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<th colspan="3" align="center">Privoxy Frequently Asked
Questions</th>
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<div class="SECT1">
<h1 class="SECT1"><a name="TROUBLE" id="TROUBLE">5.
Troubleshooting</a></h1>
-
<div class="SECT2">
- <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="AEN1100" id="AEN1100">5.1. I cannot connect
+ <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="REFUSED" id="REFUSED">5.1. I cannot connect
to any websites. Or, I am getting <span class="QUOTE">"connection
refused"</span> message with every web page. Why?</a></h3>
-
<p>There are several possibilities:</p>
-
<ul>
<li>
<p><span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> is not running.
on <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> logging, and look at
the logs to see what they say.</p>
</li>
-
<li>
<p>Or your browser is configured for a different port than what
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> is using. Solution: verify
that <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> and your browser are
set to the same port (<tt class="LITERAL">listen-address</tt>).</p>
</li>
-
<li>
<p>Or if using a forwarding rule, you have a configuration problem
or a problem with a host in the forwarding chain. Solution:
temporarily alter your configuration and take the forwarders out of
the equation.</p>
</li>
-
<li>
<p>Or you have a firewall that is interfering and blocking you.
Solution: try disabling or removing the firewall as a simple
</li>
</ul>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="ERROR503" id="ERROR503">5.2. Why am I
getting a 503 Error (WSAECONNREFUSED) on every page?</a></h3>
-
<p>More than likely this is a problem with your TCP/IP networking.
ZoneAlarm has been reported to cause this symptom -- even if not
running! The solution is to either fight the ZA configuration, or
place. Other personal firewall type products may cause similar type
problems if not configured correctly.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
- <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="AEN1123" id="AEN1123">5.3. I just added a
+ <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="FLUSHIT" id="FLUSHIT">5.3. I just added a
new rule, but the steenkin ad is still getting through. How?</a></h3>
-
<p>If the ad had been displayed before you added its URL, it will
probably be held in the browser's cache for some time, so it will be
displayed without the need for any request to the server, and
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> will not be involved. Flush
the browser's caches, and then try again.</p>
-
<p>If this doesn't help, you probably have an error in the rule you
applied. Try pasting the full URL of the offending ad into <a href=
"http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info" target=
the correct URL by looking at <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> logs (you may need to enable logging in
the main config file if its disabled).</p>
-
<p>Below is a slightly modified real-life log snippet that originates
with one requested URL: <tt class="LITERAL">www.example.com</tt> (name
of site was changed for this example, the number of requests is real).
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> has <span class="QUOTE">"crunched"</span>
(meaning caught and BLOCKED) quite a few items in this example, but
perhaps missed a few as well.</p>
-
- <table class="c2" border="0" width="100%">
+ <table border="0" bgcolor="#E0E0E0" width="100%">
<tr>
<td>
- <pre class="SCREEN">
-Request: www.example.com/
+ <pre class="SCREEN">Request: www.example.com/
Request: www.example.com/favicon.ico
Request: img.example.com/main.css
Request: img.example.com/sr.js
Request: 66.70.21.80/scripts/click.php?hid=5c3cf599a9efd0320d26&si
Request: 66.70.21.80/img/pixel.gif
Request: www.adtrak.net/adlog.php?bannerid=1309&clientid=439&zoneid=58&source=Ua&block=86400 crunch! (Blocked)
-Request: 66.70.21.80/scripts/click.php?hid=a71b9f6504b0c5681fa5&si=Ua
-</pre>
+Request: 66.70.21.80/scripts/click.php?hid=a71b9f6504b0c5681fa5&si=Ua</pre>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
-
<p>Despite 12 out of 32 requests being blocked, the page looked, and
seemed to behave perfectly <span class="QUOTE">"normal"</span> (minus
some ads, of course).</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="BADSITE" id="BADSITE">5.4. One of my
favorite sites does not work with Privoxy. What can I do?</a></h3>
-
<p>First verify that it is indeed a <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> problem, by toggling off <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> through <a href=
then shift-reloading the problem page (i.e. holding down the shift key
while clicking reload. Alternatively, flush your browser's disk and
memory caches).</p>
-
<p>If the problem went away, we know we have a configuration related
problem. Now go to <a href="http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info"
target="_top">http://config.privoxy.org/show-url-info</a> and paste the
need to be enabled in the main config file). Many sites are complex and
require a number of related pages to help present their content. Look
at what else might be used by the page in question, and what of that
- might be <span class="emphasis EMPHASIS c3">required</span>. Now, armed
- with this information, go to <a href=
- "http://config.privoxy.org/show-status" target=
+ might be <span class="emphasis"><i class=
+ "EMPHASIS">required</i></span>. Now, armed with this information, go to
+ <a href="http://config.privoxy.org/show-status" target=
"_top">http://config.privoxy.org/show-status</a> and select the
appropriate actions files for editing.</p>
-
<p>You can now either look for a section which disables the actions
that you suspect to cause the problem and add a pattern for your site
there, or make up a completely new section for your site. In any case,
actions until you have identified the culprit. You may or may not want
to turn the other actions on again. Remember to flush your browser's
caches in between any such changes!</p>
-
<p>Alternately, if you are comfortable with a text editor, you can
accomplish the same thing by editing the appropriate actions file.
