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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 p-version "2.9.14">
12 <!entity p-status "beta">
13 <!entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE">
14 <!entity % p-stable "IGNORE">
15 <!entity % p-text "IGNORE"> <!-- define we are not a text only doc -->
16 <!entity % p-doc "INCLUDE"> <!-- and we are a formal doc -->
17 <!entity % p-readme "IGNORE">
18 <!entity % p-config "IGNORE">
19 <!entity % p-supp-userman "IGNORE"> <!-- Omit some from supported.sgml -->
22 File : $Source: /cvsroot/ijbswa/current/doc/source/user-manual.sgml,v $
25 This file belongs into
26 ijbswa.sourceforge.net:/home/groups/i/ij/ijbswa/htdocs/
28 $Id: user-manual.sgml,v 1.99 2002/04/28 16:59:05 swa Exp $
30 Written by and Copyright (C) 2001 the SourceForge
31 Privoxy team. http://www.privoxy.org/
33 Based on the Internet Junkbuster originally written
34 by and Copyright (C) 1997 Anonymous Coders and
35 Junkbusters Corporation. http://www.junkbusters.com
38 ========================================================================
39 NOTE: Please read developer-manual/documentation.html before touching
40 anything in this, or other Privoxy documentation.
41 ========================================================================
47 <title>Privoxy User Manual</title>
49 <pubdate>$Id: user-manual.sgml,v 1.99 2002/04/28 16:59:05 swa Exp $</pubdate>
54 <orgname>By: Privoxy Developers</orgname>
63 This is here to keep vim syntax file from breaking :/
64 If I knew enough to fix it, I would.
65 PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE! HB: hal@foobox.net
71 The user manual gives users information on how to install, configure and use
73 url="http://www.privoxy.org/"><application>Privoxy</application></ulink>.
76 <!-- Include privoxy.sgml boilerplate: -->
78 <!-- end privoxy.sgml -->
81 You can find the latest version of the user manual at <ulink
82 url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/">http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/</ulink>.
83 Please see the <ulink url="contact.html">Contact section</ulink> on how to
84 contact the developers.
88 <!-- Feel free to send a note to the developers at <email>ijbswa-developers@lists.sourceforge.net</email>. -->
94 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
95 <sect1 id="intro" label=""><title></title>
96 <!-- dummy section to force TOC on page by itself -->
97 <!-- DO NOT REMOVE! please ;) -->
101 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
102 <sect1 label="1" id="introduction"><title>Introduction</title>
104 This documentation is included with the current &p-status; version of
105 <application>Privoxy</application>, v.&p-version;<![%p-not-stable;[,
106 and is mostly complete at this point. The most up to date reference for the
107 time being is still the comments in the source files and in the individual
108 configuration files. Development of version 3.0 is currently nearing
109 completion, and includes many significant changes and enhancements over
110 earlier versions. The target release date for
111 stable v3.0 is <quote>soon</quote> ;-)]]>.
114 <!-- include only in non-stable versions -->
117 Since this is a &p-status; version, not all new features are well tested. This
118 documentation may be slightly out of sync as a result (especially with
119 CVS sources). And there <emphasis>may be</emphasis> bugs, though hopefully
124 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
125 <sect2 id="features"><title>Features</title>
127 In addition to <application>Internet Junkbuster's</application> traditional
128 features of ad and banner blocking and cookie management,
129 <application>Privoxy</application> provides new features<![%p-not-stable;[,
130 some of them currently under development]]>:
132 <!-- Include newfeatures.sgml boilerplate here: -->
134 <!-- end boilerplate -->
139 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
142 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
143 <sect1 id="installation"><title>Installation</title>
146 <application>Privoxy</application> is available both in convenient pre-compiled
147 packages for a wide range of operating systems, and as raw source code.
148 For most users, we recommend using the packages, which can be downloaded from our
149 <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/projects/ijbswa/">Privoxy Project
150 Page</ulink>. For installing and compiling the source code, please look
151 into our Developer Manual.
155 If you like to live on the bleeding edge and are not afraid of using
156 possibly unstable development versions, you can check out the up-to-the-minute
157 version directly from <ulink url="http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=11118">the
158 CVS repository</ulink> or simply download <ulink
159 url="http://cvs.sourceforge.net/cvstarballs/ijbswa-cvsroot.tar.gz">the nightly CVS
160 tarball.</ulink> Again, we refer you to the Developer Manual.
163 <!-- Include supported.sgml boilerplate -->
165 <!-- end boilerplate -->
168 Note: If you have a previous <application>Junkbuster</application> or
169 <application>Privoxy</application> installation on your system, you
170 will need to remove it. Some platforms do this for you as part
171 of their installation procedure. (See below for your platform).
175 In any case <emphasis>be sure to backup your old configuration
176 if it is valuable to you.</emphasis> See the
177 <link linkend="upgradersnote">note to upgraders</link> section
181 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
182 <sect2 id="installation-pack-rpm"><title>Red Hat and SuSE RPMs</title>
185 RPMs can be installed with <literal>rpm -Uvh privoxy-&p-version;-1.rpm</literal>,
186 and will use <filename>/etc/privoxy</filename> for the location
187 of configuration files.
191 Note that on Red Hat, <application>Privoxy</application> will
192 <emphasis>not</emphasis> be automatically started on system boot. You will
193 need to enable that using <command>chkconfig</command>,
194 <command>ntsysv</command>, or similar methods. Note that SuSE will
195 automatically start Privoxy in the boot process.
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, before installing <application>Privoxy</application>.
212 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
213 <sect2 id="installation-deb"><title>Debian</title>
219 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
220 <sect2 id="installation-pack-win"><title>Windows</title>
223 Just double-click the installer, which will guide you through
224 the installation process. You will find the configuration files
225 in the same directory as you installed Privoxy in. We do not
226 use the registry of Windows.
230 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
231 <sect2 id="installation-pack-bintgz"><title>Solaris, NetBSD, FreeBSD, HP-UX</title>
234 Create a new directory, <literal>cd</literal> to it, then unzip and
235 untar the archive. For the most part, you'll have to figure out where
240 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
241 <sect2 id="installation-os2"><title>OS/2</title>
244 First, make sure that no previous installations of
245 <application>Junkbuster</application> and / or
246 <application>Privoxy</application> are left on your
247 system. You can do this by
251 Then, just double-click the WarpIN self-installing archive, which will
252 guide you through the installation process. A shadow of the
253 <application>Privoxy</application> executable will be placed in your
254 startup folder so it will start automatically whenever OS/2 starts.
258 The directory you choose to install <application>Privoxy</application>
259 into will contain all of the configuration files.
263 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
264 <sect2 id="installation-mac"><title>Max OSX</title>
266 Unzip the downloaded package (you can either double-click on the file
267 in the finder, or on the desktop if you downloaded it there). Then,
268 double-click on the package installer icon and follow the installation
270 <application>Privoxy</application> will be installed in the subdirectory
271 <literal>/Applications/Privoxy.app</literal>.
272 <application>Privoxy</application> will set itself up to start
273 automatically on system bring-up via
274 <literal>/System/Library/StartupItems/Privoxy</literal>.
278 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
279 <sect2 id="installation-amiga"><title>AmigaOS</title>
281 Copy and then unpack the <filename>lha</filename> archive to a suitable location.
282 All necessary files will be installed into <application>Privoxy</application>
283 directory, including all configuration and log files. To uninstall, just
284 remove this directory.
287 Start <application>Privoxy</application> (with RUN <>NIL:) in your
288 <filename>startnet</filename> script (AmiTCP), in
289 <filename>s:user-startup</filename> (RoadShow), as startup program in your
290 startup script (Genesis), or as startup action (Miami and MiamiDx).
291 <application>Privoxy</application> will automatically quit when you quit your
292 TCP/IP stack (just ignore the harmless warning your TCP/IP stack may display that
293 <application>Privoxy</application> is still running).
298 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
300 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
301 <sect1 id="upgradersnote">
302 <title>Note to Upgraders</title>
304 There are very significant changes from older versions of
305 <application>Junkbuster</application> to the current
306 <application>Privoxy</application>. Configuration is substantially
307 changed. <application>Junkbuster 2.0.x</application> and earlier
308 configuration files will not migrate. The functionality of the old
309 <filename>blockfile</filename>, <filename>cookiefile</filename> and
310 <filename>imagelist</filename>, are now combined into the
311 <ulink url="actions-file.html"><quote>actions files</quote></ulink>.
312 <filename>default.action</filename>, is the main actions file. Local
313 exceptions should best be put into <filename>user.action</filename>.
316 A <ulink url="filter-file.html"><quote>filter file</quote></ulink> (typically
317 <filename>default.filter</filename>) is new as of <application>Privoxy
318 2.9.x</application>, and provides some of the new sophistication (explained
319 below). <filename>config</filename> is much the same as before.
322 If upgrading from a 2.0.x version, you will have to use the new config
323 files, and possibly adapt any personal rules from your older files.
324 When porting personal rules over from the old <filename>blockfile</filename>
325 to the new actions files, please note that even the pattern syntax has
326 changed. If upgrading from 2.9.x development versions, it is still
327 recommended to use the new configuration files.
330 A quick list of things to be aware of before upgrading:
338 The default listening port is now 8118 due to a conflict with another
344 Some installers may remove earlier versions completely. Save any
345 important configuration files!
350 <application>Privoxy</application> is controllable with a web browser
351 at the special URL: <ulink
352 url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
353 (Shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>). Many
354 aspects of configuration can be done here, including temporarily disabling
355 <application>Privoxy</application>.
360 The primary configuration file for cookie management, ad and banner
361 blocking, and many other aspects of <application>Privoxy</application>
362 configuration is in the <ulink url="actions-file.html">actions
363 files</ulink>. It is strongly recommended to become familiar with the new
364 actions concept below, before modifying these files. Locally defined rules
365 should go into <filename>user.action</filename>.
370 <!-- I think it is best to keep this somewhat vague, in case -->
371 <!-- the situation changes under our feet. -->
372 Some installers may not automatically start
373 <application>Privoxy</application> after installation.
381 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
382 <sect1 id="quickstart"><title>Quickstart to Using <application>Privoxy</application></title>
388 Install <application>Privoxy</application>. See the section <link linkend="installation">Installing</link>.
394 Start <application>Privoxy</application>. See the section <link linkend="startup">Starting <application>Privoxy</application></link>.
400 Change your browser's configuration to use the proxy <literal>localhost</literal> on port
401 <literal>8118</literal>. See the section <link linkend="startup">Starting <application>Privoxy</application></link>.
407 Enjoy surfing with enhanced comfort and privacy. Please see the section
408 <link linkend="contact">Contacting the Developers</link> on how to report
409 bugs or problems with websites or to get help. You may want to change the
410 file <filename>user.action</filename> to further tweak your new browsing
420 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
422 <title>Starting <application>Privoxy</application></title>
424 Before launching <application>Privoxy</application> for the first time, you
425 will want to configure your browser(s) to use
426 <application>Privoxy</application> as a HTTP and HTTPS proxy. The default is
427 localhost for the proxy address, and port 8118 (earlier versions used port
428 8000). This is the one configuration step that must be done!
432 With <application>Netscape</application> (and
433 <application>Mozilla</application>), this can be set under <literal>Edit
434 -> Preferences -> Advanced -> Proxies -> HTTP Proxy</literal>.
435 For <application>Internet Explorer</application>: <literal>Tools ->
436 Internet Properties -> Connections -> LAN Setting</literal>. Then,
437 check <quote>Use Proxy</quote> and fill in the appropriate info (Address:
438 localhost, Port: 8118). Include if HTTPS proxy support too.
442 After doing this, flush your browser's disk and memory caches to force a
443 re-reading of all pages and to get rid of any ads that may be cached. You
444 are now ready to start enjoying the benefits of using
445 <application>Privoxy</application>!
449 <application>Privoxy</application> is typically started by specifying the
450 main configuration file to be used on the command line. If no configuration
451 file is specified on the command line, <application>Privoxy</application>
452 will look for a file named <filename>config</filename> in the current
453 directory. Except on Win32 where it will try <filename>config.txt</filename>.
456 <sect2 id="start-redhatdebian">
457 <title>RedHat and Debian</title>
459 We use a script. Note that RedHat does not start Privoxy upon booting per
460 default. It will use the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename> as its
461 main configuration file. FIXME: Debian??
465 # /etc/rc.d/init.d/privoxy start
470 <sect2 id="start-suse">
473 We use a script. It will use the file <filename>/etc/privoxy/config</filename>
474 as its main configuration file. Note that SuSE starts Privoxy upon booting
484 <sect2 id="start-windows">
485 <title>Windows</title>
487 Click on the Privoxy Icon to start Privoxy. If no configuration file is
488 specified on the command line, <application>Privoxy</application> will look
489 for a file named <filename>config.txt</filename>. Note that Windows will
490 automatically start Privoxy upon booting you PC.
494 <sect2 id="start-unices">
495 <title>Solaris, NetBSD, FreeBSD, HP-UX and others</title>
497 Example Unix startup command:
501 # /usr/sbin/privoxy /etc/privoxy/config
506 <sect2 id="start-os2">
513 <sect2 id="start-macosx">
514 <title>MAX OSX</title>
521 <sect2 id="start-amigaos">
522 <title>AmigaOS</title>
531 See the section <link linkend="cmdoptions">Command line options</link> for
535 must find a better place for this paragraph
538 The included default configuration files should give a reasonable starting
539 point. Most of the per site configuration is done in the
540 <ulink url="actions-file.html"><quote>actions</quote></ulink> files. These are
541 where various cookie actions are defined, ad and banner blocking, and other
542 aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> configuration. There are several
543 such files included, with varying levels of aggressiveness.
547 You will probably want to keep an eye out for sites for which you may prefer
548 persistent cookies, and add these to your actions configuration as needed. By
549 default, most of these will be accepted only during the current browser
550 session (aka <quote>session cookies</quote>), unless you add them to the
551 configuration. If you want the browser to handle this instead, you will need
552 to edit <filename>user.action</filename> (or through the web based interface)
553 and disable this feature. If you use more than one browser, it would make
554 more sense to let <application>Privoxy</application> handle this. In which
555 case, the browser(s) should be set to accept all cookies.
559 Another feature where you will probably want to define exceptions for trusted
560 sites is the popup-killing (through the <ulink
561 url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS"><quote>+kill-popups</quote></ulink> and
563 url="actions-file.html#FILTER-POPUPS"><quote>+filter{popups}</quote></ulink>
564 actions), because your favorite shopping, banking, or leisure site may need
565 popups (explained below).
569 <application>Privoxy</application> is HTTP/1.1 compliant, but not all of
570 the optional 1.1 features are as yet supported. In the unlikely event that
571 you experience inexplicable problems with browsers that use HTTP/1.1 per default
572 (like <application>Mozilla</application> or recent versions of I.E.), you might
573 try to force HTTP/1.0 compatibility. For Mozilla, look under <literal>Edit ->
574 Preferences -> Debug -> Networking</literal>.
575 Alternatively, set the <quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote> config option in
576 <filename>default.action</filename> which will downgrade your browser's HTTP
577 requests from HTTP/1.1 to HTTP/1.0 before processing them.
581 After running <application>Privoxy</application> for a while, you can
582 start to fine tune the configuration to suit your personal, or site,
583 preferences and requirements. There are many, many aspects that can
584 be customized. <quote>Actions</quote>
585 can be adjusted by pointing your browser to
586 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
587 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>),
588 and then follow the link to <quote>View & Change the Current Configuration</quote>.
589 (This is an internal page and does not require Internet access.)
593 In fact, various aspects of <application>Privoxy</application>
594 configuration can be viewed from this page, including
595 current configuration parameters, source code version numbers,
596 the browser's request headers, and <quote>actions</quote> that apply
597 to a given URL. In addition to the actions file
598 editor mentioned above, <application>Privoxy</application> can also
599 be turned <quote>on</quote> and <quote>off</quote> (toggled) from this page.
603 If you encounter problems, try loading the page without
604 <application>Privoxy</application>. If that helps, enter the URL where
605 you have the problems into <ulink url="http://p.p/show-url-info">the browser
606 based rule tracing utility</ulink>. See which rules apply and why, and
607 then try turning them off for that site one after the other, until the problem
608 is gone. When you have found the culprit, you might want to turn the rest on
613 If the above paragraph sounds gibberish to you, you might want to <ulink
614 url="actions-file.html#ACTIONSFILE">read more about the actions concept</ulink>
615 or even dive deep into the <ulink url="appendix.html#ACTIONSANAT">Appendix
620 If you can't get rid of the problem at all, think you've found a bug in
621 Privoxy, want to propose a new feature or smarter rules, please see the
622 section <ulink url="contact.html"><quote>Contacting the
623 Developers</quote></ulink> below.
628 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
629 <sect2 id="cmdoptions">
630 <title>Command Line Options</title>
632 <application>Privoxy</application> may be invoked with the following
633 command-line options:
641 <emphasis>--version</emphasis>
644 Print version info and exit. Unix only.
649 <emphasis>--help</emphasis>
652 Print short usage info and exit. Unix only.
657 <emphasis>--no-daemon</emphasis>
660 Don't become a daemon, i.e. don't fork and become process group
661 leader, and don't detach from controlling tty. Unix only.
666 <emphasis>--pidfile FILE</emphasis>
670 On startup, write the process ID to <emphasis>FILE</emphasis>. Delete the
671 <emphasis>FILE</emphasis> on exit. Failure to create or delete the
672 <emphasis>FILE</emphasis> is non-fatal. If no <emphasis>FILE</emphasis>
673 option is given, no PID file will be used. Unix only.
678 <emphasis>--user USER[.GROUP]</emphasis>
682 After (optionally) writing the PID file, assume the user ID of
683 <emphasis>USER</emphasis>, and if included the GID of GROUP. Exit if the
684 privileges are not sufficient to do so. Unix only.
