
2323 (the toggle feature may need to be enabled in the main
2324 <filename>config</filename>),
2325 and then shift-reloading the problem page (i.e. holding down the shift key
2326 while clicking reload. Alternatively, flush your browser's disk and memory
2331 If the problem went away, we know we have a configuration related problem.
2333 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
2334 and paste the full URL of the page in question into the prompt. See which
2335 actions are being applied to the URL, and which matches in which actions
2336 files are responsible for that. It might be helpful also to look at your logs
2337 for this site too, to see what else might be happening (note: logging may need
2338 to be enabled in the main config file). Many sites are
2339 complex and require a number of related pages to help present their content.
2340 Look at what else might be used by the page in question, and what of that
2341 might be <emphasis>required</emphasis>.
2342 Now, armed with this information, go to
2344 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
2345 and select the appropriate actions files for editing. </para>
2347 You can now either look for a section which disables the actions that
2348 you suspect to cause the problem and add a pattern for your site there,
2349 or make up a completely new section for your site. In any case, the recommended
2350 way is to disable only the prime suspect, reload the problem page, and only
2351 if the problem persists, disable more and more actions until you have
2352 identified the culprit. You may or may not want to turn the other actions
2353 on again. Remember to flush your browser's caches in between any such changes!
2356 Alternately, if you are comfortable with a text editor, you can accomplish
2357 the same thing by editing the appropriate actions file. Probably the easiest
2358 way to deal with such problems when editing by hand is to add your
2359 site to a <literal>{ fragile }</literal> section in <filename>user.action</filename>,
2360 which is an alias that turns off most <quote>dangerous</quote>
2361 actions, but is also likely to turn off more actions then needed, and thus lower
2362 your privacy and protection more than necessary,
2365 Troubleshooting actions is discussed in more detail in the <ulink
2366 url="../user-manual/appendix.html#ACTIONSANAT">User Manual appendix,
2367 Troubleshooting: the Anatomy of an Action</ulink>.
2368 There is also an <ulink
2369 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ACT-EXAMPLES">actions tutorial</ulink>
2370 with general configuration information and examples.
2373 As a last resort, you can always see if your browser has a setting that will
2374 bypass the proxy setting for selective sites. Modern browsers can do this.
2380 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2381 <sect2 id="dun" renderas="sect3">
2382 <title>After installing Privoxy, I have to log in
2383 every time I start IE. What gives?</title>
2386 This is a quirk that effects the installation of
2387 <application>Privoxy</application>, in conjunction with Internet Explorer and
2388 Internet Connection Sharing on Windows 2000 and Windows XP. The symptoms may
2389 appear to be corrupted or invalid DUN settings, or passwords.
2393 When setting up an NT based Windows system with
2394 <application>Privoxy</application> you may find that things do not seem to be
2395 doing what you expect. When you set your system up you will probably have set
2396 up Internet Connection Sharing (ICS) with Dial up Networking (DUN) when
2397 logged in with administrator privileges. You will probably have made this DUN
2398 connection available to other accounts that you may have set-up on your
2399 system. E.g. Mum or Dad sets up the system and makes accounts suitably
2400 configured for the kids.
2404 When setting up <application>Privoxy</application> in this environment you
2405 will have to alter the proxy set-up of Internet Explorer (IE) for the
2406 specific DUN connection on which you wish to use
2407 <application>Privoxy</application>. When you do this the ICS DUN set-up
2408 becomes user specific. In this instance you will see no difference if you
2409 change the DUN connection under the account used to set-up the connection.
2410 However when you do this from another user you will notice that the DUN
2411 connection changes to make available to "Me only". You will also find that
2412 you have to store the password under each different user!
2416 The reason for this is that each user's set-up for IE is user specific. Each
2417 set-up DUN connection and each LAN connection in IE store the settings for
2418 each user individually. As such this enforces individual configurations
2419 rather than common ones. Hence the first time you use a DUN connection after
2420 re-booting your system it may not perform as you expect, and prompt you for
2421 the password. Just set and save the password again and all should be OK.
2425 [Thanks to Ray Griffith for this submission.]
2430 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2431 <sect2 id="ftp" renderas="sect3">
2432 <title>I cannot connect to any FTP sites. Privoxy
2433 is blocking me.</title>
2435 <application>Privoxy</application> cannot act as a proxy for FTP traffic,
2436 so do not configure your browser to use <application>Privoxy</application>
2437 as an FTP proxy. The same is true for <emphasis>any protocol other than HTTP
2438 or HTTPS (SSL)</emphasis>.