Probably the easiest way to deal with such problems when editing by
that turns off most <span class="QUOTE">"dangerous"</span> actions, but
is also likely to turn off more actions then needed, and thus lower
your privacy and protection more than necessary,</p>
-
<p>Troubleshooting actions is discussed in more detail in the <a href=
"../user-manual/appendix.html#ACTIONSANAT" target="_top">User Manual
appendix, Troubleshooting: the Anatomy of an Action</a>. There is also
an <a href="../user-manual/actions-file.html#ACT-EXAMPLES" target=
"_top">actions tutorial</a> with general configuration information and
examples.</p>
-
<p>As a last resort, you can always see if your browser has a setting
that will bypass the proxy setting for selective sites. Modern browsers
can do this.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="DUN" id="DUN">5.5. After installing Privoxy,
I have to log in every time I start IE. What gives?</a></h3>
-
- <p>This is a quirk that effects the installation of <span class=
+ <p>This is a quirk that affects the installation of <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>, in conjunction with Internet Explorer and
Internet Connection Sharing on Windows 2000 and Windows XP. The
symptoms may appear to be corrupted or invalid DUN settings, or
passwords.</p>
-
<p>When setting up an NT based Windows system with <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> you may find that things do not seem to be
doing what you expect. When you set your system up you will probably
have made this DUN connection available to other accounts that you may
have set-up on your system. E.g. Mum or Dad sets up the system and
makes accounts suitably configured for the kids.</p>
-
<p>When setting up <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> in this
environment you will have to alter the proxy set-up of Internet
Explorer (IE) for the specific DUN connection on which you wish to use
will notice that the DUN connection changes to make available to "Me
only". You will also find that you have to store the password under
each different user!</p>
-
<p>The reason for this is that each user's set-up for IE is user
specific. Each set-up DUN connection and each LAN connection in IE
store the settings for each user individually. As such this enforces
you use a DUN connection after re-booting your system it may not
perform as you expect, and prompt you for the password. Just set and
save the password again and all should be OK.</p>
-
<p>[Thanks to Ray Griffith for this submission.]</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="FTP" id="FTP">5.6. I cannot connect to any
FTP sites. Privoxy is blocking me.</a></h3>
-
<p><span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> cannot act as a proxy for
FTP traffic, so do not configure your browser to use <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> as an FTP proxy. The same is true for
- <span class="emphasis EMPHASIS c3">any protocol other than HTTP or
- HTTPS (SSL)</span>.</p>
-
+ <span class="emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">any protocol other than HTTP
+ or HTTPS (SSL)</i></span>.</p>
<p>Most browsers understand FTP as well as HTTP. If you connect to a
site, with a URL like <tt class="LITERAL">ftp://ftp.example.com</tt>,
your browser is making an FTP connection, and not a HTTP connection. So
while your browser may speak FTP, <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> does not, and cannot proxy such
traffic.</p>
-
<p>To complicate matters, some systems may have a generic <span class=
"QUOTE">"proxy"</span> setting, which will enable various protocols,
- including <span class="emphasis EMPHASIS c3">both</span> HTTP and FTP
- proxying! So it is possible to accidentally enable FTP proxying in
- these cases. And of course, if this happens, <span class=
+ including <span class="emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">both</i></span>
+ HTTP and FTP proxying! So it is possible to accidentally enable FTP
+ proxying in these cases. And of course, if this happens, <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> will indeed cause problems since it does
not know FTP. Newer version will give a sane error message if a FTP
connection is attempted. Just disable the FTP setting and all will be
well again.</p>
-
<p>Will <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> ever proxy FTP
traffic? Unlikely. There just is not much reason, and the work to make
this happen is more than it may seem.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="MACOSXIE" id="MACOSXIE">5.7. In Mac OS X, I
can't configure Microsoft Internet Explorer to use Privoxy as the HTTP
proxy.</a></h3>
-
<p>Microsoft Internet Explorer (in versions like 5.1) respects
system-wide network settings. In order to change the HTTP proxy, open
System Preferences, and click on the Network icon. In the settings pane
entry field. Enter <tt class="LITERAL">8118</tt> in the Port field. The
next time you start IE, it should reflect these values.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="MACOSXUNINSTALL" id="MACOSXUNINSTALL">5.8.