689 <emphasis>configfile</emphasis>
692 If no <emphasis>configfile</emphasis> is included on the command line,
693 <application>Privoxy</application> will look for a file named
694 <quote>config</quote> in the current directory (except on Win32
695 where it will look for <quote>config.txt</quote> instead). Specify
696 full path to avoid confusion. If no config file is found,
697 <application>Privoxy</application> will fail to start.
708 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
711 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
712 <sect1 id="configuration"><title><application>Privoxy</application> Configuration</title>
714 All <application>Privoxy</application> configuration is stored
715 in text files. These files can be edited with a text editor.
716 Many important aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> can
717 also be controlled easily with a web browser.
721 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
724 <title>Controlling <application>Privoxy</application> with Your Web Browser</title>
726 <application>Privoxy</application>'s user interface can be reached through the special
727 URL <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
728 (shortcut: <ulink url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>),
729 which is a built-in page and works without Internet access.
730 You will see the following section:
734 <!-- Needs to be put in a table and colorized -->
737 <bridgehead renderas="sect2">Privoxy Menu</bridgehead>
741 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">View & change the current configuration</ulink>
744 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-version">View the source code version numbers</ulink>
747 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-request">View the request headers.</ulink>
750 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">Look up which actions apply to a URL and why</ulink>
753 ▪ <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">Toggle Privoxy on or off</ulink>
761 This should be self-explanatory. Note the first item leads to an editor for the
762 <quote>actions list</quote>, which is where the ad, banner, cookie,
763 and URL blocking magic is configured as well as other advanced features of
764 <application>Privoxy</application>. This is an easy way to adjust various
765 aspects of <application>Privoxy</application> configuration. The actions
766 file, and other configuration files, are explained in detail below.
770 <quote>Toggle Privoxy On or Off</quote> is handy for sites that might
771 have problems with your current actions and filters. You can in fact use
772 it as a test to see whether it is <application>Privoxy</application>
773 causing the problem or not. <application>Privoxy</application> continues
774 to run as a proxy in this case, but all filtering is disabled. There
775 is even a toggle <link linkend="bookmarklets">Bookmarklet</link> offered, so
776 that you can toggle <application>Privoxy</application> with one click from
782 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
787 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
789 <sect2 id="confoverview">
790 <title>Configuration Files Overview</title>
792 For Unix, *BSD and Linux, all configuration files are located in
793 <filename>/etc/privoxy/</filename> by default. For MS Windows, OS/2, and
794 AmigaOS these are all in the same directory as the
795 <application>Privoxy</application> executable. <![%p-not-stable;[ The name
796 and number of configuration files has changed from previous versions, and is
797 subject to change as development progresses.]]>
801 The installed defaults provide a reasonable starting point, though
802 some settings may be aggressive by some standards. For the time being, the
803 principle configuration files are:
811 The main configuration file is named <link linkend="config">config</link>
812 on Linux, Unix, BSD, OS/2, and AmigaOS and <filename>config.txt</filename>
813 on Windows. This is a required file.
819 <filename>default.action</filename> (the main <link linkend="actions-file">actions file</link>) is used to define
820 the default settings for various <quote>actions</quote> relating to images, banners,
821 pop-ups, access restrictions, banners and cookies.
824 Multiple actions files may be defined in <filename>config</filename>. These
825 are processed in the order they are defined. Local customizations and locally
826 preferred exceptions to the default policies as defined in
827 <filename>default.action</filename> are probably best applied in
828 <filename>user.action</filename>, which should be preserved across
829 upgrades. <filename>standard.action</filename> is also included. This is mostly
830 for <application>Privoxy's</application> internal use.
833 There is also a web based editor that can be accessed from
835 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status/">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status/</ulink>
837 url="http://p.p/show-status/">http://p.p/show-status/</ulink>) for the
838 various actions files.
844 <filename>default.filter</filename> (the <link linkend="filter-file">filter
845 file</link>) can be used to re-write the raw page content, including
846 viewable text as well as embedded HTML and JavaScript, and whatever else
847 lurks on any given web page. The filtering jobs are only pre-defined here;
848 whether to apply them or not is up to the actions files.
856 All files use the <quote><literal>#</literal></quote> character to denote a
857 comment (the rest of the line will be ignored) angd understand line continuation
858 through placing a backslash ("<literal>\</literal>") as the very last character
859 in a line. If the <literal>#</literal> is preceded by a backslash, it looses
860 its special function. Placing a <literal>#</literal> in front of an otherwise
861 valid configuration line to prevent it from being interpreted is called "commenting
866 The actions files and <filename>default.filter</filename>
867 can use Perl style <link linkend="regex">regular expressions</link> for
872 After making any changes, there is no need to restart
873 <application>Privoxy</application> in order for the changes to take
874 effect. <application>Privoxy</application> detects such changes
875 automatically. Note, however, that it may take one or two additional
876 requests for the change to take effect. When changing the listening address
877 of <application>Privoxy</application>, these <quote>wake up</quote> requests
878 must obviously be sent to the <emphasis>old</emphasis> listening address.
883 While under development, the configuration content is subject to change.
884 The below documentation may not be accurate by the time you read this.
885 Also, what constitutes a <quote>default</quote> setting, may change, so
886 please check all your configuration files on important issues.
892 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
895 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
898 <title>The Main Configuration File</title>
901 Again, the main configuration file is named <filename>config</filename> on
902 Linux/Unix/BSD and OS/2, and <filename>config.txt</filename> on Windows.
903 Configuration lines consist of an initial keyword followed by a list of
904 values, all separated by whitespace (any number of spaces or tabs). For
912 <emphasis>confdir /etc/privoxy</emphasis>
919 Assigns the value <literal>/etc/privoxy</literal> to the option
920 <literal>confdir</literal> and thus indicates that the configuration
921 directory is named <quote>/etc/privoxy/</quote>.
925 All options in the config file except for <literal>confdir</literal> and
926 <literal>logdir</literal> are optional. Watch out in the below description
927 for what happens if you leave them unset.
931 The main config file controls all aspects of <application>Privoxy</application>'s
932 operation that are not location dependent (i.e. they apply universally, no matter
933 where you may be surfing).
937 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
939 <sect2 id="conf-log-loc">
940 <title>Configuration and Log File Locations</title>
943 <application>Privoxy</application> can (and normally does) use a number of
944 other files for additional configuration, help and logging.
945 This section of the configuration file tells <application>Privoxy</application>
946 where to find those other files.
950 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="confdir"><title>confdir</title>
954 <term>Specifies:</term>
956 <para>The directory where the other configuration files are located</para>
960 <term>Type of value:</term>
962 <para>Path name</para>
966 <term>Default value:</term>
968 <para>/etc/privoxy (Unix) <emphasis>or</emphasis> <application>Privoxy</application> installation dir (Windows) </para>
972 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
974 <para><emphasis>Mandatory</emphasis></para>
981 No trailing <quote><literal>/</literal></quote>, please
984 When development goes modular and multi-user, the blocker, filter, and
985 per-user config will be stored in subdirectories of <quote>confdir</quote>.
986 For now, the configuration directory structure is flat, except for
987 <filename>confdir/templates</filename>, where the HTML templates for CGI
988 output reside (e.g. <application>Privoxy's</application> 404 error page).
996 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="logdir"><title>logdir</title>
1000 <term>Specifies:</term>
1003 The directory where all logging takes place (i.e. where <filename>logfile</filename> and
1004 <filename>jarfile</filename> are located)
1009 <term>Type of value:</term>
1011 <para>Path name</para>
1015 <term>Default value:</term>
1017 <para>/var/log/privoxy (Unix) <emphasis>or</emphasis> <application>Privoxy</application> installation dir (Windows) </para>
1021 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1023 <para><emphasis>Mandatory</emphasis></para>
1030 No trailing <quote><literal>/</literal></quote>, please
1037 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="actionsfile"><title>
1040 <anchor id="default.action">
1041 <anchor id="standard.action">
1042 <anchor id="user.action">
1043 <!-- Note: slightly modified this section 04/28/02, hal. See NOTE. -->
1046 <term>Specifies:</term>
1049 The <link linkend="actions">actions</link> file(s) to use
1054 <term>Type of value:</term>
1056 <para>File name, relative to <literal>confdir</literal></para>
1060 <term>Default value:</term>
1064 <msgtext><literallayout> standard # Internal purposes, recommended not editing</literallayout></msgtext>
1067 <msgtext><literallayout> default # Main actions file</literallayout></msgtext>
1070 <msgtext><literallayout> user # User customizations</literallayout></msgtext>
1076 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1079 No actions are taken at all. Simple neutral proxying.
1087 Multiple <literal>actionsfile</literal> lines are permitted, and are in fact recommended!
1090 The default values include standard.action, which is used for internal
1091 purposes and should be loaded, default.action, which is the
1092 <quote>main</quote> actions file maintained by the developers, and
1093 <filename>user.action</filename>, where you can make your personal additions.
1096 Actions files are where all the per site and per URL configuration is done for
1097 ad blocking, cookie management, privacy considerations, etc.
1098 There is no point in using <application>Privoxy</application> without at
1099 least one actions file.
1106 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="filterfile"><title>filterfile</title>
1107 <anchor id="default.filter">
1110 <term>Specifies:</term>
1113 The <link linkend="filter">filter</link> file to use
1118 <term>Type of value:</term>
1120 <para>File name, relative to <literal>confdir</literal></para>
1124 <term>Default value:</term>
1126 <para>default.filter (Unix) <emphasis>or</emphasis> default.filter.txt (Windows)</para>
1130 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1133 No textual content filtering takes place, i.e. all
1134 <literal>+filter{<replaceable class="parameter">name</replaceable>}</literal>
1135 actions in the actions files are turned off
1143 The <quote>default.filter</quote> file contains content modification rules
1144 that use <quote>regular expressions</quote>. These rules permit powerful
1145 changes on the content of Web pages, e.g., you could disable your favorite
1146 JavaScript annoyances, re-write the actual displayed text, or just have some
1147 fun replacing <quote>Microsoft</quote> with <quote>MicroSuck</quote> wherever
1148 it appears on a Web page.
1155 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="logfile"><title>logfile</title>
1159 <term>Specifies:</term>
1167 <term>Type of value:</term>
1169 <para>File name, relative to <literal>logdir</literal></para>
1173 <term>Default value:</term>
1175 <para>logfile (Unix) <emphasis>or</emphasis> privoxy.log (Windows)</para>
1179 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1182 No log file is used, all log messages go to the console (<literal>stderr</literal>).
1190 The windows version will additionally log to the console.
1193 The logfile is where all logging and error messages are written. The level
1194 of detail and number of messages are set with the <literal>debug</literal>
1195 option (see below). The logfile can be useful for tracking down a problem with
1196 <application>Privoxy</application> (e.g., it's not blocking an ad you
1197 think it should block) but in most cases you probably will never look at it.
1200 Your logfile will grow indefinitely, and you will probably want to
1201 periodically remove it. On Unix systems, you can do this with a cron job
1202 (see <quote>man cron</quote>). For Red Hat, a <command>logrotate</command>
1203 script has been included.
1206 On SuSE Linux systems, you can place a line like <quote>/var/log/privoxy.*
1207 +1024k 644 nobody.nogroup</quote> in <filename>/etc/logfiles</filename>, with
1208 the effect that cron.daily will automatically archive, gzip, and empty the
1209 log, when it exceeds 1M size.
1216 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="jarfile"><title>jarfile</title>
1220 <term>Specifies:</term>
1223 The file to store intercepted cookies in
1228 <term>Type of value:</term>
1230 <para>File name, relative to <literal>logdir</literal></para>
1234 <term>Default value:</term>
1236 <para>jarfile (Unix) <emphasis>or</emphasis> privoxy.jar (Windows)</para>
1240 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1243 Intercepted cookies are not stored at all.
1251 The jarfile may grow to ridiculous sizes over time.
1258 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="trustfile"><title>trustfile</title>
1261 <term>Specifies:</term>
1264 The trust file to use
1269 <term>Type of value:</term>
1271 <para>File name, relative to <literal>confdir</literal></para>
1275 <term>Default value:</term>
1277 <para><emphasis>Unset (commented out)</emphasis>. When activated: trust (Unix) <emphasis>or</emphasis> trust.txt (Windows)</para>
1281 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1284 The whole trust mechanism is turned off.
1292 The trust mechanism is an experimental feature for building white-lists and should
1293 be used with care. It is <emphasis>NOT</emphasis> recommended for the casual user.
1296 If you specify a trust file, <application>Privoxy</application> will only allow
1297 access to sites that are named in the trustfile.
1298 You can also mark sites as trusted referrers (with <literal>+</literal>), with
1299 the effect that access to untrusted sites will be granted, if a link from a
1300 trusted referrer was used.
1301 The link target will then be added to the <quote>trustfile</quote>.
1302 Possible applications include limiting Internet access for children.
1305 If you use <literal>+</literal> operator in the trust file, it may grow considerably over time.
1312 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="user-manual"><title>user-manual</title>
1315 <term>Specifies:</term>
1318 Location of the <application>Privoxy</application> User Manual.
1323 <term>Type of value:</term>
1325 <para>A fully qualified URI</para>
1329 <term>Default value:</term>
1331 <para><ulink url="http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/">http://www.privoxy.org/user-manual/</ulink></para>
1335 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1338 The default will be used.
1346 The User Manual is used for help hints from some of the internal CGI pages.
1347 It is normally packaged with the binary distributions, and would make more
1348 sense to have this pointed at a locally installed copy.
1351 A more useful example (Unix):
1354 <emphasis>user-manual file:///usr/share/doc/privoxy-&p-version;/user-manual/</emphasis>
1363 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1367 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1369 <sect2 id="local-set-up">
1370 <title>Local Set-up Documentation</title>
1373 If you intend to operate <application>Privoxy</application> for more users
1374 that just yourself, it might be a good idea to let them know how to reach
1375 you, what you block and why you do that, your policies etc.
1378 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="trust-info-url"><title>trust-info-url</title>
1382 <term>Specifies:</term>
1385 A URL to be displayed in the error page that users will see if access to an untrusted page is denied.
1390 <term>Type of value:</term>
1396 <term>Default value:</term>
1398 <para>Two example URL are provided</para>
1402 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1405 No links are displayed on the "untrusted" error page.
1413 The value of this option only matters if the experimental trust mechanism has been
1414 activated. (See <literal>trustfile</literal> above.)
1417 If you use the trust mechanism, it is a good idea to write up some on-line
1418 documentation about your trust policy and to specify the URL(s) here.
1419 Use multiple times for multiple URLs.
1422 The URL(s) should be added to the trustfile as well, so users don't end up
1423 locked out from the information on why they were locked out in the first place!
1430 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="admin-address"><title>admin-address</title>
1434 <term>Specifies:</term>
1437 An email address to reach the proxy administrator.
1442 <term>Type of value:</term>
1444 <para>Email address</para>
1448 <term>Default value:</term>
1450 <para><emphasis>Unset</emphasis></para>
1454 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1457 No email address is displayed on error pages and the CGI user interface.
1465 If both <literal>admin-address</literal> and <literal>proxy-info-url</literal>
1466 are unset, the whole "Local Privoxy Support" box on all generated pages will
1474 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="proxy-info-url"><title>proxy-info-url</title>
1478 <term>Specifies:</term>
1481 A URL to documentation about the local <application>Privoxy</application> setup,
1482 configuration or policies.
1487 <term>Type of value:</term>
1493 <term>Default value:</term>
1495 <para><emphasis>Unset</emphasis></para>
1499 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1502 No link to local documentation is displayed on error pages and the CGI user interface.
1510 If both <literal>admin-address</literal> and <literal>proxy-info-url</literal>
1511 are unset, the whole "Local Privoxy Support" box on all generated pages will
1515 This URL shouldn't be blocked ;-)
1523 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
1525 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1527 <sect2 id="debugging">
1528 <title>Debugging</title>
1531 These options are mainly useful when tracing a problem.
1532 Note that you might also want to invoke
1533 <application>Privoxy</application> with the <literal>--no-daemon</literal>
1534 command line option when debugging.
1537 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="debug"><title>debug</title>
1541 <term>Specifies:</term>
1544 Key values that determine what information gets logged.
1549 <term>Type of value:</term>
1551 <para>Integer values</para>
1555 <term>Default value:</term>
1557 <para>12289 (i.e.: URLs plus informational and warning messages)</para>
1561 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1564 Nothing gets logged.
1572 The available debug levels are:
1576 debug 1 # show each GET/POST/CONNECT request
1577 debug 2 # show each connection status
1578 debug 4 # show I/O status
1579 debug 8 # show header parsing
1580 debug 16 # log all data into the logfile
1581 debug 32 # debug force feature
1582 debug 64 # debug regular expression filter
1583 debug 128 # debug fast redirects
1584 debug 256 # debug GIF de-animation
1585 debug 512 # Common Log Format
1586 debug 1024 # debug kill pop-ups
1587 debug 4096 # Startup banner and warnings.
1588 debug 8192 # Non-fatal errors
1592 To select multiple debug levels, you can either add them or use
1593 multiple <literal>debug</literal> lines.
1596 A debug level of 1 is informative because it will show you each request
1597 as it happens. <emphasis>1, 4096 and 8192 are highly recommended</emphasis>
1598 so that you will notice when things go wrong. The other levels are probably
1599 only of interest if you are hunting down a specific problem. They can produce
1600 a hell of an output (especially 16).
1604 The reporting of <emphasis>fatal</emphasis> errors (i.e. ones which crash
1605 <application>Privoxy</application>) is always on and cannot be disabled.
1608 If you want to use CLF (Common Log Format), you should set <quote>debug
1609 512</quote> <emphasis>ONLY</emphasis> and not enable anything else.
