1 <!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook V3.1//EN" [
2 <!entity % dummy "IGNORE">
3 <!entity supported SYSTEM "supported.sgml">
4 <!entity newfeatures SYSTEM "newfeatures.sgml">
5 <!entity p-intro SYSTEM "privoxy.sgml">
6 <!entity seealso SYSTEM "seealso.sgml">
7 <!entity buildsource SYSTEM "buildsource.sgml">
8 <!entity contacting SYSTEM "contacting.sgml">
9 <!entity history SYSTEM "history.sgml">
10 <!entity copyright SYSTEM "copyright.sgml">
11 <!entity license SYSTEM "license.sgml">
12 <!entity p-authors SYSTEM "p-authors.sgml">
13 <!entity config SYSTEM "p-config.sgml">
14 <!entity p-version "3.0.7">
15 <!entity p-status "beta">
16 <!entity % p-authors-formal "INCLUDE"> <!-- include additional text, etc -->
17 <!entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE">
18 <!entity % p-stable "IGNORE">
19 <!entity % p-text "IGNORE"> <!-- define we are not a text only doc -->
20 <!entity % p-doc "INCLUDE"> <!-- and we are a formal doc -->
21 <!entity % p-readme "IGNORE">
22 <!entity % user-man "IGNORE">
23 <!entity % config-file "IGNORE">
24 <!entity % p-supp-userman "IGNORE"> <!-- Omit some from supported.sgml -->
25 <!entity my-copy "©"> <!-- kludge for docbook2man -->
26 <!entity % draft "IGNORE"> <!-- WIP stuff -->
27 <!entity my-app "<application>Privoxy</application>">
30 File : $Source: /cvsroot/ijbswa/current/doc/source/user-manual.sgml,v $
33 This file belongs into
34 ijbswa.sourceforge.net:/home/groups/i/ij/ijbswa/htdocs/
36 $Id: user-manual.sgml,v 2.44 2007/11/15 03:30:20 hal9 Exp $
38 Copyright (C) 2001-2007 Privoxy Developers http://www.privoxy.org/
41 ========================================================================
42 NOTE: Please read developer-manual/documentation.html before touching
43 anything in this, or other Privoxy documentation.
44 ========================================================================
51 <title>Privoxy &p-version; User Manual</title>
55 <!-- Completely the wrong markup, but very little is allowed -->
56 <!-- in this part of an article. FIXME -->
57 <link linkend="copyright">Copyright</link> &my-copy; 2001 - 2007 by
58 <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/">Privoxy Developers</ulink>
62 <pubdate>$Id: user-manual.sgml,v 2.44 2007/11/15 03:30:20 hal9 Exp $</pubdate>
66 Note: the following should generate a separate page, and a live link to it,
67 all nicely done. But it doesn't for some mysterious reason. Please leave
68 commented unless it can be fixed proper. For the time being, the
69 copyright/license declarations will be in their own sgml.
82 This is here to keep vim syntax file from breaking :/
83 If I knew enough to fix it, I would.
84 PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE! HB: hal@foobox.net
90 The <citetitle>Privoxy User Manual</citetitle> gives users information on how to
91 install, configure and use <ulink
92 url="http://www.privoxy.org/">Privoxy</ulink>.
95 <!-- Include privoxy.sgml boilerplate: -->
97 <!-- end privoxy.sgml -->
100 You can find the latest version of the <citetitle>Privoxy User Manual</citetitle> at <ulink
101 url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/">http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/</ulink>.
102 Please see the <link linkend="contact">Contact section</link> on how to
103 contact the developers.
107 <!-- Feel free to send a note to the developers at <email>ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net</email>. -->
113 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
114 <sect1 label="1" id="introduction"><title>Introduction</title>
116 This documentation is included with the current &p-status; version of
117 <application>Privoxy</application>, v.&p-version;<![%p-not-stable;[,
118 and is mostly complete at this point. The most up to date reference for the
119 time being is still the comments in the source files and in the individual
120 configuration files. Development of a new version is currently nearing
121 completion, and includes significant changes and enhancements over
122 earlier versions. ]]>.
125 <!-- include only in non-stable versions -->
128 Since this is a &p-status; version, not all new features are well tested. This
129 documentation may be slightly out of sync as a result (especially with
130 CVS sources). And there <emphasis>may be</emphasis> bugs, though hopefully
135 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
136 <sect2 id="features"><title>Features</title>
138 In addition to the core
139 features of ad blocking and
140 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookie</ulink> management,
141 <application>Privoxy</application> provides many supplemental
142 features<![%p-not-stable;[, some of them currently under development]]>,
143 that give the end-user more control, more privacy and more freedom:
145 <!-- Include newfeatures.sgml boilerplate here: -->
147 <!-- end boilerplate -->
152 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
155 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
156 <sect1 id="installation"><title>Installation</title>
159 <application>Privoxy</application> is available both in convenient pre-compiled
160 packages for a wide range of operating systems, and as raw source code.
161 For most users, we recommend using the packages, which can be downloaded from our
162 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ijbswa/">Privoxy Project
168 On some platforms, the installer may remove previously installed versions, if
169 found. (See below for your platform). In any case <emphasis>be sure to backup
170 your old configuration if it is valuable to you.</emphasis> See the <link
171 linkend="upgradersnote">note to upgraders</link> section below.
174 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
175 <sect2 id="installation-packages"><title>Binary Packages</title>
177 How to install the binary packages depends on your operating system:
180 <!-- XXX: The installation sections should be sorted -->
182 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
183 <sect3 id="installation-pack-rpm"><title>Red Hat and Fedora RPMs</title>
186 RPMs can be installed with <literal>rpm -Uvh privoxy-&p-version;-1.rpm</literal>,
187 and will use <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename> for the location
188 of configuration files.
192 Note that on Red Hat, <application>Privoxy</application> will
193 <emphasis>not</emphasis> be automatically started on system boot. You will
194 need to enable that using <command>chkconfig</command>,
195 <command>ntsysv</command>, or similar methods.
199 If you have problems with failed dependencies, try rebuilding the SRC RPM:
200 <literal>rpm --rebuild privoxy-&p-version;-1.src.rpm</literal>. This
201 will use your locally installed libraries and RPM version.
205 Also note that if you have a <application>Junkbuster</application> RPM installed
206 on your system, you need to remove it first, because the packages conflict.
207 Otherwise, RPM will try to remove <application>Junkbuster</application>
208 automatically if found, before installing <application>Privoxy</application>.
212 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
213 <sect3 id="installation-deb"><title>Debian and Ubuntu</title>
215 DEBs can be installed with <literal>apt-get install privoxy</literal>,
216 and will use <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename> for the location of
221 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
222 <sect3 id="installation-pack-win"><title>Windows</title>
225 Just double-click the installer, which will guide you through
226 the installation process. You will find the configuration files
227 in the same directory as you installed <application>Privoxy</application> in.
230 Version 3.0.5 beta introduced full <application>Windows</application> service
231 functionality. On Windows only, the <application>Privoxy</application>
232 program has two new command line arguments to install and uninstall
233 <application>Privoxy</application> as a <emphasis>service</emphasis>.
237 <term>Arguments:</term>
240 <replaceable class="parameter">--install</replaceable>[:<replaceable class="parameter">service_name</replaceable>]
243 <replaceable class="parameter">--uninstall</replaceable>[:<replaceable class="parameter">service_name</replaceable>]
249 After invoking <application>Privoxy</application> with
250 <command>--install</command>, you will need to bring up the
251 <application>Windows</application> service console to assign the user you
252 want <application>Privoxy</application> to run under, and whether or not you
253 want it to run whenever the system starts. You can start the
254 <application>Windows</application> services console with the following
255 command: <command>services.msc</command>. If you do not take the manual step
256 of modifying <application>Privoxy's</application> service settings, it will
257 not start. Note too that you will need to give Privoxy a user account that
258 actually exists, or it will not be permitted to
259 write to its log and configuration files.
264 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
265 <sect3 id="installation-pack-bintgz"><title>Solaris <!--, NetBSD, HP-UX--></title>
268 Create a new directory, <literal>cd</literal> to it, then unzip and
269 untar the archive. For the most part, you'll have to figure out where
270 things go. <!-- FIXME, more info needed? -->
274 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
275 <sect3 id="installation-os2"><title>OS/2</title>
278 First, make sure that no previous installations of
279 <application>Junkbuster</application> and / or
280 <application>Privoxy</application> are left on your
281 system. Check that no <application>Junkbuster</application>
282 or <application>Privoxy</application> objects are in
288 Then, just double-click the WarpIN self-installing archive, which will
289 guide you through the installation process. A shadow of the
290 <application>Privoxy</application> executable will be placed in your
291 startup folder so it will start automatically whenever OS/2 starts.
295 The directory you choose to install <application>Privoxy</application>
296 into will contain all of the configuration files.
300 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
301 <sect3 id="installation-mac"><title>Mac OSX</title>
303 Unzip the downloaded file (you can either double-click on the file
304 from the finder, or from the desktop if you downloaded it there).
305 Then, double-click on the package installer icon named
306 <literal>Privoxy.pkg</literal>
307 and follow the installation process.
308 <application>Privoxy</application> will be installed in the folder
309 <literal>/Library/Privoxy</literal>.
310 It will start automatically whenever you start up. To prevent it from
311 starting automatically, remove or rename the folder
312 <literal>/Library/StartupItems/Privoxy</literal>.
315 To start Privoxy by hand, double-click on
316 <literal>StartPrivoxy.command</literal> in the
317 <literal>/Library/Privoxy</literal> folder.
318 Or, type this command in the Terminal:
322 /Library/Privoxy/StartPrivoxy.command
326 You will be prompted for the administrator password.
330 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
331 <sect3 id="installation-amiga"><title>AmigaOS</title>
333 Copy and then unpack the <filename>lha</filename> archive to a suitable location.
334 All necessary files will be installed into <application>Privoxy</application>
335 directory, including all configuration and log files. To uninstall, just
336 remove this directory.
340 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
341 <sect3 id="installation-tbz"><title>FreeBSD</title>
344 Privoxy is part of FreeBSD's Ports Collection, you can build and install
345 it with <literal>cd /usr/ports/www/privoxy; make install clean</literal>.
348 If you don't use the ports, you can fetch and install
349 the package with <literal>pkg_add -r privoxy</literal>.
352 The port skeleton and the package can also be downloaded from the
353 <ulink url="https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118">File Release
354 Page</ulink>, but there's no reason to use them unless you're interested in the
355 beta releases which are only available there.
359 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
360 <sect3 id="installattion-gentoo"><title>Gentoo</title>
362 Gentoo source packages (Ebuilds) for <application>Privoxy</application> are
363 contained in the Gentoo Portage Tree (they are not on the download page,
364 but there is a Gentoo section, where you can see when a new
365 <application>Privoxy</application> Version is added to the Portage Tree).
368 Before installing <application>Privoxy</application> under Gentoo just do
369 first <literal>emerge rsync</literal> to get the latest changes from the
370 Portage tree. With <literal>emerge privoxy</literal> you install the latest
374 Configuration files are in <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename>, the
375 documentation is in <filename>/usr/share/doc/privoxy-&p-version;</filename>
376 and the Log directory is in <filename>/var/log/privoxy</filename>.
382 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
383 <sect2 id="installation-source"><title>Building from Source</title>
386 The most convenient way to obtain the <application>Privoxy</application> sources
387 is to download the source tarball from our
388 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118&package_id=10571">project download
393 If you like to live on the bleeding edge and are not afraid of using
394 possibly unstable development versions, you can check out the up-to-the-minute
395 version directly from <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=11118">the
396 CVS repository</ulink>.
398 deprecated...out of business.
399 or simply download <ulink
400 url="http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cvstarballs/ijbswa-cvsroot.tar.bz2">the nightly CVS
405 <!-- include buildsource.sgml boilerplate: -->
407 <!-- end boilerplate -->
410 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
411 <sect2 id="installation-keepupdated"><title>Keeping your Installation Up-to-Date</title>
413 As user feedback comes in and development continues, we will make updated versions
414 of both the main <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link> (as a <ulink
415 url="http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118&release_id=103670">separate
416 package</ulink>) and the software itself (including the actions file) available for
421 If you wish to receive an email notification whenever we release updates of
422 <application>Privoxy</application> or the actions file, <ulink
423 url="http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/ijbswa-announce/">subscribe
424 to our announce mailing list</ulink>, ijbswa-announce@lists.sourceforge.net.
428 In order not to lose your personal changes and adjustments when updating
429 to the latest <literal>default.action</literal> file we <emphasis>strongly
430 recommend</emphasis> that you use <literal>user.action</literal> and
431 <literal>user.filter</literal> for your local
432 customizations of <application>Privoxy</application>. See the <link
433 linkend="actions-file">Chapter on actions files</link> for details.
441 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
443 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
444 <sect1 id="whatsnew">
445 <title>What's New in this Release</title>
447 There are many improvements and new features since <application>Privoxy 3.0.6</application>, the last stable release:
454 Two new actions <link
455 linkend="server-header-tagger">server-header-tagger</link>
457 linkend="client-header-tagger">client-header-tagger</link>
458 that can be used to create arbitrary <quote>tags</quote>
459 based on client and server headers.
460 These <quote>tags</quote> can then subsequently be used
461 to control the other actions used for the current request,
462 greatly increasing &my-app;'s flexibility and selectivity. See <link
463 linkend="tag-pattern">tag patterns</link> for more information on tags.
469 Header filtering is done with dedicated header filters now. As a result
470 the actions <quote>filter-client-headers</quote> and <quote>filter-server-headers</quote>
471 that were introduced with <application>Privoxy 3.0.5</application> to apply
472 content filters to the headers have been removed.
473 See the new actions <link
474 linkend="server-header-filter">server-header-filter</link>
476 linkend="client-header-filter">client-header-filter</link> for details.
481 There are four new options for the main <filename>config</filename> file:
488 linkend="allow-cgi-request-crunching">allow-cgi-request-crunching</link>
489 which allows requests for Privoxy's internal CGI pages to be
490 blocked, redirected or (un)trusted like ordinary requests.
496 linkend="split-large-forms">split-large-forms</link>
497 that will work around a browser bug that caused IE6 and IE7 to
498 ignore the Submit button on the Privoxy's edit-actions-for-url CGI
505 linkend="accept-intercepted-requests">accept-intercepted-requests</link>
506 which allows to combine Privoxy with any packet filter to create an
507 intercepting proxy for HTTP/1.1 requests (and for HTTP/1.0 requests
508 with Host header set). This means clients can be forced to use
509 &my-app; even if their proxy settings are configured differently.
515 linkend="templdir">templdir</link>
516 to designate an alternate location for &my-app;'s
517 locally customized CGI templates so that
518 these are not overwritten during upgrades.
526 A new command line option <literal>--pre-chroot-nslookup hostname</literal> to
527 initialize the resolver library before chroot'ing. On some systems this
528 reduces the number of files that must be copied into the chroot tree.
529 (Patch provided by Stephen Gildea)
536 linkend="forward-override">forward-override</link> action
537 allows changing of the forwarding settings through the actions files.
538 Combined with tags, this allows to choose the forwarder based on
539 client headers like the <literal>User-Agent</literal>, or the request origin.
546 linkend="redirect">redirect</link> action can now use regular
547 expression substitutions against the original URL.
553 <application>zlib</application> support is now available as a compile
554 time option to filter compressed content. Patch provided by Wil Mahan.
559 Improve various filters, and add new ones.
566 Include support for RFC 3253 so that <filename>Subversion</filename> works
567 with &my-app;. Patch provided by Petr Kadlec.
573 Logging can be completely turned off by not specifying a logfile directive.
580 A number of improvements to Privoxy's internal CGI pages, including the
581 use of favicons for error and control pages.
587 Many bugfixes, memory leaks addressed, code improvements, and logging
593 <!-- pre-3.0.6 changes:
596 There are a number of new <link linkend="actions-file">actions</link>:
604 <literal><link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite</link></literal>
609 <literal><link linkend="crunch-client-header">crunch-client-header</link></literal>
614 <literal><link linkend="crunch-if-none-match">crunch-if-none-match</link></literal>
619 <literal><link linkend="crunch-server-header">crunch-server-header</link></literal>
624 <literal><link linkend="filter-client-headers">filter-client-headers</link></literal>
629 <literal><link linkend="filter-server-headers">filter-server-headers</link></literal>
634 <literal><link linkend="force-text-mode">force-text-mode</link></literal>
639 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal>
644 <literal><link linkend="hide-accept-language">hide-accept-language</link></literal>
649 <literal><link linkend="hide-content-disposition">hide-content-disposition</link></literal>
654 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hide-if-modified-since</link></literal>
659 <literal><link linkend="inspect-jpegs">inspect-jpegs</link></literal>
664 <literal><link linkend="overwrite-last-modified">overwrite-last-modified</link></literal>
669 <literal><link linkend="redirect">redirect</link></literal>
674 <literal><link linkend="treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks">treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks</link></literal>
681 In addition, <literal><link linkend="fast-redirects">fast-redirects</link></literal>
682 has been significantly improved with enhanced syntax.
685 And <literal><link linkend="hide-referrer">hide-referrer</link></literal>
686 has a new option, <literal>conditional block</literal>.
693 <application>MS-Windows</application> versions can now be
695 linkend="installation-pack-win">installed and
696 started as a <emphasis>Windows service</emphasis></link>.
702 <filename>config</filename> has two new options:
704 linkend="enable-remote-http-toggle">enable-remote-http-toggle</link>,
706 linkend="forwarded-connect-retries">forwarded-connect-retries</link>.
709 And there is improved handling of the <link
710 linkend="user-manual">user-manual</link>
711 option, for placing documentation and help files on the local system.
717 There are six new <link linkend="FILTER">filters</link>.
723 Actions files problems and suggestions are now being directed to:
724 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=11118&atid=460288">http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=11118&atid=460288</ulink>.
725 Please use this to report such configuration related problems as missed
726 ads, sites that don't function properly due to one action or another,
727 innocent images being blocked, etc.
733 In addition, there are numerous bug fixes and significant enhancements,
734 including error pages should no longer be cached if the problem is fixed,
735 much better DNS error handling, various logging improvements, and
736 configuration updates for better ad blocking and junk elimination.
744 For a more detailed list of changes please have a look at the ChangeLog.
747 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
749 <sect2 id="upgradersnote">
750 <title>Note to Upgraders</title>
753 A quick list of things to be aware of before upgrading from earlier
754 versions of <application>Privoxy</application>:
762 Some installers may remove earlier versions completely, including
763 configuration files. Save any important configuration files!
768 On the other hand, other installers may not overwrite any existing configuration
769 files, thinking you will want to do that. You may want to manually check
770 your saved files against the newer versions to see if the improvements have
771 merit, or whether there are new options that you may want to consider.
772 There are a number of new features, but most won't be available unless
773 these features are incorporated into your configuration somehow.
778 <filename>standard.action</filename> now only includes the enabled actions.
779 Not all actions as before.
785 See the full documentation on
786 <literal><link linkend="fast-redirects">fast-redirects</link></literal>
787 which has changed syntax, and will require adjustments to local configs,
788 such as <filename>user.action</filename>. You must reference the new
793 { +fast-redirects{check-decoded-url} }
803 Logging is off by default now. If you need logging, it can be turned on
804 in the <link linkend="logfile">config file</link>.
810 Three other config file settings are now off by default:
811 <link linkend="enable-remote-toggle">enable-remote-toggle</link>,
812 <link linkend="enable-remote-http-toggle">enable-remote-http-toggle</link>,
813 and <link linkend="enable-edit-actions">enable-edit-actions</link>.
814 If you use or want these, you will need to explicitly enable them, and
815 be aware of the security issues involved.
821 The <quote>filter-client-headers</quote> and
822 <quote>filter-server-headers</quote> actions that were introduced with
823 <application>Privoxy 3.0.5</application> to apply content filters to
824 the headers have been removed and replaced with new actions.
826 linkend="whatsnew">What's New section</link> above.
834 What constitutes a <quote>default</quote> configuration has changed,
835 and you may want to review which actions are <quote>on</quote> by
836 default. This is primarily a matter of emphasis, but some features
837 you may have been used to, may now be <quote>off</quote> by default.
838 There are also a number of new actions and filters you may want to
839 consider, most of which are not fully incorporated into the default
840 settings as yet (see above).
847 The default actions setting is now <literal>Cautious</literal>. Previous
848 releases had a default setting of <literal>Medium</literal>. Experienced
849 users may want to adjust this, as it is fairly conservative by &my-app;
850 standards and past practices. See <ulink
851 url="http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default">
852 http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default</ulink>. New users
853 should try the default settings for a while before turning up the volume.
859 The default setting has filtering turned <emphasis>off</emphasis>, which
860 subsequently means that compression is <emphasis>on</emphasis>. Remember
861 that filtering does not work on compressed pages, so if you use, or want to
862 use, filtering, you will need to force compression off. Example:
866 { +<link linkend="filter">filter</link>{google} +<link linkend="prevent-compression">prevent-compression</link> }
870 Or if you use a number of filters, or filter many sites, you may just want
871 to turn off compression for all sites in
872 <filename>default.action</filename> (or
873 <filename>user.action</filename>).
880 Also, <link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> is
881 off by default now. If you've liked this feature in the past, you may want
882 to turn it back on in <filename>user.action</filename> now.
889 Some installers may not automatically start
890 <application>Privoxy</application> after installation.
901 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
902 <sect1 id="quickstart"><title>Quickstart to Using Privoxy</title>
908 Install <application>Privoxy</application>. See the <link
909 linkend="installation">Installation Section</link> below for platform specific
916 Advanced users and those who want to offer <application>Privoxy</application>
917 service to more than just their local machine should check the <link
918 linkend="config">main config file</link>, especially the <link
919 linkend="access-control">security-relevant</link> options. These are
926 Start <application>Privoxy</application>, if the installation program has
927 not done this already (may vary according to platform). See the section
928 <link linkend="startup">Starting <application>Privoxy</application></link>.
934 Set your browser to use <application>Privoxy</application> as HTTP and
935 HTTPS (SSL) <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server">proxy</ulink>
936 by setting the proxy configuration for address of
937 <literal>127.0.0.1</literal> and port <literal>8118</literal>.
938 <emphasis>DO NOT</emphasis> activate proxying for <literal>FTP</literal> or
939 any protocols besides HTTP and HTTPS (SSL) unless you intend to prevent your
940 browser from using these protocols.
946 Flush your browser's disk and memory caches, to remove any cached ad images.
947 If using <application>Privoxy</application> to manage
948 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>,
949 you should remove any currently stored cookies too.
955 A default installation should provide a reasonable starting point for
956 most. There will undoubtedly be occasions where you will want to adjust the
957 configuration, but that can be dealt with as the need arises. Little
958 to no initial configuration is required in most cases, you may want
960 <ulink url="config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">web-based action editor</ulink> though.
961 Be sure to read the warnings first.
964 See the <link linkend="configuration">Configuration section</link> for more
965 configuration options, and how to customize your installation.
966 You might also want to look at the <link
967 linkend="quickstart-ad-blocking">next section</link> for a quick
968 introduction to how <application>Privoxy</application> blocks ads and
975 If you experience ads that slip through, innocent images that are
976 blocked, or otherwise feel the need to fine-tune
977 <application>Privoxy's</application> behavior, take a look at the <link
978 linkend="actions-file">actions files</link>. As a quick start, you might
979 find the <link linkend="act-examples">richly commented examples</link>
980 helpful. You can also view and edit the actions files through the <ulink
981 url="http://config.privoxy.org">web-based user interface</ulink>. The
982 Appendix <quote><link linkend="actionsanat">Troubleshooting: Anatomy of an
983 Action</link></quote> has hints on how to understand and debug actions that
984 <quote>misbehave</quote>.
989 Did anyone test these lately?
993 For easy access to &my-app;'s most important controls, drag the provided
994 <link linkend="bookmarklets">Bookmarklets</link> into your browser's
1002 Please see the section <link linkend="contact">Contacting the
1003 Developers</link> on how to report bugs, problems with websites or to get
1010 Now enjoy surfing with enhanced control, comfort and privacy!
1018 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1020 <sect2 id="quickstart-ad-blocking">
1021 <title>Quickstart to Ad Blocking</title>
1023 NOTE: This section is deliberately redundant for those that don't
1024 want to read the whole thing (which is getting lengthy).
1027 Ad blocking is but one of <application>Privoxy's</application>
1028 array of features. Many of these features are for the technically minded advanced
1029 user. But, ad and banner blocking is surely common ground for everybody.
1032 This section will provide a quick summary of ad blocking so
1033 you can get up to speed quickly without having to read the more extensive
1034 information provided below, though this is highly recommended.
1037 First a bit of a warning ... blocking ads is much like blocking SPAM: the
1038 more aggressive you are about it, the more likely you are to block
1039 things that were not intended. And the more likely that some things
1040 may not work as intended. So there is a trade off here. If you want
1041 extreme ad free browsing, be prepared to deal with more
1042 <quote>problem</quote> sites, and to spend more time adjusting the
1043 configuration to solve these unintended consequences. In short, there is
1044 not an easy way to eliminate <emphasis>all</emphasis> ads. Either take
1045 the easy way and settle for <emphasis>most</emphasis> ads blocked with the
1046 default configuration, or jump in and tweak it for your personal surfing
1047 habits and preferences.
1050 Secondly, a brief explanation of <application>Privoxy's </application>
1051 <quote>actions</quote>. <quote>Actions</quote> in this context, are
1052 the directives we use to tell <application>Privoxy</application> to perform
1053 some task relating to HTTP transactions (i.e. web browsing). We tell
1054 <application>Privoxy</application> to take some <quote>action</quote>. Each
1055 action has a unique name and function. While there are many potential
1056 <application>actions</application> in <application>Privoxy's</application>
1057 arsenal, only a few are used for ad blocking. <link
1058 linkend="actions">Actions</link>, and <link linkend="actions-file">action
1059 configuration files</link>, are explained in depth below.
1062 Actions are specified in <application>Privoxy's</application> configuration,
1063 followed by one or more URLs to which the action should apply. URLs
1064 can actually be URL type <link linkend="af-patterns">patterns</link> that use
1065 wildcards so they can apply potentially to a range of similar URLs. The
1066 actions, together with the URL patterns are called a section.
1069 When you connect to a website, the full URL will either match one or more
1070 of the sections as defined in <application>Privoxy's</application> configuration,
1071 or not. If so, then <application>Privoxy</application> will perform the
1072 respective actions. If not, then nothing special happens. Furthermore, web
1073 pages may contain embedded, secondary URLs that your web browser will
1074 use to load additional components of the page, as it parses the
1075 original page's HTML content. An ad image for instance, is just an URL
1076 embedded in the page somewhere. The image itself may be on the same server,
1077 or a server somewhere else on the Internet. Complex web pages will have many
1078 such embedded URLs. &my-app; can deal with each URL individually, so, for
1079 instance, the main page text is not touched, but images from such-and-such
1084 The most important actions for basic ad blocking are: <literal><link
1085 linkend="block">block</link></literal>, <literal><link
1086 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal>,
1088 linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal>,and
1089 <literal><link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>:
1097 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> - this is perhaps
1098 the single most used action, and is particularly important for ad blocking.
1099 This action stops any contact between your browser and any URL patterns
1100 that match this action's configuration. It can be used for blocking ads,
1101 but also anything that is determined to be unwanted. By itself, it simply
1102 stops any communication with the remote server and sends
1103 <application>Privoxy</application>'s own built-in BLOCKED page instead to
1104 let you now what has happened (with some exceptions, see below).
1110 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> -
1111 tells <application>Privoxy</application> to treat this URL as an image.
1112 <application>Privoxy</application>'s default configuration already does this
1113 for all common image types (e.g. GIF), but there are many situations where this
1114 is not so easy to determine. So we'll force it in these cases. This is particularly
1115 important for ad blocking, since only if we know that it's an image of
1116 some kind, can we replace it with an image of our choosing, instead of the
1117 <application>Privoxy</application> BLOCKED page (which would only result in
1118 a <quote>broken image</quote> icon). There are some limitations to this
1119 though. For instance, you can't just brute-force an image substitution for
1120 an entire HTML page in most situations.
1126 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal> -
1127 sends an empty document instead of <application>Privoxy's</application>
1128 normal BLOCKED HTML page. This is useful for file types that are neither
1129 HTML nor images, such as blocking JavaScript files.
1136 linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal> - tells
1137 <application>Privoxy</application> what to display in place of an ad image that
1138 has hit a block rule. For this to come into play, the URL must match a
1139 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action somewhere in the
1140 configuration, <emphasis>and</emphasis>, it must also match an
1141 <literal><link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> action.
1144 The configuration options on what to display instead of the ad are:
1148 <emphasis>pattern</emphasis> - a checkerboard pattern, so that an ad
1149 replacement is obvious. This is the default.
1154 <emphasis>blank</emphasis> - A very small empty GIF image is displayed.
1155 This is the so-called <quote>invisible</quote> configuration option.
1160 <emphasis>http://<URL></emphasis> - A redirect to any image anywhere
1161 of the user's choosing (advanced usage).
1170 Advanced users will eventually want to explore &my-app;
1171 <literal><link linkend="filter">filters</link></literal> as well. Filters
1172 are very different from <literal><link
1173 linkend="block">blocks</link></literal>.
1174 A <quote>block</quote> blocks a site, page, or unwanted contented. Filters
1175 are a way of filtering or modifying what is actually on the page. An example
1176 filter usage: a text replacement of <quote>no-no</quote> for
1177 <quote>nasty-word</quote>. That is a very simple example. This process can be
1178 used for ad blocking, but it is more in the realm of advanced usage and has
1179 some pitfalls to be wary off.
1183 The quickest way to adjust any of these settings is with your browser through
1184 the special <application>Privoxy</application> editor at <ulink
1185 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
1186 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/show-status</ulink>). This
1187 is an internal page, and does not require Internet access.
1191 Note that as of <application>Privoxy</application> 3.0.7 beta the
1192 action editor is disabled by default. Check the
1193 <ulink url="config.html#ENABLE-EDIT-ACTIONS">enable-edit-actions
1194 section in the configuration file</ulink> to learn why and in which
1195 cases it's safe to enable again.
1199 If you decided to enable the action editor, select the appropriate
1200 <quote>actions</quote> file, and click
1201 <quote><guibutton>Edit</guibutton></quote>. It is best to put personal or
1202 local preferences in <filename>user.action</filename> since this is not
1203 meant to be overwritten during upgrades, and will over-ride the settings in
1204 other files. Here you can insert new <quote>actions</quote>, and URLs for ad
1205 blocking or other purposes, and make other adjustments to the configuration.
1206 <application>Privoxy</application> will detect these changes automatically.
1210 A quick and simple step by step example:
1218 Right click on the ad image to be blocked, then select
1219 <quote><guimenuitem>Copy Link Location</guimenuitem></quote> from the
1227 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
1232 Find <filename>user.action</filename> in the top section, and click
1233 on <quote><guibutton>Edit</guibutton></quote>:
1236 <!-- image of editor and actions files selections -->
1238 <figure pgwide="0" float="0"><title>Actions Files in Use</title>
1241 <imagedata fileref="files-in-use.jpg" format="jpg">
1244 <phrase>[ Screenshot of Actions Files in Use ]</phrase>
1253 You should have a section with only
1254 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> listed under
1255 <quote>Actions:</quote>.