In Mac OS X, I dragged the Privoxy folder to the trash in order to
uninstall it. Now the finder tells me I don't have sufficient
privileges to empty the trash.</a></h3>
-
<p>Note: This ONLY applies to privoxy 3.0.6 and earlier.</p>
-
<p>Just dragging the <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> folder to
the trash is not enough to delete it. <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> supplies an <span class=
"APPLICATION">uninstall.command</span> file out of the trash and
double-click on it. You will be prompted for confirmation and the
administration password.</p>
-
<p>The trash may still appear full after this command; emptying the
trash from the desktop should make it appear empty again.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="MACOSXIMAGES" id="MACOSXIMAGES">5.9. In Mac
OS X Panther (10.3), images often fail to load and/or I experience
random delays in page loading. I'm using <tt class=
"LITERAL">localhost</tt> as my browser's proxy setting.</a></h3>
-
<p>We believe this is due to an IPv6-related bug in Mac OS X, but don't
fully understand the issue yet. In any case, changing the proxy setting
to <tt class="LITERAL">127.0.0.1</tt> instead of <tt class=
"LITERAL">localhost</tt> works around the problem.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
- <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="BLANKPAGE" id="BLANKPAGE">5.10. I get a
- completely blank page at one site. <span class="QUOTE">"View
- Source"</span> shows only: <span class=
- "MARKUP"><html><body></body></html></span>.
- Without Privoxy the page loads fine.</a></h3>
-
- <p>Chances are that the site suffers from a bug in <a href=
- "http://www.php.net/" target="_top"><span class=
- "APPLICATION">PHP</span></a>, which results in empty pages being sent
- if the client explicitly requests an uncompressed page, like
- <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> does. This bug has been fixed
- in PHP 4.2.3.</p>
-
- <p>To find out if this is in fact the source of the problem, try adding
- the site to a <tt class="LITERAL">-prevent-compression</tt> section in
- <tt class="FILENAME">user.action</tt>:</p>
-
- <table class="c2" border="0" width="100%">
- <tr>
- <td>
- <pre class="SCREEN">
- # Make exceptions for ill-behaved sites:
- #
- {-prevent-compression}
- .example.com
-</pre>
- </td>
- </tr>
- </table>
-
- <p>If that works, you may also want to report the problem to the site's
- webmasters, telling them to use zlib.output_compression instead of
- ob_gzhandler in their PHP applications (workaround) or upgrade to PHP
- 4.2.3 or later (fix).</p>
+ <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="MACOSXACCOUNTDELETION" id=
+ "MACOSXACCOUNTDELETION">5.10. I just upgraded to Mac OS X 10.9
+ (Mavericks) and now <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> has
+ stopped working.</a></h3>
+ <p>The upgrade process to Mac OS X Mavericks (10.9) from an earlier
+ version of OS X deletes all user accounts that are either not part of
+ OS X itself or are not interactive user accounts (ones you log in
+ with). Since, for the sake of security, <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> runs as a non-privileged user that is
+ created by its installer (_privoxy), it can no longer start up once
+ that account gets deleted. The solution is to perform a complete
+ uninstall using the supplied <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">uninstall.command</span> script (either back up your
+ configuration files or select to not have the uninstaller remove them
+ when it prompts you) and then reinstall <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> using the installer package and merge in
+ your configuration.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="NOHOSTNAME" id="NOHOSTNAME">5.11. My logs
show many <span class="QUOTE">"Unable to get my own hostname"</span>
lines. Why?</a></h3>
-
<p><span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> tries to get the hostname
of the system its running on from the IP address of the system
interface it is bound to (from the <tt class="FILENAME">config</tt>
- file <span class="emphasis EMPHASIS c3">listen-address</span> setting).