2441 Most browsers understand FTP as well as HTTP. If you connect to a site, with
2442 a URL like <literal>ftp://ftp.example.com</literal>, your browser is making
2443 an FTP connection, and not a HTTP connection. So while your browser may
2444 speak FTP, <application>Privoxy</application> does not, and cannot proxy
2448 To complicate matters, some systems may have a generic <quote>proxy</quote>
2449 setting, which will enable various protocols, including
2450 <emphasis>both</emphasis> HTTP and FTP proxying! So it is possible to
2451 accidentally enable FTP proxying in these cases. And of course, if this
2452 happens, <application>Privoxy</application> will indeed cause problems since
2453 it does not know FTP. <![%p-newstuff;[Newer version will give a sane error
2454 message if a FTP connection is attempted.]]> Just disable the FTP setting
2455 and all will be well again.
2458 Will <application>Privoxy</application> ever proxy FTP traffic? Unlikely.
2459 There just is not much reason, and the work to make this happen is more than
2464 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2465 <sect2 id="macosxie" renderas="sect3">
2466 <title>In Mac OS X, I can't configure Microsoft Internet Explorer to use
2467 Privoxy as the HTTP proxy.</title>
2469 Microsoft Internet Explorer (in versions like 5.1) respects system-wide
2470 network settings. In order to change the HTTP proxy, open System
2471 Preferences, and click on the Network icon. In the settings pane that
2472 comes up, click on the Proxies tab. Ensure the "Web Proxy (HTTP)" checkbox
2473 is checked and enter <literal>127.0.0.1</literal> in the entry field.
2474 Enter <literal>8118</literal> in the Port field. The next time you start
2475 IE, it should reflect these values.
2479 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2480 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="macosxuninstall">
2481 <title>In Mac OS X, I dragged the Privoxy folder to the trash in order to
2482 uninstall it. Now the finder tells me I don't have sufficient privileges to
2483 empty the trash.</title>
2485 Note: This ONLY applies to privoxy 3.0.6 and earlier.
2488 Just dragging the <application>Privoxy</application> folder to the trash is
2489 not enough to delete it. <application>Privoxy</application> supplies an
2490 <application>uninstall.command</application> file that takes care of
2491 these details. Open the trash, drag the <application>uninstall.command</application>
2492 file out of the trash and double-click on it. You will be prompted for
2493 confirmation and the administration password.
2496 The trash may still appear full after this command; emptying the trash
2497 from the desktop should make it appear empty again.
2502 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2503 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="macosximages">
2504 <title>In Mac OS X Panther (10.3), images often fail to load and/or I
2505 experience random delays in page loading. I'm using
2506 <literal>localhost</literal> as my browser's proxy setting.</title>
2508 We believe this is due to an IPv6-related bug in Mac OS X, but don't fully
2509 understand the issue yet. In any case, changing the proxy setting to
2510 <literal>127.0.0.1</literal> instead of <literal>localhost</literal>
2511 works around the problem.
2515 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2516 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="blankpage">
2517 <title>I get a completely blank page at one site. <quote>View Source</quote>
2518 shows only: <markup><![CDATA[<html><body></body></html>]]></markup>. Without
2519 Privoxy the page loads fine.</title>
2521 Chances are that the site suffers from a bug in
2522 <ulink url="http://www.php.net/"><application>PHP</application></ulink>,
2523 which results in empty pages being sent if the client explicitly requests
2524 an uncompressed page, like <application>Privoxy</application> does.
2525 This bug has been fixed in PHP 4.2.3.
2528 To find out if this is in fact the source of the problem, try adding
2529 the site to a <literal>-prevent-compression</literal> section in
2530 <filename>user.action</filename>:
2533 # Make exceptions for ill-behaved sites:
2535 {-prevent-compression}
2536 .example.com</screen>
2538 If that works, you may also want to report the problem to the
2539 site's webmasters, telling them to use zlib.output_compression
2540 instead of ob_gzhandler in their PHP applications (workaround)
2541 or upgrade to PHP 4.2.3 or later (fix).
2545 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="nohostname">
2546 <title>My logs show many <quote>Unable to get my own hostname</quote> lines.