1256 If not, click a <quote><guibutton>Insert new section below</guibutton></quote>
1257 button, and in the new section that just appeared, click the
1258 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> button right under the word <quote>Actions:</quote>.
1259 This will bring up a list of all actions. Find
1260 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> near the top, and click
1261 in the <quote>Enabled</quote> column, then <quote><guibutton>Submit</guibutton></quote>
1262 just below the list.
1267 Now, in the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> actions section,
1268 click the <quote><guibutton>Add</guibutton></quote> button, and paste the URL the
1269 browser got from <quote><guimenuitem>Copy Link Location</guimenuitem></quote>.
1270 Remove the <literal>http://</literal> at the beginning of the URL. Then, click
1271 <quote><guibutton>Submit</guibutton></quote> (or
1272 <quote><guibutton>OK</guibutton></quote> if in a pop-up window).
1277 Now go back to the original page, and press <keycap>SHIFT-Reload</keycap>
1278 (or flush all browser caches). The image should be gone now.
1286 This is a very crude and simple example. There might be good reasons to use a
1287 wildcard pattern match to include potentially similar images from the same
1288 site. For a more extensive explanation of <quote>patterns</quote>, and
1289 the entire actions concept, see <link linkend="actions-file">the Actions
1294 For advanced users who want to hand edit their config files, you might want
1295 to now go to the <link linkend="act-examples">Actions Files Tutorial</link>.
1296 The ideas explained therein also apply to the web-based editor.
1299 There are also various
1300 <link linkend="filter">filters</link> that can be used for ad blocking
1301 (filters are a special subset of actions). These
1302 fall into the <quote>advanced</quote> usage category, and are explained in
1303 depth in later sections.
1310 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1313 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1314 <sect1 id="startup">
1315 <title>Starting Privoxy</title>
1317 Before launching <application>Privoxy</application> for the first time, you
1318 will want to configure your browser(s) to use
1319 <application>Privoxy</application> as a HTTP and HTTPS (SSL)
1320 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxy_server">proxy</ulink>. The default is
1321 127.0.0.1 (or localhost) for the proxy address, and port 8118 (earlier versions
1322 used port 8000). This is the one configuration step <emphasis>that must be done
1326 Please note that <application>Privoxy</application> can only proxy HTTP and
1327 HTTPS traffic. It will not work with FTP or other protocols.
1330 <!-- image of Mozilla Proxy configuration -->
1332 <figure pgwide="0" float="0"><title>Proxy Configuration Showing
1333 Mozilla/Netscape HTTP and HTTPS (SSL) Settings</title>
1336 <imagedata fileref="proxy_setup.jpg" format="jpg">
1339 <phrase>[ Screenshot of Mozilla Proxy Configuration ]</phrase>
1347 With <application>Firefox</application>, this is typically set under:
1351 <guibutton>Tools</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Options</guibutton> -> <guibutton>General</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Connection Settings</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Manual Proxy Configuration</guibutton>
1356 Or optionally on some platforms:
1360 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Preferences</guibutton> -> <guibutton>General</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Connection Settings</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Manual Proxy Configuration</guibutton>
1366 With <application>Netscape</application> (and
1367 <application>Mozilla</application>), this can be set under:
1372 <!-- Mix ascii and gui art, something for everybody -->
1373 <!-- spacing on this is tricky -->
1374 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Preferences</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Advanced</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Proxies</guibutton> -> <guibutton>HTTP Proxy</guibutton>
1379 For <application>Internet Explorer v.5-6</application>:
1383 <guibutton>Tools</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Internet Options</guibutton> -> <guibutton>Connections</guibutton> -> <guibutton>LAN Settings</guibutton>
1387 Then, check <quote>Use Proxy</quote> and fill in the appropriate info
1388 (Address: 127.0.0.1, Port: 8118). Include HTTPS (SSL), if you want HTTPS
1389 proxy support too (sometimes labeled <quote>Secure</quote>). Make sure any
1390 checkboxes like <quote>Use the same proxy server for all protocols</quote> is
1391 <emphasis>UNCHECKED</emphasis>. You want only HTTP and HTTPS (SSL)!
1394 <!-- image of IE Proxy configuration -->
1396 <figure pgwide="0" float="0"><title>Proxy Configuration Showing
1397 Internet Explorer HTTP and HTTPS (Secure) Settings</title>
1400 <imagedata fileref="proxy2.jpg" format="jpg">
1403 <phrase>[ Screenshot of IE Proxy Configuration ]</phrase>
1411 After doing this, flush your browser's disk and memory caches to force a
1412 re-reading of all pages and to get rid of any ads that may be cached. Remove
1413 any <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browser_cookie">cookies</ulink>,
1414 if you want <application>Privoxy</application> to manage that. You are now
1415 ready to start enjoying the benefits of using
1416 <application>Privoxy</application>!
1420 <application>Privoxy</application> itself is typically started by specifying the
1421 main configuration file to be used on the command line. If no configuration
1422 file is specified on the command line, <application>Privoxy</application>
1423 will look for a file named <filename>config</filename> in the current
1424 directory. Except on Win32 where it will try <filename>config.txt</filename>.
1427 <sect2 id="start-redhat">
1428 <title>Red Hat and Fedora</title>
1430 A default Red Hat installation may not start &my-app; upon boot. It will use
1431 the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename> as its main configuration
1436 # /etc/rc.d/init.d/privoxy start
1444 # service privoxy start
1449 <sect2 id="start-debian">
1450 <title>Debian</title>
1452 We use a script. Note that Debian typically starts &my-app; upon booting per
1453 default. It will use the file
1454 <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename> as its main configuration
1459 # /etc/init.d/privoxy start
1465 omitting 10/31/06 HB
1467 <sect2 id="start-suse">
1470 We use a script. It will use the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename>
1471 as its main configuration file. Note that SuSE starts Privoxy upon booting
1481 <sect2 id="start-windows">
1482 <title>Windows</title>
1484 Click on the &my-app; Icon to start <application>Privoxy</application>. If no configuration file is
1485 specified on the command line, <application>Privoxy</application> will look
1486 for a file named <filename>config.txt</filename>. Note that Windows will
1487 automatically start &my-app; when the system starts if you chose that option
1491 <application>Privoxy</application> can run with full Windows service functionality.
1492 On Windows only, the &my-app; program has two new command line arguments
1493 to install and uninstall &my-app; as a service. See the
1494 <link linkend="installation-pack-win">Windows Installation
1495 instructions</link> for details.
1499 <sect2 id="start-unices">
1500 <title>Solaris, NetBSD, FreeBSD, HP-UX and others</title>
1502 Example Unix startup command:
1506 # /usr/sbin/privoxy /etc/privoxy/config
1511 <sect2 id="start-os2">
1514 During installation, <application>Privoxy</application> is configured to
1515 start automatically when the system restarts. You can start it manually by
1516 double-clicking on the <application>Privoxy</application> icon in the
1517 <application>Privoxy</application> folder.
1521 <sect2 id="start-macosx">
1522 <title>Mac OSX</title>
1524 During installation, <application>Privoxy</application> is configured to
1525 start automatically when the system restarts. To start &my-app; manually,
1526 double-click on the <literal>StartPrivoxy.command</literal> icon in the
1527 <literal>/Library/Privoxy</literal> folder. Or, type this command
1532 /Library/Privoxy/StartPrivoxy.command
1536 You will be prompted for the administrator password.
1541 <sect2 id="start-amigaos">
1542 <title>AmigaOS</title>
1544 Start <application>Privoxy</application> (with RUN <>NIL:) in your
1545 <filename>startnet</filename> script (AmiTCP), in
1546 <filename>s:user-startup</filename> (RoadShow), as startup program in your
1547 startup script (Genesis), or as startup action (Miami and MiamiDx).
1548 <application>Privoxy</application> will automatically quit when you quit your
1549 TCP/IP stack (just ignore the harmless warning your TCP/IP stack may display that
1550 <application>Privoxy</application> is still running).
1554 <sect2 id="start-gentoo">
1555 <title>Gentoo</title>
1557 A script is again used. It will use the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config
1558 </filename> as its main configuration file.
1562 /etc/init.d/privoxy start
1566 Note that <application>Privoxy</application> is not automatically started at
1567 boot time by default. You can change this with the <literal>rc-update</literal>
1572 rc-update add privoxy default
1580 See the section <link linkend="cmdoptions">Command line options</link> for
1584 must find a better place for this paragraph
1587 The included default configuration files should give a reasonable starting
1588 point. Most of the per site configuration is done in the
1589 <ulink url="actions-file.html"><quote>actions</quote></ulink> files. These are
1590 where various cookie actions are defined, ad and banner blocking, and other
1591 aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> configuration. There are several
1592 such files included, with varying levels of aggressiveness.
1596 You will probably want to keep an eye out for sites for which you may prefer
1597 persistent cookies, and add these to your actions configuration as needed. By
1598 default, most of these will be accepted only during the current browser
1599 session (aka <quote>session cookies</quote>), unless you add them to the
1600 configuration. If you want the browser to handle this instead, you will need
1601 to edit <filename>user.action</filename> (or through the web based interface)
1602 and disable this feature. If you use more than one browser, it would make
1603 more sense to let <application>Privoxy</application> handle this. In which
1604 case, the browser(s) should be set to accept all cookies.
1608 Another feature where you will probably want to define exceptions for trusted
1609 sites is the popup-killing (through the <ulink
1610 url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS"><quote>+kill-popups</quote></ulink> and
1612 url="actions-file.html#FILTER-POPUPS"><quote>+filter{popups}</quote></ulink>
1613 actions), because your favorite shopping, banking, or leisure site may need
1614 popups (explained below).
1618 <application>Privoxy</application> does not support all of the optional HTTP/1.1
1619 features yet. In the unlikely event that you experience inexplicable problems
1620 with browsers that use HTTP/1.1 per default
1621 (like <application>Mozilla</application> or recent versions of I.E.), you might
1622 try to force HTTP/1.0 compatibility. For Mozilla, look under <literal>Edit ->
1623 Preferences -> Debug -> Networking</literal>.
1624 Alternatively, set the <quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote> config option in
1625 <filename>default.action</filename> which will downgrade your browser's HTTP
1626 requests from HTTP/1.1 to HTTP/1.0 before processing them.
1630 After running <application>Privoxy</application> for a while, you can
1631 start to fine tune the configuration to suit your personal, or site,
1632 preferences and requirements. There are many, many aspects that can
1633 be customized. <quote>Actions</quote>
1634 can be adjusted by pointing your browser to
1635 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
1636 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>),
1637 and then follow the link to <quote>View & Change the Current Configuration</quote>.
1638 (This is an internal page and does not require Internet access.)
1642 In fact, various aspects of <application>Privoxy</application>
1643 configuration can be viewed from this page, including
1644 current configuration parameters, source code version numbers,
1645 the browser's request headers, and <quote>actions</quote> that apply
1646 to a given URL. In addition to the actions file
1647 editor mentioned above, <application>Privoxy</application> can also
1648 be turned <quote>on</quote> and <quote>off</quote> (toggled) from this page.
1652 If you encounter problems, try loading the page without
1653 <application>Privoxy</application>. If that helps, enter the URL where
1654 you have the problems into <ulink url="http://p.p/show-url-info">the browser
1655 based rule tracing utility</ulink>. See which rules apply and why, and
1656 then try turning them off for that site one after the other, until the problem
1657 is gone. When you have found the culprit, you might want to turn the rest on
1662 If the above paragraph sounds gibberish to you, you might want to <link
1663 linkend="actions-file">read more about the actions concept</link>
1664 or even dive deep into the <link linkend="actionsanat">Appendix
1669 If you can't get rid of the problem at all, think you've found a bug in
1670 Privoxy, want to propose a new feature or smarter rules, please see the
1671 section <link linkend="contact"><quote>Contacting the
1672 Developers</quote></link> below.
1677 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1678 <sect2 id="cmdoptions">
1679 <title>Command Line Options</title>
1681 <application>Privoxy</application> may be invoked with the following
1682 command-line options:
1690 <emphasis>--version</emphasis>
1693 Print version info and exit. Unix only.
1698 <emphasis>--help</emphasis>
1701 Print short usage info and exit. Unix only.
1706 <emphasis>--no-daemon</emphasis>
1709 Don't become a daemon, i.e. don't fork and become process group
1710 leader, and don't detach from controlling tty. Unix only.
1715 <emphasis>--pidfile FILE</emphasis>
1718 On startup, write the process ID to <emphasis>FILE</emphasis>. Delete the
1719 <emphasis>FILE</emphasis> on exit. Failure to create or delete the
1720 <emphasis>FILE</emphasis> is non-fatal. If no <emphasis>FILE</emphasis>
1721 option is given, no PID file will be used. Unix only.
1726 <emphasis>--user USER[.GROUP]</emphasis>
1729 After (optionally) writing the PID file, assume the user ID of
1730 <emphasis>USER</emphasis>, and if included the GID of GROUP. Exit if the
1731 privileges are not sufficient to do so. Unix only.
1736 <emphasis>--chroot</emphasis>
1739 Before changing to the user ID given in the <emphasis>--user</emphasis> option,
1740 chroot to that user's home directory, i.e. make the kernel pretend to the &my-app;
1741 process that the directory tree starts there. If set up carefully, this can limit
1742 the impact of possible vulnerabilities in &my-app; to the files contained in that hierarchy.
1748 <emphasis>--pre-chroot-nslookup hostname</emphasis>
1751 Specifies a hostname to look up before doing a chroot. On some systems, initializing the
1752 resolver library involves reading config files from /etc and/or loading additional shared
1753 libraries from /lib. On these systems, doing a hostname lookup before the chroot reduces
1754 the number of files that must be copied into the chroot tree.
1757 For fastest startup speed, a good value is a hostname that is not in /etc/hosts but that
1758 your local name server (listed in /etc/resolv.conf) can resolve without recursion
1759 (that is, without having to ask any other name servers). The hostname need not exist,
1760 but if it doesn't, an error message (which can be ignored) will be output.
1766 <emphasis>configfile</emphasis>
1769 If no <emphasis>configfile</emphasis> is included on the command line,
1770 <application>Privoxy</application> will look for a file named
1771 <quote>config</quote> in the current directory (except on Win32
1772 where it will look for <quote>config.txt</quote> instead). Specify
1773 full path to avoid confusion. If no config file is found,
1774 <application>Privoxy</application> will fail to start.
1782 On <application>MS Windows</application> only there are two additional
1783 command-line options to allow <application>Privoxy</application> to install and
1784 run as a <emphasis>service</emphasis>. See the
1785 <link linkend="installation-pack-win">Window Installation section</link>
1793 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1796 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1797 <sect1 id="configuration"><title>Privoxy Configuration</title>
1799 All <application>Privoxy</application> configuration is stored
1800 in text files. These files can be edited with a text editor.
1801 Many important aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> can
1802 also be controlled easily with a web browser.
1806 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1809 <title>Controlling Privoxy with Your Web Browser</title>
1811 <application>Privoxy</application>'s user interface can be reached through the special
1812 URL <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
1813 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>),
1814 which is a built-in page and works without Internet access.
1815 You will see the following section:
1819 <!-- Needs to be put in a table and colorized -->
1822 <bridgehead renderas="sect2"> Privoxy Menu</bridgehead>
1826 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">View & change the current configuration</ulink>
1829 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-version">View the source code version numbers</ulink>
1832 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-request">View the request headers.</ulink>
1835 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">Look up which actions apply to a URL and why</ulink>
1838 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">Toggle Privoxy on or off</ulink>
1841 ▪ <ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/
1842 &p-version;/user-manual/">Documentation</ulink>
1850 This should be self-explanatory. Note the first item leads to an editor for the
1851 <link linkend="actions-file">actions files</link>, which is where the ad, banner,
1852 cookie, and URL blocking magic is configured as well as other advanced features of
1853 <application>Privoxy</application>. This is an easy way to adjust various
1854 aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> configuration. The actions
1855 file, and other configuration files, are explained in detail below.
1859 <quote>Toggle Privoxy On or Off</quote> is handy for sites that might
1860 have problems with your current actions and filters. You can in fact use
1861 it as a test to see whether it is <application>Privoxy</application>
1862 causing the problem or not. <application>Privoxy</application> continues
1863 to run as a proxy in this case, but all manipulation is disabled, i.e.
1864 <application>Privoxy</application> acts like a normal forwarding proxy. There
1865 is even a toggle <link linkend="bookmarklets">Bookmarklet</link> offered, so
1866 that you can toggle <application>Privoxy</application> with one click from
1871 Note that several of the features described above are disabled by default
1872 in <application>Privoxy</application> 3.0.7 beta and later.
1874 <ulink url="config.html">configuration file</ulink> to learn why
1875 and in which cases it's safe to enable them again.
1880 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1885 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1887 <sect2 id="confoverview">
1888 <title>Configuration Files Overview</title>
1890 For Unix, *BSD and Linux, all configuration files are located in
1891 <filename>/etc/privoxy/</filename> by default. For MS Windows, OS/2, and
1892 AmigaOS these are all in the same directory as the
1893 <application>Privoxy</application> executable. <![%p-not-stable;[ The name
1894 and number of configuration files has changed from previous versions, and is
1895 subject to change as development progresses.]]>
1899 The installed defaults provide a reasonable starting point, though
1900 some settings may be aggressive by some standards. For the time being, the
1901 principle configuration files are:
1909 The <link linkend="config">main configuration file</link> is named <filename>config</filename>
1910 on Linux, Unix, BSD, OS/2, and AmigaOS and <filename>config.txt</filename>
1911 on Windows. This is a required file.
1917 <filename>default.action</filename> (the main <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link>)
1918 is used to define which <quote>actions</quote> relating to banner-blocking, images, pop-ups,
1919 content modification, cookie handling etc should be applied by default. It also defines many
1920 exceptions (both positive and negative) from this default set of actions that enable
1921 <application>Privoxy</application> to selectively eliminate the junk, and only the junk, on
1922 as many websites as possible.
1925 Multiple actions files may be defined in <filename>config</filename>. These
1926 are processed in the order they are defined. Local customizations and locally
1927 preferred exceptions to the default policies as defined in
1928 <filename>default.action</filename> (which you will most probably want
1929 to define sooner or later) are probably best applied in
1930 <filename>user.action</filename>, where you can preserve them across
1931 upgrades. <filename>standard.action</filename> is only for
1932 <application>Privoxy's</application> internal use.
1935 There is also a web based editor that can be accessed from
1937 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
1939 url="http://p.p/show-status">http://p.p/show-status</ulink>) for the
1940 various actions files.
1946 <quote>Filter files</quote> (the <link linkend="filter-file">filter
1947 file</link>) can be used to re-write the raw page content, including
1948 viewable text as well as embedded HTML and JavaScript, and whatever else
1949 lurks on any given web page. The filtering jobs are only pre-defined here;
1950 whether to apply them or not is up to the actions files.
1951 <filename>default.filter</filename> includes various filters made
1952 available for use by the developers. Some are much more intrusive than
1953 others, and all should be used with caution. You may define additional
1954 filter files in <filename>config</filename> as you can with
1955 actions files. We suggest <filename>user.filter</filename> for any
1956 locally defined filters or customizations.
1964 The syntax of the configuration and filter files may change between different
1965 Privoxy versions, unfortunately some enhancements cost backwards compatibility.
1966 <!-- Add link to documentation-->
1970 All files use the <quote><literal>#</literal></quote> character to denote a
1971 comment (the rest of the line will be ignored) and understand line continuation
1972 through placing a backslash ("<literal>\</literal>") as the very last character
1973 in a line. If the <literal>#</literal> is preceded by a backslash, it looses
1974 its special function. Placing a <literal>#</literal> in front of an otherwise
1975 valid configuration line to prevent it from being interpreted is called "commenting
1976 out" that line. Blank lines are ignored.
1980 The actions files and filter files
1981 can use Perl style <link linkend="regex">regular expressions</link> for
1982 maximum flexibility.
1986 After making any changes, there is no need to restart
1987 <application>Privoxy</application> in order for the changes to take
1988 effect. <application>Privoxy</application> detects such changes
1989 automatically. Note, however, that it may take one or two additional
1990 requests for the change to take effect. When changing the listening address
1991 of <application>Privoxy</application>, these <quote>wake up</quote> requests
1992 must obviously be sent to the <emphasis>old</emphasis> listening address.
1997 While under development, the configuration content is subject to change.
1998 The below documentation may not be accurate by the time you read this.
1999 Also, what constitutes a <quote>default</quote> setting, may change, so
2000 please check all your configuration files on important issues.
2006 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2009 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
2011 <!-- **************************************************** -->
2012 <!-- Include config.sgml here -->
2013 <!-- This is where the entire config file is detailed. -->
2015 <!-- end include -->
2018 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2022 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
2024 <sect1 id="actions-file"><title>Actions Files</title>
2027 The actions files are used to define what <emphasis>actions</emphasis>
2028 <application>Privoxy</application> takes for which URLs, and thus determines
2029 how ad images, cookies and various other aspects of HTTP content and
2030 transactions are handled, and on which sites (or even parts thereof).
2031 There are a number of such actions, with a wide range of functionality.
2032 Each action does something a little different.
2033 These actions give us a veritable arsenal of tools with which to exert
2034 our control, preferences and independence. Actions can be combined so that
2035 their effects are aggregated when applied against a given set of URLs.
2039 are three action files included with <application>Privoxy</application> with
2047 <filename>default.action</filename> - is the primary action file
2048 that sets the initial values for all actions. It is intended to
2049 provide a base level of functionality for
2050 <application>Privoxy's</application> array of features. So it is
2051 a set of broad rules that should work reasonably well as-is for most users.
2052 This is the file that the developers are keeping updated, and <link
2053 linkend="installation-keepupdated">making available to users</link>.
2054 The user's preferences as set in <filename>standard.action</filename>,
2055 e.g. either <literal>Cautious</literal> (the default),
2056 <literal>Medium</literal>, or <literal>Advanced</literal> (see
2062 <filename>user.action</filename> - is intended to be for local site
2063 preferences and exceptions. As an example, if your ISP or your bank
2064 has specific requirements, and need special handling, this kind of
2065 thing should go here. This file will not be upgraded.
2070 <filename>standard.action</filename> - is used only by the web based editor
2071 at <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default">
2072 http://config.privoxy.org/edit-actions-list?f=default</ulink>,
2073 to set various pre-defined sets of rules for the default actions section
2074 in <filename>default.action</filename>.
2077 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> <guibutton>Set to Cautious</guibutton> <guibutton>Set to Medium</guibutton> <guibutton>Set to Advanced</guibutton>
2080 These have increasing levels of aggressiveness <emphasis>and have no
2081 influence on your browsing unless you select them explicitly in the
2082 editor</emphasis>. A default installation should be pre-set to
2083 <literal>Cautious</literal> (versions prior to 3.0.5 were set to
2084 <literal>Medium</literal>). New users should try this for a while before
2085 adjusting the settings to more aggressive levels. The more aggressive
2086 the settings, then the more likelihood there is of problems such as sites
2087 not working as they should.
2090 The <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> button allows you to turn each
2091 action on/off individually for fine-tuning. The <guibutton>Cautious</guibutton>
2092 button changes the actions list to low/safe settings which will activate
2093 ad blocking and a minimal set of &my-app;'s features, and subsequently
2094 there will be less of a chance for accidental problems. The
2095 <guibutton>Medium</guibutton> button sets the list to a medium level of
2096 other features and a low level set of privacy features. The
2097 <guibutton>Advanced</guibutton> button sets the list to a high level of
2098 ad blocking and medium level of privacy. See the chart below. The latter
2099 three buttons over-ride any changes via with the
2100 <guibutton>Edit</guibutton> button. More fine-tuning can be done in the
2101 lower sections of this internal page.
2104 It is not recommend to edit the <filename>standard.action</filename> file
2108 The default profiles, and their associated actions, as pre-defined in
2109 <filename>standard.action</filename> are<!-- different than this table which is out of date -->:
2112 <table frame=all><title>Default Configurations</title>
2113 <tgroup cols=4 align=left colsep=1 rowsep=1>
2114 <colspec colname=c1>
2115 <colspec colname=c2>
2116 <colspec colname=c3>
2117 <colspec colname=c4>
2120 <entry>Feature</entry>
2121 <entry>Cautious</entry>
2122 <entry>Medium</entry>
2123 <entry>Advanced</entry>
2128 <!-- <entry>f1</entry> -->
2129 <!-- <entry>f2</entry> -->
2130 <!-- <entry>f3</entry> -->
2131 <!-- <entry>f4</entry> -->
2137 <entry>Ad-blocking Aggressiveness</entry>
2138 <entry>medium</entry>
2144 <entry>Ad-filtering by size</entry>
2151 <entry>Ad-filtering by link</entry>
2157 <entry>Pop-up killing</entry>
2158 <entry>blocks only</entry>
2159 <entry>blocks only</entry>
2160 <entry>blocks only</entry>
2164 <entry>Privacy Features</entry>
2166 <entry>medium</entry>
2167 <entry>medium/high</entry>
2171 <entry>Cookie handling</entry>
2173 <entry>session-only</entry>
2178 <entry>Referer forging</entry>
2186 <entry>GIF de-animation</entry>
2194 <entry>Fast redirects</entry>
2201 <entry>HTML taming</entry>
2208 <entry>JavaScript taming</entry>
2215 <entry>Web-bug killing</entry>
2222 <entry>Image tag reordering</entry>
2238 The list of actions files to be used are defined in the main configuration
2239 file, and are processed in the order they are defined (e.g.
2240 <filename>default.action</filename> is typically processed before
2241 <filename>user.action</filename>). The content of these can all be viewed and
2243 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
2244 The over-riding principle when applying actions, is that the last action that
2245 matches a given URL wins. The broadest, most general rules go first
2246 (defined in <filename>default.action</filename>),
2247 followed by any exceptions (typically also in
2248 <filename>default.action</filename>), which are then followed lastly by any
2249 local preferences (typically in <emphasis>user</emphasis><filename>.action</filename>).
2250 Generally, <filename>user.action</filename> has the last word.
2254 An actions file typically has multiple sections. If you want to use
2255 <quote>aliases</quote> in an actions file, you have to place the (optional)
2256 <link linkend="aliases">alias section</link> at the top of that file.
2257 Then comes the default set of rules which will apply universally to all
2258 sites and pages (be <emphasis>very careful</emphasis> with using such a
2259 universal set in <filename>user.action</filename> or any other actions file after
2260 <filename>default.action</filename>, because it will override the result
2261 from consulting any previous file). And then below that,
2262 exceptions to the defined universal policies. You can regard
2263 <filename>user.action</filename> as an appendix to <filename>default.action</filename>,
2264 with the advantage that it is a separate file, which makes preserving your
2265 personal settings across <application>Privoxy</application> upgrades easier.
2269 Actions can be used to block anything you want, including ads, banners, or
2270 just some obnoxious URL whose content you would rather not see. Cookies can be accepted
2271 or rejected, or accepted only during the current browser session (i.e. not
2272 written to disk), content can be modified, some JavaScripts tamed, user-tracking
2273 fooled, and much more. See below for a <link linkend="actions">complete list
2277 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2279 <title>Finding the Right Mix</title>
2281 Note that some <link linkend="actions">actions</link>, like cookie suppression
2282 or script disabling, may render some sites unusable that rely on these
2283 techniques to work properly. Finding the right mix of actions is not always easy and
2284 certainly a matter of personal taste. And, things can always change, requiring
2285 refinements in the configuration. In general, it can be said that the more
2286 <quote>aggressive</quote> your default settings (in the top section of the
2287 actions file) are, the more exceptions for <quote>trusted</quote> sites you
2288 will have to make later. If, for example, you want to crunch all cookies per
2289 default, you'll have to make exceptions from that rule for sites that you
2290 regularly use and that require cookies for actually useful purposes, like maybe
2291 your bank, favorite shop, or newspaper.
2295 We have tried to provide you with reasonable rules to start from in the
2296 distribution actions files. But there is no general rule of thumb on these
2297 things. There just are too many variables, and sites are constantly changing.
2298 Sooner or later you will want to change the rules (and read this chapter again :).
2302 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2304 <title>How to Edit</title>
2306 The easiest way to edit the actions files is with a browser by
2307 using our browser-based editor, which can be reached from <ulink
2308 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
2309 Note: the config file option <link
2310 linkend="enable-edit-actions">enable-edit-actions</link> must be enabled for
2311 this to work. The editor allows both fine-grained control over every single
2312 feature on a per-URL basis, and easy choosing from wholesale sets of defaults
2313 like <quote>Cautious</quote>, <quote>Medium</quote> or
2314 <quote>Advanced</quote>. Warning: the <quote>Advanced</quote> setting is more
2315 aggressive, and will be more likely to cause problems for some sites.
2316 Experienced users only!
2320 If you prefer plain text editing to GUIs, you can of course also directly edit the
2321 the actions files with your favorite text editor. Look at
2322 <filename>default.action</filename> which is richly commented with many
2328 <sect2 id="actions-apply">
2329 <title>How Actions are Applied to Requests</title>
2331 Actions files are divided into sections. There are special sections,
2332 like the <quote><link linkend="aliases">alias</link></quote> sections which will
2333 be discussed later. For now let's concentrate on regular sections: They have a
2334 heading line (often split up to multiple lines for readability) which consist
2335 of a list of actions, separated by whitespace and enclosed in curly braces.
2336 Below that, there is a list of URL and tag patterns, each on a separate line.
2340 To determine which actions apply to a request, the URL of the request is
2341 compared to all URL patterns in each <quote>action file</quote>.
2342 Every time it matches, the list of applicable actions for the request is
2343 incrementally updated, using the heading of the section in which the
2344 pattern is located. The same is done again for tags and tag patterns later on.
2348 If multiple applying sections set the same action differently,
2349 the last match wins. If not, the effects are aggregated.
2350 E.g. a URL might match a regular section with a heading line of <literal>{
2351 +<link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link> }</literal>,
2352 then later another one with just <literal>{
2353 +<link linkend="block">block</link> }</literal>, resulting
2354 in <emphasis>both</emphasis> actions to apply. And there may well be
2355 cases where you will want to combine actions together. Such a section then
2361 { +<literal>handle-as-image</literal> +<literal>block</literal> }
2362 # Block these as if they were images. Send no block page.
2364 media.example.com/.*banners
2365 .example.com/images/ads/</screen>
2369 You can trace this process for URL patterns and any given URL by visiting <ulink
2370 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>.
2374 Examples and more detail on this is provided in the Appendix, <link linkend="ACTIONSANAT">
2375 Troubleshooting: Anatomy of an Action</link> section.
2379 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2380 <sect2 id="af-patterns">
2381 <title>Patterns</title>
2383 As mentioned, <application>Privoxy</application> uses <quote>patterns</quote>
2384 to determine what <emphasis>actions</emphasis> might apply to which sites and
2385 pages your browser attempts to access. These <quote>patterns</quote> use wild
2386 card type <emphasis>pattern</emphasis> matching to achieve a high degree of
2387 flexibility. This allows one expression to be expanded and potentially match
2388 against many similar patterns.