1616 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="single-threaded"><title>single-threaded</title>
1620 <term>Specifies:</term>
1623 Whether to run only one server thread
1628 <term>Type of value:</term>
1630 <para><emphasis>None</emphasis></para>
1634 <term>Default value:</term>
1636 <para><emphasis>Unset</emphasis></para>
1640 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1643 Multi-threaded (or, where unavailable: forked) operation, i.e. the ability to
1644 serve multiple requests simultaneously.
1652 This option is only there for debug purposes and you should never
1653 need to use it. <emphasis>It will drastically reduce performance.</emphasis>
1662 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
1664 <sect2 id="access-control">
1665 <title>Access Control and Security</title>
1668 This section of the config file controls the security-relevant aspects
1669 of <application>Privoxy</application>'s configuration.
1672 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="listen-address"><title>listen-address</title>
1676 <term>Specifies:</term>
1679 The IP address and TCP port on which <application>Privoxy</application> will
1680 listen for client requests.
1685 <term>Type of value:</term>
1687 <para>[<replaceable class="parameter">IP-Address</replaceable>]:<replaceable class="parameter">Port</replaceable></para>
1692 <term>Default value:</term>
1694 <para>localhost:8118</para>
1698 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1701 Bind to localhost (127.0.0.1), port 8118. This is suitable and recommended for
1702 home users who run <application>Privoxy</application> on the same machine as
1711 You will need to configure your browser(s) to this proxy address and port.
1714 If you already have another service running on port 8118, or if you want to
1715 serve requests from other machines (e.g. on your local network) as well, you
1716 will need to override the default.
1719 If you leave out the IP address, <application>Privoxy</application> will
1720 bind to all interfaces (addresses) on your machine and may become reachable
1721 from the Internet. In that case, consider using access control lists (ACL's)
1722 (see <quote>ACLs</quote> below), or a firewall.
1727 <term>Example:</term>
1730 Suppose you are running <application>Privoxy</application> on
1731 a machine which has the address 192.168.0.1 on your local private network
1732 (192.168.0.0) and has another outside connection with a different address.
1733 You want it to serve requests from inside only:
1737 listen-address 192.168.0.1:8118
1745 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="toggle"><title>toggle</title>
1749 <term>Specifies:</term>
1752 Initial state of "toggle" status
1757 <term>Type of value:</term>
1763 <term>Default value:</term>
1769 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1772 Act as if toggled on
1780 If set to 0, <application>Privoxy</application> will start in
1781 <quote>toggled off</quote> mode, i.e. behave like a normal, content-neutral
1782 proxy. See <literal>enable-remote-toggle</literal>
1783 below. This is not really useful anymore, since toggling is much easier
1784 via <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">the web
1785 interface</ulink> than via editing the <filename>conf</filename> file.
1788 The windows version will only display the toggle icon in the system tray
1789 if this option is present.
1797 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="enable-remote-toggle"><title>enable-remote-toggle</title>
1800 <term>Specifies:</term>
1803 Whether or not the <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">web-based toggle
1804 feature</ulink> may be used
1809 <term>Type of value:</term>
1815 <term>Default value:</term>
1821 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1824 The web-based toggle feature is disabled.
1832 When toggled off, <application>Privoxy</application> acts like a normal,
1833 content-neutral proxy, i.e. it acts as if none of the actions applied to
1837 For the time being, access to the toggle feature can <emphasis>not</emphasis> be
1838 controlled separately by <quote>ACLs</quote> or HTTP authentication,
1839 so that everybody who can access <application>Privoxy</application> (see
1840 <quote>ACLs</quote> and <literal>listen-address</literal> above) can
1841 toggle it for all users. So this option is <emphasis>not recommended</emphasis>
1842 for multi-user environments with untrusted users.
1845 Note that you must have compiled <application>Privoxy</application> with
1846 support for this feature, otherwise this option has no effect.
1854 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="enable-edit-actions"><title>enable-edit-actions</title>
1857 <term>Specifies:</term>
1860 Whether or not the <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">web-based actions
1861 file editor</ulink> may be used
1866 <term>Type of value:</term>
1872 <term>Default value:</term>
1878 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1881 The web-based actions file editor is disabled.
1889 For the time being, access to the editor can <emphasis>not</emphasis> be
1890 controlled separately by <quote>ACLs</quote> or HTTP authentication,
1891 so that everybody who can access <application>Privoxy</application> (see
1892 <quote>ACLs</quote> and <literal>listen-address</literal> above) can
1893 modify its configuration for all users. So this option is <emphasis>not
1894 recommended</emphasis> for multi-user environments with untrusted users.
1897 Note that you must have compiled <application>Privoxy</application> with
1898 support for this feature, otherwise this option has no effect.
1905 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="acls"><title>
1906 ACLs: permit-access and deny-access</title>
1907 <anchor id="permit-acces">
1908 <anchor id="deny-acces">
1912 <term>Specifies:</term>
1915 Who can access what.
1920 <term>Type of value:</term>
1923 <replaceable class="parameter">src_addr</replaceable>[/<replaceable class="parameter">src_masklen</replaceable>]
1924 [<replaceable class="parameter">dst_addr</replaceable>[/<replaceable class="parameter">dst_masklen</replaceable>]]
1927 Where <replaceable class="parameter">src_addr</replaceable> and
1928 <replaceable class="parameter">dst_addr</replaceable> are IP addresses in dotted decimal notation or valid
1929 DNS names, and <replaceable class="parameter">src_masklen</replaceable> and
1930 <replaceable class="parameter">dst_masklen</replaceable> are subnet masks in CIDR notation, i.e. integer
1931 values from 2 to 30 representing the length (in bits) of the network address. The masks and the whole
1932 destination part are optional.
1937 <term>Default value:</term>
1939 <para><emphasis>Unset</emphasis></para>
1943 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
1946 Don't restrict access further than implied by <literal>listen-address</literal>
1954 Access controls are included at the request of ISPs and systems
1955 administrators, and <emphasis>are not usually needed by individual users</emphasis>.
1956 For a typical home user, it will normally suffice to ensure that
1957 <application>Privoxy</application> only listens on the localhost or internal (home)
1958 network address by means of the <literal>listen-address</literal> option.
1961 Please see the warnings in the FAQ that this proxy is not intended to be a substitute
1962 for a firewall or to encourage anyone to defer addressing basic security
1966 Multiple ACL lines are OK.
1967 If any ACLs are specified, then the <application>Privoxy</application>
1968 talks only to IP addresses that match at least one <literal>permit-access</literal> line
1969 and don't match any subsequent <literal>deny-access</literal> line. In other words, the
1970 last match wins, with the default being <literal>deny-access</literal>.
1973 If <application>Privoxy</application> is using a forwarder (see <literal>forward</literal> below)
1974 for a particular destination URL, the <replaceable class="parameter">dst_addr</replaceable>
1975 that is examined is the address of the forwarder and <emphasis>NOT</emphasis> the address
1976 of the ultimate target. This is necessary because it may be impossible for the local
1977 <application>Privoxy</application> to determine the IP address of the
1978 ultimate target (that's often what gateways are used for).
1981 You should prefer using IP addresses over DNS names, because the address lookups take
1982 time. All DNS names must resolve! You can <emphasis>not</emphasis> use domain patterns
1983 like <quote>*.org</quote> or partial domain names. If a DNS name resolves to multiple
1984 IP addresses, only the first one is used.
1987 Denying access to particular sites by ACL may have undesired side effects
1988 if the site in question is hosted on a machine which also hosts other sites.
1993 <term>Examples:</term>
1996 Explicitly define the default behavior if no ACL and
1997 <literal>listen-address</literal> are set: <quote>localhost</quote>
1998 is OK. The absence of a <replaceable class="parameter">dst_addr</replaceable> implies that
1999 <emphasis>all</emphasis> destination addresses are OK:
2003 permit-access localhost
2007 Allow any host on the same class C subnet as www.privoxy.org access to
2008 nothing but www.example.com:
2012 permit-access www.privoxy.org/24 www.example.com/32
2016 Allow access from any host on the 26-bit subnet 192.168.45.64 to anywhere,
2017 with the exception that 192.168.45.73 may not access www.dirty-stuff.example.com:
2021 permit-access 192.168.45.64/26
2022 deny-access 192.168.45.73 www.dirty-stuff.example.com
2030 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="buffer-limit"><title>buffer-limit</title>
2034 <term>Specifies:</term>
2037 Maximum size of the buffer for content filtering.
2042 <term>Type of value:</term>
2044 <para>Size in Kbytes</para>
2048 <term>Default value:</term>
2054 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
2057 Use a 4MB (4096 KB) limit.
2065 For content filtering, i.e. the <literal>+filter</literal> and
2066 <literal>+deanimate-gif</literal> actions, it is necessary that
2067 <application>Privoxy</application> buffers the entire document body.
2068 This can be potentially dangerous, since a server could just keep sending
2069 data indefinitely and wait for your RAM to exhaust -- with nasty consequences.
2073 When a document buffer size reaches the <literal>buffer-limit</literal>, it is
2074 flushed to the client unfiltered and no further attempt to
2075 filter the rest of the document is made. Remember that there may be multiple threads
2076 running, which might require up to <literal>buffer-limit</literal> Kbytes
2077 <emphasis>each</emphasis>, unless you have enabled <quote>single-threaded</quote>
2087 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2090 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2092 <sect2 id="forwarding">
2093 <title>Forwarding</title>
2096 This feature allows routing of HTTP requests through a chain of
2098 It can be used to better protect privacy and confidentiality when
2099 accessing specific domains by routing requests to those domains
2100 through an anonymous public proxy (see e.g. <ulink
2101 url="http://www.multiproxy.org/anon_list.htm">http://www.multiproxy.org/anon_list.htm</ulink>)
2102 Or to use a caching proxy to speed up browsing. Or chaining to a parent
2103 proxy may be necessary because the machine that <application>Privoxy</application>
2104 runs on has no direct Internet access.
2108 Also specified here are SOCKS proxies. <application>Privoxy</application>
2109 supports the SOCKS 4 and SOCKS 4A protocols.
2112 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="forward"><title>forward</title>
2115 <term>Specifies:</term>
2118 To which parent HTTP proxy specific requests should be routed.
2123 <term>Type of value:</term>
2126 <replaceable class="parameter">target_domain</replaceable>[:<replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable>]
2127 <replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable>[/<replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable>]
2130 Where <replaceable class="parameter">target_domain</replaceable> is a domain name pattern (see the
2131 chapter on domain matching in the <filename>default.action</filename> file),
2132 <replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable> is the address of the parent HTTP proxy
2133 as an IP addresses in dotted decimal notation or as a valid DNS name (or <quote>.</quote> to denote
2134 <quote>no forwarding</quote>, and the optional
2135 <replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable> parameters are TCP ports, i.e. integer
2136 values from 1 to 64535
2141 <term>Default value:</term>
2143 <para><emphasis>Unset</emphasis></para>
2147 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
2150 Don't use parent HTTP proxies.
2158 If <replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable> is <quote>.</quote>, then requests are not
2159 forwarded to another HTTP proxy but are made directly to the web servers.
2162 Multiple lines are OK, they are checked in sequence, and the last match wins.
2167 <term>Examples:</term>
2170 Everything goes to an example anonymizing proxy, except SSL on port 443 (which it doesn't handle):
2174 forward .* anon-proxy.example.org:8080
2179 Everything goes to our example ISP's caching proxy, except for requests
2180 to that ISP's sites:
2184 forward .*. caching-proxy.example-isp.net:8000
2185 forward .example-isp.net .
2193 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="socks"><title>
2194 forward-socks4 and forward-socks4a</title>
2195 <anchor id="forward-socks4">
2196 <anchor id="forward-socks4a">
2200 <term>Specifies:</term>
2203 Through which SOCKS proxy (and to which parent HTTP proxy) specific requests should be routed.
2208 <term>Type of value:</term>
2211 <replaceable class="parameter">target_domain</replaceable>[:<replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable>]
2212 <replaceable class="parameter">socks_proxy</replaceable>[/<replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable>]
2213 <replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable>[/<replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable>]
2216 Where <replaceable class="parameter">target_domain</replaceable> is a domain name pattern (see the
2217 chapter on domain matching in the <filename>default.action</filename> file),
2218 <replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable> and <replaceable class="parameter">socks_proxy</replaceable>
2219 are IP addresses in dotted decimal notation or valid DNS names (<replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable>
2220 may be <quote>.</quote> to denote <quote>no HTTP forwarding</quote>), and the optional
2221 <replaceable class="parameter">port</replaceable> parameters are TCP ports, i.e. integer values from 1 to 64535
2226 <term>Default value:</term>
2228 <para><emphasis>Unset</emphasis></para>
2232 <term>Effect if unset:</term>
2235 Don't use SOCKS proxies.
2243 Multiple lines are OK, they are checked in sequence, and the last match wins.
2246 The difference between <literal>forward-socks4</literal> and <literal>forward-socks4a</literal>
2247 is that in the SOCKS 4A protocol, the DNS resolution of the target hostname happens on the SOCKS
2248 server, while in SOCKS 4 it happens locally.
2251 If <replaceable class="parameter">http_parent</replaceable> is <quote>.</quote>, then requests are not
2252 forwarded to another HTTP proxy but are made (HTTP-wise) directly to the web servers, albeit through
2258 <term>Examples:</term>
2261 From the company example.com, direct connections are made to all
2262 <quote>internal</quote> domains, but everything outbound goes through
2263 their ISP's proxy by way of example.com's corporate SOCKS 4A gateway to
2268 forward-socks4a .*. socks-gw.example.com:1080 www-cache.example-isp.net:8080
2269 forward .example.com .
2273 A rule that uses a SOCKS 4 gateway for all destinations but no HTTP parent looks like this:
2277 forward-socks4 .*. socks-gw.example.com:1080 .
2285 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="advanced-forwarding-examples"><title>Advanced Forwarding Examples</title>
2288 If you have links to multiple ISPs that provide various special content
2289 only to their subscribers, you can configure multiple <application>Privoxies</application>
2290 which have connections to the respective ISPs to act as forwarders to each other, so that
2291 <emphasis>your</emphasis> users can see the internal content of all ISPs.
2295 Assume that host-a has a PPP connection to isp-a.net. And host-b has a PPP connection to
2296 isp-b.net. Both run <application>Privoxy</application>. Their forwarding
2297 configuration can look like this:
2307 forward .isp-b.net host-b:8118
2318 forward .isp-a.net host-a:8118
2323 Now, your users can set their browser's proxy to use either
2324 host-a or host-b and be able to browse the internal content
2325 of both isp-a and isp-b.
2329 If you intend to chain <application>Privoxy</application> and
2330 <application>squid</application> locally, then chain as
2331 <literal>browser -> squid -> privoxy</literal> is the recommended way.
2335 Assuming that <application>Privoxy</application> and <application>squid</application>
2336 run on the same box, your squid configuration could then look like this:
2341 # Define Privoxy as parent proxy (without ICP)
2342 cache_peer 127.0.0.1 parent 8118 7 no-query
2344 # Define ACL for protocol FTP
2347 # Do not forward FTP requests to Privoxy
2348 always_direct allow ftp
2350 # Forward all the rest to Privoxy
2351 never_direct allow all</screen>
2355 You would then need to change your browser's proxy settings to <application>squid</application>'s address and port.
2356 Squid normally uses port 3128. If unsure consult <literal>http_port</literal> in <filename>squid.conf</filename>.
2363 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2366 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2368 <sect2 id="windows-gui">
2369 <title>Windows GUI Options</title>
2371 <application>Privoxy</application> has a number of options specific to the
2372 Windows GUI interface:
2375 <anchor id="activity-animation">
2377 If <quote>activity-animation</quote> is set to 1, the
2378 <application>Privoxy</application> icon will animate when
2379 <quote>Privoxy</quote> is active. To turn off, set to 0.
2386 <emphasis>activity-animation 1</emphasis>
2392 <anchor id="log-messages">
2394 If <quote>log-messages</quote> is set to 1,
2395 <application>Privoxy</application> will log messages to the console
2403 <emphasis>log-messages 1</emphasis>
2409 <anchor id="log-buffer-size">
2411 If <quote>log-buffer-size</quote> is set to 1, the size of the log buffer,
2412 i.e. the amount of memory used for the log messages displayed in the
2413 console window, will be limited to <quote>log-max-lines</quote> (see below).
2417 Warning: Setting this to 0 will result in the buffer to grow infinitely and
2418 eat up all your memory!
2425 <emphasis>log-buffer-size 1</emphasis>
2431 <anchor id="log-max-lines">
2433 <application>log-max-lines</application> is the maximum number of lines held
2434 in the log buffer. See above.
2441 <emphasis>log-max-lines 200</emphasis>
2447 <anchor id="log-highlight-messages">
2449 If <quote>log-highlight-messages</quote> is set to 1,
2450 <application>Privoxy</application> will highlight portions of the log
2451 messages with a bold-faced font:
2458 <emphasis>log-highlight-messages 1</emphasis>
2464 <anchor id="log-font-name">
2466 The font used in the console window:
2473 <emphasis>log-font-name Comic Sans MS</emphasis>
2479 <anchor id="log-font-size">
2481 Font size used in the console window:
2488 <emphasis>log-font-size 8</emphasis>
2494 <anchor id="show-on-task-bar">
2496 <quote>show-on-task-bar</quote> controls whether or not
2497 <application>Privoxy</application> will appear as a button on the Task bar
2505 <emphasis>show-on-task-bar 0</emphasis>
2511 <anchor id="close-button-minimizes">
2513 If <quote>close-button-minimizes</quote> is set to 1, the Windows close
2514 button will minimize <application>Privoxy</application> instead of closing
2515 the program (close with the exit option on the File menu).