2549 <application>Privoxy</application> tries to get the hostname of the system
2550 its running on from the IP address of the system interface it is bound to
2551 (from the <filename>config</filename> file
2552 <emphasis>listen-address</emphasis> setting). If the system cannot supply
2553 this information, <application>Privoxy</application> logs this condition.
2556 Typically, this would be considered a minor system configuration error. It is
2557 not a fatal error to <application>Privoxy</application> however, but may
2558 result in a much slower response from <application>Privoxy</application> on
2559 some platforms due to DNS timeouts.
2562 This can be caused by a problem with the local <filename>HOSTS</filename>
2563 file. If this file has been changed from the original, try reverting it to
2564 see if that helps. Make sure whatever name(s) are used for the local system,
2565 that they resolve both ways.
2569 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="inuse">
2570 <title>When I try to launch Privoxy, I get an
2571 error message <quote>port 8118 is already in use</quote> (or similar wording).
2574 Port 8118 is <application>Privoxy's</application> default TCP
2575 <quote>listening</quote> port. Typically this message would mean that there
2576 is already one instance of <application>Privoxy</application> running, and
2577 your system is actually trying to start a second
2578 <application>Privoxy</application> on the same port, which will not work.
2579 (You can have multiple instances but they must be assigned different ports.)
2580 How and why this might happen varies from platform to platform, but you need
2581 to check your installation and start-up procedures.
2585 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="demoronizer">
2587 Pages with UTF-8 fonts are garbled.
2590 This is caused by the <quote>demoronizer</quote> filter. You should either
2591 upgrade <application>Privoxy</application>, or at least upgrade to the most
2592 recent <filename>default.action</filename> file available from <ulink
2593 url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118">SourceForge</ulink>.
2594 Or you can simply disable the demoronizer filter.
2598 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="demoronizer2">
2600 Why are binary files (such as images) corrupted when Privoxy
2604 This may also be caused by the <quote>demoronizer</quote> filter,
2605 in conjunction with a web server that is misreporting the content type. Binary
2606 files are exempted from <application>Privoxy's</application> filtering
2607 (unless the web server by mistake says the file is something else). Either
2608 upgrade <application>Privoxy</application>, or go to the most recent
2609 <filename>default.action</filename> file available from <ulink
2610 url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118">SourceForge</ulink>.
2614 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="demoronizer3">
2616 What is the <quote>demoronizer</quote> and why is it there?
2619 The original demoronizer was a Perl script that cleaned up HTML pages which
2620 were created with certain Microsoft products. MS has used proprietary extensions
2621 to standardized font encodings (ISO 8859-1), which has caused problems for pages
2622 that are viewed with non-Microsoft products (and are expecting to see a
2623 standard set of fonts). The demoronizer corrected these errors so the pages
2624 displayed correctly. <application>Privoxy</application> borrowed from this
2625 script, introducing a filter based on the original demoronizer, which in turn could
2626 correct these errors on the fly.
2629 But this is only needed in some situations, and will cause serious problems in some
2633 If you are using Microsoft products, you do not need it. If you need to view
2634 pages with UTF-8 characters (such as Cyrillic or Chinese), then it will
2635 cause corruption of the fonts, and thus <emphasis>should not be on</emphasis>.
2638 On the other hand, if you use non-Microsoft products, and you occasionally
2639 notice weird characters on pages, you might want to try it.
2643 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="windowopen">
2645 Why do I keep seeing <quote>PrivoxyWindowOpen()</quote> in raw source code?
2648 <application>Privoxy</application> is attempting to disable malicious
2649 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javascript">Javascript</ulink>
2650 in this case, with the <literal>unsolicited-popups</literal>
2651 filter. <application>Privoxy</application> cannot tell very well
2652 <quote>good</quote> code snippets from <quote>bad</quote> code snippets.
2655 If you see this in HTML source, and the page displays without problems, then
2656 this is good, and likely some pop-up window was disabled. If you see this
2657 where it is causing a problem, such as a downloaded program source code file,
2658 then you should set an exception for this site or page such that the
2659 integrity of the page stays in tact by disabling all filtering.
2663 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="dnserrors">
2665 I am getting too many DNS errors like <quote>404 No Such Domain</quote>. Why
2666 can't Privoxy do this better?
2669 There are potentially several factors here. First of all, the DNS resolution
2670 is done by the underlying operating system -- not
2671 <application>Privoxy</application> itself. <application>Privoxy</application>
2672 merely initiates the process and hands it off, and then later reports
2673 whatever the outcome was. And tries to give a coherent message if there seems
2674 to be a problem. In some cases, this might otherwise be mitigated by the
2675 browser itself which might try some work-arounds and alternate approaches (e.g
2676 adding <quote>www.</quote> to the URL).