2392 Generally, an URL pattern has the form
2393 <literal><domain>/<path></literal>, where both the
2394 <literal><domain></literal> and <literal><path></literal> are
2395 optional. (This is why the special <literal>/</literal> pattern matches all
2396 URLs). Note that the protocol portion of the URL pattern (e.g.
2397 <literal>http://</literal>) should <emphasis>not</emphasis> be included in
2398 the pattern. This is assumed already!
2401 The pattern matching syntax is different for the domain and path parts of
2402 the URL. The domain part uses a simple globbing type matching technique,
2403 while the path part uses a more flexible
2404 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
2405 Expressions (PCRE)</quote></ulink> based syntax.
2410 <term><literal>www.example.com/</literal></term>
2413 is a domain-only pattern and will match any request to <literal>www.example.com</literal>,
2414 regardless of which document on that server is requested. So ALL pages in
2415 this domain would be covered by the scope of this action. Note that a
2416 simple <literal>example.com</literal> is different and would NOT match.
2421 <term><literal>www.example.com</literal></term>
2424 means exactly the same. For domain-only patterns, the trailing <literal>/</literal> may
2430 <term><literal>www.example.com/index.html$</literal></term>
2433 matches all the documents on <literal>www.example.com</literal>
2434 whose name starts with <literal>/index.html</literal>.
2439 <term><literal>www.example.com/index.html$</literal></term>
2442 matches only the single document <literal>/index.html</literal>
2443 on <literal>www.example.com</literal>.
2448 <term><literal>/index.html$</literal></term>
2451 matches the document <literal>/index.html</literal>, regardless of the domain,
2452 i.e. on <emphasis>any</emphasis> web server anywhere.
2457 <term><literal>index.html</literal></term>
2460 matches nothing, since it would be interpreted as a domain name and
2461 there is no top-level domain called <literal>.html</literal>. So its
2469 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2470 <sect3><title>The Domain Pattern</title>
2473 The matching of the domain part offers some flexible options: if the
2474 domain starts or ends with a dot, it becomes unanchored at that end.
2480 <term><literal>.example.com</literal></term>
2483 matches any domain that <emphasis>ENDS</emphasis> in
2484 <literal>.example.com</literal>
2489 <term><literal>www.</literal></term>
2492 matches any domain that <emphasis>STARTS</emphasis> with
2493 <literal>www.</literal>
2498 <term><literal>.example.</literal></term>
2501 matches any domain that <emphasis>CONTAINS</emphasis> <literal>.example.</literal>.
2502 And, by the way, also included would be any files or documents that exist
2503 within that domain since no path limitations are specified. (Correctly
2504 speaking: It matches any FQDN that contains <literal>example</literal> as
2505 a domain.) This might be <literal>www.example.com</literal>,
2506 <literal>news.example.de</literal>, or
2507 <literal>www.example.net/cgi/testing.pl</literal> for instance. All these
2515 Additionally, there are wild-cards that you can use in the domain names
2516 themselves. These work similarly to shell globbing type wild-cards:
2517 <quote>*</quote> represents zero or more arbitrary characters (this is
2519 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
2520 Expression</quote></ulink> based syntax of <quote>.*</quote>),
2521 <quote>?</quote> represents any single character (this is equivalent to the
2522 regular expression syntax of a simple <quote>.</quote>), and you can define
2523 <quote>character classes</quote> in square brackets which is similar to
2524 the same regular expression technique. All of this can be freely mixed:
2529 <term><literal>ad*.example.com</literal></term>
2532 matches <quote>adserver.example.com</quote>,
2533 <quote>ads.example.com</quote>, etc but not <quote>sfads.example.com</quote>
2538 <term><literal>*ad*.example.com</literal></term>
2541 matches all of the above, and then some.
2546 <term><literal>.?pix.com</literal></term>
2549 matches <literal>www.ipix.com</literal>,
2550 <literal>pictures.epix.com</literal>, <literal>a.b.c.d.e.upix.com</literal> etc.
2555 <term><literal>www[1-9a-ez].example.c*</literal></term>
2558 matches <literal>www1.example.com</literal>,
2559 <literal>www4.example.cc</literal>, <literal>wwwd.example.cy</literal>,
2560 <literal>wwwz.example.com</literal> etc., but <emphasis>not</emphasis>
2561 <literal>wwww.example.com</literal>.
2568 While flexible, this is not the sophistication of full regular expression based syntax.
2573 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2576 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2577 <sect3><title>The Path Pattern</title>
2580 <application>Privoxy</application> uses Perl compatible (PCRE)
2581 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
2582 Expression</quote></ulink> based syntax
2583 (through the <ulink url="http://www.pcre.org/">PCRE</ulink> library) for
2584 matching the path portion (after the slash), and is thus more flexible.
2588 There is an <link linkend="regex">Appendix</link> with a brief quick-start into regular
2589 expressions, and full (very technical) documentation on PCRE regex syntax is available on-line
2590 at <ulink url="http://www.pcre.org/man.txt">http://www.pcre.org/man.txt</ulink>.
2591 You might also find the Perl man page on regular expressions (<literal>man perlre</literal>)
2592 useful, which is available on-line at <ulink
2593 url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html</ulink>.
2597 Note that the path pattern is automatically left-anchored at the <quote>/</quote>,
2598 i.e. it matches as if it would start with a <quote>^</quote> (regular expression speak
2599 for the beginning of a line).
2603 Please also note that matching in the path is <emphasis>CASE INSENSITIVE</emphasis>
2604 by default, but you can switch to case sensitive at any point in the pattern by using the
2605 <quote>(?-i)</quote> switch: <literal>www.example.com/(?-i)PaTtErN.*</literal> will match
2606 only documents whose path starts with <literal>PaTtErN</literal> in
2607 <emphasis>exactly</emphasis> this capitalization.
2612 <term><literal>.example.com/.*</literal></term>
2615 Is equivalent to just <quote>.example.com</quote>, since any documents
2616 within that domain are matched with or without the <quote>.*</quote>
2617 regular expression. This is redundant
2622 <term><literal>.example.com/.*/index.html$</literal></term>
2625 Will match any page in the domain of <quote>example.com</quote> that is
2626 named <quote>index.html</quote>, and that is part of some path. For
2627 example, it matches <quote>www.example.com/testing/index.html</quote> but
2628 NOT <quote>www.example.com/index.html</quote> because the regular
2629 expression called for at least two <quote>/'s</quote>, thus the path
2630 requirement. It also would match
2631 <quote>www.example.com/testing/index_html</quote>, because of the
2632 special meta-character <quote>.</quote>.
2637 <term><literal>.example.com/(.*/)?index\.html$</literal></term>
2640 This regular expression is conditional so it will match any page
2641 named <quote>index.html</quote> regardless of path which in this case can
2642 have one or more <quote>/'s</quote>. And this one must contain exactly
2643 <quote>.html</quote> (but does not have to end with that!).
2648 <term><literal>.example.com/(.*/)(ads|banners?|junk)</literal></term>
2651 This regular expression will match any path of <quote>example.com</quote>
2652 that contains any of the words <quote>ads</quote>, <quote>banner</quote>,
2653 <quote>banners</quote> (because of the <quote>?</quote>) or <quote>junk</quote>.
2654 The path does not have to end in these words, just contain them.
2659 <term><literal>.example.com/(.*/)(ads|banners?|junk)/.*\.(jpe?g|gif|png)$</literal></term>
2662 This is very much the same as above, except now it must end in either
2663 <quote>.jpg</quote>, <quote>.jpeg</quote>, <quote>.gif</quote> or <quote>.png</quote>. So this
2664 one is limited to common image formats.
2671 There are many, many good examples to be found in <filename>default.action</filename>,
2672 and more tutorials below in <link linkend="regex">Appendix on regular expressions</link>.
2677 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2680 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2681 <sect3 id="tag-pattern"><title>The Tag Pattern</title>
2684 Tag patterns are used to change the applying actions based on the
2685 request's tags. Tags can be created with either the
2686 <link linkend="CLIENT-HEADER-TAGGER">client-header-tagger</link>
2687 or the <link linkend="SERVER-HEADER-TAGGER">server-header-tagger</link> action.
2691 Tag patterns have to start with <quote>TAG:</quote>, so &my-app;
2692 can tell them apart from URL patterns. Everything after the colon
2693 including white space, is interpreted as a regular expression with
2694 path pattern syntax, except that tag patterns aren't left-anchored
2695 automatically (&my-app; doesn't silently add a <quote>^</quote>,
2696 you have to do it yourself if you need it).
2700 To match all requests that are tagged with <quote>foo</quote>
2701 your pattern line should be <quote>TAG:^foo$</quote>,
2702 <quote>TAG:foo</quote> would work as well, but it would also
2703 match requests whose tags contain <quote>foo</quote> somewhere.
2704 <quote>TAG: foo</quote> wouldn't work as it requires white space.
2708 Sections can contain URL and tag patterns at the same time,
2709 but tag patterns are checked after the URL patterns and thus
2710 always overrule them, even if they are located before the URL patterns.
2714 Once a new tag is added, Privoxy checks right away if it's matched by one
2715 of the tag patterns and updates the action settings accordingly. As a result
2716 tags can be used to activate other tagger actions, as long as these other
2717 taggers look for headers that haven't already be parsed.
2721 For example you could tag client requests which use the
2722 <literal>POST</literal> method,
2723 then use this tag to activate another tagger that adds a tag if cookies
2724 are sent, and then use a block action based on the cookie tag. This allows
2725 the outcome of one action, to be input into a subsequent action. However if
2726 you'd reverse the position of the described taggers, and activated the
2727 method tagger based on the cookie tagger, no method tags would be created.
2728 The method tagger would look for the request line, but at the time
2729 the cookie tag is created, the request line has already been parsed.
2733 While this is a limitation you should be aware of, this kind of
2734 indirection is seldom needed anyway and even the example doesn't
2735 make too much sense.
2742 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2745 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2747 <sect2 id="actions">
2748 <title>Actions</title>
2750 All actions are disabled by default, until they are explicitly enabled
2751 somewhere in an actions file. Actions are turned on if preceded with a
2752 <quote>+</quote>, and turned off if preceded with a <quote>-</quote>. So a
2753 <literal>+action</literal> means <quote>do that action</quote>, e.g.
2754 <literal>+block</literal> means <quote>please block URLs that match the
2755 following patterns</quote>, and <literal>-block</literal> means <quote>don't
2756 block URLs that match the following patterns, even if <literal>+block</literal>
2757 previously applied.</quote>
2762 Again, actions are invoked by placing them on a line, enclosed in curly braces and
2763 separated by whitespace, like in
2764 <literal>{+some-action -some-other-action{some-parameter}}</literal>,
2765 followed by a list of URL patterns, one per line, to which they apply.
2766 Together, the actions line and the following pattern lines make up a section
2767 of the actions file.
2771 Actions fall into three categories:
2778 Boolean, i.e the action can only be <quote>enabled</quote> or
2779 <quote>disabled</quote>. Syntax:
2783 +<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable> # enable action <replaceable class="parameter">name</replaceable>
2784 -<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable> # disable action <replaceable class="parameter">name</replaceable></screen>
2787 Example: <literal>+block</literal>
2794 Parameterized, where some value is required in order to enable this type of action.
2799 +<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable>{<replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>} # enable action and set parameter to <replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>,
2800 # overwriting parameter from previous match if necessary
2801 -<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable> # disable action. The parameter can be omitted</screen>
2804 Note that if the URL matches multiple positive forms of a parameterized action,
2805 the last match wins, i.e. the params from earlier matches are simply ignored.
2808 Example: <literal>+hide-user-agent{Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; FreeBSD i386; en-US; rv:1.8.1.4) Gecko/20070602 Firefox/2.0.0.4}</literal>
2814 Multi-value. These look exactly like parameterized actions,
2815 but they behave differently: If the action applies multiple times to the
2816 same URL, but with different parameters, <emphasis>all</emphasis> the parameters
2817 from <emphasis>all</emphasis> matches are remembered. This is used for actions
2818 that can be executed for the same request repeatedly, like adding multiple
2819 headers, or filtering through multiple filters. Syntax:
2823 +<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable>{<replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>} # enable action and add <replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable> to the list of parameters
2824 -<replaceable class="function">name</replaceable>{<replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable>} # remove the parameter <replaceable class="parameter">param</replaceable> from the list of parameters
2825 # If it was the last one left, disable the action.
2826 <replaceable class="parameter">-name</replaceable> # disable this action completely and remove all parameters from the list</screen>
2829 Examples: <literal>+add-header{X-Fun-Header: Some text}</literal> and
2830 <literal>+filter{html-annoyances}</literal>
2838 If nothing is specified in any actions file, no <quote>actions</quote> are
2839 taken. So in this case <application>Privoxy</application> would just be a
2840 normal, non-blocking, non-filtering proxy. You must specifically enable the
2841 privacy and blocking features you need (although the provided default actions
2842 files will give a good starting point).
2846 Later defined action sections always over-ride earlier ones of the same type.
2847 So exceptions to any rules you make, should come in the latter part of the file (or
2848 in a file that is processed later when using multiple actions files such
2849 as <filename>user.action</filename>). For multi-valued actions, the actions
2850 are applied in the order they are specified. Actions files are processed in
2851 the order they are defined in <filename>config</filename> (the default
2852 installation has three actions files). It also quite possible for any given
2853 URL to match more than one <quote>pattern</quote> (because of wildcards and
2854 regular expressions), and thus to trigger more than one set of actions! Last
2858 <!-- start actions listing -->
2860 The list of valid <application>Privoxy</application> actions are:
2864 <!-- ********************************************************** -->
2865 <!-- Please note the below defined actions use id's that are -->
2866 <!-- probably linked from other places, so please don't change. -->
2868 <!-- ********************************************************** -->
2871 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2873 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="add-header">
2874 <title>add-header</title>
2878 <term>Typical use:</term>
2880 <para>Confuse log analysis, custom applications</para>
2885 <term>Effect:</term>
2888 Sends a user defined HTTP header to the web server.
2895 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
2897 <para>Multi-value.</para>
2902 <term>Parameter:</term>
2905 Any string value is possible. Validity of the defined HTTP headers is not checked.
2906 It is recommended that you use the <quote><literal>X-</literal></quote> prefix
2916 This action may be specified multiple times, in order to define multiple
2917 headers. This is rarely needed for the typical user. If you don't know what
2918 <quote>HTTP headers</quote> are, you definitely don't need to worry about this
2925 <term>Example usage:</term>
2928 <screen>+add-header{X-User-Tracking: sucks}</screen>
2936 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2937 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="block">
2938 <title>block</title>
2942 <term>Typical use:</term>
2944 <para>Block ads or other unwanted content</para>
2949 <term>Effect:</term>
2952 Requests for URLs to which this action applies are blocked, i.e. the
2953 requests are trapped by &my-app; and the requested URL is never retrieved,
2954 but is answered locally with a substitute page or image, as determined by
2956 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal>,
2958 linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>, and
2960 linkend="handle-as-empty-document">handle-as-empty-document</link></literal> actions.
2968 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
2970 <para>Boolean.</para>
2975 <term>Parameter:</term>
2985 <application>Privoxy</application> sends a special <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page
2986 for requests to blocked pages. This page contains links to find out why the request
2987 was blocked, and a click-through to the blocked content (the latter only if compiled with the
2988 force feature enabled). The <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page adapts to the available
2989 screen space -- it displays full-blown if space allows, or miniaturized and text-only
2990 if loaded into a small frame or window. If you are using <application>Privoxy</application>
2991 right now, you can take a look at the
2992 <ulink url="http://ads.bannerserver.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor.html"><quote>BLOCKED</quote>
2996 A very important exception occurs if <emphasis>both</emphasis>
2997 <literal>block</literal> and <literal><link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal>,
2998 apply to the same request: it will then be replaced by an image. If
2999 <literal><link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>
3000 (see below) also applies, the type of image will be determined by its parameter,
3001 if not, the standard checkerboard pattern is sent.
3004 It is important to understand this process, in order
3005 to understand how <application>Privoxy</application> deals with
3006 ads and other unwanted content. Blocking is a core feature, and one
3007 upon which various other features depend.
3010 The <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal>
3011 action can perform a very similar task, by <quote>blocking</quote>
3012 banner images and other content through rewriting the relevant URLs in the
3013 document's HTML source, so they don't get requested in the first place.
3014 Note that this is a totally different technique, and it's easy to confuse the two.
3020 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3024 # Block and replace with "blocked" page
3025 .nasty-stuff.example.com
3027 {+block +handle-as-image}
3028 # Block and replace with image
3032 {+block +handle-as-empty-document}
3033 # Block and then ignore
3034 adserver.exampleclick.net/.*\.js$</screen>
3044 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3045 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="client-header-filter">
3046 <title>client-header-filter</title>
3050 <term>Typical use:</term>
3053 Rewrite or remove single client headers.
3059 <term>Effect:</term>
3062 All client headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly through
3063 the specified regular expression based substitutions.
3070 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3072 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3077 <term>Parameter:</term>
3080 The name of a client-header filter, as defined in one of the
3081 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
3090 Client-header filters are applied to each header on its own, not to
3091 all at once. This makes it easier to diagnose problems, but on the downside
3092 you can't write filters that only change header x if header y's value is z.
3093 You can do that by using tags though.
3096 Client-header filters are executed after the other header actions have finished
3097 and use their output as input.
3100 Please refer to the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file chapter</link>
3101 to learn which client-header filters are available by default, and how to
3109 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3113 {+client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}}
3124 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3125 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="client-header-tagger">
3126 <title>client-header-tagger</title>
3130 <term>Typical use:</term>
3133 Block requests based on their headers.
3139 <term>Effect:</term>
3142 Client headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly through
3143 the specified regular expression based substitutions, the result is used as
3151 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3153 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3158 <term>Parameter:</term>
3161 The name of a client-header tagger, as defined in one of the
3162 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
3171 Client-header taggers are applied to each header on its own,
3172 and as the header isn't modified, each tagger <quote>sees</quote>
3176 Client-header taggers are the first actions that are executed
3177 and their tags can be used to control every other action.
3183 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3187 # Tag every request with the User-Agent header
3188 {+client-header-tagger{user-agent}}
3199 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3200 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="content-type-overwrite">
3201 <title>content-type-overwrite</title>
3205 <term>Typical use:</term>
3207 <para>Stop useless download menus from popping up, or change the browser's rendering mode</para>
3212 <term>Effect:</term>
3215 Replaces the <quote>Content-Type:</quote> HTTP server header.
3222 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3224 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3229 <term>Parameter:</term>
3241 The <quote>Content-Type:</quote> HTTP server header is used by the
3242 browser to decide what to do with the document. The value of this
3243 header can cause the browser to open a download menu instead of
3244 displaying the document by itself, even if the document's format is
3245 supported by the browser.
3248 The declared content type can also affect which rendering mode
3249 the browser chooses. If XHTML is delivered as <quote>text/html</quote>,
3250 many browsers treat it as yet another broken HTML document.
3251 If it is send as <quote>application/xml</quote>, browsers with
3252 XHTML support will only display it, if the syntax is correct.
3255 If you see a web site that proudly uses XHTML buttons, but sets
3256 <quote>Content-Type: text/html</quote>, you can use &my-app;
3257 to overwrite it with <quote>application/xml</quote> and validate
3258 the web master's claim inside your XHTML-supporting browser.
3259 If the syntax is incorrect, the browser will complain loudly.
3262 You can also go the opposite direction: if your browser prints
3263 error messages instead of rendering a document falsely declared
3264 as XHTML, you can overwrite the content type with
3265 <quote>text/html</quote> and have it rendered as broken HTML document.
3268 By default <literal>content-type-overwrite</literal> only replaces
3269 <quote>Content-Type:</quote> headers that look like some kind of text.
3270 If you want to overwrite it unconditionally, you have to combine it with
3271 <literal><link linkend="force-text-mode">force-text-mode</link></literal>.
3272 This limitation exists for a reason, think twice before circumventing it.
3275 Most of the time it's easier to replace this action with a custom
3276 <literal><link linkend="server-header-filter">server-header filter</link></literal>.
3277 It allows you to activate it for every document of a certain site and it will still
3278 only replace the content types you aimed at.
3281 Of course you can apply <literal>content-type-overwrite</literal>
3282 to a whole site and then make URL based exceptions, but it's a lot
3283 more work to get the same precision.
3289 <term>Example usage (sections):</term>
3292 <screen># Check if www.example.net/ really uses valid XHTML
3293 { +content-type-overwrite{application/xml} }
3296 # but leave the content type unmodified if the URL looks like a style sheet
3297 {-content-type-overwrite}
3298 www.example.net/.*\.css$
3299 www.example.net/.*style
3308 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3309 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-client-header">
3313 <title>crunch-client-header</title>
3317 <term>Typical use:</term>
3319 <para>Remove a client header <application>Privoxy</application> has no dedicated action for.</para>
3324 <term>Effect:</term>
3327 Deletes every header sent by the client that contains the string the user supplied as parameter.
3334 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3336 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3341 <term>Parameter:</term>
3353 This action allows you to block client headers for which no dedicated
3354 <application>Privoxy</application> action exists.
3355 <application>Privoxy</application> will remove every client header that
3356 contains the string you supplied as parameter.
3359 Regular expressions are <emphasis>not supported</emphasis> and you can't
3360 use this action to block different headers in the same request, unless
3361 they contain the same string.
3364 <literal>crunch-client-header</literal> is only meant for quick tests.
3365 If you have to block several different headers, or only want to modify
3366 parts of them, you should use a
3367 <literal><link linkend="client-header-filter">client-header filter</link></literal>.
3371 Don't block any header without understanding the consequences.
3378 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3381 <screen># Block the non-existent "Privacy-Violation:" client header
3382 { +crunch-client-header{Privacy-Violation:} }
3392 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3393 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-if-none-match">
3394 <title>crunch-if-none-match</title>
3400 <term>Typical use:</term>
3402 <para>Prevent yet another way to track the user's steps between sessions.</para>
3407 <term>Effect:</term>
3410 Deletes the <quote>If-None-Match:</quote> HTTP client header.
3417 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3419 <para>Boolean.</para>
3424 <term>Parameter:</term>
3436 Removing the <quote>If-None-Match:</quote> HTTP client header
3437 is useful for filter testing, where you want to force a real
3438 reload instead of getting status code <quote>304</quote> which
3439 would cause the browser to use a cached copy of the page.
3442 It is also useful to make sure the header isn't used as a cookie
3443 replacement (unlikely but possible).
3446 Blocking the <quote>If-None-Match:</quote> header shouldn't cause any
3447 caching problems, as long as the <quote>If-Modified-Since:</quote> header
3448 isn't blocked or missing as well.
3451 It is recommended to use this action together with
3452 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hide-if-modified-since</link></literal>
3454 <literal><link linkend="overwrite-last-modified">overwrite-last-modified</link></literal>.
3460 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3463 <screen># Let the browser revalidate cached documents but don't
3464 # allow the server to use the revalidation headers for user tracking.
3465 {+hide-if-modified-since{-60} \
3466 +overwrite-last-modified{randomize} \
3467 +crunch-if-none-match}
3476 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3477 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-incoming-cookies">
3478 <title>crunch-incoming-cookies</title>
3482 <term>Typical use:</term>
3485 Prevent the web server from setting HTTP cookies on your system
3491 <term>Effect:</term>
3494 Deletes any <quote>Set-Cookie:</quote> HTTP headers from server replies.
3501 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3503 <para>Boolean.</para>
3508 <term>Parameter:</term>
3520 This action is only concerned with <emphasis>incoming</emphasis> HTTP cookies. For
3521 <emphasis>outgoing</emphasis> HTTP cookies, use
3522 <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal>.
3523 Use <emphasis>both</emphasis> to disable HTTP cookies completely.
3526 It makes <emphasis>no sense at all</emphasis> to use this action in conjunction
3527 with the <literal><link linkend="session-cookies-only">session-cookies-only</link></literal> action,
3528 since it would prevent the session cookies from being set. See also
3529 <literal><link linkend="filter-content-cookies">filter-content-cookies</link></literal>.
3535 <term>Example usage:</term>
3538 <screen>+crunch-incoming-cookies</screen>
3546 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3547 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-server-header">
3548 <title>crunch-server-header</title>
3554 <term>Typical use:</term>
3556 <para>Remove a server header <application>Privoxy</application> has no dedicated action for.</para>
3561 <term>Effect:</term>
3564 Deletes every header sent by the server that contains the string the user supplied as parameter.
3571 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3573 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3578 <term>Parameter:</term>
3590 This action allows you to block server headers for which no dedicated
3591 <application>Privoxy</application> action exists. <application>Privoxy</application>
3592 will remove every server header that contains the string you supplied as parameter.
3595 Regular expressions are <emphasis>not supported</emphasis> and you can't
3596 use this action to block different headers in the same request, unless
3597 they contain the same string.
3600 <literal>crunch-server-header</literal> is only meant for quick tests.
3601 If you have to block several different headers, or only want to modify
3602 parts of them, you should use a custom
3603 <literal><link linkend="server-header-filter">server-header filter</link></literal>.
3607 Don't block any header without understanding the consequences.
3614 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3617 <screen># Crunch server headers that try to prevent caching
3618 { +crunch-server-header{no-cache} }
3627 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3628 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="crunch-outgoing-cookies">
3629 <title>crunch-outgoing-cookies</title>
3633 <term>Typical use:</term>
3636 Prevent the web server from reading any HTTP cookies from your system
3642 <term>Effect:</term>
3645 Deletes any <quote>Cookie:</quote> HTTP headers from client requests.
3652 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3654 <para>Boolean.</para>
3659 <term>Parameter:</term>
3671 This action is only concerned with <emphasis>outgoing</emphasis> HTTP cookies. For
3672 <emphasis>incoming</emphasis> HTTP cookies, use
3673 <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal>.
3674 Use <emphasis>both</emphasis> to disable HTTP cookies completely.
3677 It makes <emphasis>no sense at all</emphasis> to use this action in conjunction
3678 with the <literal><link linkend="session-cookies-only">session-cookies-only</link></literal> action,
3679 since it would prevent the session cookies from being read.
3685 <term>Example usage:</term>
3688 <screen>+crunch-outgoing-cookies</screen>
3697 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3698 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="deanimate-gifs">
3699 <title>deanimate-gifs</title>
3703 <term>Typical use:</term>
3705 <para>Stop those annoying, distracting animated GIF images.</para>
3710 <term>Effect:</term>
3713 De-animate GIF animations, i.e. reduce them to their first or last image.
3720 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3722 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3727 <term>Parameter:</term>
3730 <quote>last</quote> or <quote>first</quote>
3739 This will also shrink the images considerably (in bytes, not pixels!). If
3740 the option <quote>first</quote> is given, the first frame of the animation
3741 is used as the replacement. If <quote>last</quote> is given, the last
3742 frame of the animation is used instead, which probably makes more sense for
3743 most banner animations, but also has the risk of not showing the entire
3744 last frame (if it is only a delta to an earlier frame).
3747 You can safely use this action with patterns that will also match non-GIF
3748 objects, because no attempt will be made at anything that doesn't look like
3755 <term>Example usage:</term>
3758 <screen>+deanimate-gifs{last}</screen>
3765 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3766 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="downgrade-http-version">
3767 <title>downgrade-http-version</title>
3771 <term>Typical use:</term>
3773 <para>Work around (very rare) problems with HTTP/1.1</para>
3778 <term>Effect:</term>
3781 Downgrades HTTP/1.1 client requests and server replies to HTTP/1.0.
3788 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3790 <para>Boolean.</para>
3795 <term>Parameter:</term>
3807 This is a left-over from the time when <application>Privoxy</application>
3808 didn't support important HTTP/1.1 features well. It is left here for the
3809 unlikely case that you experience HTTP/1.1 related problems with some server
3810 out there. Not all HTTP/1.1 features and requirements are supported yet,
3811 so there is a chance you might need this action.
3817 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
3820 <screen>{+downgrade-http-version}
3821 problem-host.example.com</screen>
3829 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3830 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="fast-redirects">
3831 <title>fast-redirects</title>
3835 <term>Typical use:</term>
3837 <para>Fool some click-tracking scripts and speed up indirect links.</para>
3842 <term>Effect:</term>
3845 Detects redirection URLs and redirects the browser without contacting
3846 the redirection server first.
3853 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3855 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3860 <term>Parameter:</term>
3865 <quote>simple-check</quote> to just search for the string <quote>http://</quote>
3866 to detect redirection URLs.
3871 <quote>check-decoded-url</quote> to decode URLs (if necessary) before searching
3872 for redirection URLs.
3883 Many sites, like yahoo.com, don't just link to other sites. Instead, they
3884 will link to some script on their own servers, giving the destination as a
3885 parameter, which will then redirect you to the final target. URLs
3886 resulting from this scheme typically look like:
3887 <quote>http://www.example.org/click-tracker.cgi?target=http%3a//www.example.net/</quote>.
3890 Sometimes, there are even multiple consecutive redirects encoded in the
3891 URL. These redirections via scripts make your web browsing more traceable,
3892 since the server from which you follow such a link can see where you go
3893 to. Apart from that, valuable bandwidth and time is wasted, while your
3894 browser asks the server for one redirect after the other. Plus, it feeds
3898 This feature is currently not very smart and is scheduled for improvement.
3899 If it is enabled by default, you will have to create some exceptions to
3900 this action. It can lead to failures in several ways:
3903 Not every URLs with other URLs as parameters is evil.
3904 Some sites offer a real service that requires this information to work.
3905 For example a validation service needs to know, which document to validate.
3906 <literal>fast-redirects</literal> assumes that every URL parameter that
3907 looks like another URL is a redirection target, and will always redirect to
3908 the last one. Most of the time the assumption is correct, but if it isn't,
3909 the user gets redirected anyway.
3912 Another failure occurs if the URL contains other parameters after the URL parameter.
3914 <quote>http://www.example.org/?redirect=http%3a//www.example.net/&foo=bar</quote>.
3915 contains the redirection URL <quote>http://www.example.net/</quote>,
3916 followed by another parameter. <literal>fast-redirects</literal> doesn't know that
3917 and will cause a redirect to <quote>http://www.example.net/&foo=bar</quote>.
3918 Depending on the target server configuration, the parameter will be silently ignored
3919 or lead to a <quote>page not found</quote> error. You can prevent this problem by
3920 first using the <literal><link linkend="redirect">redirect</link></literal> action
3921 to remove the last part of the URL, but it requires a little effort.
3924 To detect a redirection URL, <literal>fast-redirects</literal> only
3925 looks for the string <quote>http://</quote>, either in plain text
3926 (invalid but often used) or encoded as <quote>http%3a//</quote>.
3927 Some sites use their own URL encoding scheme, encrypt the address
3928 of the target server or replace it with a database id. In theses cases
3929 <literal>fast-redirects</literal> is fooled and the request reaches the
3930 redirection server where it probably gets logged.