2522 <emphasis>close-button-minimizes 1</emphasis>
2528 <anchor id="hide-console">
2530 The <quote>hide-console</quote> option is specific to the MS-Win console
2531 version of <application>Privoxy</application>. If this option is used,
2532 <application>Privoxy</application> will disconnect from and hide the
2540 #<emphasis>hide-console</emphasis>
2549 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2553 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
2555 <sect1 id="actions-file"><title>Actions Files</title>
2558 The actions files are used to define what actions
2559 <application>Privoxy</application> takes for which URLs, and thus determines
2560 how ad images, cookies and various other aspects of HTTP content and
2561 transactions are handled, and on which sites (or even parts thereof). There
2562 are three such files included with <application>Privoxy</application> (as of
2563 version 2.9.15), with differing purposes:
2570 <filename>standard.action</filename> - is used by the web based editor,
2571 to set various pre-defined sets of rules for the default actions section
2572 in <filename>default.action</filename>. These have increasing levels of
2573 aggressiveness. It is not recommend to edit this file.
2578 <filename>default.action</filename> - is the primary action file
2579 that sets the initial values for all actions. It is intended to
2580 provide a base level of functionality for
2581 <application>Privoxy's</application> array of features. So it is
2582 a set of broad rules that should work reasonably well for users everywhere.
2583 This is the file that the developers are keeping updated, and making
2589 <filename>user.action</filename> - is intended to be for local site
2590 preferences and exceptions. As an example, if your ISP or your bank
2591 has specific requirements, and need special handling, this kind of
2592 thing should go here. This file will not be upgraded.
2599 The list of actions files to be used are defined in the main configuration
2600 file, and are processed in the order they are defined. The content of these
2601 can all be viewed and edited from <ulink
2602 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
2606 An actions file typically has sections. Near the top, <quote>aliases</quote> are
2607 optionally defined (discussed <ulink
2608 url="actions-file.html#ALIASES">below</ulink>), then the default set of rules
2609 which will apply universally to all sites and pages. And then below that,
2610 exceptions to the defined universal policies.
2614 Actions can be used to block anything you want, including ads, banners, or
2615 just some obnoxious URL that you would rather not see. Cookies can be accepted
2616 or rejected, or accepted only during the current browser session (i.e. not
2617 written to disk), content can be modified, JavaScripts tamed, user-tracking
2618 fooled, and much more. See below for a complete list of actions.
2621 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2623 <title>Finding the Right Mix</title>
2625 Note that some <link linkend="actions">actions</link>, like cookie suppression
2626 or script disabling, may render some sites unusable that rely on these
2627 techniques to work properly. Finding the right mix of actions is not always easy and
2628 certainly a matter of personal taste. In general, it can be said that the more
2629 <quote>aggressive</quote> your default settings (in the top section of the
2630 actions file) are, the more exceptions for <quote>trusted</quote> sites you
2631 will have to make later. If, for example, you want to kill popup windows per
2632 default, you'll have to make exceptions from that rule for sites that you
2633 regularly use and that require popups for actually useful content, like maybe
2634 your bank, favorite shop, or newspaper.
2638 We have tried to provide you with reasonable rules to start from in the
2639 distribution actions files. But there is no general rule of thumb on these
2640 things. There just are too many variables, and sites are constantly changing.
2641 Sooner or later you will want to change the rules (and read this chapter again :).
2645 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2647 <title>How to Edit</title>
2649 The easiest way to edit the <quote>actions</quote> files is with a browser by
2650 using our browser-based editor, which can be reached from <ulink
2651 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>.
2655 If you prefer plain text editing to GUIs, you can of course also directly edit the
2662 <title>How Actions are Applied to URLs</title>
2664 Actions files are divided into sections. There are special sections,
2665 like the <quote><link linkend="aliases">alias</link></quote> sections which will be discussed later. For now
2666 let's concentrate on regular sections: They have a heading line (often split
2667 up to multiple lines for readability) which consist of a list of actions,
2668 separated by whitespace and enclosed in curly braces. Below that, there
2669 is a list of URL patterns, each on a separate line.
2673 To determine which actions apply to a request, the URL of the request is
2674 compared to all patterns in this file. Every time it matches, the list of
2675 applicable actions for the URL is incrementally updated, using the heading
2676 of the section in which the pattern is located. If multiple matches for
2677 the same URL set the same action differently, the last match wins. If not,
2678 the effects are aggregated (e.g. a URL might match both the
2679 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></ulink>
2680 and <ulink url="actions-file.html#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink> actions).
2685 You can trace this process by visiting <ulink
2686 url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>.
2690 More detail on this is provided in the Appendix, <link linkend="ACTIONSANAT">
2691 Anatomy of an Action</link>.
2695 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2697 <title>Patterns</title>
2699 Generally, a pattern has the form <literal><domain>/<path></literal>,
2700 where both the <literal><domain></literal> and <literal><path></literal>
2701 are optional. (This is why the pattern <literal>/</literal> matches all URLs).
2706 <term><literal>www.example.com/</literal></term>
2709 is a domain-only pattern and will match any request to <literal>www.example.com</literal>,
2710 regardless of which document on that server is requested.
2715 <term><literal>www.example.com</literal></term>
2718 means exactly the same. For domain-only patterns, the trailing <literal>/</literal> may
2724 <term><literal>www.example.com/index.html</literal></term>
2727 matches only the single document <literal>/index.html</literal>
2728 on <literal>www.example.com</literal>.
2733 <term><literal>/index.html</literal></term>
2736 matches the document <literal>/index.html</literal>, regardless of the domain,
2737 i.e. on <emphasis>any</emphasis> web server.
2742 <term><literal>index.html</literal></term>
2745 matches nothing, since it would be interpreted as a domain name and
2746 there is no top-level domain called <literal>.html</literal>.
2753 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2754 <sect3><title>The Domain Pattern</title>
2757 The matching of the domain part offers some flexible options: if the
2758 domain starts or ends with a dot, it becomes unanchored at that end.
2764 <term><literal>.example.com</literal></term>
2767 matches any domain that <emphasis>ENDS</emphasis> in
2768 <literal>.example.com</literal>
2773 <term><literal>www.</literal></term>
2776 matches any domain that <emphasis>STARTS</emphasis> with
2777 <literal>www.</literal>
2782 <term><literal>.example.</literal></term>
2785 matches any domain that <emphasis>CONTAINS</emphasis> <literal>.example.</literal>
2786 (Correctly speaking: It matches any FQDN that contains <literal>example</literal> as a domain.)
2793 Additionally, there are wild-cards that you can use in the domain names
2794 themselves. They work pretty similar to shell wild-cards: <quote>*</quote>
2795 stands for zero or more arbitrary characters, <quote>?</quote> stands for
2796 any single character, you can define character classes in square
2797 brackets and all of that can be freely mixed:
2802 <term><literal>ad*.example.com</literal></term>
2805 matches <quote>adserver.example.com</quote>,
2806 <quote>ads.example.com</quote>, etc but not <quote>sfads.example.com</quote>
2811 <term><literal>*ad*.example.com</literal></term>
2814 matches all of the above, and then some.
2819 <term><literal>.?pix.com</literal></term>
2822 matches <literal>www.ipix.com</literal>,
2823 <literal>pictures.epix.com</literal>, <literal>a.b.c.d.e.upix.com</literal> etc.
2828 <term><literal>www[1-9a-ez].example.c*</literal></term>
2831 matches <literal>www1.example.com</literal>,
2832 <literal>www4.example.cc</literal>, <literal>wwwd.example.cy</literal>,
2833 <literal>wwwz.example.com</literal> etc., but <emphasis>not</emphasis>
2834 <literal>wwww.example.com</literal>.
2842 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2845 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2846 <sect3><title>The Path Pattern</title>
2849 <application>Privoxy</application> uses Perl compatible regular expressions
2850 (through the <ulink url="http://www.pcre.org/">PCRE</ulink> library) for
2855 There is an <link linkend="regex">Appendix</link> with a brief quick-start into regular
2856 expressions, and full (very technical) documentation on PCRE regex syntax is available on-line
2857 at <ulink url="http://www.pcre.org/man.txt">http://www.pcre.org/man.txt</ulink>.
2858 You might also find the Perl man page on regular expressions (<literal>man perlre</literal>)
2859 useful, which is available on-line at <ulink
2860 url="http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6/pod/perlre.html">http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6/pod/perlre.html</ulink>.
2864 Note that the path pattern is automatically left-anchored at the <quote>/</quote>,
2865 i.e. it matches as if it would start with a <quote>^</quote> (regular expression speak
2866 for the beginning of a line).
2870 Please also note that matching in the path is case
2871 <emphasis>INSENSITIVE</emphasis> by default, but you can switch to case
2872 sensitive at any point in the pattern by using the
2873 <quote>(?-i)</quote> switch:
2874 <literal>www.example.com/(?-i)PaTtErN.*</literal> will match only
2875 documents whose path starts with <literal>PaTtErN</literal> in
2876 <emphasis>exactly</emphasis> this capitalization.
2882 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
2885 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
2887 <sect2 id="actions">
2888 <title>Actions</title>
2890 All actions are disabled by default, until they are explicitly enabled
2891 somewhere in an actions file. Actions are turned on if preceded with a
2892 <quote>+</quote>, and turned off if preceded with a <quote>-</quote>. So a
2893 <quote>+action</quote> means <quote>do that action</quote>, e.g.
2894 <quote>+block</quote> means please <quote>block the following URL
2899 Actions are invoked by enclosing the action name in curly braces (e.g.
2900 {+some_action}), followed by a list of URLs (or patterns that match URLs) to
2901 which the action applies. There are three classes of actions:
2909 Boolean, i.e the action can only be <quote>on</quote> or
2910 <quote>off</quote>. Examples:
2916 <emphasis>{+name}</emphasis> # enable this action
2917 <emphasis>{-name}</emphasis> # disable this action
2927 Parameterized, e.g. <quote>+/-hide-user-agent{ Mozilla 1.0 }</quote>,
2928 where some value is required in order to enable this type of action.
2935 <emphasis>{+name{param}}</emphasis> # enable action and set parameter to <quote>param</quote>
2936 <emphasis>{-name}</emphasis> # disable action (<quote>parameter</quote>) can be omitted
2945 <!-- oes, or someone, check this. Re-worded 04/20/02 HB. -->
2946 Multi-value, e.g. <quote>{+/-add-header{Name: value}}</quote> or
2947 <quote>{+/-send-wafer{name=value}}</quote>), where some value needs to be defined
2948 in addition to simply enabling the action. Examples:
2954 <emphasis>{+name{param=value}}</emphasis> # enable action and set <quote>param</quote> to <quote>value</quote>
2955 <emphasis>{-name{param=value}}</emphasis> # remove the parameter <quote>param</quote> completely
2956 <emphasis>{-name}</emphasis> # disable this action totally and remove <application>param</application> too
2967 If nothing is specified in any actions file, no <quote>actions</quote> are
2968 taken. So in this case <application>Privoxy</application> would just be a
2969 normal, non-blocking, non-anonymizing proxy. You must specifically enable the
2970 privacy and blocking features you need (although the provided default actions
2971 files will give a good starting point).
2975 Later defined actions always over-ride earlier ones. So exceptions
2976 to any rules you make, should come in the latter part of the file (or
2977 in a file that is processed later when using multiple actions files). For
2978 multi-valued actions, the actions are applied in the order they are specified.
2979 Actions files are processed in the order they are defined in
2980 <filename>config</filename> (the default installation has three actions
2981 files). It also quite possible for any given URL pattern to match more than
2985 <!-- start actions listing -->
2987 The list of valid <application>Privoxy</application> <quote>actions</quote> are:
2991 <!-- ********************************************************** -->
2992 <!-- Please note the below defined actions use id's that are -->
2993 <!-- probably linked from other places, so please don't change. -->
2995 <!-- ********************************************************** -->
2998 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3000 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="add-header">
3001 <title><emphasis>+add-header</emphasis></title>
3006 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3008 <para>Multi-value.</para>
3013 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3016 Send a user defined HTTP header to the web server.
3022 <term>Possible values:</term>
3025 Any value is possible. Validity of the defined HTTP headers is not checked.
3031 <term>Example usage:</term>
3034 <emphasis>{+add-header{X-User-Tracking: sucks}}</emphasis>
3035 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3044 This action may be specified multiple times, in order to define multiple
3045 headers. This is rarely needed for the typical user. If you don't know what
3046 <quote>HTTP headers</quote> are, you definitely don't need to worry about this
3055 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3056 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="block">
3057 <title><emphasis>+block</emphasis></title>
3062 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3064 <para>Boolean.</para>
3069 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3072 Used to block a URL from reaching your browser. The URL may be
3073 anything, but is typically used to block ads or other obnoxious
3080 <term>Possible values:</term>
3087 <term>Example usage:</term>
3090 <emphasis>{+block}</emphasis>
3091 <emphasis>.banners.example.com</emphasis>
3092 <emphasis>.ads.r.us</emphasis>
3101 If a URL matches one of the blocked patterns, <application>Privoxy</application>
3102 will intercept the URL and display its special <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page
3103 instead. If there is sufficient space, a large red banner will appear with
3104 a friendly message about why the page was blocked, and a way to go there
3105 anyway. If there is insufficient space a smaller <quote>BLOCKED</quote>
3106 page will appear without the red banner.
3107 <ulink url="http://ads.bannerserver.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor.html">Click here</ulink>
3108 to view the default blocked HTML page (<application>Privoxy</application> must be running
3109 for this to work as intended!).
3113 A very important exception is if the URL <emphasis>matches both</emphasis>
3114 <quote>+block</quote> and <ulink
3115 url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></ulink>,
3116 then it will be handled by
3117 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><quote>+set-image-blocker</quote></ulink>
3118 (see below). It is important to understand this process, in order
3119 to understand how <application>Privoxy</application> is able to deal with
3120 ads and other objectionable content.
3123 The <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></ulink>
3124 action can also perform some of the
3125 same functionality as <quote>+block</quote>, but by virtue of very
3126 different programming techniques, and is most often used for different
3136 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3137 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="deanimate-gifs">
3138 <title><emphasis>+deanimate-gifs</emphasis></title>
3143 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3145 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3150 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3153 To stop those annoying, distracting animated GIF images.
3159 <term>Possible values:</term>
3162 <quote>last</quote> or <quote>first</quote>
3168 <term>Example usage:</term>
3171 <emphasis>{+deanimate-gifs{last}}</emphasis>
3172 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3181 De-animate all animated GIF images, i.e. reduce them to their last frame.
3182 This will also shrink the images considerably (in bytes, not pixels!). If
3183 the option <quote>first</quote> is given, the first frame of the animation
3184 is used as the replacement. If <quote>last</quote> is given, the last
3185 frame of the animation is used instead, which probably makes more sense for
3186 most banner animations, but also has the risk of not showing the entire
3187 last frame (if it is only a delta to an earlier frame).
3195 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3196 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="downgrade-http-version">
3197 <title><emphasis>+downgrade-http-version</emphasis></title>
3202 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3204 <para>Boolean.</para>
3209 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3212 <quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote> will downgrade HTTP/1.1 client requests to
3213 HTTP/1.0 and downgrade the responses as well.
3219 <term>Possible values:</term>
3228 <term>Example usage:</term>
3231 <emphasis>{+downgrade-http-version}</emphasis>
3232 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3241 Use this action for servers that use HTTP/1.1 protocol features that
3242 <application>Privoxy</application> doesn't handle well yet. HTTP/1.1 is
3243 only partially implemented. Default is not to downgrade requests. This is
3244 an infrequently needed action, and is used to help with rare problem sites only.
3252 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3253 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="fast-redirects">
3254 <title><emphasis>+fast-redirects</emphasis></title>
3259 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3261 <para>Boolean.</para>
3266 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3269 The <quote>+fast-redirects</quote> action enables interception of
3270 <quote>redirect</quote> requests from one server to another, which
3271 are used to track users.<application>Privoxy</application> can cut off
3272 all but the last valid URL in a redirect request and send a local redirect
3273 back to your browser without contacting the intermediate site(s).
3279 <term>Possible values:</term>
3288 <term>Example usage:</term>
3291 <emphasis>{+fast-redirects}</emphasis>
3292 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3301 Many sites, like yahoo.com, don't just link to other sites. Instead, they
3302 will link to some script on their own server, giving the destination as a
3303 parameter, which will then redirect you to the final target. URLs
3304 resulting from this scheme typically look like:
3305 <emphasis>http://some.place/some_script?http://some.where-else</emphasis>.
3308 Sometimes, there are even multiple consecutive redirects encoded in the
3309 URL. These redirections via scripts make your web browsing more traceable,
3310 since the server from which you follow such a link can see where you go
3311 to. Apart from that, valuable bandwidth and time is wasted, while your
3312 browser ask the server for one redirect after the other. Plus, it feeds
3316 This is a normally <quote>on</quote> feature, and often requires exceptions
3317 for sites that are sensitive to defeating this mechanism.
3326 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3327 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="filter">
3328 <title><emphasis>+filter</emphasis></title>
3333 <!-- boolean, parameterized, Multi-value -->
3335 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3340 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3343 Apply page filtering as defined by named sections of the
3344 <filename>default.filter</filename> file to the specified site(s).
3345 <quote>Filtering</quote> can be any modification of the raw
3346 page content, including re-writing or deletion of content.
3352 <term>Possible values:</term>
3355 <quote>+filter</quote> must include the name of one of the section identifiers
3356 from <filename>default.filter</filename> (or whatever
3357 <emphasis>filterfile</emphasis> is specified in <filename>config</filename>).
3363 <term>Example usage (from the current <filename>default.filter</filename>):</term>
3367 <anchor id="filter-html-annoyances">
3368 <emphasis>+filter{html-annoyances}</emphasis>: Get rid of particularly annoying HTML abuse.