2679 In other cases, if <application>Privoxy</application> is being chained
2680 with another proxy, this could complicate the issue, and cause undue
2681 delays and timeouts. In the case of a <quote>socks4a</quote> proxy, the socks
2682 server handles all the DNS. <application>Privoxy</application> would just be
2683 the <quote>messenger</quote> which is reporting whatever problem occurred
2684 downstream, and not the root cause of the error.
2688 In any case, versions newer than 3.0.3 include various improvements to help
2689 <application>Privoxy</application> better handle these cases.
2693 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="allcpu">
2695 At one site Privoxy just hangs, and starts taking
2696 all CPU. Why is this?
2699 This is probably a manifestation of the <quote>100% cpu</quote> problem that
2700 occurs on pages containing many (thousands upon thousands) of blank lines. The blank lines
2701 are in the raw HTML source of the page, and the browser just ignores them. But the
2702 pattern matching in <application>Privoxy's</application> page filtering
2703 mechanism is trying to match against absurdly long strings and this becomes
2704 very CPU-intensive, taking a long, long time to complete. Until a better
2705 solution comes along, disable filtering on these pages, particularly the
2706 <literal>js-annoyances</literal> and <literal>unsolicited-popups</literal>
2711 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="slowcrawl">
2712 <title>I just installed Privoxy, and all my
2713 browsing has slowed to a crawl. What gives? </title>
2715 This should not happen, and for the overwhelming number of users world-wide,
2716 it does not happen. I would suspect some inadvertent interaction of software
2717 components such as anti-virus software, spyware protectors, personal
2718 firewalls or similar components. Try disabling (or uninstalling) these one
2719 at a time and see if that helps.
2723 <sect2 renderas="sect3" id="preventcomp">
2724 <title>Why do my filters work on some sites but not on others? </title>
2726 It's probably due to compression. It is a common practice for web servers to
2727 send their content <quote>compressed</quote> in order to speed things up, and
2728 then let the browser <quote>uncompress</quote> them. When compiled with zlib support
2729 &my-app; can decompress content before filtering, otherwise you may want to enable
2731 url="../user-manual/actions-file.html#PREVENT-COMPRESSION">prevent-compression</ulink>.
2738 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2739 <sect1 id="contact"><title>Contacting the developers, Bug Reporting and Feature Requests</title>
2740 <!-- Include contacting.sgml -->
2742 <!-- end contacting -->
2745 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2746 <sect1 id="copyright"><title>Privoxy Copyright, License and History</title>
2748 <!-- Include copyright.sgml -->
2754 Portions of this document are <quote>borrowed</quote> from the original
2755 <application>Junkbuster</application> (tm) FAQ, and modified as
2756 appropriate for <application>Privoxy</application>.
2759 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2760 <sect2><title>License</title>
2761 <!-- Include copyright.sgml: -->
2763 <!-- end copyright -->
2765 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2767 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2768 <sect2><title>History</title>
2769 <!-- Include history.sgml -->
2775 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2778 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2780 <sect1 id="seealso"><title>See also</title>
2782 <!-- Include seealso.sgml -->
2793 Tue 09/11/01 06:38:14 PM EST: Test SGML doc by Hal Burgiss.
2795 This program is free software; you can redistribute it
2796 and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
2797 Public License as published by the Free Software
2798 Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at
2799 your option) any later version.