3936 <term>Example usage:</term>
3940 { +fast-redirects{simple-check} }
3943 { +fast-redirects{check-decoded-url} }
3944 another.example.com/testing</screen>
3953 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3954 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="filter">
3955 <title>filter</title>
3959 <term>Typical use:</term>
3961 <para>Get rid of HTML and JavaScript annoyances, banner advertisements (by size),
3962 do fun text replacements, add personalized effects, etc.</para>
3967 <term>Effect:</term>
3970 All instances of text-based type, most notably HTML and JavaScript, to which
3971 this action applies, can be filtered on-the-fly through the specified regular
3972 expression based substitutions. (Note: as of version 3.0.3 plain text documents
3973 are exempted from filtering, because web servers often use the
3974 <literal>text/plain</literal> MIME type for all files whose type they don't know.)
3981 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3983 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3988 <term>Parameter:</term>
3991 The name of a content filter, as defined in the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file</link>.
3992 Filters can be defined in one or more files as defined by the
3993 <literal><link linkend="filterfile">filterfile</link></literal>
3994 option in the <link linkend="config">config file</link>.
3995 <filename>default.filter</filename> is the collection of filters
3996 supplied by the developers. Locally defined filters should go
3997 in their own file, such as <filename>user.filter</filename>.
4000 When used in its negative form,
4001 and without parameters, <emphasis>all</emphasis> filtering is completely disabled.
4010 For your convenience, there are a number of pre-defined filters available
4011 in the distribution filter file that you can use. See the examples below for
4015 Filtering requires buffering the page content, which may appear to
4016 slow down page rendering since nothing is displayed until all content has
4017 passed the filters. (It does not really take longer, but seems that way
4018 since the page is not incrementally displayed.) This effect will be more
4019 noticeable on slower connections.
4022 <quote>Rolling your own</quote>
4023 filters requires a knowledge of
4024 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
4025 Expressions</quote></ulink> and
4026 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Html"><quote>HTML</quote></ulink>.
4027 This is very powerful feature, and potentially very intrusive.
4028 Filters should be used with caution, and where an equivalent
4029 <quote>action</quote> is not available.
4032 The amount of data that can be filtered is limited to the
4033 <literal><link linkend="buffer-limit">buffer-limit</link></literal>
4034 option in the main <link linkend="config">config file</link>. The
4035 default is 4096 KB (4 Megs). Once this limit is exceeded, the buffered
4036 data, and all pending data, is passed through unfiltered.
4039 Inappropriate MIME types, such as zipped files, are not filtered at all.
4040 (Again, only text-based types except plain text). Encrypted SSL data
4041 (from HTTPS servers) cannot be filtered either, since this would violate
4042 the integrity of the secure transaction. In some situations it might
4043 be necessary to protect certain text, like source code, from filtering
4044 by defining appropriate <literal>-filter</literal> exceptions.
4047 Compressed content can't be filtered either, unless &my-app;
4048 is compiled with zlib support (requires at least &my-app; 3.0.7),
4049 in which case &my-app; will decompress the content before filtering
4053 If you use a &my-app; version without zlib support, but want filtering to work on
4054 as much documents as possible, even those that would normally be sent compressed,
4055 you must use the <literal><link linkend="prevent-compression">prevent-compression</link></literal>
4056 action in conjunction with <literal>filter</literal>.
4059 Content filtering can achieve some of the same effects as the
4060 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>
4061 action, i.e. it can be used to block ads and banners. But the mechanism
4062 works quite differently. One effective use, is to block ad banners
4063 based on their size (see below), since many of these seem to be somewhat
4067 <link linkend="contact">Feedback</link> with suggestions for new or
4068 improved filters is particularly welcome!
4071 The below list has only the names and a one-line description of each
4072 predefined filter. There are <link linkend="predefined-filters">more
4073 verbose explanations</link> of what these filters do in the <link
4074 linkend="filter-file">filter file chapter</link>.
4080 <term>Example usage (with filters from the distribution <filename>default.filter</filename> file).
4081 See <link linkend="PREDEFINED-FILTERS">the Predefined Filters section</link> for
4082 more explanation on each:</term>
4085 <anchor id="filter-js-annoyances">
4086 <screen>+filter{js-annoyances} # Get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse</screen>
4089 <anchor id="filter-js-events">
4090 <screen>+filter{js-events} # Kill all JS event bindings (Radically destructive! Only for extra nasty sites)</screen>
4093 <anchor id="filter-html-annoyances">
4094 <screen>+filter{html-annoyances} # Get rid of particularly annoying HTML abuse</screen>
4097 <anchor id="filter-content-cookies">
4098 <screen>+filter{content-cookies} # Kill cookies that come in the HTML or JS content</screen>
4101 <anchor id="filter-refresh-tags">
4102 <screen>+filter{refresh-tags} # Kill automatic refresh tags (for dial-on-demand setups)</screen>
4105 <anchor id="filter-unsolicited-popups">
4106 <screen>+filter{unsolicited-popups} # Disable only unsolicited pop-up windows. Useful if your browser lacks this ability.</screen>
4109 <anchor id="filter-all-popups">
4110 <screen>+filter{all-popups} # Kill all popups in JavaScript and HTML. Useful if your browser lacks this ability.</screen>
4113 <anchor id="filter-img-reorder">
4114 <screen>+filter{img-reorder} # Reorder attributes in <img> tags to make the banners-by-* filters more effective</screen>
4117 <anchor id="filter-banners-by-size">
4118 <screen>+filter{banners-by-size} # Kill banners by size</screen>
4121 <anchor id="filter-banners-by-link">
4122 <screen>+filter{banners-by-link} # Kill banners by their links to known clicktrackers</screen>
4125 <anchor id="filter-webbugs">
4126 <screen>+filter{webbugs} # Squish WebBugs (1x1 invisible GIFs used for user tracking)</screen>
4129 <anchor id="filter-tiny-textforms">
4130 <screen>+filter{tiny-textforms} # Extend those tiny textareas up to 40x80 and kill the hard wrap</screen>
4133 <anchor id="filter-jumping-windows">
4134 <screen>+filter{jumping-windows} # Prevent windows from resizing and moving themselves</screen>
4137 <anchor id="filter-frameset-borders">
4138 <screen>+filter{frameset-borders} # Give frames a border and make them resizeable</screen>
4141 <anchor id="filter-demoronizer">
4142 <screen>+filter{demoronizer} # Fix MS's non-standard use of standard charsets</screen>
4145 <anchor id="filter-shockwave-flash">
4146 <screen>+filter{shockwave-flash} # Kill embedded Shockwave Flash objects</screen>
4149 <anchor id="filter-quicktime-kioskmode">
4150 <screen>+filter{quicktime-kioskmode} # Make Quicktime movies savable</screen>
4153 <anchor id="filter-fun">
4154 <screen>+filter{fun} # Text replacements for subversive browsing fun!</screen>
4157 <anchor id="filter-crude-parental">
4158 <screen>+filter{crude-parental} # Crude parental filtering (demo only)</screen>
4161 <anchor id="filter-ie-exploits">
4162 <screen>+filter{ie-exploits} # Disable a known Internet Explorer bug exploits</screen>
4165 <anchor id="filter-site-specifics">
4166 <screen>+filter{site-specifics} # Custom filters for specific site related problems</screen>
4169 <anchor id="filter-google">
4170 <screen>+filter{google} # Removes text ads and other Google specific improvements</screen>
4173 <anchor id="filter-yahoo">
4174 <screen>+filter{yahoo} # Removes text ads and other Yahoo specific improvements</screen>
4177 <anchor id="filter-msn">
4178 <screen>+filter{msn} # Removes text ads and other MSN specific improvements</screen>
4181 <anchor id="filter-blogspot">
4182 <screen>+filter{blogspot} # Cleans up Blogspot blogs</screen>
4185 <anchor id="filter-no-ping">
4186 <screen>+filter{no-ping} # Removes non-standard ping attributes from anchor and area tags</screen>
4194 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4195 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="force-text-mode">
4196 <title>force-text-mode</title>
4202 <term>Typical use:</term>
4204 <para>Force <application>Privoxy</application> to treat a document as if it was in some kind of <emphasis>text</emphasis> format. </para>
4209 <term>Effect:</term>
4212 Declares a document as text, even if the <quote>Content-Type:</quote> isn't detected as such.
4219 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4221 <para>Boolean.</para>
4226 <term>Parameter:</term>
4238 As explained <literal><link linkend="filter">above</link></literal>,
4239 <application>Privoxy</application> tries to only filter files that are
4240 in some kind of text format. The same restrictions apply to
4241 <literal><link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite</link></literal>.
4242 <literal>force-text-mode</literal> declares a document as text,
4243 without looking at the <quote>Content-Type:</quote> first.
4247 Think twice before activating this action. Filtering binary data
4248 with regular expressions can cause file damage.
4255 <term>Example usage:</term>
4268 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4269 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="forward-override">
4270 <title>forward-override</title>
4276 <term>Typical use:</term>
4278 <para>Change the forwarding settings based on User-Agent or request origin</para>
4283 <term>Effect:</term>
4286 Overrules the forward directives in the configuration file.
4293 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4295 <para>Multi-value.</para>
4300 <term>Parameter:</term>
4304 <para><quote>forward .</quote> to use a direct connection without any additional proxies.</para>
4308 <quote>forward 127.0.0.1:8123</quote> to use the HTTP proxy listening at 127.0.0.1 port 8123.
4313 <quote>forward-socks4a 127.0.0.1:9050 .</quote> to use the socks4a proxy listening at
4314 127.0.0.1 port 9050. Replace <quote>forward-socks4a</quote> with <quote>forward-socks4</quote>
4315 to use a socks4 connection (with local DNS resolution) instead.
4320 <quote>forward-socks4a 127.0.0.1:9050 proxy.example.org:8000</quote> to use the socks4a proxy
4321 listening at 127.0.0.1 port 9050 to reach the HTTP proxy listening at proxy.example.org port 8000.
4322 Replace <quote>forward-socks4a</quote> with <quote>forward-socks4</quote> to use a socks4 connection
4323 (with local DNS resolution) instead.
4334 This action takes parameters similar to the <!-- I hope this link actual works -->
4335 <link linkend="forwarding">forward</link> directives in the configuration
4336 file, but without the URL pattern. It can be used as replacement, but normally it's only
4337 used in cases where matching based on the request URL isn't sufficient.
4341 Please read the description for the <link linkend="forwarding">forward</link> directives before
4342 using this action. Forwarding to the wrong people will reduce your privacy and increase the
4343 chances of man-in-the-middle attacks.
4346 If the ports are missing or invalid, default values will be used. This might change
4347 in the future and you shouldn't rely on it. Otherwise incorrect syntax causes Privoxy
4351 Use the <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">show-url-info CGI page</ulink>
4352 to verify that your forward settings do what you thought the do.
4359 <term>Example usage:</term>
4363 # Always use direct connections for requests previously tagged as
4364 # <quote>User-Agent: fetch libfetch/2.0</quote> and make sure
4365 # resuming downloads continues to work.
4366 # This way you can continue to use Tor for your normal browsing,
4367 # without overloading the Tor network with your FreeBSD ports updates
4368 # or downloads of bigger files like ISOs.
4369 {+forward-override{forward .} \
4370 -hide-if-modified-since \
4371 -overwrite-last-modified \
4373 TAG:^User-Agent: fetch libfetch/2\.0$
4382 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4383 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="handle-as-empty-document">
4384 <title>handle-as-empty-document</title>
4390 <term>Typical use:</term>
4392 <para>Mark URLs that should be replaced by empty documents <emphasis>if they get blocked</emphasis></para>
4397 <term>Effect:</term>
4400 This action alone doesn't do anything noticeable. It just marks URLs.
4401 If the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action <emphasis>also applies</emphasis>,
4402 the presence or absence of this mark decides whether an HTML <quote>BLOCKED</quote>
4403 page, or an empty document will be sent to the client as a substitute for the blocked content.
4404 The <emphasis>empty</emphasis> document isn't literally empty, but actually contains a single space.
4411 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4413 <para>Boolean.</para>
4418 <term>Parameter:</term>
4430 Some browsers complain about syntax errors if JavaScript documents
4431 are blocked with <application>Privoxy's</application>
4432 default HTML page; this option can be used to silence them.
4433 And of course this action can also be used to eliminate the &my-app;
4434 BLOCKED message in frames.
4437 The content type for the empty document can be specified with
4438 <literal><link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite{}</link></literal>,
4439 but usually this isn't necessary.
4445 <term>Example usage:</term>
4448 <screen># Block all documents on example.org that end with ".js",
4449 # but send an empty document instead of the usual HTML message.
4450 {+block +handle-as-empty-document}
4460 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4461 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="handle-as-image">
4462 <title>handle-as-image</title>
4466 <term>Typical use:</term>
4468 <para>Mark URLs as belonging to images (so they'll be replaced by images <emphasis>if they do get blocked</emphasis>, rather than HTML pages)</para>
4473 <term>Effect:</term>
4476 This action alone doesn't do anything noticeable. It just marks URLs as images.
4477 If the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action <emphasis>also applies</emphasis>,
4478 the presence or absence of this mark decides whether an HTML <quote>blocked</quote>
4479 page, or a replacement image (as determined by the <literal><link
4480 linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal> action) will be sent to the
4481 client as a substitute for the blocked content.
4488 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4490 <para>Boolean.</para>
4495 <term>Parameter:</term>
4507 The below generic example section is actually part of <filename>default.action</filename>.
4508 It marks all URLs with well-known image file name extensions as images and should
4512 Users will probably only want to use the handle-as-image action in conjunction with
4513 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>, to block sources of banners, whose URLs don't
4514 reflect the file type, like in the second example section.
4517 Note that you cannot treat HTML pages as images in most cases. For instance, (in-line) ad
4518 frames require an HTML page to be sent, or they won't display properly.
4519 Forcing <literal>handle-as-image</literal> in this situation will not replace the
4520 ad frame with an image, but lead to error messages.
4526 <term>Example usage (sections):</term>
4529 <screen># Generic image extensions:
4532 /.*\.(gif|jpg|jpeg|png|bmp|ico)$
4534 # These don't look like images, but they're banners and should be
4535 # blocked as images:
4537 {+block +handle-as-image}
4538 some.nasty-banner-server.com/junk.cgi\?output=trash
4540 # Banner source! Who cares if they also have non-image content?
4550 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4551 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-accept-language">
4552 <title>hide-accept-language</title>
4558 <term>Typical use:</term>
4560 <para>Pretend to use different language settings.</para>
4565 <term>Effect:</term>
4568 Deletes or replaces the <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> HTTP header in client requests.
4575 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4577 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4582 <term>Parameter:</term>
4585 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
4594 Faking the browser's language settings can be useful to make a
4595 foreign User-Agent set with
4596 <literal><link linkend="hide-user-agent">hide-user-agent</link></literal>
4600 However some sites with content in different languages check the
4601 <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> to decide which one to take by default.
4602 Sometimes it isn't possible to later switch to another language without
4603 changing the <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> header first.
4606 Therefore it's a good idea to either only change the
4607 <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> header to languages you understand,
4608 or to languages that aren't wide spread.
4611 Before setting the <quote>Accept-Language:</quote> header
4612 to a rare language, you should consider that it helps to
4613 make your requests unique and thus easier to trace.
4614 If you don't plan to change this header frequently,
4615 you should stick to a common language.
4621 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
4624 <screen># Pretend to use Canadian language settings.
4625 {+hide-accept-language{en-ca} \
4626 +hide-user-agent{Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; OpenBSD i386; en-CA; rv:1.8.0.4) Gecko/20060628 Firefox/1.5.0.4} \
4636 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4637 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-content-disposition">
4638 <title>hide-content-disposition</title>
4644 <term>Typical use:</term>
4646 <para>Prevent download menus for content you prefer to view inside the browser.</para>
4651 <term>Effect:</term>
4654 Deletes or replaces the <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> HTTP header set by some servers.
4661 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4663 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4668 <term>Parameter:</term>
4671 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
4680 Some servers set the <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> HTTP header for
4681 documents they assume you want to save locally before viewing them.
4682 The <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> header contains the file name
4683 the browser is supposed to use by default.
4686 In most browsers that understand this header, it makes it impossible to
4687 <emphasis>just view</emphasis> the document, without downloading it first,
4688 even if it's just a simple text file or an image.
4691 Removing the <quote>Content-Disposition:</quote> header helps
4692 to prevent this annoyance, but some browsers additionally check the
4693 <quote>Content-Type:</quote> header, before they decide if they can
4694 display a document without saving it first. In these cases, you have
4695 to change this header as well, before the browser stops displaying
4699 It is also possible to change the server's file name suggestion
4700 to another one, but in most cases it isn't worth the time to set
4704 This action will probably be removed in the future,
4705 use server-header filters instead.
4711 <term>Example usage:</term>
4714 <screen># Disarm the download link in Sourceforge's patch tracker
4716 +content-type-overwrite{text/plain}\
4717 +hide-content-disposition{block} }
4718 .sourceforge.net/tracker/download\.php</screen>
4726 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4727 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-if-modified-since">
4728 <title>hide-if-modified-since</title>
4734 <term>Typical use:</term>
4736 <para>Prevent yet another way to track the user's steps between sessions.</para>
4741 <term>Effect:</term>
4744 Deletes the <quote>If-Modified-Since:</quote> HTTP client header or modifies its value.
4751 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4753 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4758 <term>Parameter:</term>
4761 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or a user defined value that specifies a range of hours.
4770 Removing this header is useful for filter testing, where you want to force a real
4771 reload instead of getting status code <quote>304</quote>, which would cause the
4772 browser to use a cached copy of the page.
4775 Instead of removing the header, <literal>hide-if-modified-since</literal> can
4776 also add or subtract a random amount of time to/from the header's value.
4777 You specify a range of minutes where the random factor should be chosen from and
4778 <application>Privoxy</application> does the rest. A negative value means
4779 subtracting, a positive value adding.
4782 Randomizing the value of the <quote>If-Modified-Since:</quote> makes
4783 sure it isn't used as a cookie replacement, but you will run into
4784 caching problems if the random range is too high.
4787 It is a good idea to only use a small negative value and let
4788 <literal><link linkend="overwrite-last-modified">overwrite-last-modified</link></literal>
4789 handle the greater changes.
4792 It is also recommended to use this action together with
4793 <literal><link linkend="crunch-if-none-match">crunch-if-none-match</link></literal>.
4799 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
4802 <screen># Let the browser revalidate without being tracked across sessions
4803 { +hide-if-modified-since{-60} \
4804 +overwrite-last-modified{randomize} \
4805 +crunch-if-none-match}
4814 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4815 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-forwarded-for-headers">
4816 <title>hide-forwarded-for-headers</title>
4819 <term>Typical use:</term>
4821 <para>Improve privacy by not embedding the source of the request in the HTTP headers.</para>
4826 <term>Effect:</term>
4829 Deletes any existing <quote>X-Forwarded-for:</quote> HTTP header from client requests,
4830 and prevents adding a new one.
4837 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4839 <para>Boolean.</para>
4844 <term>Parameter:</term>
4856 It is safe to leave this on.
4862 <term>Example usage:</term>
4865 <screen>+hide-forwarded-for-headers</screen>
4873 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4874 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-from-header">
4875 <title>hide-from-header</title>
4879 <term>Typical use:</term>
4881 <para>Keep your (old and ill) browser from telling web servers your email address</para>
4886 <term>Effect:</term>
4889 Deletes any existing <quote>From:</quote> HTTP header, or replaces it with the
4897 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4899 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4904 <term>Parameter:</term>
4907 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
4916 The keyword <quote>block</quote> will completely remove the header
4917 (not to be confused with the <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>
4921 Alternately, you can specify any value you prefer to be sent to the web
4922 server. If you do, it is a matter of fairness not to use any address that
4923 is actually used by a real person.
4926 This action is rarely needed, as modern web browsers don't send
4927 <quote>From:</quote> headers anymore.
4933 <term>Example usage:</term>
4936 <screen>+hide-from-header{block}</screen> or
4937 <screen>+hide-from-header{spam-me-senseless@sittingduck.example.com}</screen>
4945 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4946 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-referrer">
4947 <title>hide-referrer</title>
4948 <anchor id="hide-referer">
4951 <term>Typical use:</term>
4953 <para>Conceal which link you followed to get to a particular site</para>
4958 <term>Effect:</term>
4961 Deletes the <quote>Referer:</quote> (sic) HTTP header from the client request,
4962 or replaces it with a forged one.
4969 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4971 <para>Parameterized.</para>
4976 <term>Parameter:</term>
4980 <para><quote>conditional-block</quote> to delete the header completely if the host has changed.</para>
4984 <para><quote>conditional-forge</quote> to forge the header if the host has changed.</para>
4988 <para><quote>block</quote> to delete the header unconditionally.</para>
4991 <para><quote>forge</quote> to pretend to be coming from the homepage of the server we are talking to.</para>
4994 <para>Any other string to set a user defined referrer.</para>
5004 <literal>conditional-block</literal> is the only parameter,
5005 that isn't easily detected in the server's log file. If it blocks the
5006 referrer, the request will look like the visitor used a bookmark or
5007 typed in the address directly.
5010 Leaving the referrer unmodified for requests on the same host
5011 allows the server owner to see the visitor's <quote>click path</quote>,
5012 but in most cases she could also get that information by comparing
5013 other parts of the log file: for example the User-Agent if it isn't
5014 a very common one, or the user's IP address if it doesn't change between
5018 Always blocking the referrer, or using a custom one, can lead to
5019 failures on servers that check the referrer before they answer any
5020 requests, in an attempt to prevent their valuable content from being
5021 embedded or linked to elsewhere.
5024 Both <literal>conditional-block</literal> and <literal>forge</literal>
5025 will work with referrer checks, as long as content and valid referring page
5026 are on the same host. Most of the time that's the case.
5029 <literal>hide-referer</literal> is an alternate spelling of
5030 <literal>hide-referrer</literal> and the two can be can be freely
5031 substituted with each other. (<quote>referrer</quote> is the
5032 correct English spelling, however the HTTP specification has a bug - it
5033 requires it to be spelled as <quote>referer</quote>.)
5039 <term>Example usage:</term>
5042 <screen>+hide-referrer{forge}</screen> or
5043 <screen>+hide-referrer{http://www.yahoo.com/}</screen>
5051 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5052 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-user-agent">
5053 <title>hide-user-agent</title>
5057 <term>Typical use:</term>
5059 <para>Conceal your type of browser and client operating system</para>
5064 <term>Effect:</term>
5067 Replaces the value of the <quote>User-Agent:</quote> HTTP header
5068 in client requests with the specified value.
5075 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5077 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5082 <term>Parameter:</term>
5085 Any user-defined string.
5095 This can lead to problems on web sites that depend on looking at this header in
5096 order to customize their content for different browsers (which, by the
5097 way, is <emphasis>NOT</emphasis> the right thing to do: good web sites
5098 work browser-independently).
5100 <ulink url="http://www.javascriptkit.com/javaindex.shtml">smart way to do
5106 Using this action in multi-user setups or wherever different types of
5107 browsers will access the same <application>Privoxy</application> is
5108 <emphasis>not recommended</emphasis>. In single-user, single-browser
5109 setups, you might use it to delete your OS version information from
5110 the headers, because it is an invitation to exploit known bugs for your
5111 OS. It is also occasionally useful to forge this in order to access
5112 sites that won't let you in otherwise (though there may be a good
5113 reason in some cases). Example of this: some MSN sites will not
5114 let <application>Mozilla</application> enter, yet forging to a
5115 <application>Netscape 6.1</application> user-agent works just fine.
5116 (Must be just a silly MS goof, I'm sure :-).
5119 More information on known user-agent strings can be found at
5120 <ulink url="http://www.user-agents.org/">http://www.user-agents.org/</ulink>
5122 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent</ulink>.
5128 <term>Example usage:</term>
5131 <screen>+hide-user-agent{Netscape 6.1 (X11; I; Linux 2.4.18 i686)}</screen>
5139 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5140 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="inspect-jpegs">
5141 <title>inspect-jpegs</title>
5147 <term>Typical use:</term>
5149 <para>To protect against the MS buffer over-run in JPEG processing</para>
5154 <term>Effect:</term>
5157 Protect against a known exploit
5164 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5166 <para>Boolean.</para>
5171 <term>Parameter:</term>
5183 See Microsoft Security Bulletin MS04-028. JPEG images are one of the most
5184 common image types found across the Internet. The exploit as described can
5185 allow execution of code on the target system, giving an attacker access
5186 to the system in question by merely planting an altered JPEG image, which
5187 would have no obvious indications of what lurks inside. This action
5188 prevents this exploit.
5191 Note that the described exploit is only one of many,
5192 using this action does not mean that you no longer
5193 have to patch the client.
5200 <term>Example usage:</term>
5202 <para><screen>+inspect-jpegs</screen></para>
5209 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5210 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="kill-popups">
5211 <title>kill-popups<anchor id="kill-popup"></title>
5215 <term>Typical use:</term>
5217 <para>Eliminate those annoying pop-up windows (deprecated)</para>
5222 <term>Effect:</term>
5225 While loading the document, replace JavaScript code that opens
5226 pop-up windows with (syntactically neutral) dummy code on the fly.
5233 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5235 <para>Boolean.</para>
5240 <term>Parameter:</term>
5252 This action is basically a built-in, hardwired special-purpose filter
5253 action, but there are important differences: For <literal>kill-popups</literal>,
5254 the document need not be buffered, so it can be incrementally rendered while
5255 downloading. But <literal>kill-popups</literal> doesn't catch as many pop-ups as
5257 linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{<replaceable>all-popups</replaceable>}</link></literal>
5258 does and is not as smart as <literal><link
5259 linkend="FILTER-UNSOLICITED-POPUPS">filter{<replaceable>unsolicited-popups</replaceable>}</link>
5263 Think of it as a fast and efficient replacement for a filter that you
5264 can use if you don't want any filtering at all. Note that it doesn't make
5265 sense to combine it with any <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal> action,
5266 since as soon as one <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal> applies,
5267 the whole document needs to be buffered anyway, which destroys the advantage of
5268 the <literal>kill-popups</literal> action over its filter equivalent.
5271 Killing all pop-ups unconditionally is problematic. Many shops and banks rely on
5272 pop-ups to display forms, shopping carts etc, and the <literal><link
5273 linkend="FILTER-UNSOLICITED-POPUPS">filter{<replaceable>unsolicited-popups</replaceable>}</link>
5274 </literal> does a better job of catching only the unwanted ones.
5277 If the only kind of pop-ups that you want to kill are exit consoles (those
5278 <emphasis>really nasty</emphasis> windows that appear when you close an other
5279 one), you might want to use
5281 linkend="filter">filter</link>{<replaceable>js-annoyances</replaceable>}</literal>
5285 This action is most appropriate for browsers that don't have any controls
5286 for unwanted pop-ups. Not recommended for general usage.
5291 An alternate spelling is <literal>+kill-popup</literal>, which is
5299 <term>Example usage:</term>
5301 <para><screen>+kill-popups</screen></para>
5308 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5309 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="limit-connect">
5310 <title>limit-connect</title>
5314 <term>Typical use:</term>
5316 <para>Prevent abuse of <application>Privoxy</application> as a TCP proxy relay or disable SSL for untrusted sites</para>
5321 <term>Effect:</term>
5324 Specifies to which ports HTTP CONNECT requests are allowable.
5331 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5333 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5338 <term>Parameter:</term>
5341 A comma-separated list of ports or port ranges (the latter using dashes, with the minimum
5342 defaulting to 0 and the maximum to 65K).
5351 By default, i.e. if no <literal>limit-connect</literal> action applies,
5352 <application>Privoxy</application> only allows HTTP CONNECT
5353 requests to port 443 (the standard, secure HTTPS port). Use
5354 <literal>limit-connect</literal> if more fine-grained control is desired
5355 for some or all destinations.
5358 The CONNECT methods exists in HTTP to allow access to secure websites
5359 (<quote>https://</quote> URLs) through proxies. It works very simply:
5360 the proxy connects to the server on the specified port, and then
5361 short-circuits its connections to the client and to the remote server.
5362 This can be a big security hole, since CONNECT-enabled proxies can be
5363 abused as TCP relays very easily.
5366 <application>Privoxy</application> relays HTTPS traffic without seeing
5367 the decoded content. Websites can leverage this limitation to circumvent &my-app;'s
5368 filters. By specifying an invalid port range you can disable HTTPS entirely.
5369 If you plan to disable SSL by default, consider enabling
5370 <literal><link linkend="treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks ">treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks</link></literal>
5371 as well, to be able to quickly create exceptions.
5377 <term>Example usages:</term>
5379 <!-- I had trouble getting the spacing to look right in my browser -->
5380 <!-- I probably have the wrong font setup, bollocks. -->
5381 <!-- Apparently the emphasis tag uses a proportional font no matter what -->
5383 <screen>+limit-connect{443} # This is the default and need not be specified.
5384 +limit-connect{80,443} # Ports 80 and 443 are OK.
5385 +limit-connect{-3, 7, 20-100, 500-} # Ports less than 3, 7, 20 to 100 and above 500 are OK.
5386 +limit-connect{-} # All ports are OK
5387 +limit-connect{,} # No HTTPS/SSL traffic is allowed</screen>
5394 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5395 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="prevent-compression">
5396 <title>prevent-compression</title>
5400 <term>Typical use:</term>
5403 Ensure that servers send the content uncompressed, so it can be
5404 passed through <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal>s.
5410 <term>Effect:</term>
5413 Removes the Accept-Encoding header which can be used to ask for compressed transfer.
5420 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5422 <para>Boolean.</para>
5427 <term>Parameter:</term>
5439 More and more websites send their content compressed by default, which
5440 is generally a good idea and saves bandwidth. But the <literal><link
5441 linkend="filter">filter</link></literal>, <literal><link linkend="deanimate-gifs">deanimate-gifs</link></literal>
5442 and <literal><link linkend="kill-popups">kill-popups</link></literal> actions need
5443 access to the uncompressed data.
5446 When compiled with zlib support (available since &my-app; 3.0.7), content that should be
5447 filtered is decompressed on-the-fly and you don't have to worry about this action.
5448 If you are using an older &my-app; version, or one that hasn't been compiled with zlib
5449 support, this action can be used to convince the server to send the content uncompressed.
5452 Most text-based instances compress very well, the size is seldom decreased by less than 50%,
5453 for markup-heavy instances like news feeds saving more than 90% of the original size isn't
5457 Not using compression will therefore slow down the transfer, and you should only
5458 enable this action if you really need it. As of &my-app; 3.0.7 it's disabled in all
5459 predefined action settings.
5462 Note that some (rare) ill-configured sites don't handle requests for uncompressed
5463 documents correctly. Broken PHP applications tend to send an empty document body,
5464 some IIS versions only send the beginning of the content. If you enable
5465 <literal>prevent-compression</literal> per default, you might want to add
5466 exceptions for those sites. See the example for how to do that.