3373 <anchor id="filter-js-annoyances">
3374 <emphasis>+filter{js-annoyances}</emphasis>: Get rid of particularly annoying JavaScript abuse
3379 <anchor id="filter-content-cookies">
3380 <emphasis>+filter{content-cookies}</emphasis>: Kill cookies that come in the HTML or JS content
3385 <anchor id="filter-popups">
3386 <emphasis>+filter{popups}</emphasis>: Kill all popups in JS and HTML
3391 <anchor id="filter-frameset-borders">
3392 <emphasis>+filter{frameset-borders}</emphasis>: Give frames a border and make them resizable
3397 <anchor id="filter-webbugs">
3398 <emphasis>+filter{webbugs}</emphasis>: Squish WebBugs (1x1 invisible GIFs used for user tracking)
3403 <anchor id="filter-refresh-tags">
3404 <emphasis>+filter{refresh-tags}</emphasis>: Kill automatic refresh tags (for dial-on-demand setups)
3409 <anchor id="filter-fun">
3410 <emphasis>+filter{fun}</emphasis>: Text replacements for subversive browsing fun!
3415 <anchor id="filter-nimda">
3416 <emphasis>+filter{nimda}</emphasis>: Remove Nimda (virus) code.
3421 <anchor id="filter-banners-by-size">
3422 <emphasis>+filter{banners-by-size}</emphasis>: Kill banners by size (<emphasis>very</emphasis> efficient!)
3427 <anchor id="filter-shockwave-flash">
3428 <emphasis>+filter{shockwave-flash}</emphasis>: Kill embedded Shockwave Flash objects
3433 <anchor id="filter-crude-parental">
3434 <emphasis>+filter{crude-parental}</emphasis>: Kill all web pages that contain the words "sex" or "warez"
3444 This is potentially a very powerful feature! And requires a knowledge
3445 of regular expressions if you want to <quote>roll your own</quote>.
3446 Filtering operates on a line by line basis throughout the entire page.
3449 Filtering requires buffering the page content, which may appear to
3450 slow down page rendering since nothing is displayed until all content has
3451 passed the filters. (It does not really take longer, but seems that way
3452 since the page is not incrementally displayed.) This effect will be more
3453 noticeable on slower connections.
3456 Filtering can achieve some of the effects as the
3457 <ulink url="actions-file#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink>
3458 action, i.e. it can be used to block ads and banners. In the overall
3459 scheme of things, filtering is one of the first things <quote>Privoxy</quote>
3460 does with a web page. So other most other actions are applied to the
3461 already <quote>filtered</quote> page.
3470 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3471 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-forwarded-for-headers">
3472 <title><emphasis>+hide-forwarded-for-headers</emphasis></title>
3477 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3479 <para>Boolean.</para>
3484 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3487 Block any existing X-Forwarded-for HTTP header, and do not add a new one.
3493 <term>Possible values:</term>
3502 <term>Example usage:</term>
3505 <emphasis>{+hide-forwarded-for-headers}</emphasis>
3506 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3515 It is fairly safe to leave this on. It does not seem to break many sites.
3524 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3525 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-from-header">
3526 <title><emphasis>+hide-from-header</emphasis></title>
3531 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3533 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3538 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3541 To block the browser from sending your email address in a <quote>From:</quote>
3548 <term>Possible values:</term>
3551 Keyword: <quote>block</quote>, or any user defined value.
3557 <term>Example usage:</term>
3560 <emphasis>{+hide-from-header{block}}</emphasis>
3561 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3570 The keyword <quote>block</quote> will completely remove the header
3571 (not to be confused with the <ulink
3572 url="actions-file.html#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink> action).
3573 Alternately, you can specify any value you prefer to send to the web
3583 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3584 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-referer">
3585 <title><emphasis>+hide-referer</emphasis></title>
3586 <anchor id="hide-referrer">
3590 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3592 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3597 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3600 Don't send the <quote>Referer:</quote> (sic) HTTP header to the web site.
3601 Or, alternately send a forged header instead.
3607 <term>Possible values:</term>
3610 Prevent the header from being sent with the keyword, <quote>block</quote>.
3611 Or, <quote>forge</quote> a URL to one from the same server as the request.
3612 Or, set to user defined value of your choice.
3618 <term>Example usage:</term>
3621 <emphasis>{+hide-referer{forge}}</emphasis>
3622 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3631 <quote>forge</quote> is the preferred option here, since some servers will
3632 not send images back otherwise.
3635 <quote>+hide-referrer</quote> is an alternate spelling of
3636 <quote>+hide-referer</quote>. It has the exact same parameters, and can be freely
3637 mixed with, <quote>+hide-referer</quote>. (<quote>referrer</quote> is the
3638 correct English spelling, however the HTTP specification has a bug - it
3639 requires it to be spelled as <quote>referer</quote>.)
3648 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3649 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="hide-user-agent">
3650 <title><emphasis>+hide-user-agent</emphasis></title>
3655 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3657 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3662 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3665 To change the <quote>User-Agent:</quote> header so web servers can't tell
3666 your browser type. Who's business is it anyway?
3672 <term>Possible values:</term>
3675 Any user defined string.
3681 <term>Example usage:</term>
3684 <emphasis>{+hide-user-agent{Netscape 6.1 (X11; I; Linux 2.4.18 i686)}}</emphasis>
3685 <emphasis>.msn.com</emphasis>
3694 Warning! This breaks many web sites that depend on this in order
3695 to determine how the target browser will respond to various
3696 requests. Use with caution.
3704 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3705 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="handle-as-image">
3706 <title><emphasis>+handle-as-image</emphasis></title>
3711 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3713 <para>Boolean.</para>
3718 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3721 To define what <application>Privoxy</application> should treat
3722 automatically as an image, and is an important ingredient of how
3729 <term>Possible values:</term>
3738 <term>Example usage:</term>
3741 <emphasis>{+handle-as-image}</emphasis>
3742 <emphasis>/.*\.(gif|jpg|jpeg|png|bmp|ico)</emphasis>
3751 This only has meaning if the URL (or pattern) also is
3752 <quote>+block</quote>ed, in which case a user definable image can
3753 be sent rather than a HTML page. This is integral to the whole concept of
3754 ad blocking: the URL must match <emphasis>both</emphasis> a <ulink
3755 url="actions-file.html#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink> rule,
3756 <emphasis>and</emphasis> <quote>+handle-as-image</quote>.
3758 url="actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><quote>+set-image-blocker</quote></ulink>
3759 below for control over what will actually be displayed by the browser.)
3762 There is little reason to change the default definition for this action.
3771 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3772 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="set-image-blocker">
3773 <title><emphasis>+set-image-blocker</emphasis></title>
3778 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3780 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3785 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3788 Decide what to do with URLs that end up tagged with <emphasis>both</emphasis>
3789 <ulink url="actions-file.html#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink>
3791 url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></ulink>,
3792 e.g an advertisement.
3798 <term>Possible values:</term>
3801 There are four available options: <quote>-set-image-blocker</quote> will send a HTML
3802 <quote>blocked</quote> page, usually resulting in a <quote>broken
3804 <quote>+set-image-blocker{<emphasis>blank</emphasis>}</quote> will send a
3805 1x1 transparent GIF image.
3806 <quote>+set-image-blocker{<emphasis>pattern</emphasis>}</quote> will send a
3807 checkerboard type pattern (the default). And finally,
3808 <quote>+set-image-blocker{<emphasis>http://xyz.com</emphasis>}</quote> will
3809 send a HTTP temporary redirect to the specified image. This has the
3810 advantage of the icon being being cached by the browser, which will speed
3817 <term>Example usage:</term>
3820 <emphasis>{+set-image-blocker{blank}}</emphasis>
3821 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3830 If you want <emphasis>invisible</emphasis> ads, they need to meet
3831 criteria as matching both <emphasis>images</emphasis> and <emphasis>blocked</emphasis>
3832 actions. And then, <quote>image-blocker</quote> should be set to
3833 <quote>blank</quote> for invisibility. Note you cannot treat HTML pages as
3834 images in most cases. For instance, frames require an HTML page to
3835 display. So a frame that is an ad, typically cannot be treated as an image.
3836 Forcing an <quote>image</quote> in this situation just will not work
3845 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3846 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="limit-connect">
3847 <title><emphasis>+limit-connect</emphasis></title>
3852 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3854 <para>Parameterized.</para>
3859 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3862 By default, <application>Privoxy</application> only allows HTTP CONNECT
3863 requests to port 443 (the standard, secure HTTPS port). Use
3864 <quote>+limit-connect</quote> to disable this altogether, or to allow
3871 <term>Possible values:</term>
3874 Any valid port number, or port number range.
3880 <term>Example usages:</term>
3882 <!-- I had trouble getting the spacing to look right in my browser -->
3883 <!-- I probably have the wrong font setup, bollocks. -->
3884 <!-- Apparently the emphasis tag uses a proportional font no matter what -->
3886 <emphasis>+limit-connect{443}</emphasis> # This is the default and need not be specified.
3887 <emphasis>+limit-connect{80,443}</emphasis> # Ports 80 and 443 are OK.
3888 <emphasis>+limit-connect{-3, 7, 20-100, 500-}</emphasis> # Port less than 3, 7, 20 to 100 and above 500 are OK.
3897 The CONNECT methods exists in HTTP to allow access to secure websites
3898 (https:// URLs) through proxies. It works very simply: the proxy connects
3899 to the server on the specified port, and then short-circuits its
3900 connections to the client <emphasis>and</emphasis> to the remote proxy.
3901 This can be a big security hole, since CONNECT-enabled proxies can be
3902 abused as TCP relays very easily.
3905 If you want to allow CONNECT for more ports than this, or want to forbid
3906 CONNECT altogether, you can specify a comma separated list of ports and
3907 port ranges (the latter using dashes, with the minimum defaulting to 0 and
3911 If you don't know what any of this means, there probably is no reason to
3920 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3921 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="prevent-compression">
3922 <title><emphasis>+prevent-compression</emphasis></title>
3927 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3929 <para>Boolean.</para>
3934 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3937 Prevent the specified websites from compressing HTTP data.
3943 <term>Possible values:</term>
3952 <term>Example usage:</term>
3955 <emphasis>{+prevent-compression}</emphasis>
3956 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
3965 Some websites do this, which can be a problem for
3966 <application>Privoxy</application>, since
3967 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></ulink>,
3968 <ulink url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS"><quote>+kill-popups</quote></ulink>
3970 url="actions-file.html#GIF-DEANIMATE"><quote>+gif-deanimate</quote></ulink>
3971 will not work on compressed data. This will slow down connections to those
3972 websites, though. Default typically is to turn
3973 <quote>prevent-compression</quote> on.
3981 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
3982 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="session-cookies-only">
3983 <title><emphasis>+session-cookies-only</emphasis></title>
3988 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
3990 <para>Boolean.</para>
3995 <term>Typical uses:</term>
3998 Allow cookies for the current browser session <emphasis>only</emphasis>.
4004 <term>Possible values:</term>
4013 <term>Example usage (disabling):</term>
4016 <emphasis>{-session-cookies-only}</emphasis>
4017 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
4026 If websites set cookies, <quote>+session-cookies-only</quote> will make sure
4027 they are erased when you exit and restart your web browser. This makes
4028 profiling cookies useless, but won't break sites which require cookies so
4029 that you can log in for transactions. This is generally turned on for all
4030 sites, and is the recommended setting.
4033 <quote>+prevent-*-cookies</quote> actions should be turned off as well (see
4034 below), for <quote>+session-cookies-only</quote> to work. Or, else no cookies
4035 will get through at all. For, <quote>persistent</quote> cookies that survive
4036 across browser sessions, see below as well.
4045 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4046 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="prevent-reading-cookies">
4047 <title><emphasis>+prevent-reading-cookies</emphasis></title>
4052 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4054 <para>Boolean.</para>
4059 <term>Typical uses:</term>
4062 Explicitly prevent the web server from reading any cookies on your
4069 <term>Possible values:</term>
4078 <term>Example usage:</term>
4081 <emphasis>{+prevent-reading-cookies}</emphasis>
4082 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
4091 Often used in conjunction with <quote>+prevent-setting-cookies</quote> to
4092 disable cookies completely. Note that
4093 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></ulink>
4094 requires these to both be disabled (or else it never gets any cookies to cache).
4097 For <quote>persistent</quote> cookies to work (i.e. they survive across browser
4098 sessions and reboots), all three cookie settings should be <quote>off</quote>
4099 for the specified sites.
4108 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4109 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="prevent-setting-cookies">
4110 <title><emphasis>+prevent-setting-cookies</emphasis></title>
4115 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4117 <para>Boolean.</para>
4122 <term>Typical uses:</term>
4125 Explicitly block the web server from storing cookies on your
4132 <term>Possible values:</term>
4141 <term>Example usage:</term>
4144 <emphasis>{+prevent-setting-cookies}</emphasis>
4145 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
4154 Often used in conjunction with <quote>+prevent-reading-cookies</quote> to
4155 disable cookies completely (see above).
4164 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4165 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="kill-popup">
4166 <title><emphasis>+kill-popups<anchor id="kill-popups"></emphasis></title>
4170 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4172 <para>Boolean.</para>
4177 <term>Typical uses:</term>
4180 Stop those annoying JavaScript pop-up windows!
4186 <term>Possible values:</term>
4195 <term>Example usage:</term>
4198 <emphasis>{+kill-popups}</emphasis>
4199 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
4208 <quote>+kill-popups</quote> uses a built in filter to disable pop-ups
4209 that use the <literal>window.open()</literal> function, etc. This is
4210 one of the first actions processed by <application>Privoxy</application>
4211 as it contacts the remote web server. This action is not always 100% reliable,
4212 and is supplemented by <quote>+filter{<emphasis>popups</emphasis>}</quote>.
4216 An alternate spelling is <quote>+kill-popup</quote>, which is
4227 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4228 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="send-vanilla-wafer">
4229 <title><emphasis>+send-vanilla-wafer</emphasis></title>
4234 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4236 <para>Boolean.</para>
4241 <term>Typical uses:</term>
4244 Sends a cookie for every site stating that you do not accept any copyright
4245 on cookies sent to you, and asking them not to track you.
4251 <term>Possible values:</term>
4260 <term>Example usage:</term>
4263 <emphasis>{+send-vanilla-wafer}</emphasis>
4264 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
4273 This action only applies if you are using a <filename>jarfile</filename>
4274 for saving cookies. Of course, this is a (relatively) unique header and
4275 could conceivably be used to track you.
4284 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4285 <sect3 renderas="sect4" id="send-wafer">
4286 <title><emphasis>+send-wafer</emphasis></title>
4291 <!-- Boolean, Parameterized, Multi-value -->
4293 <para>Multi-value.</para>
4298 <term>Typical uses:</term>
4301 This allows you to send an arbitrary, user definable cookie.
4307 <term>Possible values:</term>
4310 User specified cookie name and corresponding value.
4316 <term>Example usage:</term>
4319 <emphasis>{+send-wafer{name=value}}</emphasis>
4320 <emphasis>.example.com</emphasis>
4329 This can be specified multiple times in order to add as many cookies as you
4339 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4341 <title>Summary</title>
4343 Note that many of these actions have the potential to cause a page to
4344 misbehave, possibly even not to display at all. There are many ways
4345 a site designer may choose to design his site, and what HTTP header
4346 content, and other criteria, he may depend on. There is no way to have hard
4347 and fast rules for all sites. See the <link
4348 linkend="ACTIONSANAT">Appendix</link> for a brief example on troubleshooting
4354 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4355 <sect3 renderas="sect2" id="act-examples">
4356 <title>Sample Actions Files</title>
4358 Remember that the meaning of any of the above references is reversed by preceding
4359 the action with a <quote>-</quote>, in place of the <quote>+</quote>. Also,
4360 that some actions are turned on in the default section of the actions file,
4361 and require little to no additional configuration. These are just <quote>on</quote>.
4365 But, other actions that are turned on in the default section <emphasis>do
4366 typically require</emphasis> exceptions to be listed in the latter sections of
4367 one of our actions file. For instance, by default no URLs are
4368 <quote>blocked</quote> (i.e. in the default definitions of
4369 <filename>default.action</filename>). We need exceptions to this in order to
4370 <emphasis>enable</emphasis> ad blocking in the lower sections. But we need to
4371 be very selective about what we do block. Thus, the default is <quote>off</quote>
4376 Below is a liberally commented sample <filename>default.action</filename> file
4377 to demonstrate how all the pieces come together. And to show how exceptions
4378 to the default policies can be handled. This is followed by a brief
4379 <filename>user.action</filename> with similar examples.
4386 # Sample default.action file <developers@privoxy.org>
4388 # Settings -- Don't change! For internal Privoxy use ONLY.
4390 for-privoxy-version=3.0
4393 ##########################################################################
4394 # <ulink url="actions-file.html#ALIASES">Aliases</ulink> must be defined *before* they are used. These are
4395 # easier to remember, and can combine several actions into one. Once
4396 # defined they can be used just like any built-in action -- but within
4397 # this file only! Aliases do not require a + or - sign.
4398 ##########################################################################
4400 # Some useful aliases.
4401 # Alias to turn off cookie handling, ie allow all cookies unmolested.
4402 -prevent-cookies = -prevent-setting-cookies -prevent-reading-cookies \
4403 -session-cookies-only
4405 # Alias to both block and treat as if an image for ad blocking
4407 +imageblock = +block +handle-as-image
4409 # Fragile sites should have the minimum changes:
4410 fragile = -block -deanimate-gifs -fast-redirects -filter -hide-referer \
4411 -prevent-cookies -kill-popups
4413 # Shops should be allowed to set persistent cookies
4414 shop = -filter -prevent-cookies -session-cookies-only
4417 ##########################################################################
4418 # Begin default action settings. Anything in this section will match
4419 # all URLs -- UNLESS we have exceptions that also match, defined below this
4420 # section. We will show all potential actions here whether they are on
4421 # or off. We could omit any disabled action if we wanted, since all
4422 # actions are 'off' by default anyway. Shown for completeness only.