2801 This program is distributed in the hope that it will
2802 be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the
2803 implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
2804 PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public
2805 License for more details.
2807 The GNU General Public License should be included with
2808 this file. If not, you can view it at
2809 http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
2810 or write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
2811 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA
2814 Revision 2.39 2008/02/03 21:37:41 hal9
2815 Apply patch from Mark: s/OSX/OS X/
2817 Revision 2.38 2008/01/19 17:52:39 hal9
2818 Re-commit to fix various minor issues for new release.
2820 Revision 2.37 2008/01/19 15:03:05 hal9
2821 Doc sources tagged for 3.0.8 release.
2823 Revision 2.36 2008/01/17 01:49:51 hal9
2824 Change copyright notice for docs s/2007/2008/. All these will be rebuilt soon
2827 Revision 2.35 2007/11/19 17:57:59 fabiankeil
2828 A bunch of rewordings, minor updates and fixes.
2830 Revision 2.34 2007/11/19 02:38:11 hal9
2831 Minor revisions and rebuild
2833 Revision 2.33 2007/11/15 03:30:20 hal9
2834 Results of spell check.
2836 Revision 2.32 2007/11/13 03:03:42 hal9
2837 Various changes to reflect new features and revised configuration for the
2840 Revision 2.31 2007/11/05 02:34:53 hal9
2841 Various changes in preparation for the upcoming release. Much yet to be done.
2843 Revision 2.30 2007/11/04 15:16:40 hal9
2846 Revision 2.29 2007/11/04 15:12:47 hal9
2847 Various minor adjustments.
2849 Revision 2.28 2007/10/27 15:14:16 fabiankeil
2850 Change Tor links to use the new domain torproject.org.
2852 Revision 2.27 2007/10/22 19:47:05 fabiankeil
2853 - Bump version and copyright.
2854 - Adjust Tor section to make it clear that forward exceptions
2855 aren't required and may not even be desired.
2856 - A bunch of other minor rewordings.
2857 - Fix markup problems Roland noticed (hopefully without adding new ones).
2859 Revision 2.26 2007/08/05 15:37:55 fabiankeil
2860 - Don't claim that thousands of people read our code.
2861 - Specify the GPL version and link to GPLv2 instead of v3.
2862 - Note that configuration syntax may change between releases.
2863 - Mention zlib support.
2864 - Answer the "transparent proxy" question properly.
2865 - Add "intercepting proxy" entry.
2867 - Rephrase some other sentences for various reasons.
2869 Revision 2.25 2007/07/18 11:00:34 hal9
2870 Add misc note about valid mark-up in Privoxy.
2872 Revision 2.24 2006/11/14 01:57:46 hal9
2873 Dump all docs prior to 3.0.6 release. Various minor changes to faq and user
2876 Revision 2.23 2006/10/21 22:19:52 hal9
2877 Two new FAQs, a rewrite or two, and some touch ups.
2879 Revision 2.22 2006/10/14 20:33:10 hal9
2880 Three new FAQ's re: templates and blocking, and various minor touch-ups/improvements.
2882 Revision 2.21 2006/10/03 14:40:51 fabiankeil
2883 Added links from the Tor faq to the
2884 configuration chapter in the User Manual.
2886 Revision 2.20 2006/09/26 10:12:37 fabiankeil
2889 Revision 2.19 2006/09/22 10:54:32 hal9
2890 Change references to 3.0.4 to 3.0.5 and minor adjustments.
2892 Revision 2.18 2006/09/22 01:27:55 hal9
2893 Final commit of probably various minor changes here and there. Unless
2894 something changes this should be ready for pending release.
2896 Revision 2.17 2006/09/17 14:56:32 hal9
2897 This includes yet several more new FAQs, some improved wording, enhanced
2898 mark-up, various hyper links to wikipedia to explain key terminology to the
2899 uninitiated, etc. This is ready for release IMO pending final tagging of cvs
2900 and Privoxy version stamping.
2902 Revision 2.16 2006/09/10 15:30:46 hal9
2905 Revision 2.15 2006/09/08 23:05:07 hal9
2906 Fix broken links. Add faq on hosts files. Move most of new windows service
2907 feature to user manual and reference in faq. Various other small changes.
2909 Revision 2.14 2006/09/05 13:25:12 david__schmidt
2910 Add Windows service invocation stuff (duplicated) in FAQ and in user manual under Windows startup. One probably ought to reference the other.
2912 Revision 2.13 2006/09/04 19:20:33 fabiankeil
2913 Adjusted anonymity related sections to match reality.
2914 Added a section about using Privoxy with Tor.
2916 Revision 2.12 2006/09/03 14:15:30 hal9
2917 Various updates, including 7 or 8 new FAQs, and updates/changes to various
2918 other ones to better reflect improvements, additions and changes for the
2919 upcoming release. This is close to final form for 3.0.4 IMHO.