5472 <term>Example usage (sections):</term>
5476 # Selectively turn off compression, and enable a filter
5478 { +filter{tiny-textforms} +prevent-compression }
5479 # Match only these sites
5484 # Or instead, we could set a universal default:
5486 { +prevent-compression }
5489 # Then maybe make exceptions for broken sites:
5491 { -prevent-compression }
5492 .compusa.com/</screen>
5501 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5502 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="overwrite-last-modified">
5503 <title>overwrite-last-modified</title>
5509 <term>Typical use:</term>
5511 <para>Prevent yet another way to track the user's steps between sessions.</para>
5516 <term>Effect:</term>
5519 Deletes the <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> HTTP server header or modifies its value.
5526 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5528 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5533 <term>Parameter:</term>
5536 One of the keywords: <quote>block</quote>, <quote>reset-to-request-time</quote>
5537 and <quote>randomize</quote>
5546 Removing the <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header is useful for filter
5547 testing, where you want to force a real reload instead of getting status
5548 code <quote>304</quote>, which would cause the browser to reuse the old
5549 version of the page.
5552 The <quote>randomize</quote> option overwrites the value of the
5553 <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header with a randomly chosen time
5554 between the original value and the current time. In theory the server
5555 could send each document with a different <quote>Last-Modified:</quote>
5556 header to track visits without using cookies. <quote>Randomize</quote>
5557 makes it impossible and the browser can still revalidate cached documents.
5560 <quote>reset-to-request-time</quote> overwrites the value of the
5561 <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header with the current time. You could use
5562 this option together with
5563 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hided-if-modified-since</link></literal>
5564 to further customize your random range.
5567 The preferred parameter here is <quote>randomize</quote>. It is safe
5568 to use, as long as the time settings are more or less correct.
5569 If the server sets the <quote>Last-Modified:</quote> header to the time
5570 of the request, the random range becomes zero and the value stays the same.
5571 Therefore you should later randomize it a second time with
5572 <literal><link linkend="hide-if-modified-since">hided-if-modified-since</link></literal>,
5576 It is also recommended to use this action together with
5577 <literal><link linkend="crunch-if-none-match">crunch-if-none-match</link></literal>.
5583 <term>Example usage:</term>
5586 <screen># Let the browser revalidate without being tracked across sessions
5587 { +hide-if-modified-since{-60} \
5588 +overwrite-last-modified{randomize} \
5589 +crunch-if-none-match}
5598 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5599 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="redirect">
5600 <title>redirect</title>
5606 <term>Typical use:</term>
5609 Redirect requests to other sites.
5615 <term>Effect:</term>
5618 Convinces the browser that the requested document has been moved
5619 to another location and the browser should get it from there.
5626 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5628 <para>Parameterized</para>
5633 <term>Parameter:</term>
5636 An absolute URL or a single pcrs command.
5645 Requests to which this action applies are answered with a
5646 HTTP redirect to URLs of your choosing. The new URL is
5647 either provided as parameter, or derived by applying a
5648 single pcrs command to the original URL.
5651 This action will be ignored if you use it together with
5652 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal>.
5653 It can be combined with
5654 <literal><link linkend="fast-redirects">fast-redirects{check-decoded-url}</link></literal>
5655 to redirect to a decoded version of a rewritten URL.
5658 Use this action carefully, make sure not to create redirection loops
5659 and be aware that using your own redirects might make it
5660 possible to fingerprint your requests.
5666 <term>Example usages:</term>
5669 <screen># Replace example.com's style sheet with another one
5670 { +redirect{http://localhost/css-replacements/example.com.css} }
5671 example.com/stylesheet\.css
5673 # Create a short, easy to remember nickname for a favorite site
5674 # (relies on the browser accept and forward invalid URLs to &my-app;)
5675 { +redirect{http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/actions-file.html} }
5678 # Always use the expanded view for Undeadly.org articles
5679 # (Note the $ at the end of the URL pattern to make sure
5680 # the request for the rewritten URL isn't redirected as well)
5681 {+redirect{s@$@&mode=expanded@}}
5682 undeadly.org/cgi\?action=article&sid=\d*$</screen>
5691 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5692 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="send-vanilla-wafer">
5693 <title>send-vanilla-wafer</title>
5697 <term>Typical use:</term>
5700 Feed log analysis scripts with useless data.
5706 <term>Effect:</term>
5709 Sends a cookie with each request stating that you do not accept any copyright
5710 on cookies sent to you, and asking the site operator not to track you.
5717 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5719 <para>Boolean.</para>
5724 <term>Parameter:</term>
5736 The vanilla wafer is a (relatively) unique header and could conceivably be used to track you.
5739 This action is rarely used and not enabled in the default configuration.
5745 <term>Example usage:</term>
5748 <screen>+send-vanilla-wafer</screen>
5757 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5758 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="send-wafer">
5759 <title>send-wafer</title>
5763 <term>Typical use:</term>
5766 Send custom cookies or feed log analysis scripts with even more useless data.
5772 <term>Effect:</term>
5775 Sends a custom, user-defined cookie with each request.
5782 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
5784 <para>Multi-value.</para>
5789 <term>Parameter:</term>
5792 A string of the form <quote><replaceable class="option">name</replaceable>=<replaceable
5793 class="parameter">value</replaceable></quote>.
5802 Being multi-valued, multiple instances of this action can apply to the same request,
5803 resulting in multiple cookies being sent.
5806 This action is rarely used and not enabled in the default configuration.
5811 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
5814 <screen>{+send-wafer{UsingPrivoxy=true}}
5815 my-internal-testing-server.void</screen>
5823 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5824 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="server-header-filter">
5825 <title>server-header-filter</title>
5829 <term>Typical use:</term>
5832 Rewrite or remove single server headers.
5838 <term>Effect:</term>
5841 All server headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly
5842 through the specified regular expression based substitutions.
5849 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
5851 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5856 <term>Parameter:</term>
5859 The name of a server-header filter, as defined in one of the
5860 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
5869 Server-header filters are applied to each header on its own, not to
5870 all at once. This makes it easier to diagnose problems, but on the downside
5871 you can't write filters that only change header x if header y's value is z.
5872 You can do that by using tags though.
5875 Server-header filters are executed after the other header actions have finished
5876 and use their output as input.
5879 Please refer to the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file chapter</link>
5880 to learn which server-header filters are available by default, and how to
5887 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
5891 {+server-header-filter{html-to-xml}}
5892 example.org/xml-instance-that-is-delivered-as-html
5894 {+server-header-filter{xml-to-html}}
5895 example.org/instance-that-is-delivered-as-xml-but-is-not
5905 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5906 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="server-header-tagger">
5907 <title>server-header-tagger</title>
5911 <term>Typical use:</term>
5914 Enable or disable filters based on the Content-Type header.
5920 <term>Effect:</term>
5923 Server headers to which this action applies are filtered on-the-fly through
5924 the specified regular expression based substitutions, the result is used as
5932 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
5934 <para>Parameterized.</para>
5939 <term>Parameter:</term>
5942 The name of a server-header tagger, as defined in one of the
5943 <link linkend="filter-file">filter files</link>.
5952 Server-header taggers are applied to each header on its own,
5953 and as the header isn't modified, each tagger <quote>sees</quote>
5957 Server-header taggers are executed before all other header actions
5958 that modify server headers. Their tags can be used to control
5959 all of the other server-header actions, the content filters
5960 and the crunch actions (<link linkend="redirect">redirect</link>
5961 and <link linkend="block">block</link>).
5964 Obviously crunching based on tags created by server-header taggers
5965 doesn't prevent the request from showing up in the server's log file.
5972 <term>Example usage (section):</term>
5976 # Tag every request with the content type declared by the server
5977 {+server-header-tagger{content-type}}
5988 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5989 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="session-cookies-only">
5990 <title>session-cookies-only</title>
5994 <term>Typical use:</term>
5997 Allow only temporary <quote>session</quote> cookies (for the current
5998 browser session <emphasis>only</emphasis>).
6004 <term>Effect:</term>
6007 Deletes the <quote>expires</quote> field from <quote>Set-Cookie:</quote>
6008 server headers. Most browsers will not store such cookies permanently and
6009 forget them in between sessions.
6016 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
6018 <para>Boolean.</para>
6023 <term>Parameter:</term>
6035 This is less strict than <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal> /
6036 <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal> and allows you to browse
6037 websites that insist or rely on setting cookies, without compromising your privacy too badly.
6040 Most browsers will not permanently store cookies that have been processed by
6041 <literal>session-cookies-only</literal> and will forget about them between sessions.
6042 This makes profiling cookies useless, but won't break sites which require cookies so
6043 that you can log in for transactions. This is generally turned on for all
6044 sites, and is the recommended setting.
6047 It makes <emphasis>no sense at all</emphasis> to use <literal>session-cookies-only</literal>
6048 together with <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal> or
6049 <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal>. If you do, cookies
6050 will be plainly killed.
6053 Note that it is up to the browser how it handles such cookies without an <quote>expires</quote>
6054 field. If you use an exotic browser, you might want to try it out to be sure.
6057 This setting also has no effect on cookies that may have been stored
6058 previously by the browser before starting <application>Privoxy</application>.
6059 These would have to be removed manually.
6062 <application>Privoxy</application> also uses
6063 the <link linkend="filter-content-cookies">content-cookies filter</link>
6064 to block some types of cookies. Content cookies are not effected by
6065 <literal>session-cookies-only</literal>.
6071 <term>Example usage:</term>
6074 <screen>+session-cookies-only</screen>
6082 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
6083 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="set-image-blocker">
6084 <title>set-image-blocker</title>
6088 <term>Typical use:</term>
6090 <para>Choose the replacement for blocked images</para>
6095 <term>Effect:</term>
6098 This action alone doesn't do anything noticeable. If <emphasis>both</emphasis>
6099 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> <emphasis>and</emphasis> <literal><link
6100 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> <emphasis>also</emphasis>
6101 apply, i.e. if the request is to be blocked as an image,
6102 <emphasis>then</emphasis> the parameter of this action decides what will be
6103 sent as a replacement.
6110 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
6112 <para>Parameterized.</para>
6117 <term>Parameter:</term>
6122 <quote>pattern</quote> to send a built-in checkerboard pattern image. The image is visually
6123 decent, scales very well, and makes it obvious where banners were busted.
6128 <quote>blank</quote> to send a built-in transparent image. This makes banners disappear
6129 completely, but makes it hard to detect where <application>Privoxy</application> has blocked
6130 images on a given page and complicates troubleshooting if <application>Privoxy</application>
6131 has blocked innocent images, like navigation icons.
6136 <quote><replaceable class="parameter">target-url</replaceable></quote> to
6137 send a redirect to <replaceable class="parameter">target-url</replaceable>. You can redirect
6138 to any image anywhere, even in your local filesystem via <quote>file:///</quote> URL.
6139 (But note that not all browsers support redirecting to a local file system).
6142 A good application of redirects is to use special <application>Privoxy</application>-built-in
6143 URLs, which send the built-in images, as <replaceable class="parameter">target-url</replaceable>.
6144 This has the same visual effect as specifying <quote>blank</quote> or <quote>pattern</quote> in
6145 the first place, but enables your browser to cache the replacement image, instead of requesting
6146 it over and over again.
6157 The URLs for the built-in images are <quote>http://config.privoxy.org/send-banner?type=<replaceable
6158 class="parameter">type</replaceable></quote>, where <replaceable class="parameter">type</replaceable> is
6159 either <quote>blank</quote> or <quote>pattern</quote>.
6162 There is a third (advanced) type, called <quote>auto</quote>. It is <emphasis>NOT</emphasis> to be
6163 used in <literal>set-image-blocker</literal>, but meant for use from <link linkend="filter-file">filters</link>.
6164 Auto will select the type of image that would have applied to the referring page, had it been an image.
6170 <term>Example usage:</term>
6176 <screen>+set-image-blocker{pattern}</screen>
6179 Redirect to the BSD daemon:
6182 <screen>+set-image-blocker{http://www.freebsd.org/gifs/dae_up3.gif}</screen>
6185 Redirect to the built-in pattern for better caching:
6188 <screen>+set-image-blocker{http://config.privoxy.org/send-banner?type=pattern}</screen>
6196 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
6197 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks">
6198 <title>treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks</title>
6204 <term>Typical use:</term>
6206 <para>Block forbidden connects with an easy to find error message.</para>
6211 <term>Effect:</term>
6214 If this action is enabled, <application>Privoxy</application> no longer
6215 makes a difference between forbidden connects and ordinary blocks.
6222 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
6224 <para>Boolean</para>
6229 <term>Parameter:</term>
6239 By default <application>Privoxy</application> answers
6240 <link linkend="limit-connect">forbidden <quote>Connect</quote> requests</link>
6241 with a short error message inside the headers. If the browser doesn't display
6242 headers (most don't), you just see an empty page.
6245 With this action enabled, <application>Privoxy</application> displays
6246 the message that is used for ordinary blocks instead. If you decide
6247 to make an exception for the page in question, you can do so by
6248 following the <quote>See why</quote> link.
6251 For <quote>Connect</quote> requests the clients tell
6252 <application>Privoxy</application> which host they are interested
6253 in, but not which document they plan to get later. As a result, the
6254 <quote>Go there anyway</quote> wouldn't work and is therefore suppressed.
6260 <term>Example usage:</term>
6263 <screen>+treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks</screen>
6271 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
6273 <title>Summary</title>
6275 Note that many of these actions have the potential to cause a page to
6276 misbehave, possibly even not to display at all. There are many ways
6277 a site designer may choose to design his site, and what HTTP header
6278 content, and other criteria, he may depend on. There is no way to have hard
6279 and fast rules for all sites. See the <link
6280 linkend="ACTIONSANAT">Appendix</link> for a brief example on troubleshooting
6286 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
6287 <sect2 id="aliases">
6288 <title>Aliases</title>
6290 Custom <quote>actions</quote>, known to <application>Privoxy</application>
6291 as <quote>aliases</quote>, can be defined by combining other actions.
6292 These can in turn be invoked just like the built-in actions.
6293 Currently, an alias name can contain any character except space, tab,
6295 <quote>{</quote> and <quote>}</quote>, but we <emphasis>strongly
6296 recommend</emphasis> that you only use <quote>a</quote> to <quote>z</quote>,
6297 <quote>0</quote> to <quote>9</quote>, <quote>+</quote>, and <quote>-</quote>.
6298 Alias names are not case sensitive, and are not required to start with a
6299 <quote>+</quote> or <quote>-</quote> sign, since they are merely textually
6303 Aliases can be used throughout the actions file, but they <emphasis>must be
6304 defined in a special section at the top of the file!</emphasis>
6305 And there can only be one such section per actions file. Each actions file may
6306 have its own alias section, and the aliases defined in it are only visible
6310 There are two main reasons to use aliases: One is to save typing for frequently
6311 used combinations of actions, the other one is a gain in flexibility: If you
6312 decide once how you want to handle shops by defining an alias called
6313 <quote>shop</quote>, you can later change your policy on shops in
6314 <emphasis>one</emphasis> place, and your changes will take effect everywhere
6315 in the actions file where the <quote>shop</quote> alias is used. Calling aliases
6316 by their purpose also makes your actions files more readable.
6319 Currently, there is one big drawback to using aliases, though:
6320 <application>Privoxy</application>'s built-in web-based action file
6321 editor honors aliases when reading the actions files, but it expands
6322 them before writing. So the effects of your aliases are of course preserved,
6323 but the aliases themselves are lost when you edit sections that use aliases
6328 Now let's define some aliases...
6333 # Useful custom aliases we can use later.
6335 # Note the (required!) section header line and that this section
6336 # must be at the top of the actions file!
6340 # These aliases just save typing later:
6341 # (Note that some already use other aliases!)
6343 +crunch-all-cookies = +<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> +<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
6344 -crunch-all-cookies = -<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> -<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
6345 +block-as-image = +block +handle-as-image
6346 allow-all-cookies = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> -<link linkend="FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">filter{content-cookies}</link>
6348 # These aliases define combinations of actions
6349 # that are useful for certain types of sites:
6351 fragile = -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link> -<link linkend="HIDE-REFERER">hide-referrer</link> -<link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link> -<link linkend="PREVENT-COMPRESSION">prevent-compression</link>
6353 shop = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{all-popups}</link> -<link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link>
6355 # Short names for other aliases, for really lazy people ;-)
6357 c0 = +crunch-all-cookies
6358 c1 = -crunch-all-cookies</screen>
6362 ...and put them to use. These sections would appear in the lower part of an
6363 actions file and define exceptions to the default actions (as specified further
6364 up for the <quote>/</quote> pattern):
6369 # These sites are either very complex or very keen on
6370 # user data and require minimal interference to work:
6373 .office.microsoft.com
6374 .windowsupdate.microsoft.com
6375 # Gmail is really mail.google.com, not gmail.com
6379 # Allow cookies (for setting and retrieving your customer data)
6383 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
6386 # These shops require pop-ups:
6388 {-kill-popups -filter{all-popups} -filter{unsolicited-popups}}
6390 .overclockers.co.uk</screen>
6394 Aliases like <quote>shop</quote> and <quote>fragile</quote> are typically used for
6395 <quote>problem</quote> sites that require more than one action to be disabled
6396 in order to function properly.
6402 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
6403 <sect2 id="act-examples">
6404 <title>Actions Files Tutorial</title>
6406 The above chapters have shown <link linkend="actions-file">which actions files
6407 there are and how they are organized</link>, how actions are <link
6408 linkend="actions">specified</link> and <link linkend="actions-apply">applied
6409 to URLs</link>, how <link linkend="af-patterns">patterns</link> work, and how to
6410 define and use <link linkend="aliases">aliases</link>. Now, let's look at an
6411 example <filename>default.action</filename> and <filename>user.action</filename>
6412 file and see how all these pieces come together:
6415 <sect3><title>default.action</title>
6418 Every config file should start with a short comment stating its purpose:
6422 <screen># Sample default.action file <ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net></screen>
6426 Then, since this is the <filename>default.action</filename> file, the
6427 first section is a special section for internal use that you needn't
6428 change or worry about:
6433 ##########################################################################
6434 # Settings -- Don't change! For internal Privoxy use ONLY.
6435 ##########################################################################
6438 for-privoxy-version=3.0</screen>
6442 After that comes the (optional) alias section. We'll use the example
6443 section from the above <link linkend="aliases">chapter on aliases</link>,
6444 that also explains why and how aliases are used:
6449 ##########################################################################
6451 ##########################################################################
6454 # These aliases just save typing later:
6455 # (Note that some already use other aliases!)
6457 +crunch-all-cookies = +<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> +<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
6458 -crunch-all-cookies = -<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> -<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link>
6459 +block-as-image = +block +handle-as-image
6460 mercy-for-cookies = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> -<link linkend="FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">filter{content-cookies}</link>
6462 # These aliases define combinations of actions
6463 # that are useful for certain types of sites:
6465 fragile = -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link> -<link linkend="HIDE-REFERER">hide-referrer</link> -<link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link>
6466 shop = -crunch-all-cookies -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{all-popups}</link> -<link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link></screen>
6470 Now come the regular sections, i.e. sets of actions, accompanied
6471 by URL patterns to which they apply. Remember <emphasis>all actions
6472 are disabled when matching starts</emphasis>, so we have to explicitly
6473 enable the ones we want.
6477 The first regular section is probably the most important. It has only
6478 one pattern, <quote><literal>/</literal></quote>, but this pattern
6479 <link linkend="af-patterns">matches all URLs</link>. Therefore, the
6480 set of actions used in this <quote>default</quote> section <emphasis>will
6481 be applied to all requests as a start</emphasis>. It can be partly or
6482 wholly overridden by later matches further down this file, or in user.action,
6483 but it will still be largely responsible for your overall browsing
6488 Again, at the start of matching, all actions are disabled, so there is
6489 no real need to disable any actions here, but we will do that nonetheless,
6490 to have a complete listing for your reference. (Remember: a <quote>+</quote>
6491 preceding the action name enables the action, a <quote>-</quote> disables!).
6492 Also note how this long line has been made more readable by splitting it into
6493 multiple lines with line continuation.
6498 ##########################################################################
6499 # "Defaults" section:
6500 ##########################################################################
6502 -<link linkend="ADD-HEADER">add-header</link> \
6503 -<link linkend="CLIENT-HEADER-FILTER">client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}</link> \
6504 -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> \
6505 -<link linkend="CONTENT-TYPE-OVERWRITE">content-type-overwrite</link> \
6506 -<link linkend="CRUNCH-CLIENT-HEADER">crunch-client-header</link> \
6507 -<link linkend="CRUNCH-IF-NONE-MATCH">crunch-if-none-match</link> \
6508 -<link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES">crunch-incoming-cookies</link> \
6509 -<link linkend="CRUNCH-SERVER-HEADER">crunch-server-header</link> \
6510 -<link linkend="CRUNCH-OUTGOING-COOKIES">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link> \
6511 +<link linkend="DEANIMATE-GIFS">deanimate-gifs</link> \
6512 -<link linkend="DOWNGRADE-HTTP-VERSION">downgrade-http-version</link> \
6513 -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects{check-decoded-url}</link> \
6514 -<link linkend="FILTER-JS-ANNOYANCES">filter{js-annoyances}</link> \
6515 -<link linkend="FILTER-JS-EVENTS">filter{js-events}</link> \
6516 +<link linkend="FILTER-HTML-ANNOYANCES">filter{html-annoyances}</link> \
6517 -<link linkend="FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">filter{content-cookies}</link> \
6518 +<link linkend="FILTER-REFRESH-TAGS">filter{refresh-tags}</link> \
6519 -<link linkend="FILTER-UNSOLICITED-POPUPS">filter{unsolicited-popups}</link> \
6520 -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{all-popups}</link> \
6521 -<link linkend="FILTER-IMG-REORDER">filter{img-reorder}</link> \
6522 -<link linkend="FILTER-BANNERS-BY-SIZE">filter{banners-by-size}</link> \
6523 -<link linkend="FILTER-BANNERS-BY-LINK">filter{banners-by-link}</link> \
6524 +<link linkend="FILTER-WEBBUGS">filter{webbugs}</link> \
6525 -<link linkend="FILTER-TINY-TEXTFORMS">filter{tiny-textforms}</link> \
6526 -<link linkend="FILTER-JUMPING-WINDOWS">filter{jumping-windows}</link> \
6527 -<link linkend="FILTER-FRAMESET-BORDERS">filter{frameset-borders}</link> \
6528 -<link linkend="FILTER-DEMORONIZER">filter{demoronizer}</link> \
6529 -<link linkend="FILTER-SHOCKWAVE-FLASH">filter{shockwave-flash}</link> \
6530 -<link linkend="FILTER-QUICKTIME-KIOSKMODE">filter{quicktime-kioskmode}</link> \
6531 -<link linkend="FILTER-FUN">filter{fun}</link> \
6532 -<link linkend="FILTER-CRUDE-PARENTAL">filter{crude-parental}</link> \
6533 +<link linkend="FILTER-IE-EXPLOITS">filter{ie-exploits}</link> \
6534 -<link linkend="FILTER-GOOGLE">filter{google}</link> \
6535 -<link linkend="FILTER-YAHOO">filter{yahoo}</link> \
6536 -<link linkend="FILTER-MSN">filter{msn}</link> \
6537 -<link linkend="FILTER-BLOGSPOT">filter{blogspot}</link> \
6538 -<link linkend="FILTER-NO-PING">filter{no-ping}</link> \
6539 -<link linkend="FORCE-TEXT-MODE">force-text-mode</link> \
6540 -<link linkend="HANDLE-AS-EMPTY-DOCUMENT">handle-as-empty-document</link> \
6541 -<link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE">handle-as-image</link> \
6542 -<link linkend="HIDE-ACCEPT-LANGUAGE">hide-accept-language</link> \
6543 -<link linkend="HIDE-CONTENT-DISPOSITION">hide-content-disposition</link> \
6544 -<link linkend="HIDE-IF-MODIFIED-SINCE">hide-if-modified-since</link> \
6545 +<link linkend="HIDE-FORWARDED-FOR-HEADERS">hide-forwarded-for-headers</link> \
6546 +<link linkend="HIDE-FROM-HEADER">hide-from-header{block}</link> \
6547 +<link linkend="HIDE-REFERER">hide-referrer{forge}</link> \
6548 -<link linkend="HIDE-USER-AGENT">hide-user-agent</link> \
6549 -<link linkend="INSPECT-JPEGS">inspect-jpegs</link> \
6550 -<link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link> \
6551 -<link linkend="LIMIT-CONNECT">limit-connect</link> \
6552 +<link linkend="PREVENT-COMPRESSION">prevent-compression</link> \
6553 -<link linkend="OVERWRITE-LAST-MODIFIED">overwrite-last-modified</link> \
6554 -<link linkend="REDIRECT">redirect</link> \
6555 -<link linkend="SEND-VANILLA-WAFER">send-vanilla-wafer</link> \
6556 -<link linkend="SEND-WAFER">send-wafer</link> \
6557 -<link linkend="SERVER-HEADER-FILTER">server-header-filter{xml-to-html}</link> \
6558 -<link linkend="SERVER-HEADER-FILTER">server-header-filter{html-to-xml}</link> \
6559 +<link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">session-cookies-only</link> \
6560 +<link linkend="SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER">set-image-blocker{pattern}</link> \
6561 -<link linkend="TREAT-FORBIDDEN-CONNECTS-LIKE-BLOCKS">treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks</link> \
6563 / # forward slash will match *all* potential URL patterns.</screen>
6567 The default behavior is now set. Note that some actions, like not hiding
6568 the user agent, are part of a <quote>general policy</quote> that applies
6569 universally and won't get any exceptions defined later. Other choices,
6570 like not blocking (which is <emphasis>understandably</emphasis> the
6571 default!) need exceptions, i.e. we need to specify explicitly what we
6572 want to block in later sections.
6576 The first of our specialized sections is concerned with <quote>fragile</quote>
6577 sites, i.e. sites that require minimum interference, because they are either
6578 very complex or very keen on tracking you (and have mechanisms in place that
6579 make them unusable for people who avoid being tracked). We will simply use
6580 our pre-defined <literal>fragile</literal> alias instead of stating the list
6581 of actions explicitly:
6586 ##########################################################################
6587 # Exceptions for sites that'll break under the default action set:
6588 ##########################################################################
6590 # "Fragile" Use a minimum set of actions for these sites (see alias above):
6593 .office.microsoft.com # surprise, surprise!
6594 .windowsupdate.microsoft.com
6595 mail.google.com</screen>
6599 Shopping sites are not as fragile, but they typically
6600 require cookies to log in, and pop-up windows for shopping
6601 carts or item details. Again, we'll use a pre-defined alias:
6610 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
6612 .scan.co.uk</screen>
6615 <!-- No longer needed BEGIN OF COMMENTED OUT BLOCK
6618 Then, there are sites which rely on pop-up windows (yuck!) to work.
6619 Since we made pop-up-killing our default above, we need to make exceptions
6620 now. <ulink url="http://www.mozilla.org/">Mozilla</ulink> users, who
6621 can turn on smart handling of unwanted pop-ups in their browsers, can
6623 -<literal><link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{popups}</link></literal> (and
6624 -<literal><link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link></literal>) above
6625 and hence don't need this section. Anyway, disabling an already disabled
6626 action doesn't hurt, so we'll define our exceptions regardless of what was
6627 chosen in the defaults section:
6632 # These sites require pop-ups too :(
6634 { -<link linkend="KILL-POPUPS">kill-popups</link> -<link linkend="FILTER-ALL-POPUPS">filter{popups}</link> }
6637 .deutsche-bank-24.de</screen>
6640 END OF COMMENTED OUT BLOCK -->
6643 The <literal><link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link></literal>
6644 action, which we enabled per default above, breaks some sites. So disable
6645 it for popular sites where we know it misbehaves:
6650 { -<link linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS">fast-redirects</link> }
6654 .altavista.com/.*(like|url|link):http
6655 .altavista.com/trans.*urltext=http
6656 .nytimes.com</screen>
6660 It is important that <application>Privoxy</application> knows which
6661 URLs belong to images, so that <emphasis>if</emphasis> they are to
6662 be blocked, a substitute image can be sent, rather than an HTML page.
6663 Contacting the remote site to find out is not an option, since it
6664 would destroy the loading time advantage of banner blocking, and it
6665 would feed the advertisers (in terms of money <emphasis>and</emphasis>
6666 information). We can mark any URL as an image with the <literal><link
6667 linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> action,
6668 and marking all URLs that end in a known image file extension is a
6674 ##########################################################################
6676 ##########################################################################
6678 # Define which file types will be treated as images, in case they get
6679 # blocked further down this file:
6681 { +<link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE">handle-as-image</link> }
6682 /.*\.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp|ico)$</screen>
6686 And then there are known banner sources. They often use scripts to
6687 generate the banners, so it won't be visible from the URL that the
6688 request is for an image. Hence we block them <emphasis>and</emphasis>
6689 mark them as images in one go, with the help of our
6690 <literal>+block-as-image</literal> alias defined above. (We could of
6691 course just as well use <literal>+<link linkend="block">block</link>
6692 +<link linkend="handle-as-image">handle-as-image</link></literal> here.)
6693 Remember that the type of the replacement image is chosen by the
6694 <literal><link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link></literal>
6695 action. Since all URLs have matched the default section with its
6696 <literal>+<link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker</link>{pattern}</literal>
6697 action before, it still applies and needn't be repeated:
6702 # Known ad generators:
6707 .ad.*.doubleclick.net
6708 .a.yimg.com/(?:(?!/i/).)*$
6709 .a[0-9].yimg.com/(?:(?!/i/).)*$
6715 One of the most important jobs of <application>Privoxy</application>
6716 is to block banners. Many of these can be <quote>blocked</quote>
6717 by the <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link>{banners-by-size}</literal>
6718 action, which we enabled above, and which deletes the references to banner
6719 images from the pages while they are loaded, so the browser doesn't request
6720 them anymore, and hence they don't need to be blocked here. But this naturally
6721 doesn't catch all banners, and some people choose not to use filters, so we
6722 need a comprehensive list of patterns for banner URLs here, and apply the
6723 <literal><link linkend="block">block</link></literal> action to them.
6726 First comes many generic patterns, which do most of the work, by
6727 matching typical domain and path name components of banners. Then comes
6728 a list of individual patterns for specific sites, which is omitted here
6729 to keep the example short:
6734 ##########################################################################
6735 # Block these fine banners:
6736 ##########################################################################
6737 { <link linkend="BLOCK">+block</link> }
6745 /.*count(er)?\.(pl|cgi|exe|dll|asp|php[34]?)
6746 /(?:.*/)?(publicite|werbung|rekla(ma|me|am)|annonse|maino(kset|nta|s)?)/
6748 # Site-specific patterns (abbreviated):
6750 .hitbox.com</screen>
6754 It's quite remarkable how many advertisers actually call their banner
6755 servers ads.<replaceable>company</replaceable>.com, or call the directory
6756 in which the banners are stored simply <quote>banners</quote>. So the above
6757 generic patterns are surprisingly effective.