- If the system cannot supply this information, <span class=
- "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> logs this condition.</p>
-
+ file <span class="emphasis"><i class=
+ "EMPHASIS">listen-address</i></span> setting). If the system cannot
+ supply this information, <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> logs
+ this condition.</p>
<p>Typically, this would be considered a minor system configuration
error. It is not a fatal error to <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> however, but may result in a much slower
response from <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> on some
platforms due to DNS timeouts.</p>
-
<p>This can be caused by a problem with the local <tt class=
"FILENAME">hosts</tt> file. If this file has been changed from the
original, try reverting it to see if that helps. Make sure whatever
name(s) are used for the local system, that they resolve both ways.</p>
-
<p>You should also be able to work around the problem with the <a href=
"../user-manual/config.html#HOSTNAME" target="_top">hostname
option</a>.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="INUSE" id="INUSE">5.12. When I try to launch
Privoxy, I get an error message <span class="QUOTE">"port 8118 is
already in use"</span> (or similar wording). Why?</a></h3>
-
<p>Port 8118 is <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> default TCP
<span class="QUOTE">"listening"</span> port. Typically this message
would mean that there is already one instance of <span class=
happen varies from platform to platform, but you need to check your
installation and start-up procedures.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="DEMORONIZER" id="DEMORONIZER">5.13. Pages
with UTF-8 fonts are garbled.</a></h3>
-
- <p>This is caused by the <span class="QUOTE">"demoronizer"</span>
- filter. You should either upgrade <span class=
- "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>, or at least upgrade to the most recent
- <tt class="FILENAME">default.action</tt> file available from <a href=
- "http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118" target=
- "_top">SourceForge</a>. Or you can simply disable the demoronizer
- filter.</p>
+ <p>This may be the result of an overly aggressive filter. The filters
+ that are enabled in the default configuration aren't expected to cause
+ problems like this. If you enabled the <span class=
+ "QUOTE">"demoronizer"</span> filter, please try temporarily disabling
+ it.</p>
+ <p>If that doesn't help, temporarily disable all filters to see if
+ another filter could be the culprit. If the problem disappears, enable
+ the filters one by one, until the problem reappears and the offending
+ filter is found.</p>
+ <p>Once the problem-causing filter is known, it can be fixed or
+ disabled.</p>
+ <p>Upgrading <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>, or going to the
+ most recent <tt class="FILENAME">default.action</tt> file available
+ from <a href=
+ "https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118" target=
+ "_top">SourceForge</a> might be worth a try, too.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="DEMORONIZER2" id="DEMORONIZER2">5.14. Why
are binary files (such as images) corrupted when Privoxy is
used?</a></h3>
-
- <p>This may also be caused by the <span class=
- "QUOTE">"demoronizer"</span> filter, in conjunction with a web server
- that is misreporting the content type. Binary files are exempted from
- <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> filtering (unless the web
- server by mistake says the file is something else). Either upgrade
- <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>, or go to the most recent
- <tt class="FILENAME">default.action</tt> file available from <a href=
- "http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=11118" target=
- "_top">SourceForge</a>.</p>
+ <p>This may also be caused by an (<a href=
+ "trouble.html#DEMORONIZER">overly aggressive filter</a> in conjunction
+ with a web server that is misreporting the content type. By default
+ binary files are exempted from <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> filtering (unless the web server by
+ mistake says the file is something else).</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="DEMORONIZER3" id="DEMORONIZER3">5.15. What
is the <span class="QUOTE">"demoronizer"</span> and why is it
there?</a></h3>
-
<p>The original demoronizer was a Perl script that cleaned up HTML
pages which were created with certain Microsoft products. MS has used
proprietary extensions to standardized font encodings (ISO 8859-1),
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> borrowed from this script,
introducing a filter based on the original demoronizer, which in turn
could correct these errors on the fly.</p>
-
<p>But this is only needed in some situations, and will cause serious
problems in some other situations.</p>
-