2921 Revision 2.11 2006/07/18 14:48:50 david__schmidt
2922 Reorganizing the repository: swapping out what was HEAD (the old 3.1 branch)
2923 with what was really the latest development (the v_3_0_branch branch)
2925 Revision 1.61.2.41 2004/04/05 13:44:05 oes
2926 Fixed allow-all-cookies alias name; closes SR #929746
2928 Revision 1.61.2.40 2004/01/30 17:00:33 oes
2929 Added Mac OS X Panther problem
2931 Revision 1.61.2.39 2004/01/29 22:53:08 hal9
2932 Minor changes for exempting docs of text/plain. Change copyright date.
2934 Revision 1.61.2.38 2003/12/10 03:39:45 hal9
2935 Added FAQs for: demoronizer, related problems and why its included. Also,
2936 port 8118 already in use questions, and PrivoxyWindowOpen() questions. All in
2937 troubleshooting section.
2939 Revision 1.61.2.37 2003/10/17 11:01:50 oes
2940 Added Q&A for "not being used" page problem
2942 Revision 1.61.2.36 2003/06/26 23:49:20 hal9
2943 More on the filter/source code problem.
2945 Revision 1.61.2.35 2003/06/26 13:38:08 hal9
2946 Add FAQ on whether configuring Privoxy is necessary or not.
2948 Revision 1.61.2.34 2003/06/26 03:00:03 hal9
2949 Sorry, found another copyright date.
2951 Revision 1.61.2.33 2003/06/26 02:57:05 hal9
2952 Fix typo (finally!) and very minor modifications.
2954 Revision 1.61.2.32 2003/06/26 02:52:04 hal9
2957 Revision 1.61.2.31 2003/06/25 01:27:51 hal9
2958 Fix copyright, and a few nits.
2960 Revision 1.61.2.30 2003/06/25 01:13:52 hal9
2963 - FAQ on "Unable to get my own hostname"
2964 - Another one on filtering effects on text files.
2966 Revision 1.61.2.29 2003/06/15 21:32:58 hal9
2967 Add to the 4.17 (filtering effects on downloaded files).
2969 Revision 1.61.2.28 2003/03/18 19:37:21 oes
2970 s/Advanced|Radical/Adventuresome/g to avoid complaints re fun filter
2972 Revision 1.61.2.27 2002/12/01 06:31:58 hal9
2973 Add faq on win32 error 503 due to ZoneAlarm.
2975 Revision 1.61.2.26 2002/11/17 06:41:06 hal9
2976 Move default profiles table from FAQ to U-M, and other minor related changes.
2979 Revision 1.61.2.25 2002/10/29 03:21:50 hal9
2980 Add 3 Q/A's relating to HTML in email. Other minor touchups.
2982 Revision 1.61.2.24 2002/10/15 12:50:22 oes
2983 s/Advanced/Radical/ (stupid me)
2985 Revision 1.61.2.23 2002/10/15 12:38:56 oes
2986 Added Microsuck faq; more detail for PHP problem
2988 Revision 1.61.2.22 2002/10/12 01:13:13 hal9
2989 Updates for demoronizer, more commentary on Radical profile, and update on
2990 the srvany.exe/icon fix.
2992 Revision 1.61.2.21 2002/10/10 04:09:35 hal9
2993 s/Advanced/Radical/ and added very brief note.
2995 Revision 1.61.2.20 2002/09/26 01:22:45 hal9
2996 Small additions for LAN setup, content-cookies/SSL, and FTP non-support.
2998 Revision 1.61.2.19 2002/08/25 23:31:56 hal9
2999 Fix one grammatical error. Add brief FAQ relating to tranparent proxies (ie
3000 port 80 setting). Add FAQ on effects of Privoxy on downloaded files
3001 (especially filtering).