6760 But being very generic, they necessarily also catch URLs that we don't want
6761 to block. The pattern <literal>.*ads.</literal> e.g. catches
6762 <quote>nasty-<emphasis>ads</emphasis>.nasty-corp.com</quote> as intended,
6763 but also <quote>downlo<emphasis>ads</emphasis>.sourcefroge.net</quote> or
6764 <quote><emphasis>ads</emphasis>l.some-provider.net.</quote> So here come some
6765 well-known exceptions to the <literal>+<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link></literal>
6769 Note that these are exceptions to exceptions from the default! Consider the URL
6770 <quote>downloads.sourcefroge.net</quote>: Initially, all actions are deactivated,
6771 so it wouldn't get blocked. Then comes the defaults section, which matches the
6772 URL, but just deactivates the <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">block</link></literal>
6773 action once again. Then it matches <literal>.*ads.</literal>, an exception to the
6774 general non-blocking policy, and suddenly
6775 <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">+block</link></literal> applies. And now, it'll match
6776 <literal>.*loads.</literal>, where <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">-block</link></literal>
6777 applies, so (unless it matches <emphasis>again</emphasis> further down) it ends up
6778 with no <literal><link linkend="BLOCK">block</link></literal> action applying.
6783 ##########################################################################
6784 # Save some innocent victims of the above generic block patterns:
6785 ##########################################################################
6789 { -<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> }
6790 adv[io]*. # (for advogato.org and advice.*)
6791 adsl. # (has nothing to do with ads)
6792 adobe. # (has nothing to do with ads either)
6793 ad[ud]*. # (adult.* and add.*)
6794 .edu # (universities don't host banners (yet!))
6795 .*loads. # (downloads, uploads etc)
6803 www.globalintersec.com/adv # (adv = advanced)
6804 www.ugu.com/sui/ugu/adv</screen>
6808 Filtering source code can have nasty side effects,
6809 so make an exception for our friends at sourceforge.net,
6810 and all paths with <quote>cvs</quote> in them. Note that
6811 <literal>-<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link></literal>
6812 disables <emphasis>all</emphasis> filters in one fell swoop!
6817 # Don't filter code!
6819 { -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> }
6824 .sourceforge.net</screen>
6828 The actual <filename>default.action</filename> is of course much more
6829 comprehensive, but we hope this example made clear how it works.
6834 <sect3><title>user.action</title>
6837 So far we are painting with a broad brush by setting general policies,
6838 which would be a reasonable starting point for many people. Now,
6839 you might want to be more specific and have customized rules that
6840 are more suitable to your personal habits and preferences. These would
6841 be for narrowly defined situations like your ISP or your bank, and should
6842 be placed in <filename>user.action</filename>, which is parsed after all other
6843 actions files and hence has the last word, over-riding any previously
6844 defined actions. <filename>user.action</filename> is also a
6845 <emphasis>safe</emphasis> place for your personal settings, since
6846 <filename>default.action</filename> is actively maintained by the
6847 <application>Privoxy</application> developers and you'll probably want
6848 to install updated versions from time to time.
6852 So let's look at a few examples of things that one might typically do in
6853 <filename>user.action</filename>:
6857 <!-- brief sample user.action here -->
6861 # My user.action file. <fred@foobar.com></screen>
6865 As <link linkend="aliases">aliases</link> are local to the actions
6866 file that they are defined in, you can't use the ones from
6867 <filename>default.action</filename>, unless you repeat them here:
6872 # Aliases are local to the file they are defined in.
6873 # (Re-)define aliases for this file:
6877 # These aliases just save typing later, and the alias names should
6878 # be self explanatory.
6880 +crunch-all-cookies = +crunch-incoming-cookies +crunch-outgoing-cookies
6881 -crunch-all-cookies = -crunch-incoming-cookies -crunch-outgoing-cookies
6882 allow-all-cookies = -crunch-all-cookies -session-cookies-only
6883 allow-popups = -filter{all-popups} -kill-popups
6884 +block-as-image = +block +handle-as-image
6885 -block-as-image = -block
6887 # These aliases define combinations of actions that are useful for
6888 # certain types of sites:
6890 fragile = -block -crunch-all-cookies -filter -fast-redirects -hide-referrer -kill-popups
6891 shop = -crunch-all-cookies allow-popups
6893 # Allow ads for selected useful free sites:
6895 allow-ads = -block -filter{banners-by-size} -filter{banners-by-link}
6897 # Alias for specific file types that are text, but might have conflicting
6898 # MIME types. We want the browser to force these to be text documents.
6899 handle-as-text = -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> +-<link linkend="content-type-overwrite">content-type-overwrite{text/plain}</link> +-<link linkend="FORCE-TEXT-MODE">force-text-mode</link> -<link linkend="HIDE-CONTENT-DISPOSITION">hide-content-disposition</link></screen>
6904 Say you have accounts on some sites that you visit regularly, and
6905 you don't want to have to log in manually each time. So you'd like
6906 to allow persistent cookies for these sites. The
6907 <literal>allow-all-cookies</literal> alias defined above does exactly
6908 that, i.e. it disables crunching of cookies in any direction, and the
6909 processing of cookies to make them only temporary.
6914 { allow-all-cookies }
6918 .redhat.com</screen>
6922 Your bank is allergic to some filter, but you don't know which, so you disable them all:
6927 { -<link linkend="FILTER">filter</link> }
6928 .your-home-banking-site.com</screen>
6932 Some file types you may not want to filter for various reasons:
6937 # Technical documentation is likely to contain strings that might
6938 # erroneously get altered by the JavaScript-oriented filters:
6943 # And this stupid host sends streaming video with a wrong MIME type,
6944 # so that Privoxy thinks it is getting HTML and starts filtering:
6946 stupid-server.example.com/</screen>
6950 Example of a simple <link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> action. Say you've
6951 seen an ad on your favourite page on example.com that you want to get rid of.
6952 You have right-clicked the image, selected <quote>copy image location</quote>
6953 and pasted the URL below while removing the leading http://, into a
6954 <literal>{ +block }</literal> section. Note that <literal>{ +handle-as-image
6955 }</literal> need not be specified, since all URLs ending in
6956 <literal>.gif</literal> will be tagged as images by the general rules as set
6957 in default.action anyway:
6962 { +<link linkend="BLOCK">block</link> }
6963 www.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor\.gif
6964 another.popular.site.net/more/junk/here/</screen>
6968 The URLs of dynamically generated banners, especially from large banner
6969 farms, often don't use the well-known image file name extensions, which
6970 makes it impossible for <application>Privoxy</application> to guess
6971 the file type just by looking at the URL.
6972 You can use the <literal>+block-as-image</literal> alias defined above for
6974 Note that objects which match this rule but then turn out NOT to be an
6975 image are typically rendered as a <quote>broken image</quote> icon by the
6976 browser. Use cautiously.
6985 ar.atwola.com/</screen>
6989 Now you noticed that the default configuration breaks Forbes Magazine,
6990 but you were too lazy to find out which action is the culprit, and you
6991 were again too lazy to give <link linkend="contact">feedback</link>, so
6992 you just used the <literal>fragile</literal> alias on the site, and
6993 -- <emphasis>whoa!</emphasis> -- it worked. The <literal>fragile</literal>
6994 aliases disables those actions that are most likely to break a site. Also,
6995 good for testing purposes to see if it is <application>Privoxy</application>
6996 that is causing the problem or not. We later find other regular sites
6997 that misbehave, and add those to our personalized list of troublemakers:
7005 .mybank.com</screen>
7009 You like the <quote>fun</quote> text replacements in <filename>default.filter</filename>,
7010 but it is disabled in the distributed actions file. (My colleagues on the team just
7011 don't have a sense of humour, that's why! ;-). So you'd like to turn it on in your private,
7012 update-safe config, once and for all:
7017 { +<link linkend="filter-fun">filter{fun}</link> }
7018 / # For ALL sites!</screen>
7022 Note that the above is not really a good idea: There are exceptions
7023 to the filters in <filename>default.action</filename> for things that
7024 really shouldn't be filtered, like code on CVS->Web interfaces. Since
7025 <filename>user.action</filename> has the last word, these exceptions
7026 won't be valid for the <quote>fun</quote> filtering specified here.
7030 You might also worry about how your favourite free websites are
7031 funded, and find that they rely on displaying banner advertisements
7032 to survive. So you might want to specifically allow banners for those
7033 sites that you feel provide value to you:
7045 Note that <literal>allow-ads</literal> has been aliased to
7046 <literal>-<link linkend="block">block</link></literal>,
7047 <literal>-<link linkend="filter-banners-by-size">filter{banners-by-size}</link></literal>, and
7048 <literal>-<link linkend="filter-banners-by-link">filter{banners-by-link}</link></literal> above.
7052 Invoke another alias here to force an over-ride of the MIME type <literal>
7053 application/x-sh</literal> which typically would open a download type
7054 dialog. In my case, I want to look at the shell script, and then I can save
7055 it should I choose to.
7065 <filename>user.action</filename> is generally the best place to define
7066 exceptions and additions to the default policies of
7067 <filename>default.action</filename>. Some actions are safe to have their
7068 default policies set here though. So let's set a default policy to have a
7069 <quote>blank</quote> image as opposed to the checkerboard pattern for
7070 <emphasis>ALL</emphasis> sites. <quote>/</quote> of course matches all URL
7076 { +<link linkend="set-image-blocker">set-image-blocker{blank}</link> }
7077 / # ALL sites</screen>
7083 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7087 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7089 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
7091 <sect1 id="filter-file">
7092 <title>Filter Files</title>
7095 On-the-fly text substitutions need
7096 to be defined in a <quote>filter file</quote>. Once defined, they
7097 can then be invoked as an <quote>action</quote>.
7101 &my-app; supports three different filter actions:
7102 <literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link></literal> to
7103 rewrite the content that is send to the client,
7104 <literal><link linkend="client-header-filter">client-header-filter</link></literal>
7105 to rewrite headers that are send by the client, and
7106 <literal><link linkend="server-header-filter">server-header-filter</link></literal>
7107 to rewrite headers that are send by the server, and
7111 &my-app; also supports two tagger actions:
7112 <literal><link linkend="client-header-tagger">client-header-tagger</link></literal>
7114 <literal><link linkend="server-header-tagger">server-header-tagger</link></literal>.
7115 Taggers and filters use the same syntax in the filter files, the difference
7116 is that taggers don't modify the text they are filtering, but use a rewritten
7117 version of the filtered text as tag. The tags can then be used to change the
7118 applying actions through sections with <link linkend="tag-pattern">tag-patterns</link>.
7123 Multiple filter files can be defined through the <literal> <link
7124 linkend="filterfile">filterfile</link></literal> config directive. The filters
7125 as supplied by the developers will be found in
7126 <filename>default.filter</filename>. It is recommended that any locally
7127 defined or modified filters go in a separately defined file such as
7128 <filename>user.filter</filename>.
7133 Command tasks for content filters are to eliminate common annoyances in
7134 HTML and JavaScript, such as pop-up windows,
7135 exit consoles, crippled windows without navigation tools, the
7136 infamous <BLINK> tag etc, to suppress images with certain
7137 width and height attributes (standard banner sizes or web-bugs),
7138 or just to have fun.
7142 Content filtering works on any text-based document type, including
7143 HTML, JavaScript, CSS etc. (all <literal>text/*</literal>
7144 MIME types, <emphasis>except</emphasis> <literal>text/plain</literal>).
7145 Substitutions are made at the source level, so if you want to <quote>roll
7146 your own</quote> filters, you should first be familiar with HTML syntax,
7147 and, of course, regular expressions.
7151 Just like the <link linkend="actions-file">actions files</link>, the
7152 filter file is organized in sections, which are called <emphasis>filters</emphasis>
7153 here. Each filter consists of a heading line, that starts with one of the
7154 <emphasis>keywords</emphasis> <literal>FILTER:</literal>,
7155 <literal>CLIENT-HEADER-FILTER:</literal> or <literal>SERVER-HEADER-FILTER:</literal>
7156 followed by the filter's <emphasis>name</emphasis>, and a short (one line)
7157 <emphasis>description</emphasis> of what it does. Below that line
7158 come the <emphasis>jobs</emphasis>, i.e. lines that define the actual
7159 text substitutions. By convention, the name of a filter
7160 should describe what the filter <emphasis>eliminates</emphasis>. The
7161 comment is used in the <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">web-based
7162 user interface</ulink>.
7166 Once a filter called <replaceable>name</replaceable> has been defined
7167 in the filter file, it can be invoked by using an action of the form
7168 +<literal><link linkend="filter">filter</link>{<replaceable>name</replaceable>}</literal>
7169 in any <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link>.
7173 Filter definitions start with a header line that contains the filter
7174 type, the filter name and the filter description.
7175 A content filter header line for a filter called <quote>foo</quote> could look
7180 <screen>FILTER: foo Replace all "foo" with "bar"</screen>
7184 Below that line, and up to the next header line, come the jobs that
7185 define what text replacements the filter executes. They are specified
7186 in a syntax that imitates <ulink url="http://www.perl.org/">Perl</ulink>'s
7187 <literal>s///</literal> operator. If you are familiar with Perl, you
7188 will find this to be quite intuitive, and may want to look at the
7189 PCRS documentation for the subtle differences to Perl behaviour. Most
7190 notably, the non-standard option letter <literal>U</literal> is supported,
7191 which turns the default to ungreedy matching.
7196 <ulink url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regular_expressions"><quote>Regular
7197 Expressions</quote></ulink>, you might want to take a look at
7198 the <link linkend="regex">Appendix on regular expressions</link>, and
7199 see the <ulink url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">Perl
7201 <ulink url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlop.html">the
7202 <literal>s///</literal> operator's syntax</ulink> and <ulink
7203 url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">Perl-style regular
7204 expressions</ulink> in general.
7205 The below examples might also help to get you started.
7209 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
7211 <sect2><title>Filter File Tutorial</title>
7213 Now, let's complete our <quote>foo</quote> content filter. We have already defined
7214 the heading, but the jobs are still missing. Since all it does is to replace
7215 <quote>foo</quote> with <quote>bar</quote>, there is only one (trivial) job
7220 <screen>s/foo/bar/</screen>
7224 But wait! Didn't the comment say that <emphasis>all</emphasis> occurrences
7225 of <quote>foo</quote> should be replaced? Our current job will only take
7226 care of the first <quote>foo</quote> on each page. For global substitution,
7227 we'll need to add the <literal>g</literal> option:
7231 <screen>s/foo/bar/g</screen>
7235 Our complete filter now looks like this:
7238 <screen>FILTER: foo Replace all "foo" with "bar"
7239 s/foo/bar/g</screen>
7243 Let's look at some real filters for more interesting examples. Here you see
7244 a filter that protects against some common annoyances that arise from JavaScript
7245 abuse. Let's look at its jobs one after the other:
7251 FILTER: js-annoyances Get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse
7253 # Get rid of JavaScript referrer tracking. Test page: http://www.randomoddness.com/untitled.htm
7255 s|(<script.*)document\.referrer(.*</script>)|$1"Not Your Business!"$2|Usg</screen>
7259 Following the header line and a comment, you see the job. Note that it uses
7260 <literal>|</literal> as the delimiter instead of <literal>/</literal>, because
7261 the pattern contains a forward slash, which would otherwise have to be escaped
7262 by a backslash (<literal>\</literal>).
7266 Now, let's examine the pattern: it starts with the text <literal><script.*</literal>
7267 enclosed in parentheses. Since the dot matches any character, and <literal>*</literal>
7268 means: <quote>Match an arbitrary number of the element left of myself</quote>, this
7269 matches <quote><script</quote>, followed by <emphasis>any</emphasis> text, i.e.
7270 it matches the whole page, from the start of the first <script> tag.
7274 That's more than we want, but the pattern continues: <literal>document\.referrer</literal>
7275 matches only the exact string <quote>document.referrer</quote>. The dot needed to
7276 be <emphasis>escaped</emphasis>, i.e. preceded by a backslash, to take away its
7277 special meaning as a joker, and make it just a regular dot. So far, the meaning is:
7278 Match from the start of the first <script> tag in a the page, up to, and including,
7279 the text <quote>document.referrer</quote>, if <emphasis>both</emphasis> are present
7280 in the page (and appear in that order).
7284 But there's still more pattern to go. The next element, again enclosed in parentheses,
7285 is <literal>.*</script></literal>. You already know what <literal>.*</literal>
7286 means, so the whole pattern translates to: Match from the start of the first <script>
7287 tag in a page to the end of the last <script> tag, provided that the text
7288 <quote>document.referrer</quote> appears somewhere in between.
7292 This is still not the whole story, since we have ignored the options and the parentheses:
7293 The portions of the page matched by sub-patterns that are enclosed in parentheses, will be
7294 remembered and be available through the variables <literal>$1, $2, ...</literal> in
7295 the substitute. The <literal>U</literal> option switches to ungreedy matching, which means
7296 that the first <literal>.*</literal> in the pattern will only <quote>eat up</quote> all
7297 text in between <quote><script</quote> and the <emphasis>first</emphasis> occurrence
7298 of <quote>document.referrer</quote>, and that the second <literal>.*</literal> will
7299 only span the text up to the <emphasis>first</emphasis> <quote></script></quote>
7300 tag. Furthermore, the <literal>s</literal> option says that the match may span
7301 multiple lines in the page, and the <literal>g</literal> option again means that the
7302 substitution is global.
7306 So, to summarize, the pattern means: Match all scripts that contain the text
7307 <quote>document.referrer</quote>. Remember the parts of the script from
7308 (and including) the start tag up to (and excluding) the string
7309 <quote>document.referrer</quote> as <literal>$1</literal>, and the part following
7310 that string, up to and including the closing tag, as <literal>$2</literal>.
7314 Now the pattern is deciphered, but wasn't this about substituting things? So
7315 lets look at the substitute: <literal>$1"Not Your Business!"$2</literal> is
7316 easy to read: The text remembered as <literal>$1</literal>, followed by
7317 <literal>"Not Your Business!"</literal> (<emphasis>including</emphasis>
7318 the quotation marks!), followed by the text remembered as <literal>$2</literal>.
7319 This produces an exact copy of the original string, with the middle part
7320 (the <quote>document.referrer</quote>) replaced by <literal>"Not Your
7321 Business!"</literal>.
7325 The whole job now reads: Replace <quote>document.referrer</quote> by
7326 <literal>"Not Your Business!"</literal> wherever it appears inside a
7327 <script> tag. Note that this job won't break JavaScript syntax,
7328 since both the original and the replacement are syntactically valid
7329 string objects. The script just won't have access to the referrer
7330 information anymore.
7334 We'll show you two other jobs from the JavaScript taming department, but
7335 this time only point out the constructs of special interest:
7340 # The status bar is for displaying link targets, not pointless blahblah
7342 s/window\.status\s*=\s*(['"]).*?\1/dUmMy=1/ig</screen>
7346 <literal>\s</literal> stands for whitespace characters (space, tab, newline,
7347 carriage return, form feed), so that <literal>\s*</literal> means: <quote>zero
7348 or more whitespace</quote>. The <literal>?</literal> in <literal>.*?</literal>
7349 makes this matching of arbitrary text ungreedy. (Note that the <literal>U</literal>
7350 option is not set). The <literal>['"]</literal> construct means: <quote>a single
7351 <emphasis>or</emphasis> a double quote</quote>. Finally, <literal>\1</literal> is
7352 a back-reference to the first parenthesis just like <literal>$1</literal> above,
7353 with the difference that in the <emphasis>pattern</emphasis>, a backslash indicates
7354 a back-reference, whereas in the <emphasis>substitute</emphasis>, it's the dollar.
7358 So what does this job do? It replaces assignments of single- or double-quoted
7359 strings to the <quote>window.status</quote> object with a dummy assignment
7360 (using a variable name that is hopefully odd enough not to conflict with
7361 real variables in scripts). Thus, it catches many cases where e.g. pointless
7362 descriptions are displayed in the status bar instead of the link target when
7363 you move your mouse over links.
7368 # Kill OnUnload popups. Yummy. Test: http://www.zdnet.com/zdsubs/yahoo/tree/yfs.html
7370 s/(<body [^>]*)onunload(.*>)/$1never$2/iU</screen>
7375 <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-DOM-Level-2-Events-20001113/events.html#Events-eventgroupings-htmlevents">OnUnload
7376 event binding</ulink> in the HTML DOM was a <emphasis>CRIME</emphasis>.
7377 When I close a browser window, I want it to close and die. Basta.
7378 This job replaces the <quote>onunload</quote> attribute in
7379 <quote><body></quote> tags with the dummy word <literal>never</literal>.
7380 Note that the <literal>i</literal> option makes the pattern matching
7381 case-insensitive. Also note that ungreedy matching alone doesn't always guarantee
7382 a minimal match: In the first parenthesis, we had to use <literal>[^>]*</literal>
7383 instead of <literal>.*</literal> to prevent the match from exceeding the
7384 <body> tag if it doesn't contain <quote>OnUnload</quote>, but the page's
7389 The last example is from the fun department:
7394 FILTER: fun Fun text replacements
7396 # Spice the daily news:
7398 s/microsoft(?!\.com)/MicroSuck/ig</screen>
7402 Note the <literal>(?!\.com)</literal> part (a so-called negative lookahead)
7403 in the job's pattern, which means: Don't match, if the string
7404 <quote>.com</quote> appears directly following <quote>microsoft</quote>
7405 in the page. This prevents links to microsoft.com from being trashed, while
7406 still replacing the word everywhere else.
7411 # Buzzword Bingo (example for extended regex syntax)
7413 s* industry[ -]leading \
7415 | customer[ -]focused \
7416 | market[ -]driven \
7417 | award[ -]winning # Comments are OK, too! \
7418 | high[ -]performance \
7419 | solutions[ -]based \
7423 *<font color="red"><b>BINGO!</b></font> \
7428 The <literal>x</literal> option in this job turns on extended syntax, and allows for
7429 e.g. the liberal use of (non-interpreted!) whitespace for nicer formatting.
7437 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
7439 <sect2 id="predefined-filters"><title>The Pre-defined Filters</title>
7443 Note each filter is also listed in the +filter action section above. Please
7444 keep these listings in sync.
7449 The distribution <filename>default.filter</filename> file contains a selection of
7450 pre-defined filters for your convenience:
7455 <term><emphasis>js-annoyances</emphasis></term>
7458 The purpose of this filter is to get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse.
7463 replaces JavaScript references to the browser's referrer information
7464 with the string "Not Your Business!". This compliments the <literal><link
7465 linkend="hide-referrer">hide-referrer</link></literal> action on the content level.
7470 removes the bindings to the DOM's
7471 <ulink url="http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-DOM-Level-2-Events-20001113/events.html#Events-eventgroupings-htmlevents">unload
7472 event</ulink> which we feel has no right to exist and is responsible for most <quote>exit consoles</quote>, i.e.
7473 nasty windows that pop up when you close another one.
7478 removes code that causes new windows to be opened with undesired properties, such as being
7479 full-screen, non-resizeable, without location, status or menu bar etc.
7485 Use with caution. This is an aggressive filter, and can break sites that
7486 rely heavily on JavaScript.
7492 <term><emphasis>js-events</emphasis></term>
7495 This is a very radical measure. It removes virtually all JavaScript event bindings, which
7496 means that scripts can not react to user actions such as mouse movements or clicks, window
7497 resizing etc, anymore. Use with caution!
7500 We <emphasis>strongly discourage</emphasis> using this filter as a default since it breaks
7501 many legitimate scripts. It is meant for use only on extra-nasty sites (should you really
7508 <term><emphasis>html-annoyances</emphasis></term>
7511 This filter will undo many common instances of HTML based abuse.
7514 The <literal>BLINK</literal> and <literal>MARQUEE</literal> tags
7515 are neutralized (yeah baby!), and browser windows will be created as
7516 resizeable (as of course they should be!), and will have location,
7517 scroll and menu bars -- even if specified otherwise.
7523 <term><emphasis>content-cookies</emphasis></term>
7526 Most cookies are set in the HTTP dialog, where they can be intercepted
7528 <literal><link linkend="crunch-incoming-cookies">crunch-incoming-cookies</link></literal>
7529 and <literal><link linkend="crunch-outgoing-cookies">crunch-outgoing-cookies</link></literal>
7530 actions. But web sites increasingly make use of HTML meta tags and JavaScript
7531 to sneak cookies to the browser on the content level.
7534 This filter disables most HTML and JavaScript code that reads or sets
7535 cookies. It cannot detect all clever uses of these types of code, so it
7536 should not be relied on as an absolute fix. Use it wherever you would also
7537 use the cookie crunch actions.
7543 <term><emphasis>refresh tags</emphasis></term>
7546 Disable any refresh tags if the interval is greater than nine seconds (so
7547 that redirections done via refresh tags are not destroyed). This is useful
7548 for dial-on-demand setups, or for those who find this HTML feature
7555 <term><emphasis>unsolicited-popups</emphasis></term>
7558 This filter attempts to prevent only <quote>unsolicited</quote> pop-up
7559 windows from opening, yet still allow pop-up windows that the user
7560 has explicitly chosen to open. It was added in version 3.0.1,
7561 as an improvement over earlier such filters.
7564 Technical note: The filter works by redefining the window.open JavaScript
7565 function to a dummy function, <literal>PrivoxyWindowOpen()</literal>,
7566 during the loading and rendering phase of each HTML page access, and
7567 restoring the function afterward.
7570 This is recommended only for browsers that cannot perform this function
7571 reliably themselves. And be aware that some sites require such windows
7572 in order to function normally. Use with caution.
7578 <term><emphasis>all-popups</emphasis></term>
7581 Attempt to prevent <emphasis>all</emphasis> pop-up windows from opening.
7582 Note this should be used with even more discretion than the above, since
7583 it is more likely to break some sites that require pop-ups for normal
7584 usage. Use with caution.
7590 <term><emphasis>img-reorder</emphasis></term>
7593 This is a helper filter that has no value if used alone. It makes the
7594 <literal>banners-by-size</literal> and <literal>banners-by-link</literal>
7595 (see below) filters more effective and should be enabled together with them.
7601 <term><emphasis>banners-by-size</emphasis></term>
7604 This filter removes image tags purely based on what size they are. Fortunately
7605 for us, many ads and banner images tend to conform to certain standardized
7606 sizes, which makes this filter quite effective for ad stripping purposes.
7609 Occasionally this filter will cause false positives on images that are not ads,
7610 but just happen to be of one of the standard banner sizes.
7613 Recommended only for those who require extreme ad blocking. The default
7614 block rules should catch 95+% of all ads <emphasis>without</emphasis> this filter enabled.
7620 <term><emphasis>banners-by-link</emphasis></term>
7623 This is an experimental filter that attempts to kill any banners if
7624 their URLs seem to point to known or suspected click trackers. It is currently
7625 not of much value and is not recommended for use by default.
7631 <term><emphasis>webbugs</emphasis></term>
7634 Webbugs are small, invisible images (technically 1X1 GIF images), that
7635 are used to track users across websites, and collect information on them.
7636 As an HTML page is loaded by the browser, an embedded image tag causes the
7637 browser to contact a third-party site, disclosing the tracking information
7638 through the requested URL and/or cookies for that third-party domain, without
7639 the user ever becoming aware of the interaction with the third-party site.
7640 HTML-ized spam also uses a similar technique to verify email addresses.
7643 This filter removes the HTML code that loads such <quote>webbugs</quote>.
7649 <term><emphasis>tiny-textforms</emphasis></term>
7652 A rather special-purpose filter that can be used to enlarge textareas (those
7653 multi-line text boxes in web forms) and turn off hard word wrap in them.
7654 It was written for the sourceforge.net tracker system where such boxes are
7655 a nuisance, but it can be handy on other sites, too.
7658 It is not recommended to use this filter as a default.
7664 <term><emphasis>jumping-windows</emphasis></term>
7667 Many consider windows that move, or resize themselves to be abusive. This filter
7668 neutralizes the related JavaScript code. Note that some sites might not display
7669 or behave as intended when using this filter. Use with caution.
7675 <term><emphasis>frameset-borders</emphasis></term>
7678 Some web designers seem to assume that everyone in the world will view their
7679 web sites using the same browser brand and version, screen resolution etc,
7680 because only that assumption could explain why they'd use static frame sizes,
7681 yet prevent their frames from being resized by the user, should they be too
7682 small to show their whole content.
7685 This filter removes the related HTML code. It should only be applied to sites
7692 <term><emphasis>demoronizer</emphasis></term>
7695 Many Microsoft products that generate HTML use non-standard extensions (read:
7696 violations) of the ISO 8859-1 aka Latin-1 character set. This can cause those
7697 HTML documents to display with errors on standard-compliant platforms.
7700 This filter translates the MS-only characters into Latin-1 equivalents.
7701 It is not necessary when using MS products, and will cause corruption of
7702 all documents that use 8-bit character sets other than Latin-1. It's mostly
7703 worthwhile for Europeans on non-MS platforms, if weird garbage characters
7704 sometimes appear on some pages, or user agents that don't correct for this on
7707 My version of Mozilla (ancient) shows litte square boxes for quote
7708 characters, and apostrophes on moronized pages. So many pages have this, I
7709 can read them fine now. HB 08/27/06
7716 <term><emphasis>shockwave-flash</emphasis></term>
7719 A filter for shockwave haters. As the name suggests, this filter strips code
7720 out of web pages that is used to embed shockwave flash objects.
7728 <term><emphasis>quicktime-kioskmode</emphasis></term>
7731 Change HTML code that embeds Quicktime objects so that kioskmode, which
7732 prevents saving, is disabled.
7738 <term><emphasis>fun</emphasis></term>
7741 Text replacements for subversive browsing fun. Make fun of your favorite
7742 Monopolist or play buzzword bingo.
7748 <term><emphasis>crude-parental</emphasis></term>
7751 A demonstration-only filter that shows how <application>Privoxy</application>
7752 can be used to delete web content on a keyword basis.
7758 <term><emphasis>ie-exploits</emphasis></term>
7761 An experimental collection of text replacements to disable malicious HTML and JavaScript
7762 code that exploits known security holes in Internet Explorer.
7765 Presently, it only protects against Nimda and a cross-site scripting bug, and
7766 would need active maintenance to provide more substantial protection.
7772 <term><emphasis>site-specifics</emphasis></term>
7775 Some web sites have very specific problems, the cure for which doesn't apply
7776 anywhere else, or could even cause damage on other sites.
7779 This is a collection of such site-specific cures which should only be applied
7780 to the sites they were intended for, which is what the supplied
7781 <filename>default.action</filename> file does. Users shouldn't need to change
7782 anything regarding this filter.
7788 <term><emphasis>google</emphasis></term>
7791 A CSS based block for Google text ads. Also removes a width limitation
7792 and the toolbar advertisement.
7798 <term><emphasis>yahoo</emphasis></term>
7801 Another CSS based block, this time for Yahoo text ads. And removes
7802 a width limitation as well.
7808 <term><emphasis>msn</emphasis></term>
7811 Another CSS based block, this time for MSN text ads. And removes
7812 tracking URLs, as well as a width limitation.
7818 <term><emphasis>blogspot</emphasis></term>
7821 Cleans up some Blogspot blogs. Read the fine print before using this one!
7824 This filter also intentionally removes some navigation stuff and sets the
7825 page width to 100%. As a result, some rounded <quote>corners</quote> would
7826 appear to early or not at all and as fixing this would require a browser
7827 that understands background-size (CSS3), they are removed instead.
7833 <term><emphasis>xml-to-html</emphasis></term>
7836 Server-header filter to change the Content-Type from xml to html.
7842 <term><emphasis>html-to-xml</emphasis></term>
7845 Server-header filter to change the Content-Type from html to xml.
7851 <term><emphasis>no-ping</emphasis></term>
7854 Removes the non-standard <literal>ping</literal> attribute from
7855 anchor and area HTML tags.