<p>If you are using Microsoft products, you do not need it. If you need
to view pages with UTF-8 characters (such as Cyrillic or Chinese), then
it will cause corruption of the fonts, and thus <span class=
- "emphasis EMPHASIS c3">should not be on</span>.</p>
-
+ "emphasis"><i class="EMPHASIS">should not be on</i></span>.</p>
<p>On the other hand, if you use non-Microsoft products, and you
occasionally notice weird characters on pages, you might want to try
it.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="WINDOWOPEN" id="WINDOWOPEN">5.16. Why do I
keep seeing <span class="QUOTE">"PrivoxyWindowOpen()"</span> in raw
source code?</a></h3>
-
<p><span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> is attempting to disable
malicious <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Javascript" target=
"_top">Javascript</a> in this case, with the <tt class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> cannot tell very well <span class=
"QUOTE">"good"</span> code snippets from <span class=
"QUOTE">"bad"</span> code snippets.</p>
-
<p>If you see this in HTML source, and the page displays without
problems, then this is good, and likely some pop-up window was
disabled. If you see this where it is causing a problem, such as a
for this site or page such that the integrity of the page stays in tact
by disabling all filtering.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="DNSERRORS" id="DNSERRORS">5.17. I am getting
too many DNS errors like <span class="QUOTE">"404 No Such
Domain"</span>. Why can't Privoxy do this better?</a></h3>
-
<p>There are potentially several factors here. First of all, the DNS
resolution is done by the underlying operating system -- not
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> itself. <span class=
might otherwise be mitigated by the browser itself which might try some
work-arounds and alternate approaches (e.g adding <span class=
"QUOTE">"www."</span> to the URL).</p>
-
<p>In other cases, if <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> is being
chained with another proxy, this could complicate the issue, and cause
undue delays and timeouts. In the case of a <span class=
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> would just be the <span class=
"QUOTE">"messenger"</span> which is reporting whatever problem occurred
downstream, and not the root cause of the error.</p>
-
<p>In any case, versions newer than 3.0.3 include various improvements
to help <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> better handle these
cases.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="ALLCPU" id="ALLCPU">5.18. At one site
Privoxy just hangs, and starts taking all CPU. Why is this?</a></h3>
-
<p>This is probably a manifestation of the <span class="QUOTE">"100%
cpu"</span> problem that occurs on pages containing many (thousands
upon thousands) of blank lines. The blank lines are in the raw HTML
matching in <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> page filtering
mechanism is trying to match against absurdly long strings and this
becomes very CPU-intensive, taking a long, long time to complete.</p>
-
<p>Until a better solution comes along, disable filtering on these
pages, particularly the <tt class="LITERAL">js-annoyances</tt> and
<tt class="LITERAL">unsolicited-popups</tt> filters. If you run into
this problem with a recent <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>
version, please send a problem report.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="SLOWCRAWL" id="SLOWCRAWL">5.19. I just
installed Privoxy, and all my browsing has slowed to a crawl. What
gives?</a></h3>
-
<p>This should not happen, and for the overwhelming number of users
world-wide, it does not happen. I would suspect some inadvertent
interaction of software components such as anti-virus software, spyware
you are using a recent <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>
version, please report the problem.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="PREVENTCOMP" id="PREVENTCOMP">5.20. Why do
my filters work on some sites but not on others?</a></h3>
-
<p>It's probably due to compression. It is a common practice for web
servers to send their content <span class="QUOTE">"compressed"</span>
in order to speed things up, and then let the browser <span class=
filtering, otherwise you may want to enable <a href=
"../user-manual/actions-file.html#PREVENT-COMPRESSION" target=
"_top">prevent-compression</a>.</p>
-
<p>As of <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> 3.0.9, zlib support
is enabled in the default builds.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="SSL-WARNINGS" id="SSL-WARNINGS">5.21. On
some HTTPS sites my browser warns me about unauthenticated content, the
URL bar doesn't get highlighted and the lock symbol appears to be
broken. What's going on?</a></h3>
-
<p>Probably the browser is requesting ads through HTTPS and
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> is blocking the requests.