3003 Revision 1.61.2.18 2002/08/14 16:39:37 hal9
3004 Fix wrong tag on FAQ addition.
3006 Revision 1.61.2.17 2002/08/14 00:01:18 hal9
3009 Revision 1.61.2.16 2002/08/13 00:10:38 hal9
3010 Add faq to troubleshooting re: blank page syndrome, ie {-prevent-compression}.
3012 Revision 1.61.2.15 2002/08/10 11:34:22 oes
3013 Add disclaimer about probably being out-of-date
3015 Revision 1.61.2.14 2002/08/07 02:53:43 hal9
3016 Fix some minor markup errors, and move one Mac OS X Q/A to troubleshooting section.
3018 Revision 1.61.2.13 2002/08/06 11:55:32 oes
3019 Added missing close tag
3021 Revision 1.61.2.12 2002/08/06 11:43:46 david__schmidt
3022 Updated Mac OS X uninstall FAQ... we have an uninstall script now.
3024 Revision 1.61.2.11 2002/08/06 08:54:03 oes
3025 Style police: Fixed formatting details
3027 Revision 1.61.2.10 2002/08/02 14:00:25 david__schmidt
3028 Made the Mac OS X removal commands far less dangerous
3030 Revision 1.61.2.9 2002/08/02 13:14:45 oes
3031 Added warning about sudo rm -r for Mac OS X deinstallation; moved this item to install section
3033 Revision 1.61.2.8 2002/08/02 02:01:42 david__schmidt
3034 Add FAQ item for MSIE on Mac OS X HTTP proxy confusion
3036 Revision 1.61.2.7 2002/08/02 01:46:01 david__schmidt
3037 Added FAQ item for Mac OS X uninstall woes
3039 Revision 1.61.2.6 2002/07/30 20:04:56 hal9
3040 Fix typo: 'schould'.
3042 Revision 1.61.2.5 2002/07/26 15:22:58 oes
3043 - Updated to reflect changes in standard.action
3044 - Added info on where to get updated actions files
3046 Revision 1.61.2.4 2002/07/25 21:42:29 hal9
3047 Add brief notes on not proxying non-HTTP protocols.
3049 Revision 1.61.2.3 2002/06/09 16:36:33 hal9
3050 Clarifications on filtering and MIME. Hardcode 'latest release' in index.html.
3052 Revision 1.61.2.2 2002/06/06 02:51:34 hal9
3053 Fix typo in URL http:/config.privoxy.org
3055 Revision 1.61.2.1 2002/06/05 23:10:43 hal9
3056 Add new FAQ re: DUN/IE. Change release date from May to June :)
3058 Revision 1.61 2002/05/25 12:37:25 hal9
3059 Various minor changes and edits.
3061 Revision 1.60 2002/05/22 17:17:48 oes
3062 Proofread & added more links into u-m
3064 Revision 1.59 2002/05/15 04:03:30 hal9
3065 Fix ulink -> link markup.
3067 Revision 1.58 2002/05/10 01:48:20 hal9
3068 This is mostly proposed copyright/licensing additions and changes. Docs
3069 are still GPL, but licensing and copyright are more visible. Also, copyright
3070 changed in doc header comments (eliminate references to JB except FAQ).
3072 Revision 1.57 2002/05/05 20:26:02 hal9
3073 Sorting out license vs copyright in these docs.
3075 Revision 1.56 2002/05/04 08:44:44 swa
3078 Revision 1.55 2002/05/04 00:41:56 hal9
3079 -Remove TOC/first page kludge in favor of proper handling via dsl file.
3081 Revision 1.54 2002/05/03 05:06:44 hal9
3082 Add brief Q/A on transparent proxies.
3084 Revision 1.53 2002/05/03 01:34:52 hal9
3085 Fix section numbering for new sections (due to TOC kludge).
3087 Revision 1.52 2002/04/29 03:08:43 hal9
3088 -Added new Q/A on new actions file set up (pointer to u-m)
3089 -Fixed a few broken links and converted old actions as a result of
3092 Revision 1.51 2002/04/26 17:24:31 swa
3093 bookmarks cleaned, changed structure of user manual, screen and programlisting cleanups, and numerous other changes that I forgot
3095 Revision 1.50 2002/04/26 05:25:23 hal9
3096 Mass commit to catch a few scattered fixes.
3098 Revision 1.49 2002/04/12 10:10:18 swa
3101 Revision 1.48 2002/04/10 18:45:15 swa
3104 Revision 1.47 2002/04/10 04:05:32 hal9
3107 Revision 1.45 2002/04/08 22:59:26 hal9
3108 Version update. Spell chkconfig correctly :)
3110 Revision 1.44 2002/04/07 21:24:29 hal9
3111 Touch up on name change.
3113 Revision 1.43 2002/04/04 21:59:53 hal9
3114 Added NT/W2K service/icon situation.
3116 Revision 1.42 2002/04/04 18:46:47 swa
3117 consistent look. reuse of copyright, history et. al.
3119 Revision 1.41 2002/04/04 06:48:37 hal9
3120 Structural changes to allow for conditional inclusion/exclusion of content
3121 based on entity toggles, e.g. 'entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE"'. And
3122 definition of internal entities, e.g. 'entity p-version "2.9.13"' that will
3123 eventually be set by Makefile.