7861 <term><emphasis>hide-tor-exit-notation</emphasis></term>
7864 Client-header filter to remove the <command>Tor</command> exit node notation
7865 found in Host and Referer headers.
7868 If &my-app; and <command>Tor</command> are chained and &my-app;
7869 is configured to use socks4a, one can use <quote>http://www.example.org.foobar.exit/</quote>
7870 to access the host <quote>www.example.org</quote> through the
7871 <command>Tor</command> exit node <quote>foobar</quote>.
7874 As the HTTP client isn't aware of this notation, it treats the
7875 whole string <quote>www.example.org.foobar.exit</quote> as host and uses it
7876 for the <quote>Host</quote> and <quote>Referer</quote> headers. From the
7877 server's point of view the resulting headers are invalid and can cause problems.
7880 An invalid <quote>Referer</quote> header can trigger <quote>hot-linking</quote>
7881 protections, an invalid <quote>Host</quote> header will make it impossible for
7882 the server to find the right vhost (several domains hosted on the same IP address).
7885 This client-header filter removes the <quote>foo.exit</quote> part in those headers
7886 to prevent the mentioned problems. Note that it only modifies
7887 the HTTP headers, it doesn't make it impossible for the server
7888 to detect your <command>Tor</command> exit node based on the IP address
7889 the request is coming from.
7896 <term><emphasis> </emphasis></term>
7910 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
7914 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
7916 <sect1 id="templates">
7917 <title>Privoxy's Template Files</title>
7919 All <application>Privoxy</application> built-in pages, i.e. error pages such as the
7920 <ulink url="http://show-the-404-error.page"><quote>404 - No Such Domain</quote>
7921 error page</ulink>, the <ulink
7922 url="http://ads.bannerserver.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor.html"><quote>BLOCKED</quote>
7924 and all pages of its <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">web-based
7925 user interface</ulink>, are generated from <emphasis>templates</emphasis>.
7926 (<application>Privoxy</application> must be running for the above links to work as
7931 These templates are stored in a subdirectory of the <link linkend="confdir">configuration
7932 directory</link> called <filename>templates</filename>. On Unixish platforms,
7934 <ulink url="file:///etc/privoxy/templates/"><filename>/etc/privoxy/templates/</filename></ulink>.
7938 The templates are basically normal HTML files, but with place-holders (called symbols
7939 or exports), which <application>Privoxy</application> fills at run time. It
7940 is possible to edit the templates with a normal text editor, should you want
7941 to customize them. (<emphasis>Not recommended for the casual
7942 user</emphasis>). Should you create your own custom templates, you should use
7943 the <filename>config</filename> setting <link linkend="templdir">templdir</link>
7944 to specify an alternate location, so your templates do not get overwritten
7948 Note that just like in configuration files, lines starting
7949 with <literal>#</literal> are ignored when the templates are filled in.
7953 The place-holders are of the form <literal>@name@</literal>, and you will
7954 find a list of available symbols, which vary from template to template,
7955 in the comments at the start of each file. Note that these comments are not
7956 always accurate, and that it's probably best to look at the existing HTML
7957 code to find out which symbols are supported and what they are filled in with.
7961 A special application of this substitution mechanism is to make whole
7962 blocks of HTML code disappear when a specific symbol is set. We use this
7963 for many purposes, one of them being to include the beta warning in all
7964 our user interface (CGI) pages when <application>Privoxy</application>
7965 is in an alpha or beta development stage:
7970 <!-- @if-unstable-start -->
7972 ... beta warning HTML code goes here ...
7974 <!-- if-unstable-end@ --></screen>
7978 If the "unstable" symbol is set, everything in between and including
7979 <literal>@if-unstable-start</literal> and <literal>if-unstable-end@</literal>
7980 will disappear, leaving nothing but an empty comment:
7984 <screen><!-- --></screen>
7988 There's also an if-then-else construct and an <literal>#include</literal>
7989 mechanism, but you'll sure find out if you are inclined to edit the
7994 All templates refer to a style located at
7995 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/send-stylesheet"><literal>http://config.privoxy.org/send-stylesheet</literal></ulink>.
7996 This is, of course, locally served by <application>Privoxy</application>
7997 and the source for it can be found and edited in the
7998 <filename>cgi-style.css</filename> template.
8003 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
8007 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8009 <sect1 id="contact"><title>Contacting the Developers, Bug Reporting and Feature
8012 <!-- Include contacting.sgml boilerplate: -->
8014 <!-- end boilerplate -->
8018 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
8021 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8022 <sect1 id="copyright"><title>Privoxy Copyright, License and History</title>
8024 <!-- Include copyright.sgml: -->
8026 <!-- end copyright -->
8028 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8029 <sect2><title>License</title>
8030 <!-- Include copyright.sgml: -->
8032 <!-- end copyright -->
8034 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
8037 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8039 <sect2 id="history"><title>History</title>
8040 <!-- Include history.sgml: -->
8042 <!-- end history -->
8045 <sect2 id="authors"><title>Authors</title>
8046 <!-- Include p-authors.sgml: -->
8048 <!-- end authors -->
8053 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
8056 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8057 <sect1 id="seealso"><title>See Also</title>
8058 <!-- Include seealso.sgml: -->
8060 <!-- end seealso -->
8065 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8066 <sect1 id="appendix"><title>Appendix</title>
8069 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8071 <title>Regular Expressions</title>
8073 <application>Privoxy</application> uses Perl-style <quote>regular
8074 expressions</quote> in its <link linkend="actions-file">actions
8075 files</link> and <link linkend="filter-file">filter file</link>,
8076 through the <ulink url="http://www.pcre.org/">PCRE</ulink> and
8079 <ulink url="http://www.oesterhelt.org/pcrs/">PCRS</ulink> libraries.
8081 <application>PCRS</application> libraries.
8085 If you are reading this, you probably don't understand what <quote>regular
8086 expressions</quote> are, or what they can do. So this will be a very brief
8087 introduction only. A full explanation would require a <ulink
8088 url="http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/regex/">book</ulink> ;-)
8092 Regular expressions provide a language to describe patterns that can be
8093 run against strings of characters (letter, numbers, etc), to see if they
8094 match the string or not. The patterns are themselves (sometimes complex)
8095 strings of literal characters, combined with wild-cards, and other special
8096 characters, called meta-characters. The <quote>meta-characters</quote> have
8097 special meanings and are used to build complex patterns to be matched against.
8098 Perl Compatible Regular Expressions are an especially convenient
8099 <quote>dialect</quote> of the regular expression language.
8103 To make a simple analogy, we do something similar when we use wild-card
8104 characters when listing files with the <command>dir</command> command in DOS.
8105 <literal>*.*</literal> matches all filenames. The <quote>special</quote>
8106 character here is the asterisk which matches any and all characters. We can be
8107 more specific and use <literal>?</literal> to match just individual
8108 characters. So <quote>dir file?.text</quote> would match
8109 <quote>file1.txt</quote>, <quote>file2.txt</quote>, etc. We are pattern
8110 matching, using a similar technique to <quote>regular expressions</quote>!
8114 Regular expressions do essentially the same thing, but are much, much more
8115 powerful. There are many more <quote>special characters</quote> and ways of
8116 building complex patterns however. Let's look at a few of the common ones,
8117 and then some examples:
8122 <emphasis>.</emphasis> - Matches any single character, e.g. <quote>a</quote>,
8123 <quote>A</quote>, <quote>4</quote>, <quote>:</quote>, or <quote>@</quote>.
8125 </simplelist></para>
8129 <emphasis>?</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ZERO or ONE
8132 </simplelist></para>
8136 <emphasis>+</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ONE or MORE
8139 </simplelist></para>
8143 <emphasis>*</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ZERO or MORE
8146 </simplelist></para>
8150 <emphasis>\</emphasis> - The <quote>escape</quote> character denotes that
8151 the following character should be taken literally. This is used where one of the
8152 special characters (e.g. <quote>.</quote>) needs to be taken literally and
8153 not as a special meta-character. Example: <quote>example\.com</quote>, makes
8154 sure the period is recognized only as a period (and not expanded to its
8155 meta-character meaning of any single character).
8157 </simplelist></para>
8161 <emphasis>[ ]</emphasis> - Characters enclosed in brackets will be matched if
8162 any of the enclosed characters are encountered. For instance, <quote>[0-9]</quote>
8163 matches any numeric digit (zero through nine). As an example, we can combine
8164 this with <quote>+</quote> to match any digit one of more times: <quote>[0-9]+</quote>.
8166 </simplelist></para>
8170 <emphasis>( )</emphasis> - parentheses are used to group a sub-expression,
8171 or multiple sub-expressions.
8173 </simplelist></para>
8177 <emphasis>|</emphasis> - The <quote>bar</quote> character works like an
8178 <quote>or</quote> conditional statement. A match is successful if the
8179 sub-expression on either side of <quote>|</quote> matches. As an example:
8180 <quote>/(this|that) example/</quote> uses grouping and the bar character
8181 and would match either <quote>this example</quote> or <quote>that
8182 example</quote>, and nothing else.
8184 </simplelist></para>
8187 These are just some of the ones you are likely to use when matching URLs with
8188 <application>Privoxy</application>, and is a long way from a definitive
8189 list. This is enough to get us started with a few simple examples which may
8190 be more illuminating:
8194 <emphasis><literal>/.*/banners/.*</literal></emphasis> - A simple example
8195 that uses the common combination of <quote>.</quote> and <quote>*</quote> to
8196 denote any character, zero or more times. In other words, any string at all.
8197 So we start with a literal forward slash, then our regular expression pattern
8198 (<quote>.*</quote>) another literal forward slash, the string
8199 <quote>banners</quote>, another forward slash, and lastly another
8200 <quote>.*</quote>. We are building
8201 a directory path here. This will match any file with the path that has a
8202 directory named <quote>banners</quote> in it. The <quote>.*</quote> matches
8203 any characters, and this could conceivably be more forward slashes, so it
8204 might expand into a much longer looking path. For example, this could match:
8205 <quote>/eye/hate/spammers/banners/annoy_me_please.gif</quote>, or just
8206 <quote>/banners/annoying.html</quote>, or almost an infinite number of other
8207 possible combinations, just so it has <quote>banners</quote> in the path
8212 And now something a little more complex:
8216 <emphasis><literal>/.*/adv((er)?ts?|ertis(ing|ements?))?/</literal></emphasis> -
8217 We have several literal forward slashes again (<quote>/</quote>), so we are
8218 building another expression that is a file path statement. We have another
8219 <quote>.*</quote>, so we are matching against any conceivable sub-path, just so
8220 it matches our expression. The only true literal that <emphasis>must
8221 match</emphasis> our pattern is <application>adv</application>, together with
8222 the forward slashes. What comes after the <quote>adv</quote> string is the
8227 Remember the <quote>?</quote> means the preceding expression (either a
8228 literal character or anything grouped with <quote>(...)</quote> in this case)
8229 can exist or not, since this means either zero or one match. So
8230 <quote>((er)?ts?|ertis(ing|ements?))</quote> is optional, as are the
8231 individual sub-expressions: <quote>(er)</quote>,
8232 <quote>(ing|ements?)</quote>, and the <quote>s</quote>. The <quote>|</quote>
8233 means <quote>or</quote>. We have two of those. For instance,
8234 <quote>(ing|ements?)</quote>, can expand to match either <quote>ing</quote>
8235 <emphasis>OR</emphasis> <quote>ements?</quote>. What is being done here, is an
8236 attempt at matching as many variations of <quote>advertisement</quote>, and
8237 similar, as possible. So this would expand to match just <quote>adv</quote>,
8238 or <quote>advert</quote>, or <quote>adverts</quote>, or
8239 <quote>advertising</quote>, or <quote>advertisement</quote>, or
8240 <quote>advertisements</quote>. You get the idea. But it would not match
8241 <quote>advertizements</quote> (with a <quote>z</quote>). We could fix that by
8242 changing our regular expression to:
8243 <quote>/.*/adv((er)?ts?|erti(s|z)(ing|ements?))?/</quote>, which would then match
8248 <emphasis><literal>/.*/advert[0-9]+\.(gif|jpe?g)</literal></emphasis> - Again
8249 another path statement with forward slashes. Anything in the square brackets
8250 <quote>[ ]</quote> can be matched. This is using <quote>0-9</quote> as a
8251 shorthand expression to mean any digit one through nine. It is the same as
8252 saying <quote>0123456789</quote>. So any digit matches. The <quote>+</quote>
8253 means one or more of the preceding expression must be included. The preceding
8254 expression here is what is in the square brackets -- in this case, any digit
8255 one through nine. Then, at the end, we have a grouping: <quote>(gif|jpe?g)</quote>.
8256 This includes a <quote>|</quote>, so this needs to match the expression on
8257 either side of that bar character also. A simple <quote>gif</quote> on one side, and the other
8258 side will in turn match either <quote>jpeg</quote> or <quote>jpg</quote>,
8259 since the <quote>?</quote> means the letter <quote>e</quote> is optional and
8260 can be matched once or not at all. So we are building an expression here to
8261 match image GIF or JPEG type image file. It must include the literal
8262 string <quote>advert</quote>, then one or more digits, and a <quote>.</quote>
8263 (which is now a literal, and not a special character, since it is escaped
8264 with <quote>\</quote>), and lastly either <quote>gif</quote>, or
8265 <quote>jpeg</quote>, or <quote>jpg</quote>. Some possible matches would
8266 include: <quote>//advert1.jpg</quote>,
8267 <quote>/nasty/ads/advert1234.gif</quote>,
8268 <quote>/banners/from/hell/advert99.jpg</quote>. It would not match
8269 <quote>advert1.gif</quote> (no leading slash), or
8270 <quote>/adverts232.jpg</quote> (the expression does not include an
8271 <quote>s</quote>), or <quote>/advert1.jsp</quote> (<quote>jsp</quote> is not
8272 in the expression anywhere).
8276 We are barely scratching the surface of regular expressions here so that you
8277 can understand the default <application>Privoxy</application>
8278 configuration files, and maybe use this knowledge to customize your own
8279 installation. There is much, much more that can be done with regular
8280 expressions. Now that you know enough to get started, you can learn more on
8285 More reading on Perl Compatible Regular expressions:
8286 <ulink url="http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html">http://perldoc.perl.org/perlre.html</ulink>
8290 For information on regular expression based substitutions and their applications
8291 in filters, please see the <link linkend="filter-file">filter file tutorial</link>
8296 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
8299 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8301 <title>Privoxy's Internal Pages</title>
8304 Since <application>Privoxy</application> proxies each requested
8305 web page, it is easy for <application>Privoxy</application> to
8306 trap certain special URLs. In this way, we can talk directly to
8307 <application>Privoxy</application>, and see how it is
8308 configured, see how our rules are being applied, change these
8309 rules and other configuration options, and even turn
8310 <application>Privoxy's</application> filtering off, all with
8316 The URLs listed below are the special ones that allow direct access
8317 to <application>Privoxy</application>. Of course,
8318 <application>Privoxy</application> must be running to access these. If
8319 not, you will get a friendly error message. Internet access is not
8332 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
8336 There is a shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink> (But it
8337 doesn't provide a fall-back to a real page, in case the request is not
8338 sent through <application>Privoxy</application>)
8344 Show information about the current configuration, including viewing and
8345 editing of actions files:
8349 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
8356 Show the source code version numbers:
8360 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-version">http://config.privoxy.org/show-version</ulink>
8367 Show the browser's request headers:
8371 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-request">http://config.privoxy.org/show-request</ulink>
8378 Show which actions apply to a URL and why:
8382 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
8389 Toggle Privoxy on or off. This feature can be turned off/on in the main
8390 <filename>config</filename> file. When toggled <quote>off</quote>, <quote>Privoxy</quote>
8391 continues to run, but only as a pass-through proxy, with no actions taking
8396 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle</ulink>
8400 Short cuts. Turn off, then on:
8404 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=disable">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=disable</ulink>
8409 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=enable">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=enable</ulink>
8418 These may be bookmarked for quick reference. See next.
8422 <sect3 id="bookmarklets">
8423 <title>Bookmarklets</title>
8425 Below are some <quote>bookmarklets</quote> to allow you to easily access a
8426 <quote>mini</quote> version of some of <application>Privoxy's</application>
8427 special pages. They are designed for MS Internet Explorer, but should work
8428 equally well in Netscape, Mozilla, and other browsers which support
8429 JavaScript. They are designed to run directly from your bookmarks - not by
8430 clicking the links below (although that should work for testing).
8433 To save them, right-click the link and choose <quote>Add to Favorites</quote>
8434 (IE) or <quote>Add Bookmark</quote> (Netscape). You will get a warning that
8435 the bookmark <quote>may not be safe</quote> - just click OK. Then you can run the
8436 Bookmarklet directly from your favorites/bookmarks. For even faster access,
8437 you can put them on the <quote>Links</quote> bar (IE) or the <quote>Personal
8438 Toolbar</quote> (Netscape), and run them with a single click.
8447 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y&set=enabled','ijbstatus','width=250,height=100,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Enable</ulink>
8454 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y&set=disabled','ijbstatus','width=250,height=100,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Disable</ulink>
8461 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y&set=toggle','ijbstatus','width=250,height=100,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Toggle Privoxy</ulink> (Toggles between enabled and disabled)
8468 url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?mini=y','ijbstatus','width=250,height=2,resizable=yes,scrollbars=no,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy- View Status</ulink>
8474 <ulink url="javascript:w=Math.floor(screen.width/2);h=Math.floor(screen.height*0.9);void(window.open('http://www.privoxy.org/actions/index.php?url='+escape(location.href),'Feedback','screenx='+w+',width='+w+',height='+h+',scrollbars=yes,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Submit Actions File Feedback</ulink>
8480 <ulink url="javascript:void(window.open('http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info?url='+escape(location.href),'Why').focus());">Privoxy - Why?</ulink>
8487 Credit: The site which gave us the general idea for these bookmarklets is
8488 <ulink url="http://www.bookmarklets.com/">www.bookmarklets.com</ulink>. They
8489 have more information about bookmarklets.
8498 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8500 <title>Chain of Events</title>
8502 Let's take a quick look at how some of <application>Privoxy's</application>
8503 core features are triggered, and the ensuing sequence of events when a web
8504 page is requested by your browser:
8511 First, your web browser requests a web page. The browser knows to send
8512 the request to <application>Privoxy</application>, which will in turn,
8513 relay the request to the remote web server after passing the following
8519 <application>Privoxy</application> traps any request for its own internal CGI
8520 pages (e.g <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>) and sends the CGI page back to the browser.
8525 Next, <application>Privoxy</application> checks to see if the URL
8527 linkend="BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></link> patterns. If
8528 so, the URL is then blocked, and the remote web server will not be contacted.
8529 <link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></link>
8531 <link linkend="HANDLE-AS-EMPTY-DOCUMENT"><quote>+handle-as-empty-document</quote></link>
8532 are then checked, and if there is no match, an
8533 HTML <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page is sent back to the browser. Otherwise, if
8534 it does match, an image is returned for the former, and an empty text
8535 document for the latter. The type of image would depend on the setting of
8536 <link linkend="SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><quote>+set-image-blocker</quote></link>
8537 (blank, checkerboard pattern, or an HTTP redirect to an image elsewhere).
8542 Untrusted URLs are blocked. If URLs are being added to the
8543 <filename>trust</filename> file, then that is done.
8548 If the URL pattern matches the <link
8549 linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS"><quote>+fast-redirects</quote></link> action,
8550 it is then processed. Unwanted parts of the requested URL are stripped.
8555 Now the rest of the client browser's request headers are processed. If any
8556 of these match any of the relevant actions (e.g. <link
8557 linkend="HIDE-USER-AGENT"><quote>+hide-user-agent</quote></link>,
8558 etc.), headers are suppressed or forged as determined by these actions and
8564 Now the web server starts sending its response back (i.e. typically a web
8570 First, the server headers are read and processed to determine, among other
8571 things, the MIME type (document type) and encoding. The headers are then
8572 filtered as determined by the
8573 <link linkend="CRUNCH-INCOMING-COOKIES"><quote>+crunch-incoming-cookies</quote></link>,
8574 <link linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></link>,
8575 and <link linkend="DOWNGRADE-HTTP-VERSION"><quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote></link>
8581 If the <link linkend="KILL-POPUPS"><quote>+kill-popups</quote></link>
8582 action applies, and it is an HTML or JavaScript document, the popup-code in the
8583 response is filtered on-the-fly as it is received.
8588 If any <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> action
8590 linkend="DEANIMATE-GIFS"><quote>+deanimate-gifs</quote></link>
8591 action applies (and the document type fits the action), the rest of the page is
8592 read into memory (up to a configurable limit). Then the filter rules (from
8593 <filename>default.filter</filename> and any other filter files) are
8594 processed against the buffered content. Filters are applied in the order
8595 they are specified in one of the filter files. Animated GIFs, if present,
8596 are reduced to either the first or last frame, depending on the action
8597 setting.The entire page, which is now filtered, is then sent by
8598 <application>Privoxy</application> back to your browser.
8601 If neither a <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> action
8603 linkend="DEANIMATE-GIFS"><quote>+deanimate-gifs</quote></link>
8604 matches, then <application>Privoxy</application> passes the raw data through
8605 to the client browser as it becomes available.
8610 As the browser receives the now (possibly filtered) page content, it
8611 reads and then requests any URLs that may be embedded within the page
8612 source, e.g. ad images, stylesheets, JavaScript, other HTML documents (e.g.
8613 frames), sounds, etc. For each of these objects, the browser issues a
8614 separate request (this is easily viewable in <application>Privoxy's</application>
8615 logs). And each such request is in turn processed just as above. Note that a
8616 complex web page will have many, many such embedded URLs. If these
8617 secondary requests are to a different server, then quite possibly a very
8618 differing set of actions is triggered.
8625 NOTE: This is somewhat of a simplistic overview of what happens with each URL
8626 request. For the sake of brevity and simplicity, we have focused on
8627 <application>Privoxy's</application> core features only.
8633 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
8634 <sect2 id="actionsanat">
8635 <title>Troubleshooting: Anatomy of an Action</title>
8638 The way <application>Privoxy</application> applies
8639 <link linkend="ACTIONS">actions</link> and <link linkend="FILTER">filters</link>
8640 to any given URL can be complex, and not always so
8641 easy to understand what is happening. And sometimes we need to be able to
8642 <emphasis>see</emphasis> just what <application>Privoxy</application> is
8643 doing. Especially, if something <application>Privoxy</application> is doing
8644 is causing us a problem inadvertently. It can be a little daunting to look at
8645 the actions and filters files themselves, since they tend to be filled with
8646 <link linkend="regex">regular expressions</link> whose consequences are not
8651 One quick test to see if <application>Privoxy</application> is causing a problem
8652 or not, is to disable it temporarily. This should be the first troubleshooting
8653 step. See <link linkend="bookmarklets">the Bookmarklets</link> section on a quick
8654 and easy way to do this (be sure to flush caches afterward!). Looking at the
8655 logs is a good idea too. (Note that both the toggle feature and logging are
8656 enabled via <filename>config</filename> file settings, and may need to be
8657 turned <quote>on</quote>.)
8660 Another easy troubleshooting step to try is if you have done any
8661 customization of your installation, revert back to the installed
8662 defaults and see if that helps. There are times the developers get complaints
8663 about one thing or another, and the problem is more related to a customized
8664 configuration issue.
8668 <application>Privoxy</application> also provides the
8669 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
8670 page that can show us very specifically how <application>actions</application>
8671 are being applied to any given URL. This is a big help for troubleshooting.
8675 First, enter one URL (or partial URL) at the prompt, and then
8676 <application>Privoxy</application> will tell us
8677 how the current configuration will handle it. This will not
8678 help with filtering effects (i.e. the <link
8679 linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> action) from
8680 one of the filter files since this is handled very
8681 differently and not so easy to trap! It also will not tell you about any other
8682 URLs that may be embedded within the URL you are testing. For instance, images
8683 such as ads are expressed as URLs within the raw page source of HTML pages. So
8684 you will only get info for the actual URL that is pasted into the prompt area
8685 -- not any sub-URLs. If you want to know about embedded URLs like ads, you
8686 will have to dig those out of the HTML source. Use your browser's <quote>View
8687 Page Source</quote> option for this. Or right click on the ad, and grab the
8692 Let's try an example, <ulink url="http://google.com">google.com</ulink>,
8693 and look at it one section at a time in a sample configuration (your real
8694 configuration may vary):
8699 Matches for http://www.google.com:
8701 In file: default.action <guibutton>[ View ]</guibutton> <guibutton>[ Edit ]</guibutton>
8703 {+deanimate-gifs {last}
8704 +fast-redirects {check-decoded-url}
8705 +filter {refresh-tags}
8706 +filter {img-reorder}
8707 +filter {banners-by-size}
8709 +filter {jumping-windows}
8710 +filter {ie-exploits}
8711 +hide-forwarded-for-headers
8712 +hide-from-header {block}
8713 +hide-referrer {forge}
8714 +session-cookies-only
8715 +set-image-blocker {pattern}
8718 { -session-cookies-only }
8724 In file: user.action <guibutton>[ View ]</guibutton> <guibutton>[ Edit ]</guibutton>
8725 (no matches in this file)
8730 This is telling us how we have defined our
8731 <link linkend="ACTIONS"><quote>actions</quote></link>, and
8732 which ones match for our test case, <quote>google.com</quote>.
8733 Displayed is all the actions that are available to us. Remember,
8734 the <literal>+</literal> sign denotes <quote>on</quote>. <literal>-</literal>
8735 denotes <quote>off</quote>. So some are <quote>on</quote> here, but many
8736 are <quote>off</quote>. Each example we try may provide a slightly different
8737 end result, depending on our configuration directives.
8741 is for our <filename>default.action</filename> file. The large, multi-line
8742 listing, is how the actions are set to match for all URLs, i.e. our default
8743 settings. If you look at your <quote>actions</quote> file, this would be the
8744 section just below the <quote>aliases</quote> section near the top. This
8745 will apply to all URLs as signified by the single forward slash at the end
8746 of the listing -- <quote> / </quote>.
8750 But we have defined additional actions that would be exceptions to these general
8751 rules, and then we list specific URLs (or patterns) that these exceptions
8752 would apply to. Last match wins. Just below this then are two explicit
8753 matches for <quote>.google.com</quote>. The first is negating our previous
8754 cookie setting, which was for <link
8755 linkend="SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></link>
8756 (i.e. not persistent). So we will allow persistent cookies for google, at
8757 least that is how it is in this example. The second turns
8758 <emphasis>off</emphasis> any <link
8759 linkend="FAST-REDIRECTS"><quote>+fast-redirects</quote></link>
8760 action, allowing this to take place unmolested. Note that there is a leading
8761 dot here -- <quote>.google.com</quote>. This will match any hosts and
8762 sub-domains, in the google.com domain also, such as
8763 <quote>www.google.com</quote> or <quote>mail.google.com</quote>. But it would not
8764 match <quote>www.google.de</quote>! So, apparently, we have these two actions
8765 defined as exceptions to the general rules at the top somewhere in the lower
8766 part of our <filename>default.action</filename> file, and
8767 <quote>google.com</quote> is referenced somewhere in these latter sections.
8771 Then, for our <filename>user.action</filename> file, we again have no hits.
8772 So there is nothing google-specific that we might have added to our own, local
8773 configuration. If there was, those actions would over-rule any actions from
8774 previously processed files, such as <filename>default.action</filename>.
8775 <filename>user.action</filename> typically has the last word. This is the
8776 best place to put hard and fast exceptions,
8780 And finally we pull it all together in the bottom section and summarize how
8781 <application>Privoxy</application> is applying all its <quote>actions</quote>
8782 to <quote>google.com</quote>:
8793 -client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}
8794 -content-type-overwrite
8795 -crunch-client-header
8796 -crunch-if-none-match
8797 -crunch-incoming-cookies
8798 -crunch-outgoing-cookies
8799 -crunch-server-header
8800 +deanimate-gifs {last}
8801 -downgrade-http-version
8804 -filter {content-cookies}
8805 -filter {all-popups}
8806 -filter {banners-by-link}
8807 -filter {tiny-textforms}
8808 -filter {frameset-borders}
8809 -filter {demoronizer}
8810 -filter {shockwave-flash}
8811 -filter {quicktime-kioskmode}
8813 -filter {crude-parental}
8814 -filter {site-specifics}
8815 -filter {js-annoyances}
8816 -filter {html-annoyances}
8817 +filter {refresh-tags}
8818 -filter {unsolicited-popups}
8819 +filter {img-reorder}
8820 +filter {banners-by-size}
8822 +filter {jumping-windows}
8823 +filter {ie-exploits}
8830 -handle-as-empty-document
8832 -hide-accept-language
8833 -hide-content-disposition
8834 +hide-forwarded-for-headers
8835 +hide-from-header {block}
8836 -hide-if-modified-since
8837 +hide-referrer {forge}
8842 -overwrite-last-modified
8843 -prevent-compression
8847 -server-header-filter{xml-to-html}
8848 -server-header-filter{html-to-xml}
8849 -session-cookies-only
8850 +set-image-blocker {pattern}
8851 -treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks </screen>
8855 Notice the only difference here to the previous listing, is to
8856 <quote>fast-redirects</quote> and <quote>session-cookies-only</quote>,
8857 which are activated specifically for this site in our configuration,
8858 and thus show in the <quote>Final Results</quote>.
8862 Now another example, <quote>ad.doubleclick.net</quote>:
8874 { +block +handle-as-image }
8875 .[a-vx-z]*.doubleclick.net
8880 We'll just show the interesting part here - the explicit matches. It is
8881 matched three different times. Two <quote>+block</quote> sections,
8882 and a <quote>+block +handle-as-image</quote>,
8883 which is the expanded form of one of our aliases that had been defined as:
8884 <quote>+block-as-image</quote>. (<link
8885 linkend="ALIASES"><quote>Aliases</quote></link> are defined in
8886 the first section of the actions file and typically used to combine more
8891 Any one of these would have done the trick and blocked this as an unwanted
8892 image. This is unnecessarily redundant since the last case effectively
8893 would also cover the first. No point in taking chances with these guys
8894 though ;-) Note that if you want an ad or obnoxious
8895 URL to be invisible, it should be defined as <quote>ad.doubleclick.net</quote>
8896 is done here -- as both a <link
8897 linkend="BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></link>
8898 <emphasis>and</emphasis> an
8899 <link linkend="HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></link>.
8900 The custom alias <quote><literal>+block-as-image</literal></quote> just
8901 simplifies the process and make it more readable.