Privoxy's error messages are delivered unencrypted and while it's
obvious for the browser that the HTTPS request is already blocked by
the proxy, some warn about unauthenticated content anyway.</p>
-
<p>To work around the problem you can redirect those requests to an
invalid local address instead of blocking them. While the redirects
aren't encrypted either, many browsers don't care. They simply follow
the redirect, fail to reach a server and display an error message
instead of the ad.</p>
-
<p>To do that, enable logging to figure out which requests get blocked
by <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> and add the hosts (no path
patterns) to a section like this:</p>
-
- <table class="c2" border="0" width="100%">
+ <table border="0" bgcolor="#E0E0E0" width="100%">
<tr>
<td>
<pre class="SCREEN">
-{+redirect{http://127.0.0.1:0/} -block -limit-connect}
-.ivwbox.de:443/
-</pre>
+ {+redirect{http://127.0.0.1:0/} -block -limit-connect}
+.ivwbox.de:443/</pre>
</td>
</tr>
</table>
-
<p>Additionally you have to configure your browser to contact
<span class="QUOTE">"127.0.0.1:0"</span> directly (instead of through
<span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>).</p>
-
<p>To add a proxy exception in <span class="APPLICATION">Mozilla
Firefox</span> open the <span class="QUOTE">"Preferences"</span>, click
the <span class="QUOTE">"Settings"</span> button located on the
"QUOTE">"127.0.0.1:0"</span> in the <span class="QUOTE">"No Proxy
for:"</span> field.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="SE-LINUX" id="SE-LINUX">5.22. I get selinux
error messages. How can I fix this?</a></h3>
-
<p>Please report the problem to the creator of your selinux
policies.</p>
-
<p>The problem is that some selinux policy writers aren't familiar with
the application they are trying to <span class="QUOTE">"secure"</span>
and thus create policies that make no sense.</p>
-
<p>In <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> case the problem
usually is that the policy only allows outgoing connections for certain
destination ports (e.g. 80 and 443). While this may cover the standard
security problem and therefore <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy's</span> default configuration doesn't block
these requests.</p>
-
<p>If you really want to block these ports (and don't be able to load
websites that don't use standard ports), you should configure Privoxy
to block these ports as well, so it doesn't trigger the selinux
warnings.</p>
</div>
-
<div class="SECT2">
<h3 class="SECT2"><a name="GENTOO-RICERS" id="GENTOO-RICERS">5.23. I
compiled <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> with Gentoo's portage
and it appears to be very slow. Why?</a></h3>
-
<p>Probably you unintentionally compiled <span class=
"APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> without threading support in which case
requests have to be serialized and only one can be served at the same
time.</p>
-
<p>Check your <span class="QUOTE">"USE"</span> flags and make sure they
include <span class="QUOTE">"threads"</span>. If they don't, add the
flag and rebuild <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>.</p>
-
<p>If you compiled <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> with
threading support (on POSIX-based systems), the <span class=
"QUOTE">"Conditional #defines"</span> section on <a href=
"QUOTE">"FEATURE_PTHREAD"</span> as <span class=
"QUOTE">"enabled"</span>.</p>
</div>
+ <div class="SECT2">
+ <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="TAINTED-SOCKETS" id="TAINTED-SOCKETS">5.24.
+ What are tainted sockets and how do I prevent them?</a></h3>
+ <p><span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> marks sockets as tainted
+ when it can't use them to serve additional requests. This does not
+ necessarily mean that something went wrong and information about
+ tainted sockets is only logged if connection debugging is enabled
+ (debug 2).</p>
+ <p>For example server sockets that were used for CONNECT requests
+ (which are used to tunnel https:// requests) are considered tainted
+ once the client closed its connection to <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span>. Technically <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> could keep the connection to the server
+ open, but the server would not accept requests that do not belong to
+ the previous TLS/SSL session (and the client may even have terminated
+ the session).</p>
+ <p>Server sockets are also marked tainted when a client requests a
+ resource, but closes the connection before <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> has completely received (and forwarded)
+ the resource to the client. In this case the server would (probably)
+ accept additional requests, but <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> could not get the response without
+ completely reading the leftovers from the previous response.</p>
+ <p>These are just two examples, there are currently a bit more than 25
+ scenarios in which a socket is considered tainted.</p>
+ <p>While sockets can also be marked tainted as a result of a technical
+ problem that may be worth fixing, the problem will be explicitly logged
+ as error.</p>
+ </div>
+ <div class="SECT2">
+ <h3 class="SECT2"><a name="PCRE-STACK-LIMIT" id=
+ "PCRE-STACK-LIMIT">5.25. After adding my custom filters, <span class=
+ "APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> crashes when visitting certain
+ websites</a></h3>
+ <p>This can happen if your custom filters require more memory than
+ <span class="APPLICATION">Privoxy</span> is allowed to use. Usually the
+ problem is that the operating system enforces a stack size limit that
+ isn't sufficient.</p>
+ <p>Unless the problem occurs with the filters available in the default
+ configuration, this is not considered a Privoxy bug.</p>
+ <p>To prevent the crashes you can rewrite your filter to use less
+ ressources, increase the relevant memory limit or recompile pcre to use
+ less stack space. For details please see the <a href=
+ "http://pcre.org/original/doc/html/pcrestack.html" target=
+ "_top">pcrestack man page</a> and the documentation of your operating
+ system.</p>
+ </div>
</div>
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