3124 More boilerplate text for use across multiple docs.
3126 Revision 1.40 2002/04/03 04:22:03 hal9
3127 Fixed several typos.
3129 Revision 1.39 2002/04/03 03:53:03 hal9
3130 Revert some changes, and then make some news, to layout, and appearance.
3132 Revision 1.38 2002/04/02 03:49:10 hal9
3133 Major changes to doc structure and layout. Sections are not automatically
3134 numbered now. TOC is on page by itself.
3136 Revision 1.37 2002/04/01 16:24:07 hal9
3137 -Rework of supported Q/A.
3138 -Set up entities to include boilerplate text.
3140 Revision 1.36 2002/03/31 23:18:47 hal9
3141 More on dealing with BLOCKED.
3143 Revision 1.35 2002/03/30 04:14:19 hal9
3144 Fix privoxy.org/config links.
3146 Revision 1.34 2002/03/29 04:35:56 hal9
3149 Revision 1.33 2002/03/29 01:31:48 hal9
3150 Several new Q/A's and other touch ups.
3152 Revision 1.32 2002/03/27 00:57:03 hal9
3153 Touch ups for name change.
3155 Revision 1.31 2002/03/26 22:29:55 swa
3156 we have a new homepage!
3158 Revision 1.30 2002/03/25 16:39:22 hal9
3159 A few new sections. Made all links relative to user-manual.
3161 Revision 1.29 2002/03/25 05:23:57 hal9
3162 Moved section, and touch ups.
3164 Revision 1.28 2002/03/25 04:27:33 hal9
3165 New section related to name change.
3167 Revision 1.25 2002/03/24 16:08:08 swa
3168 we are too lazy to make a block-built
3169 privoxy logo. hence removed the option.
3171 Revision 1.24 2002/03/24 15:46:20 swa
3172 name change related issue.
3174 Revision 1.23 2002/03/24 12:33:01 swa
3177 Revision 1.22 2002/03/24 11:51:00 swa
3178 name change. changed filenames.
3180 Revision 1.21 2002/03/24 11:01:06 swa
3183 Revision 1.20 2002/03/23 15:13:11 swa
3184 renamed every reference to the old name with foobar.
3185 fixed "application foobar application" tag, fixed
3186 "the foobar" with "foobar". left junkbustser in cvs
3187 comments and remarks to history untouched.
3189 Revision 1.19 2002/03/21 17:01:54 hal9
3192 Revision 1.18 2002/03/18 16:40:31 hal9
3195 Revision 1.17 2002/03/18 03:53:53 hal9
3198 Revision 1.16 2002/03/17 21:32:56 hal9
3199 A few more additions.
3201 Revision 1.15 2002/03/17 07:25:59 hal9
3202 Correcting some of my typos, and some additions.
3204 Revision 1.14 2002/03/17 02:39:13 hal9
3205 A little more added ...
3207 Revision 1.13 2002/03/17 00:22:20 hal9
3208 Adding new stuff, and trying to incorporate stuff from old faq.
3210 Revision 1.12 2002/03/11 20:13:21 swa
3213 Revision 1.11 2002/03/11 18:42:27 swa
3216 Revision 1.10 2002/03/11 13:13:27 swa
3217 correct feedback channels
3219 Revision 1.9 2002/03/10 23:34:04 swa
3220 more info on not hiding ip address
3222 Revision 1.8 2002/03/09 15:55:48 swa
3223 added default config section
3225 Revision 1.7 2002/03/07 18:16:55 swa
3228 Revision 1.6 2002/03/07 13:16:31 oes
3229 Committing changes by Stefan
3231 Revision 1.5 2002/03/02 15:50:04 swa
3232 2.9.11 version. more input for docs.
3234 Revision 1.4 2002/02/24 14:34:24 jongfoster
3235 Formatting changes. Now changing the doctype to DocBook XML 4.1
3236 will work - no other changes are needed.
3238 Revision 1.3 2001/09/23 10:13:48 swa
3239 upload process established. run make webserver and
3240 the documentation is moved to the webserver. documents
3241 are now linked correctly.
3243 Revision 1.2 2001/09/13 15:20:17 swa
3244 merged standards into developer manual
3246 Revision 1.1 2001/09/12 15:36:41 swa
3247 source files for junkbuster documentation
3249 Revision 1.3 2001/09/10 17:43:59 swa
3250 first proposal of a structure.
3252 Revision 1.2 2001/06/13 14:28:31 swa
3253 docs should have an author.
3255 Revision 1.1 2001/06/13 14:20:37 swa
3256 first import of project's documentation for the webserver.