4423 # Actions are enabled if preceded by a '+', otherwise they are disabled
4424 # (unless an alias has been defined without this).
4425 ##########################################################################
4427 <ulink url="actions-file.html#ADD-HEADER">-add-header</ulink> \
4428 <ulink url="actions-file.html#BLOCK">-block</ulink> \
4429 <ulink url="actions-file.html#DEANIMATE-GIFS">-deanimate-gifs</ulink> \
4430 <ulink url="actions-file.html#DOWNGRADE-HTTP-VERSION">-downgrade-http-version</ulink> \
4431 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FAST-REDIRECTS">+fast-redirects</ulink> \
4432 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-HTML-ANNOYANCES">+filter{html-annoyances}</ulink> \
4433 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-JS-ANNOYANCES">+filter{js-annoyances}</ulink> \
4434 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-CONTENT-COOKIES">-filter{content-cookies}</ulink> \
4435 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-POPUPS">-filter{popups}</ulink> \
4436 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-WEBBUGS">+filter{webbugs}</ulink> \
4437 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-REFRESH-TAGS">-filter{refresh-tags}</ulink> \
4438 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-FUN">-filter{fun}</ulink> \
4439 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-NIMDA">+filter{nimda}</ulink> \
4440 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-BANNERS-BY-SIZE">+filter{banners-by-size}</ulink> \
4441 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-SHOCKWAVE-FLASH">-filter{shockwave-flash}</ulink> \
4442 <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-CRUDE-PARENTAL">-filter{crude-prental}</ulink> \
4443 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HIDE-FORWARDED-FOR-HEADERS">+hide-forwarded-for-headers</ulink> \
4444 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HIDE-FROM-HEADER">+hide-from-header{block}</ulink> \
4445 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HIDE-REFERER">-hide-referrer</ulink> \
4446 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HIDE-USER-AGENT">-hide-user-agent</ulink> \
4447 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE">-handle-as-image</ulink> \
4448 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER">+set-image-blocker{pattern}</ulink> \
4449 <ulink url="actions-file.html#LIMIT-CONNECT">-limit-connect</ulink> \
4450 <ulink url="actions-file.html#PREVENT-COMPRESSION">+prevent-compression</ulink> \
4451 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY">-session-cookies-only</ulink> \
4452 <ulink url="actions-file.html#PREVENT-READING-COOKIES">-prevent-reading-cookies</ulink> \
4453 <ulink url="actions-file.html#PREVENT-SETTING-COOKIES">-prevent-setting-cookies</ulink> \
4454 <ulink url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS">-kill-popups</ulink> \
4455 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SEND-VANILLA-WAFER">-send-vanilla-wafer</ulink> \
4456 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SEND-WAFER">-send-wafer</ulink> \
4458 / # forward slash will match *all* potential URL patterns.
4460 ##########################################################################
4461 # Default behavior is now set. Now we will define some exceptions to our
4462 # default action policies.
4463 ##########################################################################
4465 # These sites are very complex and require very minimal interference.
4466 # We'll disable most actions with our 'fragile' alias:
4468 .office.microsoft.com # surprise, surprise!
4469 .windowsupdate.microsoft.com
4472 # Shopping sites - not as fragile but require some special
4473 # handling. We still want to block ads, and we will allow
4474 # persistant cookies via the 'shop' alias:
4477 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
4482 # These sites require pop-ups too :( We'll combine our 'shop'
4483 # alias with two other actions into one rule to allow all popups.
4484 { shop <ulink url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS">-kill-popups</ulink> <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-POPUPS">-filter{popups}</ulink> }
4489 # The 'Fast-redirects' action breaks some sites. Disable this action
4490 # for these known sensitive sites:
4491 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#FAST-REDIRECTS">-fast-redirects</ulink> }
4493 edit.europe.yahoo.com
4495 .altavista.com/.*(like|url|link):http
4496 .altavista.com/trans.*urltext=http
4500 # Define which file types will be treated as images. Important
4502 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE">+handle-as-image</ulink> }
4503 /.*\.(gif|jpe?g|png|bmp|ico)
4506 # Now lets list some domains that are known ad generators. And
4507 # our alias that we use here will block these as well as force
4508 # them to be treated as images. This combination of actions is
4509 # important for ad blocking. What the browser will show instead is
4510 # determined by the setting of <ulink url="actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><quote>+set-image-blocker</quote></ulink>
4514 .a.yimg.com/(?:(?!/i/).)*$
4515 .a[0-9].yimg.com/(?:(?!/i/).)*$
4519 ad.*.doubleclick.net
4522 # These will just simply be blocked. They will generate the BLOCKED
4523 # banner page, if matched. Heavy use of wildcards and regular
4524 # expressions in this example. Enable block action:
4525 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#BLOCK">+block</ulink> }
4530 /.*count(er)?\.(pl|cgi|exe|dll|asp|php[34]?)
4531 /(?:.*/)?(publicite|werbung|rekla(ma|me|am)|annonse|maino(kset|nta|s)?)/
4535 # The above block section will probably inadvertantly catch some
4536 # sites we DO NOT want blocked via the wildcards and regular expressions.
4537 # Now let's set exceptions to the exceptions so the good guys get better
4538 # treatment. Disable block action:
4539 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#BLOCK">-block</ulink> }
4544 # Let's just trust all .edu top level domains.
4546 www.ugu.com/sui/ugu/adv
4547 # We'll need to access to path names containing 'download'
4550 # 'adv' is for globalintersec and means advanced, not advertisement
4551 www.globalintersec.com/adv
4554 # Don't filter *anything* from our friends at sourceforge.
4555 # Notice we don't have to name the individual filter
4556 # identifiers -- we just turn them all off in one fell swoop.
4557 # Disable all filters for this one site:
4558 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER">-filter</ulink> }
4566 So far we are painting with a broad brush by setting general policies.
4567 The above would be a reasonable starting point for many situations. Now,
4568 we want to be more specific and have customized rules that are more suitable
4569 to our personal habits and preferences. These would be for narrowly defined
4570 situations like your ISP or your bank, and should be placed in
4571 <filename>user.action</filename>, which is parsed after all other
4572 actions files and should not be clobbered by upgrades. So any settings here,
4573 will have the last word and over-ride any previously defined actions.
4577 Now a few examples of some things that one might do with a
4578 <filename>user.action</filename> file.
4581 <!-- brief sample user.action here -->
4587 # Sample user.action file.
4589 # Any aliases you want to use need to be re-defined here.
4590 # Alias to turn off cookie handling, ie allow all cookies unmolested.
4591 -prevent-cookies = -prevent-setting-cookies -prevent-reading-cookies \
4592 -session-cookies-only
4594 # Fragile sites should have the minimum changes:
4595 fragile = -block -deanimate-gifs -fast-redirects -filter -hide-referer \
4596 -prevent-cookies -kill-popups
4598 # Allow persistent cookies for a few regular sites that we
4599 # trust via our above alias. These will be saved from one browser session
4600 # to the next. We are explicity turning off any and all cookie handling,
4601 # even though the prevent-*-cookie settings were disabled in our above
4602 # default.action anyway. So cookies from these domains will come through
4604 { -prevent-cookies }
4611 # My ISP uses obnoxious self promoting images on many pages.
4612 # Nuke them :) Note that <ulink url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></ulink> need not be specified,
4613 # since all URLs ending in .gif will be tagged as images by the
4614 # general rules in default.action anyway.
4615 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#BLOCK">+block</ulink> }
4616 www.my-isp-example.com/logo[0-9].gif
4619 # Say the site where you do your homebanking needs to open
4620 # popup windows, but you have chosen to kill popups by
4621 # default. This will allow it for your-example-bank.com:
4623 { <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER-POPUPS">-filter{popups}</ulink> <ulink url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS">-kill-popups</ulink> }
4624 .my-example-bank.com
4627 # This site is delicate, and requires kid-glove
4639 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
4642 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4643 <sect2 id="aliases">
4644 <title>Aliases</title>
4646 Custom <quote>actions</quote>, known to <application>Privoxy</application>
4647 as <quote>aliases</quote>, can be defined by combining other <quote>actions</quote>.
4648 These can in turn be invoked just like the built-in <quote>actions</quote>.
4649 Currently, an alias can contain any character except space, tab, <quote>=</quote>,
4650 <quote>{</quote> or <quote>}</quote>. But please use only <quote>a</quote>-
4651 <quote>z</quote>, <quote>0</quote>-<quote>9</quote>, <quote>+</quote>, and
4652 <quote>-</quote>. Alias names are not case sensitive, and
4653 <emphasis>must be defined before other actions</emphasis> in the
4654 actions file! And there can only be one set of <quote>aliases</quote>
4655 defined per file. Each actions file may have its own aliases, but they are
4656 only visible within that file. Aliases do not requir a <quote>+</quote> or
4657 <quote>-</quote> sign in front, since they are merely expanded.
4661 Now let's define a few aliases:
4668 # Useful custom aliases we can use later. These must come first!
4670 +prevent-cookies = +prevent-setting-cookies +prevent-reading-cookies
4671 -prevent-cookies = -prevent-setting-cookies -prevent-reading-cookies
4672 fragile = -block -prevent-cookies -filter -fast-redirects -hide-referer -kill-popups
4673 shop = -prevent-cookies -filter -fast-redirects
4674 +imageblock = +block +handle-as-image
4676 # Aliases defined from other aliases, for people who don't like to type
4678 c0 = +prevent-cookies
4679 c1 = -prevent-cookies
4680 #... etc. Customize to your heart's content.
4687 Some examples using our <quote>shop</quote> and <quote>fragile</quote>
4688 aliases from above. These would appear in the lower sections of an
4689 actions file as exceptions to the default actions (as defined in the
4697 # These sites are very complex and require
4698 # minimal interference.
4700 .office.microsoft.com
4701 .windowsupdate.microsoft.com
4704 # Shopping sites - but we still want to block ads.
4707 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
4710 # These shops require pop-ups also
4720 The <quote>shop</quote> and <quote>fragile</quote> aliases are often used for
4721 <quote>problem</quote> sites that require most actions to be disabled
4722 in order to function properly.
4729 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
4733 <!-- ~~~~~~~~ New section Header ~~~~~~~~~ -->
4735 <sect1 id="filter-file">
4736 <title>The Filter File</title>
4738 Any web page can be dynamically modified with the filter file. This
4739 modification can be removal, or re-writing, of any web page content,
4740 including tags and non-visible content. The default filter file is
4741 oddly enough <filename>default.filter</filename>, located in the config
4746 This is potentially a very powerful feature, and requires knowledge of both
4747 <quote>regular expression</quote> and HTML in order create custom
4748 filters. But, there are a number of useful filters included with
4749 <application>Privoxy</application> for many common situations.
4753 The included example file is divided into sections. Each section begins
4754 with the <literal>FILTER</literal> keyword, followed by the identifier
4755 for that section, e.g. <quote>FILTER: webbugs</quote>. Each section performs
4756 a similar type of filtering, such as <quote>html-annoyances</quote>.
4760 This file uses regular expressions to alter or remove any string in the
4761 target page. The expressions can only operate on one line at a time. Some
4762 examples from the included default <filename>default.filter</filename>:
4766 Stop web pages from displaying annoying messages in the status bar by
4767 deleting such references:
4774 FILTER: html-annoyances
4776 # New browser windows should be resizeable and have a location and status
4779 s/resizable="?(no|0)"?/resizable=1/ig s/noresize/yesresize/ig
4780 s/location="?(no|0)"?/location=1/ig s/status="?(no|0)"?/status=1/ig
4781 s/scrolling="?(no|0|Auto)"?/scrolling=1/ig
4782 s/menubar="?(no|0)"?/menubar=1/ig
4784 # The <BLINK> tag was a crime!
4786 s*<blink>|</blink>**ig
4790 #s/framespacing="?(no|0)"?//ig
4791 #s/margin(height|width)=[0-9]*//gi
4798 Just for kicks, replace any occurrence of <quote>Microsoft</quote> with
4799 <quote>MicroSuck</quote>, and have a little fun with topical buzzwords:
4808 s/microsoft(?!.com)/MicroSuck/ig
4812 s/industry-leading|cutting-edge|award-winning/<font color=red><b>BINGO!</b></font>/ig
4819 Kill those pesky little web-bugs:
4826 # webbugs: Squish WebBugs (1x1 invisible GIFs used for user tracking)
4829 s/<img\s+[^>]*?(width|height)\s*=\s*['"]?1\D[^>]*?(width|height)\s*=\s*['"]?1(\D[^>]*?)?>/<!-- Squished WebBug -->/sig
4836 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4838 <title>The <emphasis>+filter</emphasis> Action</title>
4840 Filters are enabled with the <ulink
4841 url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></ulink> action from within
4842 one of the actions files. <quote>+filter</quote> requires one parameter, which
4843 should match one of the section identifiers in the filter file itself. Example:
4847 +filter{html-annoyances}
4851 This would activate that particular filter. Similarly, <quote>+filter</quote>
4852 can be turned off for selected sites as:
4853 <quote>-filter{html-annoyances}</quote>. Remember too, all actions are off by
4854 default, unless they are explicity enabled in one of the actions files.
4861 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
4865 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4867 <sect1 id="templates">
4868 <title>Templates</title>
4870 When <application>Privoxy</application> displays one of its internal
4871 pages, such as a <ulink url="http://bogus_404_page.com">404 Not Found error page</ulink>
4872 (<application>Privoxy</application> must be running for link to work as
4873 intended), it uses the appropriate template. On Linux, BSD, and Unix, these
4874 are located in <filename>/etc/privoxy/templates</filename> by default. These
4875 may be customized, if desired. <filename>cgi-style.css</filename> is used to
4876 control the HTML attributes (fonts, etc).
4880 <ulink url="http://ads.bannerserver.example.com/nasty-ads/sponsor.html">Blocked
4881 (<application>Privoxy</application> needs to be running for page to display)</ulink>
4882 banner page with the bright red top
4883 banner, is called just <quote><filename>blocked</filename></quote>. This
4884 may be customized or replaced with something else if desired.
4889 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
4893 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4895 <sect1 id="contact"><title>Contacting the Developers, Bug Reporting and Feature
4898 <!-- Include contacting.sgml boilerplate: -->
4900 <!-- end boilerplate -->
4905 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4906 <sect1 id="copyright"><title>Copyright and History</title>
4908 <sect2><title>Copyright</title>
4909 <!-- Include copyright.sgml: -->
4911 <!-- end copyright -->
4914 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
4917 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4919 <sect2 id="history"><title>History</title>
4920 <!-- Include history.sgml: -->
4922 <!-- end history -->
4926 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4927 <sect1 id="seealso"><title>See Also</title>
4928 <!-- Include seealso.sgml: -->
4930 <!-- end seealso -->
4935 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4936 <sect1 id="appendix"><title>Appendix</title>
4939 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
4941 <title>Regular Expressions</title>
4943 <application>Privoxy</application> can use <quote>regular expressions</quote>
4944 in various config files. Assuming support for <quote>pcre</quote> (Perl
4945 Compatible Regular Expressions) is compiled in, which is the default. Such
4946 configuration directives do not require regular expressions, but they can be
4947 used to increase flexibility by matching a pattern with wild-cards against
4952 If you are reading this, you probably don't understand what <quote>regular
4953 expressions</quote> are, or what they can do. So this will be a very brief
4954 introduction only. A full explanation would require a book ;-)
4958 <quote>Regular expressions</quote> is a way of matching one character
4959 expression against another to see if it matches or not. One of the
4960 <quote>expressions</quote> is a literal string of readable characters
4961 (letter, numbers, etc), and the other is a complex string of literal
4962 characters combined with wild-cards, and other special characters, called
4963 meta-characters. The <quote>meta-characters</quote> have special meanings and
4964 are used to build the complex pattern to be matched against. Perl Compatible
4965 Regular Expressions is an enhanced form of the regular expression language
4966 with backward compatibility.
4970 To make a simple analogy, we do something similar when we use wild-card
4971 characters when listing files with the <command>dir</command> command in DOS.
4972 <literal>*.*</literal> matches all filenames. The <quote>special</quote>
4973 character here is the asterisk which matches any and all characters. We can be
4974 more specific and use <literal>?</literal> to match just individual
4975 characters. So <quote>dir file?.text</quote> would match
4976 <quote>file1.txt</quote>, <quote>file2.txt</quote>, etc. We are pattern
4977 matching, using a similar technique to <quote>regular expressions</quote>!
4981 Regular expressions do essentially the same thing, but are much, much more
4982 powerful. There are many more <quote>special characters</quote> and ways of
4983 building complex patterns however. Let's look at a few of the common ones,
4984 and then some examples:
4989 <emphasis>.</emphasis> - Matches any single character, e.g. <quote>a</quote>,
4990 <quote>A</quote>, <quote>4</quote>, <quote>:</quote>, or <quote>@</quote>.
4992 </simplelist></para>
4996 <emphasis>?</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ZERO or ONE
4999 </simplelist></para>
5003 <emphasis>+</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ONE or MORE
5006 </simplelist></para>
5010 <emphasis>*</emphasis> - The preceding character or expression is matched ZERO or MORE
5013 </simplelist></para>
5017 <emphasis>\</emphasis> - The <quote>escape</quote> character denotes that
5018 the following character should be taken literally. This is used where one of the
5019 special characters (e.g. <quote>.</quote>) needs to be taken literally and
5020 not as a special meta-character. Example: <quote>example\.com</quote>, makes
5021 sure the period is recognized only as a period (and not expanded to its
5022 meta-character meaning of any single character).