8905 One last example. Let's try <quote>http://www.example.net/adsl/HOWTO/</quote>.
8906 This one is giving us problems. We are getting a blank page. Hmmm ...
8912 Matches for http://www.example.net/adsl/HOWTO/:
8914 In file: default.action <guibutton>[ View ]</guibutton> <guibutton>[ Edit ]</guibutton>
8918 -client-header-filter{hide-tor-exit-notation}
8919 -content-type-overwrite
8920 -crunch-client-header
8921 -crunch-if-none-match
8922 -crunch-incoming-cookies
8923 -crunch-outgoing-cookies
8924 -crunch-server-header
8926 -downgrade-http-version
8927 +fast-redirects {check-decoded-url}
8929 -filter {content-cookies}
8930 -filter {all-popups}
8931 -filter {banners-by-link}
8932 -filter {tiny-textforms}
8933 -filter {frameset-borders}
8934 -filter {demoronizer}
8935 -filter {shockwave-flash}
8936 -filter {quicktime-kioskmode}
8938 -filter {crude-parental}
8939 -filter {site-specifics}
8940 -filter {js-annoyances}
8941 -filter {html-annoyances}
8942 +filter {refresh-tags}
8943 -filter {unsolicited-popups}
8944 +filter {img-reorder}
8945 +filter {banners-by-size}
8947 +filter {jumping-windows}
8948 +filter {ie-exploits}
8955 -handle-as-empty-document
8957 -hide-accept-language
8958 -hide-content-disposition
8959 +hide-forwarded-for-headers
8960 +hide-from-header{block}
8961 +hide-referer{forge}
8965 -overwrite-last-modified
8966 +prevent-compression
8970 -server-header-filter{xml-to-html}
8971 -server-header-filter{html-to-xml}
8972 +session-cookies-only
8973 +set-image-blocker{blank}
8974 -treat-forbidden-connects-like-blocks }
8977 { +block +handle-as-image }
8983 Ooops, the <quote>/adsl/</quote> is matching <quote>/ads</quote> in our
8984 configuration! But we did not want this at all! Now we see why we get the
8985 blank page. It is actually triggering two different actions here, and
8986 the effects are aggregated so that the URL is blocked, and &my-app; is told
8987 to treat the block as if it were an image. But this is, of course, all wrong.
8988 We could now add a new action below this (or better in our own
8989 <filename>user.action</filename> file) that explicitly
8990 <emphasis>un</emphasis> blocks (
8991 <link linkend="BLOCK"><quote>{-block}</quote></link>) paths with
8992 <quote>adsl</quote> in them (remember, last match in the configuration
8993 wins). There are various ways to handle such exceptions. Example:
9005 Now the page displays ;-)
9006 Remember to flush your browser's caches when making these kinds of changes to
9007 your configuration to insure that you get a freshly delivered page! Or, try
9008 using <literal>Shift+Reload</literal>.
9012 But now what about a situation where we get no explicit matches like
9019 { +block +handle-as-image }
9025 That actually was very helpful and pointed us quickly to where the problem
9026 was. If you don't get this kind of match, then it means one of the default
9027 rules in the first section of <filename>default.action</filename> is causing
9028 the problem. This would require some guesswork, and maybe a little trial and
9029 error to isolate the offending rule. One likely cause would be one of the
9030 <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link> actions.
9031 These tend to be harder to troubleshoot.
9032 Try adding the URL for the site to one of aliases that turn off
9033 <link linkend="FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></link>:
9041 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
9049 <quote><literal>{ shop }</literal></quote> is an <quote>alias</quote> that expands to
9050 <quote><literal>{ -filter -session-cookies-only }</literal></quote>.
9051 Or you could do your own exception to negate filtering:
9059 # Disable ALL filter actions for sites in this section
9067 This would turn off all filtering for these sites. This is best
9068 put in <filename>user.action</filename>, for local site
9069 exceptions. Note that when a simple domain pattern is used by itself (without
9070 the subsequent path portion), all sub-pages within that domain are included
9071 automatically in the scope of the action.
9075 Images that are inexplicably being blocked, may well be hitting the
9076 <link linkend="FILTER-BANNERS-BY-SIZE"><quote>+filter{banners-by-size}</quote></link>
9078 that images of certain sizes are ad banners (works well
9079 <emphasis>most of the time</emphasis> since these tend to be standardized).
9083 <quote><literal>{ fragile }</literal></quote> is an alias that disables most
9084 actions that are the most likely to cause trouble. This can be used as a
9085 last resort for problem sites.
9091 # Handle with care: easy to break
9093 mybank.example.com</screen>
9098 <emphasis>Remember to flush caches!</emphasis> Note that the
9099 <literal>mail.google</literal> reference lacks the TLD portion (e.g.
9100 <quote>.com</quote>). This will effectively match any TLD with
9101 <literal>google</literal> in it, such as <literal>mail.google.de.</literal>,
9105 If this still does not work, you will have to go through the remaining
9106 actions one by one to find which one(s) is causing the problem.
9115 This program is free software; you can redistribute it
9116 and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
9117 Public License as published by the Free Software
9118 Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at
9119 your option) any later version.
9121 This program is distributed in the hope that it will
9122 be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the
9123 implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
9124 PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public
9125 License for more details.
9127 The GNU General Public License should be included with
9128 this file. If not, you can view it at
9129 http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
9130 or write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
9131 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301,
9134 $Log: user-manual.sgml,v $
9135 Revision 2.44 2007/11/15 03:30:20 hal9
9136 Results of spell check.
9138 Revision 2.43 2007/11/14 18:45:39 fabiankeil
9139 - Mention some more contributors in the "New in this Release" list.
9142 Revision 2.42 2007/11/12 03:32:40 hal9
9143 Updates for "What's New" and "Notes to Upgraders". Various other changes in
9144 preparation for new release. User Manual is almost ready.
9146 Revision 2.41 2007/11/11 16:32:11 hal9
9147 This is primarily syncing What's New and Note to Upgraders sections with the many
9148 new features and changes (gleaned from memory but mostly from ChangeLog).
9150 Revision 2.40 2007/11/10 17:10:59 fabiankeil
9151 In the first third of the file, mention several times that
9152 the action editor is disabled by default in 3.0.7 beta and later.
9154 Revision 2.39 2007/11/05 02:34:49 hal9
9155 Various changes in preparation for the upcoming release. Much yet to be done.
9157 Revision 2.38 2007/09/22 16:01:42 fabiankeil
9158 Update embedded show-url-info output.
9160 Revision 2.37 2007/08/27 16:09:55 fabiankeil
9161 Fix pre-chroot-nslookup description which I failed to
9162 copy and paste properly. Reported by Stephen Gildea.
9164 Revision 2.36 2007/08/26 16:47:14 fabiankeil
9165 Add Stephen Gildea's pre-chroot-nslookup patch [#1276666],
9166 extensive comments moved to user manual.
9168 Revision 2.35 2007/08/26 14:59:49 fabiankeil
9169 Minor rewordings and fixes.
9171 Revision 2.34 2007/08/05 15:19:50 fabiankeil
9172 - Don't claim HTTP/1.1 compliance.
9173 - Use $ in some of the path pattern examples.
9174 - Use a hide-user-agent example argument without
9175 leading and trailing space.
9176 - Make it clear that the cookie actions work with
9178 - Rephrase the inspect-jpegs text to underline
9179 that it's only meant to protect against a single
9182 Revision 2.33 2007/07/27 10:57:35 hal9
9183 Add references for user-agent strings for hide-user-agenet
9185 Revision 2.32 2007/06/07 12:36:22 fabiankeil
9186 Apply Roland's 29_usermanual.dpatch to fix a bunch
9187 of syntax errors I collected over the last months.
9189 Revision 2.31 2007/06/02 14:01:37 fabiankeil
9190 Start to document forward-override{}.
9192 Revision 2.30 2007/04/25 15:10:36 fabiankeil
9193 - Describe installation for FreeBSD.
9194 - Start to document taggers and tag patterns.
9195 - Don't confuse devils and daemons.
9197 Revision 2.29 2007/04/05 11:47:51 fabiankeil
9198 Some updates regarding header filtering,
9199 handling of compressed content and redirect's
9200 support for pcrs commands.
9202 Revision 2.28 2006/12/10 23:42:48 hal9
9203 Fix various typos reported by Adam P. Thanks.
9205 Revision 2.27 2006/11/14 01:57:47 hal9
9206 Dump all docs prior to 3.0.6 release. Various minor changes to faq and user
9209 Revision 2.26 2006/10/24 11:16:44 hal9
9212 Revision 2.25 2006/10/18 10:50:33 hal9
9213 Add note that since filters are off in Cautious, compression is ON. Turn off
9214 compression to make filters work on all sites.
9216 Revision 2.24 2006/10/03 11:13:54 hal9
9217 More references to the new filters. Include html this time around.
9219 Revision 2.23 2006/10/02 22:43:53 hal9
9220 Contains new filter definitions from Fabian, and few other miscellaneous
9223 Revision 2.22 2006/09/22 01:27:55 hal9
9224 Final commit of probably various minor changes here and there. Unless
9225 something changes this should be ready for pending release.
9227 Revision 2.21 2006/09/20 03:21:36 david__schmidt
9228 Just the tiniest tweak. Wafer thin!
9230 Revision 2.20 2006/09/10 14:53:54 hal9
9231 Results of spell check. User manual has some updates to standard.actions file
9234 Revision 2.19 2006/09/08 12:19:02 fabiankeil
9235 Adjust hide-if-modified-since example values
9236 to reflect the recent changes.
9238 Revision 2.18 2006/09/08 02:38:57 hal9
9240 -Fix a number of broken links.
9241 -Migrate the new Windows service command line options, and reference as
9243 -Rebuild so that can be used with the new "user-manual" config capabilities.
9246 Revision 2.17 2006/09/05 13:25:12 david__schmidt
9247 Add Windows service invocation stuff (duplicated) in FAQ and in user manual under Windows startup. One probably ought to reference the other.
9249 Revision 2.16 2006/09/02 12:49:37 hal9
9250 Various small updates for new actions, filterfiles, etc.
9252 Revision 2.15 2006/08/30 11:15:22 hal9
9253 More work on the new actions, especially filter-*-headers, and What's New
9254 section. User Manual is close to final form for 3.0.4 release. Some tinkering
9255 and proof reading left to do.
9257 Revision 2.14 2006/08/29 10:59:36 hal9
9258 Add a "Whats New in this release" Section. Further work on multiple filter
9259 files, and assorted other minor changes.
9261 Revision 2.13 2006/08/22 11:04:59 hal9
9262 Silence warnings and errors. This should build now. New filters were only
9263 stubbed in. More to be done.
9265 Revision 2.12 2006/08/14 08:40:39 fabiankeil
9266 Documented new actions that were part of
9267 the "minor Privoxy improvements".
9269 Revision 2.11 2006/07/18 14:48:51 david__schmidt
9270 Reorganizing the repository: swapping out what was HEAD (the old 3.1 branch)
9271 with what was really the latest development (the v_3_0_branch branch)
9273 Revision 1.123.2.43 2005/05/23 09:59:10 hal9
9276 Revision 1.123.2.42 2004/12/04 14:39:57 hal9
9277 Fix two minor typos per bug SF report.
9279 Revision 1.123.2.41 2004/03/23 12:58:42 oes
9282 Revision 1.123.2.40 2004/02/27 12:48:49 hal9
9283 Add comment re: redirecting to local file system for set-image-blocker may
9284 is dependent on browser.
9286 Revision 1.123.2.39 2004/01/30 22:31:40 oes
9287 Added a hint re bookmarklets to Quickstart section
9289 Revision 1.123.2.38 2004/01/30 16:47:51 oes
9290 Some minor clarifications
9292 Revision 1.123.2.37 2004/01/29 22:36:11 hal9
9293 Updates for no longer filtering text/plain, and demoronizer default settings,
9294 and copyright notice dates.
9296 Revision 1.123.2.36 2003/12/10 02:26:26 hal9
9297 Changed the demoronizer filter description.
9299 Revision 1.123.2.35 2003/11/06 13:36:37 oes
9300 Updated link to nightly CVS tarball
9302 Revision 1.123.2.34 2003/06/26 23:50:16 hal9
9303 Add a small bit on filtering and problems re: source code being corrupted.
9305 Revision 1.123.2.33 2003/05/08 18:17:33 roro
9306 Use apt-get instead of dpkg to install Debian package, which is more
9307 solid, uses the correct and most recent Debian version automatically.
9309 Revision 1.123.2.32 2003/04/11 03:13:57 hal9
9310 Add small note about only one filterfile (as opposed to multiple actions
9313 Revision 1.123.2.31 2003/03/26 02:03:43 oes
9314 Updated hard-coded copyright dates
9316 Revision 1.123.2.30 2003/03/24 12:58:56 hal9
9317 Add new section on Predefined Filters.
9319 Revision 1.123.2.29 2003/03/20 02:45:29 hal9
9320 More problems with \-\-chroot causing markup problems :(
9322 Revision 1.123.2.28 2003/03/19 00:35:24 hal9
9323 Manual edit of revision log because 'chroot' (even inside a comment) was
9324 causing Docbook to hang here (due to double hyphen and the processor thinking
9327 Revision 1.123.2.27 2003/03/18 19:37:14 oes
9328 s/Advanced|Radical/Adventuresome/g to avoid complaints re fun filter
9330 Revision 1.123.2.26 2003/03/17 16:50:53 oes
9331 Added documentation for new chroot option
9333 Revision 1.123.2.25 2003/03/15 18:36:55 oes
9334 Adapted to the new filters
9336 Revision 1.123.2.24 2002/11/17 06:41:06 hal9
9337 Move default profiles table from FAQ to U-M, and other minor related changes.
9340 Revision 1.123.2.23 2002/10/21 02:32:01 hal9
9341 Updates to the user.action examples section. A few new ones.
9343 Revision 1.123.2.22 2002/10/12 00:51:53 hal9
9344 Add demoronizer to filter section.
9346 Revision 1.123.2.21 2002/10/10 04:09:35 hal9
9347 s/Advanced/Radical/ and added very brief note.
9349 Revision 1.123.2.20 2002/10/10 03:49:21 hal9
9350 Add notes to session-cookies-only and Quickstart about pre-existing
9351 cookies. Also, note content-cookies work differently.
9353 Revision 1.123.2.19 2002/09/26 01:25:36 hal9
9354 More explanation on Privoxy patterns, more on content-cookies and SSL.
9356 Revision 1.123.2.18 2002/08/22 23:47:58 hal9
9357 Add 'Documentation' to Privoxy Menu shot in Configuration section to match
9360 Revision 1.123.2.17 2002/08/18 01:13:05 hal9
9361 Spell checked (only one typo this time!).
9363 Revision 1.123.2.16 2002/08/09 19:20:54 david__schmidt
9364 Update to Mac OSX startup script name
9366 Revision 1.123.2.15 2002/08/07 17:32:11 oes
9367 Converted some internal links from ulink to link for PDF creation; no content changed
9369 Revision 1.123.2.14 2002/08/06 09:16:13 oes
9370 Nits re: actions file download
9372 Revision 1.123.2.13 2002/08/02 18:23:19 g_sauthoff
9373 Just 2 small corrections to the Gentoo sections
9375 Revision 1.123.2.12 2002/08/02 18:17:21 g_sauthoff
9376 Added 2 Gentoo sections
9378 Revision 1.123.2.11 2002/07/26 15:20:31 oes
9379 - Added version info to title
9380 - Added info on new filters
9381 - Revised parts of the filter file tutorial
9382 - Added info on where to get updated actions files
9384 Revision 1.123.2.10 2002/07/25 21:42:29 hal9
9385 Add brief notes on not proxying non-HTTP protocols.
9387 Revision 1.123.2.9 2002/07/11 03:40:28 david__schmidt
9389 Updated Mac OSX sections due to installation location change
9391 Revision 1.123.2.8 2002/06/09 16:36:32 hal9
9392 Clarifications on filtering and MIME. Hardcode 'latest release' in index.html.
9394 Revision 1.123.2.7 2002/06/09 00:29:34 hal9
9395 Touch ups on filtering, in actions section and Anatomy.
9397 Revision 1.123.2.6 2002/06/06 23:11:03 hal9
9398 Fix broken link. Linkchecked all docs.
9400 Revision 1.123.2.5 2002/05/29 02:01:02 hal9
9401 This is break out of the entire config section from u-m, so it can
9402 eventually be used to generate the comments, etc in the main config file
9403 so that these are in sync with each other.
9405 Revision 1.123.2.4 2002/05/27 03:28:45 hal9
9406 Ooops missed something from David.
9408 Revision 1.123.2.3 2002/05/27 03:23:17 hal9
9409 Fix FIXMEs for OS2 and OSX startup. Fix Redhat typos (should be Red Hat).
9410 That's a wrap, I think.
9412 Revision 1.123.2.2 2002/05/26 19:02:09 hal9
9413 Move Amiga stuff around to take of FIXME in start up section.
9415 Revision 1.123.2.1 2002/05/26 17:04:25 hal9
9416 -Spellcheck, very minor edits, and sync across branches
9418 Revision 1.123 2002/05/24 23:19:23 hal9
9419 Include new image (Proxy setup). More fun with guibutton.
9420 Minor corrections/clarifications here and there.
9422 Revision 1.122 2002/05/24 13:24:08 oes
9423 Added Bookmarklet for one-click pre-filled access to show-url-info
9425 Revision 1.121 2002/05/23 23:20:17 oes
9426 - Changed more (all?) references to actions to the
9427 <literal><link> style.
9428 - Small fixes in the actions chapter
9429 - Small clarifications in the quickstart to ad blocking
9430 - Removed <emphasis> from <title>s since the new doc CSS
9431 renders them red (bad in TOC).
9433 Revision 1.120 2002/05/23 19:16:43 roro
9434 Correct Debian specials (installation and startup).
9436 Revision 1.119 2002/05/22 17:17:05 oes
9439 Revision 1.118 2002/05/21 04:54:55 hal9
9440 -New Section: Quickstart to Ad Blocking
9441 -Reformat Actions Anatomy to match new CGI layout
9443 Revision 1.117 2002/05/17 13:56:16 oes
9444 - Reworked & extended Templates chapter
9445 - Small changes to Regex appendix
9446 - #included authors.sgml into (C) and hist chapter
9448 Revision 1.116 2002/05/17 03:23:46 hal9
9449 Fixing merge conflict in Quickstart section.
9451 Revision 1.115 2002/05/16 16:25:00 oes
9452 Extended the Filter File chapter & minor fixes
9454 Revision 1.114 2002/05/16 09:42:50 oes
9455 More ulink->link, added some hints to Quickstart section
9457 Revision 1.113 2002/05/15 21:07:25 oes
9458 Extended and further commented the example actions files
9460 Revision 1.112 2002/05/15 03:57:14 hal9
9461 Spell check. A few minor edits here and there for better syntax and
9464 Revision 1.111 2002/05/14 23:01:36 oes
9467 Revision 1.110 2002/05/14 19:10:45 oes
9468 Restored alphabetical order of actions
9470 Revision 1.109 2002/05/14 17:23:11 oes
9471 Renamed the prevent-*-cookies actions, extended aliases section and moved it before the example AFs
9473 Revision 1.108 2002/05/14 15:29:12 oes
9474 Completed proofreading the actions chapter
9476 Revision 1.107 2002/05/12 03:20:41 hal9
9477 Small clarifications for 127.0.0.1 vs localhost for listen-address since this
9478 apparently an important distinction for some OS's.
9480 Revision 1.106 2002/05/10 01:48:20 hal9
9481 This is mostly proposed copyright/licensing additions and changes. Docs
9482 are still GPL, but licensing and copyright are more visible. Also, copyright
9483 changed in doc header comments (eliminate references to JB except FAQ).
9485 Revision 1.105 2002/05/05 20:26:02 hal9
9486 Sorting out license vs copyright in these docs.
9488 Revision 1.104 2002/05/04 08:44:45 swa
9491 Revision 1.103 2002/05/04 00:40:53 hal9
9492 -Remove the TOC first page kludge. It's fixed proper now in ldp.dsl.in.
9493 -Some minor additions to Quickstart.
9495 Revision 1.102 2002/05/03 17:46:00 oes
9496 Further proofread & reactivated short build instructions
9498 Revision 1.101 2002/05/03 03:58:30 hal9
9499 Move the user-manual config directive to top of section. Add note about
9500 Privoxy needing read permissions for configs, and write for logs.
9502 Revision 1.100 2002/04/29 03:05:55 hal9
9503 Add clarification on differences of new actions files.
9505 Revision 1.99 2002/04/28 16:59:05 swa
9506 more structure in starting section
9508 Revision 1.98 2002/04/28 05:43:59 hal9
9509 This is the break up of configuration.html into multiple files. This
9510 will probably break links elsewhere :(
9512 Revision 1.97 2002/04/27 21:04:42 hal9
9513 -Rewrite of Actions File example.
9514 -Add section for user-manual directive in config.
9516 Revision 1.96 2002/04/27 05:32:00 hal9
9517 -Add short section to Filter Files to tie in with +filter action.
9518 -Start rewrite of examples in Actions Examples (not finished).
9520 Revision 1.95 2002/04/26 17:23:29 swa
9521 bookmarks cleaned, changed structure of user manual, screen and programlisting cleanups, and numerous other changes that I forgot
9523 Revision 1.94 2002/04/26 05:24:36 hal9
9524 -Add most of Andreas suggestions to Chain of Events section.
9525 -A few other minor corrections and touch up.
9527 Revision 1.92 2002/04/25 18:55:13 hal9
9528 More catchups on new actions files, and new actions names.
9529 Other assorted cleanups, and minor modifications.
9531 Revision 1.91 2002/04/24 02:39:31 hal9
9532 Add 'Chain of Events' section.
9534 Revision 1.90 2002/04/23 21:41:25 hal9
9535 Linuxconf is deprecated on RH, substitute chkconfig.
9537 Revision 1.89 2002/04/23 21:05:28 oes
9538 Added hint for startup on Red Hat
9540 Revision 1.88 2002/04/23 05:37:54 hal9
9541 Add AmigaOS install stuff.
9543 Revision 1.87 2002/04/23 02:53:15 david__schmidt
9544 Updated OSX installation section
9545 Added a few English tweaks here an there
9547 Revision 1.86 2002/04/21 01:46:32 hal9
9548 Re-write actions section.
9550 Revision 1.85 2002/04/18 21:23:23 hal9
9551 Fix ugly typo (mine).
9553 Revision 1.84 2002/04/18 21:17:13 hal9
9554 Spell Redhat correctly (ie Red Hat). A few minor grammar corrections.
9556 Revision 1.83 2002/04/18 18:21:12 oes
9557 Added RPM install detail
9559 Revision 1.82 2002/04/18 12:04:50 oes
9562 Revision 1.81 2002/04/18 11:50:24 oes
9563 Extended Install section - needs fixing by packagers
9565 Revision 1.80 2002/04/18 10:45:19 oes
9566 Moved text to buildsource.sgml, renamed some filters, details
9568 Revision 1.79 2002/04/18 03:18:06 hal9
9569 Spellcheck, and minor touchups.
9571 Revision 1.78 2002/04/17 18:04:16 oes
9574 Revision 1.77 2002/04/17 13:51:23 oes
9575 Proofreading, part one
9577 Revision 1.76 2002/04/16 04:25:51 hal9
9578 -Added 'Note to Upgraders' and re-ordered the 'Quickstart' section.
9579 -Note about proxy may need requests to re-read config files.
9581 Revision 1.75 2002/04/12 02:08:48 david__schmidt
9582 Remove OS/2 building info... it is already in the developer-manual
9584 Revision 1.74 2002/04/11 00:54:38 hal9
9585 Add small section on submitting actions.
9587 Revision 1.73 2002/04/10 18:45:15 swa
9590 Revision 1.72 2002/04/10 04:06:19 hal9
9591 Added actions feedback to Bookmarklets section
9593 Revision 1.71 2002/04/08 22:59:26 hal9
9594 Version update. Spell chkconfig correctly :)
9596 Revision 1.70 2002/04/08 20:53:56 swa
9599 Revision 1.69 2002/04/06 05:07:29 hal9
9600 -Add privoxy-man-page.sgml, for man page.
9601 -Add authors.sgml for AUTHORS (and p-authors.sgml)
9602 -Reworked various aspects of various docs.
9603 -Added additional comments to sub-docs.
9605 Revision 1.68 2002/04/04 18:46:47 swa
9606 consistent look. reuse of copyright, history et. al.
9608 Revision 1.67 2002/04/04 17:27:57 swa
9609 more single file to be included at multiple points. make maintaining easier
9611 Revision 1.66 2002/04/04 06:48:37 hal9
9612 Structural changes to allow for conditional inclusion/exclusion of content
9613 based on entity toggles, e.g. 'entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE"'. And
9614 definition of internal entities, e.g. 'entity p-version "2.9.13"' that will
9615 eventually be set by Makefile.
9616 More boilerplate text for use across multiple docs.
9618 Revision 1.65 2002/04/03 19:52:07 swa
9619 enhance squid section due to user suggestion
9621 Revision 1.64 2002/04/03 03:53:43 hal9
9622 A few minor bug fixes, and touch ups. Ready for review.
9624 Revision 1.63 2002/04/01 16:24:49 hal9
9625 Define entities to include boilerplate text. See doc/source/*.
9627 Revision 1.62 2002/03/30 04:15:53 hal9
9628 - Fix privoxy.org/config links.
9629 - Paste in Bookmarklets from Toggle page.
9630 - Move Quickstart nearer top, and minor rework.
9632 Revision 1.61 2002/03/29 01:31:08 hal9
9635 Revision 1.60 2002/03/27 01:57:34 hal9
9636 Added more to Anatomy section.
9638 Revision 1.59 2002/03/27 00:54:33 hal9
9639 Touch up intro for new name.
9641 Revision 1.58 2002/03/26 22:29:55 swa
9642 we have a new homepage!
9644 Revision 1.57 2002/03/24 20:33:30 hal9
9645 A few minor catch ups with name change.
9647 Revision 1.56 2002/03/24 16:17:06 swa
9648 configure needs to be generated.
9650 Revision 1.55 2002/03/24 16:08:08 swa
9651 we are too lazy to make a block-built
9652 privoxy logo. hence removed the option.
9654 Revision 1.54 2002/03/24 15:46:20 swa
9655 name change related issue.
9657 Revision 1.53 2002/03/24 11:51:00 swa
9658 name change. changed filenames.
9660 Revision 1.52 2002/03/24 11:01:06 swa
9663 Revision 1.51 2002/03/23 15:13:11 swa
9664 renamed every reference to the old name with foobar.
9665 fixed "application foobar application" tag, fixed
9666 "the foobar" with "foobar". left junkbustser in cvs
9667 comments and remarks to history untouched.
9669 Revision 1.50 2002/03/23 05:06:21 hal9
9672 Revision 1.49 2002/03/21 17:01:05 hal9
9673 New section in Appendix.
9675 Revision 1.48 2002/03/12 06:33:01 hal9
9676 Catching up to Andreas and re_filterfile changes.
9678 Revision 1.47 2002/03/11 13:13:27 swa
9679 correct feedback channels
9681 Revision 1.46 2002/03/10 00:51:08 hal9
9682 Added section on JB internal pages in Appendix.
9684 Revision 1.45 2002/03/09 17:43:53 swa
9687 Revision 1.44 2002/03/09 17:08:48 hal9
9688 New section on Jon's actions file editor, and move some stuff around.
9690 Revision 1.43 2002/03/08 00:47:32 hal9
9691 Added imageblock{pattern}.
9693 Revision 1.42 2002/03/07 18:16:55 swa
9696 Revision 1.41 2002/03/07 16:46:43 hal9
9697 Fix a few markup problems for jade.
9699 Revision 1.40 2002/03/07 16:28:39 swa
9700 provide correct feedback channels
9702 Revision 1.39 2002/03/06 16:19:28 hal9
9703 Note on perceived filtering slowdown per FR.
9705 Revision 1.38 2002/03/05 23:55:14 hal9
9706 Stupid I did it again. Double hyphen in comment breaks jade.
9708 Revision 1.37 2002/03/05 23:53:49 hal9
9709 jade barfs on '- -' embedded in comments. - -user option broke it.
9711 Revision 1.36 2002/03/05 22:53:28 hal9
9712 Add new - - user option.
9714 Revision 1.35 2002/03/05 00:17:27 hal9
9715 Added section on command line options.
9717 Revision 1.34 2002/03/04 19:32:07 oes
9718 Changed default port to 8118
9720 Revision 1.33 2002/03/03 19:46:13 hal9
9721 Emphasis on where/how to report bugs, etc
9723 Revision 1.32 2002/03/03 09:26:06 joergs
9724 AmigaOS changes, config is now loaded from PROGDIR: instead of
9725 AmiTCP:db/junkbuster/ if no configuration file is specified on the
9728 Revision 1.31 2002/03/02 22:45:52 david__schmidt
9731 Revision 1.30 2002/03/02 22:00:14 hal9
9732 Updated 'New Features' list. Ran through spell-checker.
9734 Revision 1.29 2002/03/02 20:34:07 david__schmidt
9735 Update OS/2 build section
9737 Revision 1.28 2002/02/24 14:34:24 jongfoster
9738 Formatting changes. Now changing the doctype to DocBook XML 4.1
9739 will work - no other changes are needed.
9741 Revision 1.27 2002/01/11 14:14:32 hal9
9742 Added a very short section on Templates
9744 Revision 1.26 2002/01/09 20:02:50 hal9
9745 Fix bug re: auto-detect config file changes.
9747 Revision 1.25 2002/01/09 18:20:30 hal9
9748 Touch ups for *.action files.
9750 Revision 1.24 2001/12/02 01:13:42 hal9
9753 Revision 1.23 2001/12/02 00:20:41 hal9
9754 Updates for recent changes.
9756 Revision 1.22 2001/11/05 23:57:51 hal9
9757 Minor update for startup now daemon mode.
9759 Revision 1.21 2001/10/31 21:11:03 hal9
9760 Correct 2 minor errors
9762 Revision 1.18 2001/10/24 18:45:26 hal9
9763 *** empty log message ***
9765 Revision 1.17 2001/10/24 17:10:55 hal9
9766 Catching up with Jon's recent work, and a few other things.
9768 Revision 1.16 2001/10/21 17:19:21 swa
9769 wrong url in documentation
9771 Revision 1.15 2001/10/14 23:46:24 hal9
9772 Various minor changes. Fleshed out SEE ALSO section.
9774 Revision 1.13 2001/10/10 17:28:33 hal9
9777 Revision 1.12 2001/09/28 02:57:04 hal9
9780 Revision 1.11 2001/09/28 02:25:20 hal9
9783 Revision 1.9 2001/09/27 23:50:29 hal9
9784 A few changes. A short section on regular expression in appendix.
9786 Revision 1.8 2001/09/25 00:34:59 hal9
9787 Some additions, and re-arranging.
9789 Revision 1.7 2001/09/24 14:31:36 hal9
9792 Revision 1.6 2001/09/24 14:10:32 hal9
9793 Including David's OS/2 installation instructions.
9795 Revision 1.2 2001/09/13 15:27:40 swa
9798 Revision 1.1 2001/09/12 15:36:41 swa
9799 source files for junkbuster documentation
9801 Revision 1.3 2001/09/10 17:43:59 swa
9802 first proposal of a structure.
9804 Revision 1.2 2001/06/13 14:28:31 swa
9805 docs should have an author.
9807 Revision 1.1 2001/06/13 14:20:37 swa
9808 first import of project's documentation for the webserver.