5024 </simplelist></para>
5028 <emphasis>[]</emphasis> - Characters enclosed in brackets will be matched if
5029 any of the enclosed characters are encountered. For instance, <quote>[0-9]</quote>
5030 matches any numeric digit (zero through nine). As an example, we can combine
5031 this with <quote>+</quote> to match any digit one of more times: <quote>[0-9]+</quote>.
5033 </simplelist></para>
5037 <emphasis>()</emphasis> - parentheses are used to group a sub-expression,
5038 or multiple sub-expressions.
5040 </simplelist></para>
5044 <emphasis>|</emphasis> - The <quote>bar</quote> character works like an
5045 <quote>or</quote> conditional statement. A match is successful if the
5046 sub-expression on either side of <quote>|</quote> matches. As an example:
5047 <quote>/(this|that) example/</quote> uses grouping and the bar character
5048 and would match either <quote>this example</quote> or <quote>that
5049 example</quote>, and nothing else.
5051 </simplelist></para>
5055 <emphasis>s/string1/string2/g</emphasis> - This is used to rewrite strings of text.
5056 <quote>string1</quote> is replaced by <quote>string2</quote> in this
5057 example. There must of course be a match on <quote>string1</quote> first.
5059 </simplelist></para>
5062 These are just some of the ones you are likely to use when matching URLs with
5063 <application>Privoxy</application>, and is a long way from a definitive
5064 list. This is enough to get us started with a few simple examples which may
5065 be more illuminating:
5069 <emphasis><literal>/.*/banners/.*</literal></emphasis> - A simple example
5070 that uses the common combination of <quote>.</quote> and <quote>*</quote> to
5071 denote any character, zero or more times. In other words, any string at all.
5072 So we start with a literal forward slash, then our regular expression pattern
5073 (<quote>.*</quote>) another literal forward slash, the string
5074 <quote>banners</quote>, another forward slash, and lastly another
5075 <quote>.*</quote>. We are building
5076 a directory path here. This will match any file with the path that has a
5077 directory named <quote>banners</quote> in it. The <quote>.*</quote> matches
5078 any characters, and this could conceivably be more forward slashes, so it
5079 might expand into a much longer looking path. For example, this could match:
5080 <quote>/eye/hate/spammers/banners/annoy_me_please.gif</quote>, or just
5081 <quote>/banners/annoying.html</quote>, or almost an infinite number of other
5082 possible combinations, just so it has <quote>banners</quote> in the path
5087 A now something a little more complex:
5091 <emphasis><literal>/.*/adv((er)?ts?|ertis(ing|ements?))?/</literal></emphasis> -
5092 We have several literal forward slashes again (<quote>/</quote>), so we are
5093 building another expression that is a file path statement. We have another
5094 <quote>.*</quote>, so we are matching against any conceivable sub-path, just so
5095 it matches our expression. The only true literal that <emphasis>must
5096 match</emphasis> our pattern is <application>adv</application>, together with
5097 the forward slashes. What comes after the <quote>adv</quote> string is the
5102 Remember the <quote>?</quote> means the preceding expression (either a
5103 literal character or anything grouped with <quote>(...)</quote> in this case)
5104 can exist or not, since this means either zero or one match. So
5105 <quote>((er)?ts?|ertis(ing|ements?))</quote> is optional, as are the
5106 individual sub-expressions: <quote>(er)</quote>,
5107 <quote>(ing|ements?)</quote>, and the <quote>s</quote>. The <quote>|</quote>
5108 means <quote>or</quote>. We have two of those. For instance,
5109 <quote>(ing|ements?)</quote>, can expand to match either <quote>ing</quote>
5110 <emphasis>OR</emphasis> <quote>ements?</quote>. What is being done here, is an
5111 attempt at matching as many variations of <quote>advertisement</quote>, and
5112 similar, as possible. So this would expand to match just <quote>adv</quote>,
5113 or <quote>advert</quote>, or <quote>adverts</quote>, or
5114 <quote>advertising</quote>, or <quote>advertisement</quote>, or
5115 <quote>advertisements</quote>. You get the idea. But it would not match
5116 <quote>advertizements</quote> (with a <quote>z</quote>). We could fix that by
5117 changing our regular expression to:
5118 <quote>/.*/adv((er)?ts?|erti(s|z)(ing|ements?))?/</quote>, which would then match
5123 <emphasis><literal>/.*/advert[0-9]+\.(gif|jpe?g)</literal></emphasis> - Again
5124 another path statement with forward slashes. Anything in the square brackets
5125 <quote>[]</quote> can be matched. This is using <quote>0-9</quote> as a
5126 shorthand expression to mean any digit one through nine. It is the same as
5127 saying <quote>0123456789</quote>. So any digit matches. The <quote>+</quote>
5128 means one or more of the preceding expression must be included. The preceding
5129 expression here is what is in the square brackets -- in this case, any digit
5130 one through nine. Then, at the end, we have a grouping: <quote>(gif|jpe?g)</quote>.
5131 This includes a <quote>|</quote>, so this needs to match the expression on
5132 either side of that bar character also. A simple <quote>gif</quote> on one side, and the other
5133 side will in turn match either <quote>jpeg</quote> or <quote>jpg</quote>,
5134 since the <quote>?</quote> means the letter <quote>e</quote> is optional and
5135 can be matched once or not at all. So we are building an expression here to
5136 match image GIF or JPEG type image file. It must include the literal
5137 string <quote>advert</quote>, then one or more digits, and a <quote>.</quote>
5138 (which is now a literal, and not a special character, since it is escaped
5139 with <quote>\</quote>), and lastly either <quote>gif</quote>, or
5140 <quote>jpeg</quote>, or <quote>jpg</quote>. Some possible matches would
5141 include: <quote>//advert1.jpg</quote>,
5142 <quote>/nasty/ads/advert1234.gif</quote>,
5143 <quote>/banners/from/hell/advert99.jpg</quote>. It would not match
5144 <quote>advert1.gif</quote> (no leading slash), or
5145 <quote>/adverts232.jpg</quote> (the expression does not include an
5146 <quote>s</quote>), or <quote>/advert1.jsp</quote> (<quote>jsp</quote> is not
5147 in the expression anywhere).
5151 <emphasis><literal>s/microsoft(?!.com)/MicroSuck/i</literal></emphasis> - This is
5152 a substitution. <quote>MicroSuck</quote> will replace any occurrence of
5153 <quote>microsoft</quote>. The <quote>i</quote> at the end of the expression
5154 means ignore case. The <quote>(?!.com)</quote> means
5155 the match should fail if <quote>microsoft</quote> is followed by
5156 <quote>.com</quote>. In other words, this acts like a <quote>NOT</quote>
5157 modifier. In case this is a hyperlink, we don't want to break it ;-).
5161 We are barely scratching the surface of regular expressions here so that you
5162 can understand the default <application>Privoxy</application>
5163 configuration files, and maybe use this knowledge to customize your own
5164 installation. There is much, much more that can be done with regular
5165 expressions. Now that you know enough to get started, you can learn more on
5170 More reading on Perl Compatible Regular expressions:
5171 <ulink url="http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6/pod/perlre.html">http://www.perldoc.com/perl5.6/pod/perlre.html</ulink>
5176 <!-- ~ End section ~ -->
5179 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5181 <title><application>Privoxy</application>'s Internal Pages</title>
5184 Since <application>Privoxy</application> proxies each requested
5185 web page, it is easy for <application>Privoxy</application> to
5186 trap certain special URLs. In this way, we can talk directly to
5187 <application>Privoxy</application>, and see how it is
5188 configured, see how our rules are being applied, change these
5189 rules and other configuration options, and even turn
5190 <application>Privoxy's</application> filtering off, all with
5196 The URLs listed below are the special ones that allow direct access
5197 to <application>Privoxy</application>. Of course,
5198 <application>Privoxy</application> must be running to access these. If
5199 not, you will get a friendly error message. Internet access is not
5212 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/">http://config.privoxy.org/</ulink>
5216 Alternately, this may be reached at <ulink
5217 url="http://p.p/">http://p.p/</ulink>, but this
5218 variation may not work as reliably as the above in some configurations.
5224 Show information about the current configuration, including viewing and
5225 editing of actions files:
5229 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</ulink>
5236 Show the source code version numbers:
5240 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-version">http://config.privoxy.org/show-version</ulink>
5247 Show the browser's request headers:
5251 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-request">http://config.privoxy.org/show-request</ulink>
5258 Show which actions apply to a URL and why:
5262 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
5269 Toggle Privoxy on or off. In this case, <quote>Privoxy</quote> continues
5270 to run, but only as a pass-through proxy, with no actions taking place:
5274 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle</ulink>
5278 Short cuts. Turn off, then on:
5282 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=disable">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=disable</ulink>
5287 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=enable">http://config.privoxy.org/toggle?set=enable</ulink>
5296 These may be bookmarked for quick reference. See next.
5300 <sect3 id="bookmarklets">
5301 <title>Bookmarklets</title>
5303 Below are some <quote>bookmarklets</quote> to allow you to easily access a
5304 <quote>mini</quote> version of some of <application>Privoxy's</application>
5305 special pages. They are designed for MS Internet Explorer, but should work
5306 equally well in Netscape, Mozilla, and other browsers which support
5307 JavaScript. They are designed to run directly from your bookmarks - not by
5308 clicking the links below (although that should work for testing).
5311 To save them, right-click the link and choose <quote>Add to Favorites</quote>
5312 (IE) or <quote>Add Bookmark</quote> (Netscape). You will get a warning that
5313 the bookmark <quote>may not be safe</quote> - just click OK. Then you can run the
5314 Bookmarklet directly from your favorites/bookmarks. For even faster access,
5315 you can put them on the <quote>Links</quote> bar (IE) or the <quote>Personal
5316 Toolbar</quote> (Netscape), and run them with a single click.
5325 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>
5332 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>
5339 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)
5346 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>
5352 <ulink url="javascript:w=Math.floor(screen.width/2);h=Math.floor(screen.height*0.9);void(window.open('http://www.privoxy.org/actions','Feedback','screenx='+w+',width='+w+',height='+h+',scrollbars=yes,toolbar=no,location=no,directories=no,status=no,menubar=no,copyhistory=no').focus());">Privoxy - Submit Filter Feedback</ulink>
5362 Credit: The site which gave me the general idea for these bookmarklets is
5363 <ulink url="http://www.bookmarklets.com">www.bookmarklets.com</ulink>. They
5364 have more information about bookmarklets.
5373 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5375 <title>Chain of Events</title>
5377 Let's take a quick look at the basic sequence of events when a web page is
5378 requested by your browser and <application>Privoxy</application> is on duty:
5385 First, your web browser requests a web page. The browser knows to send
5386 the request to <application>Privoxy</application>, which will in turn,
5387 relay the request to the remote web server after passing the following
5393 <application>Privoxy</application> traps any request for its own internal CGI
5394 pages (e.g http://p.p/) and sends the CGI page back to the browser.
5399 Next, <application>Privoxy</application> checks to see if the URL
5401 url="actions-file.html#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink> patterns. If
5402 so, the URL is then blocked, and the remote web server will not be contacted.
5403 <ulink url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></ulink>
5404 is then checked and if it does not match, an
5405 HTML <quote>BLOCKED</quote> page is sent back. Otherwise, if it does match,
5406 an image is returned. The type of image depends on the setting of <ulink
5407 url="actions-file.html#SET-IMAGE-BLOCKER"><quote>+set-image-blocker</quote></ulink>
5408 (blank, checkerboard pattern, or an HTTP redirect to an image elsewhere).
5413 Untrusted URLs are blocked. If URLs are being added to the
5414 <filename>trust</filename> file, then that is done.
5419 If the URL pattern matches the <ulink
5420 url="actions-file.html#FAST-REDIRECTS"><quote>+fast-redirects</quote></ulink> action,
5421 it is then processed. Unwanted parts of the requested URL are stripped.
5426 Now the rest of the client browser's request headers are processed. If any
5427 of these match any of the relevant actions (e.g. <ulink
5428 url="actions-file.html#HIDE-USER-AGENT"><quote>+hide-user-agent</quote></ulink>,
5429 etc.), headers are suppressed or forged as determined by these actions and
5435 Now the web server starts sending its response back (i.e. typically a web page and related
5441 First, the server headers are read and processed to determine, among other
5442 things, the MIME type (document type) and encoding. The headers are then
5443 filtered as deterimed by the
5444 <ulink url="actions-file.html#PREVENT-SETTING-COOKIES"><quote>+prevent-setting-cookies</quote></ulink>,
5445 <ulink url="actions-file.html#SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></ulink>,
5446 and <ulink url="actions-file.html#DOWNGRADE-HTTP-VERSION"><quote>+downgrade-http-version</quote></ulink>
5452 If the <ulink url="actions-file.html#KILL-POPUPS"><quote>+kill-popups</quote></ulink>
5453 action applies, and it is an HTML or JavaScript document, the popup-code in the
5454 response is filtered on-the-fly as it is received.
5459 If a <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></ulink>
5461 url="actions-file.html#DEANIMATE-GIFS"><quote>+deanimate-gifs</quote></ulink>
5462 action applies (and the document type fits the action), the rest of the page is
5463 read into memory (up to a configurable limit). Then the filter rules (from
5464 <filename>default.filter</filename>) are processed against the buffered
5465 content. Filters are applied in the order they are specified in the
5466 <filename>default.filter</filename> file. Animated GIFs, if present, are
5467 reduced to either the first or last frame, depending on the action
5468 setting.The entire page, which is now filtered, is then sent by
5469 <application>Privoxy</application> back to your browser.
5472 If neither <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></ulink>
5474 url="actions-file.html#DEANIMATE-GIFS"><quote>+deanimate-gifs</quote></ulink>
5475 matches, then <application>Privoxy</application> passes the raw data through
5476 to the client browser as it becomes available.
5481 As the browser receives the now (probably filtered) page content, it
5482 reads and then requests any URLs that may be embedded within the page
5483 source, e.g. ad images, stylesheets, JavaScript, other HTML documents (e.g.
5484 frames), sounds, etc. For each of these objects, the browser issues a new
5485 request. And each such request is in turn processed as above. Note that a
5486 complex web page may have many such embedded URLs.
5496 <!-- ~~~~~ New section ~~~~~ -->
5497 <sect2 id="actionsanat">
5498 <title>Anatomy of an Action</title>
5501 The way <application>Privoxy</application> applies
5502 <ulink url="actions-file.html#ACTIONS"><quote>actions</quote></ulink>
5503 and <ulink url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>filters</quote></ulink>
5504 to any given URL can be complex, and not always so
5505 easy to understand what is happening. And sometimes we need to be able to
5506 <emphasis>see</emphasis> just what <application>Privoxy</application> is
5507 doing. Especially, if something <application>Privoxy</application> is doing
5508 is causing us a problem inadvertently. It can be a little daunting to look at
5509 the actions and filters files themselves, since they tend to be filled with
5510 <quote>regular expressions</quote> whose consequences are not always
5515 One quick test to see if <application>Privoxy</application> is causing a problem
5516 or not, is to disable it temporarily. This should be the first troubleshooting
5517 step. See <link linkend="bookmarklets">the Bookmarklets</link> section on a quick
5518 and easy way to do this (be sure to flush caches afterward!).
5522 <application>Privoxy</application> also provides the
5523 <ulink url="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</ulink>
5524 page that can show us very specifically how <application>actions</application>
5525 are being applied to any given URL. This is a big help for troubleshooting.
5529 First, enter one URL (or partial URL) at the prompt, and then
5530 <application>Privoxy</application> will tell us
5531 how the current configuration will handle it. This will not
5532 help with filtering effects (i.e. the <ulink
5533 url="actions-file.html#FILTER"><quote>+filter</quote></ulink> action) from
5534 the <filename>default.filter</filename> file since this is handled very
5535 differently and not so easy to trap! It also will not tell you about any other
5536 URLs that may be embedded within the URL you are testing. For instance, images
5537 such as ads are expressed as URLs within the raw page source of HTML pages. So
5538 you will only get info for the actual URL that is pasted into the prompt area
5539 -- not any sub-URLs. If you want to know about embedded URLs like ads, you
5540 will have to dig those out of the HTML source. Use your browser's <quote>View
5541 Page Source</quote> option for this. Or right click on the ad, and grab the
5546 Let's try an example, <ulink url="http://google.com">google.com</ulink>,
5547 and look at it one section at a time:
5552 Matches for http://google.com:
5554 --- File standard ---
5555 (no matches in this file)
5557 --- File default ---
5559 { -add-header -block +deanimate-gifs{last} -downgrade-http-version +fast-redirects
5560 -filter{popups} -filter{fun} -filter{shockwave-flash} -filter{crude-parental}
5561 +filter{html-annoyances} +filter{js-annoyances} +filter{content-cookies}
5562 +filter{webbugs} +filter{refresh-tags} +filter{nimda} +filter{banners-by-size}
5563 +hide-forwarded-for-headers +hide-from-header{block} +hide-referer{forge}
5564 -hide-user-agent -handle-as-image +set-image-blocker{pattern} -limit-connect
5565 +prevent-compression +session-cookies-only -prevent-reading-cookies
5566 -prevent-setting-cookies -kill-popups -send-vanilla-wafer -send-wafer }
5569 { -session-cookies-only }
5576 (no matches in this file)
5581 This tells us how we have defined our
5582 <ulink url="actions-file.html#ACTIONS"><quote>actions</quote></ulink>, and
5583 which ones match for our example, <quote>google.com</quote>. The first listing
5584 is any matches for the <filename>standard.action</filename> file. No hits at
5585 all here on <quote>standard</quote>. Then next is <quote>default</quote>, or
5586 our <filename>default.action</filename> file. The large, multi-line listing,
5587 is how the actions are set to match for all URLs, i.e. our default settings.
5588 If you look at your <quote>actions</quote> file, this would be the section
5589 just below the <quote>aliases</quote> section near the top. This will apply to
5590 all URLs as signified by the single forward slash at the end of the listing
5591 -- <quote>/</quote>.
5595 But we can define additional actions that would be exceptions to these general
5596 rules, and then list specific URLs (or patterns) that these exceptions would
5597 apply to. Last match wins. Just below this then are two explicit matches for
5598 <quote>.google.com</quote>. The first is negating our previous cookie setting,
5599 which was for <ulink
5600 url="actions-file.html#SESSION-COOKIES-ONLY"><quote>+session-cookies-only</quote></ulink>
5601 (i.e. not persistent). So we will allow persistent cookies for google. The
5602 second turns <emphasis>off</emphasis> any
5604 url="actions-file.html#FAST-REDIRECTS"><quote>+fast-redirects</quote></ulink>
5605 action, allowing this to take place unmolested. Note that there is a leading
5606 dot here -- <quote>.google.com</quote>. This will match any hosts and
5607 sub-domains, in the google.com domain also, such as
5608 <quote>www.google.com</quote>. So, apparently, we have these two actions
5609 defined somewhere in the lower part of our <filename>default.action</filename>
5610 file, and <quote>google.com</quote> is referenced somewhere in these latter
5615 Then, for our <filename>user.action</filename> file, we again have no hits.
5619 And finally we pull it all together in the bottom section and summarize how
5620 <application>Privoxy</application> is applying all its <quote>actions</quote>
5621 to <quote>google.com</quote>:
5629 -add-header -block +deanimate-gifs{last} -downgrade-http-version -fast-redirects
5630 -filter{popups} -filter{fun} -filter{shockwave-flash} -filter{crude-parental}
5631 +filter{html-annoyances} +filter{js-annoyances} +filter{content-cookies}
5632 +filter{webbugs} +filter{refresh-tags} +filter{nimda} +filter{banners-by-size}
5633 +hide-forwarded-for-headers +hide-from-header{block} +hide-referer{forge}
5634 -hide-user-agent -handle-as-image +set-image-blocker{pattern} -limit-connect
5635 +prevent-compression -session-cookies-only -prevent-reading-cookies
5636 -prevent-setting-cookies -kill-popups -send-vanilla-wafer -send-wafer
5641 Notice the only difference here to the previous listing, is to
5642 <quote>fast-redirects</quote> and <quote>session-cookies-only</quote>.
5646 Now another example, <quote>ad.doubleclick.net</quote>:
5652 { +block +handle-as-image }
5655 { +block +handle-as-image }
5658 { +block +handle-as-image }
5664 We'll just show the interesting part here, the explicit matches. It is
5665 matched three different times. Each as an <quote>+block +handle-as-image</quote>,
5666 which is the expanded form of one of our aliases that had been defined as:
5667 <quote>+imageblock</quote>. (<ulink
5668 url="actions-file.html#ALIASES"><quote>Aliases</quote></ulink> are defined in
5669 the first section of the actions file and typically used to combine more
5674 Any one of these would have done the trick and blocked this as an unwanted
5675 image. This is unnecessarily redundant since the last case effectively
5676 would also cover the first. No point in taking chances with these guys
5677 though ;-) Note that if you want an ad or obnoxious
5678 URL to be invisible, it should be defined as <quote>ad.doubleclick.net</quote>
5679 is done here -- as both a <ulink
5680 url="actions-file.html#BLOCK"><quote>+block</quote></ulink>
5681 <emphasis>and</emphasis> an
5683 url="actions-file.html#HANDLE-AS-IMAGE"><quote>+handle-as-image</quote></ulink>.
5684 The custom alias <quote>+imageblock</quote> just simplifies the process and make
5689 One last example. Let's try <quote>http://www.rhapsodyk.net/adsl/HOWTO/</quote>.
5690 This one is giving us problems. We are getting a blank page. Hmmm...
5696 Matches for http://www.rhapsodyk.net/adsl/HOWTO/:
5698 { -add-header -block +deanimate-gifs -downgrade-http-version +fast-redirects
5699 +filter{html-annoyances} +filter{js-annoyances} +filter{kill-popups}
5700 +filter{webbugs} +filter{nimda} +filter{banners-by-size} +filter{hal}
5701 +filter{fun} +hide-forwarded-for-headers +hide-from-header{block}
5702 +hide-referer{forge} -hide-user-agent -handle-as-image +set-image-blocker{blank}
5703 +prevent-compression +session-cookies-only -prevent-setting-cookies
5704 -prevent-reading-cookies +kill-popups -send-vanilla-wafer -send-wafer }
5707 { +block +handle-as-image }
5713 Ooops, the <quote>/adsl/</quote> is matching <quote>/ads</quote>! But
5714 we did not want this at all! Now we see why we get the blank page. We could
5715 now add a new action below this that explicitly does <emphasis>not</emphasis>
5716 block (<quote>{-block}</quote>) paths with <quote>adsl</quote>. There are
5717 various ways to handle such exceptions. Example:
5729 Now the page displays ;-) Be sure to flush your browser's caches when
5730 making such changes. Or, try using <literal>Shift+Reload</literal>.
5734 But now what about a situation where we get no explicit matches like
5741 { +block +handle-as-image }
5747 That actually was very telling and pointed us quickly to where the problem
5748 was. If you don't get this kind of match, then it means one of the default
5749 rules in the first section is causing the problem. This would require some
5750 guesswork, and maybe a little trial and error to isolate the offending rule.
5751 One likely cause would be one of the <quote>{+filter}</quote> actions. Try
5752 adding the URL for the site to one of aliases that turn off <quote>+filter</quote>:
5760 .worldpay.com # for quietpc.com
5768 <quote>{shop}</quote> is an <quote>alias</quote> that expands to
5769 <quote>{ -filter -session-cookies-only }</quote>.
5770 Or you could do your own exception to negate filtering:
5783 This would probably be most appropriately put in <filename>user.action</filename>,
5784 for local site exceptions.
5788 <quote>{fragile}</quote> is an alias that disables most actions. This can be
5789 used as a last resort for problem sites. Remember to flush caches! If this
5790 still does not work, you will have to go through the remaining actions one by
5791 one to find which one(s) is causing the problem.
5800 This program is free software; you can redistribute it
5801 and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General
5802 Public License as published by the Free Software
5803 Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at
5804 your option) any later version.
5806 This program is distributed in the hope that it will
5807 be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the
5808 implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A
5809 PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public
5810 License for more details.
5812 The GNU General Public License should be included with
5813 this file. If not, you can view it at
5814 http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
5815 or write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59
5816 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.
5818 $Log: user-manual.sgml,v $
5819 Revision 1.99 2002/04/28 16:59:05 swa
5820 more structure in starting section
5822 Revision 1.98 2002/04/28 05:43:59 hal9
5823 This is the break up of configuration.html into multiple files. This
5824 will probably break links elsewhere :(
5826 Revision 1.97 2002/04/27 21:04:42 hal9
5827 -Rewrite of Actions File example.
5828 -Add section for user-manual directive in config.
5830 Revision 1.96 2002/04/27 05:32:00 hal9
5831 -Add short section to Filter Files to tie in with +filter action.
5832 -Start rewrite of examples in Actions Examples (not finished).
5834 Revision 1.95 2002/04/26 17:23:29 swa
5835 bookmarks cleaned, changed structure of user manual, screen and programlisting cleanups, and numerous other changes that I forgot
5837 Revision 1.94 2002/04/26 05:24:36 hal9
5838 -Add most of Andreas suggestions to Chain of Events section.
5839 -A few other minor corrections and touch up.
5841 Revision 1.92 2002/04/25 18:55:13 hal9
5842 More catchups on new actions files, and new actions names.
5843 Other assorted cleanups, and minor modifications.
5845 Revision 1.91 2002/04/24 02:39:31 hal9
5846 Add 'Chain of Events' section.
5848 Revision 1.90 2002/04/23 21:41:25 hal9
5849 Linuxconf is deprecated on RH, substitute chkconfig.
5851 Revision 1.89 2002/04/23 21:05:28 oes
5852 Added hint for startup on Red Hat
5854 Revision 1.88 2002/04/23 05:37:54 hal9
5855 Add AmigaOS install stuff.
5857 Revision 1.87 2002/04/23 02:53:15 david__schmidt
5858 Updated OSX installation section
5859 Added a few English tweaks here an there
5861 Revision 1.86 2002/04/21 01:46:32 hal9
5862 Re-write actions section.
5864 Revision 1.85 2002/04/18 21:23:23 hal9
5865 Fix ugly typo (mine).
5867 Revision 1.84 2002/04/18 21:17:13 hal9
5868 Spell Redhat correctly (ie Red Hat). A few minor grammar corrections.
5870 Revision 1.83 2002/04/18 18:21:12 oes
5871 Added RPM install detail
5873 Revision 1.82 2002/04/18 12:04:50 oes
5876 Revision 1.81 2002/04/18 11:50:24 oes
5877 Extended Install section - needs fixing by packagers
5879 Revision 1.80 2002/04/18 10:45:19 oes
5880 Moved text to buildsource.sgml, renamed some filters, details
5882 Revision 1.79 2002/04/18 03:18:06 hal9
5883 Spellcheck, and minor touchups.
5885 Revision 1.78 2002/04/17 18:04:16 oes
5888 Revision 1.77 2002/04/17 13:51:23 oes
5889 Proofreading, part one
5891 Revision 1.76 2002/04/16 04:25:51 hal9
5892 -Added 'Note to Upgraders' and re-ordered the 'Quickstart' section.
5893 -Note about proxy may need requests to re-read config files.
5895 Revision 1.75 2002/04/12 02:08:48 david__schmidt
5896 Remove OS/2 building info... it is already in the developer-manual
5898 Revision 1.74 2002/04/11 00:54:38 hal9
5899 Add small section on submitting actions.
5901 Revision 1.73 2002/04/10 18:45:15 swa
5904 Revision 1.72 2002/04/10 04:06:19 hal9
5905 Added actions feedback to Bookmarklets section
5907 Revision 1.71 2002/04/08 22:59:26 hal9
5908 Version update. Spell chkconfig correctly :)
5910 Revision 1.70 2002/04/08 20:53:56 swa
5913 Revision 1.69 2002/04/06 05:07:29 hal9
5914 -Add privoxy-man-page.sgml, for man page.
5915 -Add authors.sgml for AUTHORS (and p-authors.sgml)
5916 -Reworked various aspects of various docs.
5917 -Added additional comments to sub-docs.
5919 Revision 1.68 2002/04/04 18:46:47 swa
5920 consistent look. reuse of copyright, history et. al.
5922 Revision 1.67 2002/04/04 17:27:57 swa
5923 more single file to be included at multiple points. make maintaining easier
5925 Revision 1.66 2002/04/04 06:48:37 hal9
5926 Structural changes to allow for conditional inclusion/exclusion of content
5927 based on entity toggles, e.g. 'entity % p-not-stable "INCLUDE"'. And
5928 definition of internal entities, e.g. 'entity p-version "2.9.13"' that will
5929 eventually be set by Makefile.
5930 More boilerplate text for use across multiple docs.
5932 Revision 1.65 2002/04/03 19:52:07 swa
5933 enhance squid section due to user suggestion
5935 Revision 1.64 2002/04/03 03:53:43 hal9
5936 A few minor bug fixes, and touch ups. Ready for review.
5938 Revision 1.63 2002/04/01 16:24:49 hal9
5939 Define entities to include boilerplate text. See doc/source/*.
5941 Revision 1.62 2002/03/30 04:15:53 hal9
5942 - Fix privoxy.org/config links.
5943 - Paste in Bookmarklets from Toggle page.
5944 - Move Quickstart nearer top, and minor rework.
5946 Revision 1.61 2002/03/29 01:31:08 hal9
5949 Revision 1.60 2002/03/27 01:57:34 hal9
5950 Added more to Anatomy section.
5952 Revision 1.59 2002/03/27 00:54:33 hal9
5953 Touch up intro for new name.
5955 Revision 1.58 2002/03/26 22:29:55 swa
5956 we have a new homepage!
5958 Revision 1.57 2002/03/24 20:33:30 hal9
5959 A few minor catch ups with name change.
5961 Revision 1.56 2002/03/24 16:17:06 swa
5962 configure needs to be generated.
5964 Revision 1.55 2002/03/24 16:08:08 swa
5965 we are too lazy to make a block-built
5966 privoxy logo. hence removed the option.
5968 Revision 1.54 2002/03/24 15:46:20 swa
5969 name change related issue.
5971 Revision 1.53 2002/03/24 11:51:00 swa
5972 name change. changed filenames.
5974 Revision 1.52 2002/03/24 11:01:06 swa
5977 Revision 1.51 2002/03/23 15:13:11 swa
5978 renamed every reference to the old name with foobar.
5979 fixed "application foobar application" tag, fixed
5980 "the foobar" with "foobar". left junkbustser in cvs
5981 comments and remarks to history untouched.
5983 Revision 1.50 2002/03/23 05:06:21 hal9
5986 Revision 1.49 2002/03/21 17:01:05 hal9
5987 New section in Appendix.
5989 Revision 1.48 2002/03/12 06:33:01 hal9
5990 Catching up to Andreas and re_filterfile changes.
5992 Revision 1.47 2002/03/11 13:13:27 swa
5993 correct feedback channels
5995 Revision 1.46 2002/03/10 00:51:08 hal9
5996 Added section on JB internal pages in Appendix.
5998 Revision 1.45 2002/03/09 17:43:53 swa
6001 Revision 1.44 2002/03/09 17:08:48 hal9
6002 New section on Jon's actions file editor, and move some stuff around.
6004 Revision 1.43 2002/03/08 00:47:32 hal9
6005 Added imageblock{pattern}.
6007 Revision 1.42 2002/03/07 18:16:55 swa
6010 Revision 1.41 2002/03/07 16:46:43 hal9
6011 Fix a few markup problems for jade.
6013 Revision 1.40 2002/03/07 16:28:39 swa
6014 provide correct feedback channels
6016 Revision 1.39 2002/03/06 16:19:28 hal9
6017 Note on perceived filtering slowdown per FR.
6019 Revision 1.38 2002/03/05 23:55:14 hal9
6020 Stupid I did it again. Double hyphen in comment breaks jade.
6022 Revision 1.37 2002/03/05 23:53:49 hal9
6023 jade barfs on '- -' embedded in comments. - -user option broke it.
6025 Revision 1.36 2002/03/05 22:53:28 hal9
6026 Add new - - user option.
6028 Revision 1.35 2002/03/05 00:17:27 hal9
6029 Added section on command line options.
6031 Revision 1.34 2002/03/04 19:32:07 oes
6032 Changed default port to 8118
6034 Revision 1.33 2002/03/03 19:46:13 hal9
6035 Emphasis on where/how to report bugs, etc
6037 Revision 1.32 2002/03/03 09:26:06 joergs
6038 AmigaOS changes, config is now loaded from PROGDIR: instead of
6039 AmiTCP:db/junkbuster/ if no configuration file is specified on the
6042 Revision 1.31 2002/03/02 22:45:52 david__schmidt
6045 Revision 1.30 2002/03/02 22:00:14 hal9
6046 Updated 'New Features' list. Ran through spell-checker.
6048 Revision 1.29 2002/03/02 20:34:07 david__schmidt
6049 Update OS/2 build section
6051 Revision 1.28 2002/02/24 14:34:24 jongfoster
6052 Formatting changes. Now changing the doctype to DocBook XML 4.1
6053 will work - no other changes are needed.
6055 Revision 1.27 2002/01/11 14:14:32 hal9
6056 Added a very short section on Templates
6058 Revision 1.26 2002/01/09 20:02:50 hal9
6059 Fix bug re: auto-detect config file changes.
6061 Revision 1.25 2002/01/09 18:20:30 hal9
6062 Touch ups for *.action files.
6064 Revision 1.24 2001/12/02 01:13:42 hal9
6067 Revision 1.23 2001/12/02 00:20:41 hal9
6068 Updates for recent changes.
6070 Revision 1.22 2001/11/05 23:57:51 hal9
6071 Minor update for startup now daemon mode.
6073 Revision 1.21 2001/10/31 21:11:03 hal9
6074 Correct 2 minor errors
6076 Revision 1.18 2001/10/24 18:45:26 hal9
6077 *** empty log message ***
6079 Revision 1.17 2001/10/24 17:10:55 hal9
6080 Catching up with Jon's recent work, and a few other things.
6082 Revision 1.16 2001/10/21 17:19:21 swa
6083 wrong url in documentation
6085 Revision 1.15 2001/10/14 23:46:24 hal9
6086 Various minor changes. Fleshed out SEE ALSO section.
6088 Revision 1.13 2001/10/10 17:28:33 hal9
6091 Revision 1.12 2001/09/28 02:57:04 hal9
6094 Revision 1.11 2001/09/28 02:25:20 hal9
6097 Revision 1.9 2001/09/27 23:50:29 hal9
6098 A few changes. A short section on regular expression in appendix.
6100 Revision 1.8 2001/09/25 00:34:59 hal9
6101 Some additions, and re-arranging.
6103 Revision 1.7 2001/09/24 14:31:36 hal9
6106 Revision 1.6 2001/09/24 14:10:32 hal9
6107 Including David's OS/2 installation instructions.
6109 Revision 1.2 2001/09/13 15:27:40 swa
6112 Revision 1.1 2001/09/12 15:36:41 swa
6113 source files for junkbuster documentation
6115 Revision 1.3 2001/09/10 17:43:59 swa
6116 first proposal of a structure.
6118 Revision 1.2 2001/06/13 14:28:31 swa
6119 docs should have an author.
6121 Revision 1.1 2001/06/13 14:20:37 swa
6122 first import of project's documentation for the webserver.
projects / privoxy.git / blob