NAME
SYNOPSIS
privoxy [--help ] [--version ] [--no-daemon ] [--pidfile pidfile ]
[--user user[.group] ] [--chroot ] [--pre-chroot-nslookup hostname ]
[configfile ]
OPTIONS
Privoxy may be invoked with the following command line options:
--help Print brief usage info and exit.
--version
Print version info and exit.
--no-daemon
Don't become a daemon, i.e. don't fork and become process
group leader, don't detach from controlling tty, and do all log-
ging there.
--pidfile pidfile
On startup, write the process ID to pidfile. Delete the pidfile
on exit. Failure to create or delete the pidfile is non-fatal.
If no --pidfile option is given, no PID file will be used.
--user user[.group]
After (optionally) writing the PID file, assume the user ID of
user and the GID of group, or, if the optional group was not
given, the default group of user. Exit if the privileges are not
sufficient to do so.
--chroot
Before changing to the user ID given in the --user option,
chroot to that user's home directory, i.e. make the kernel pre-
tend to the Privoxy process that the directory tree starts
there. If set up carefully, this can limit the impact of possi-
ble vulnerabilities in Privoxy to the files contained in that
hierarchy.
--pre-chroot-nslookup hostname
Initialize the resolver library using hostname before
chroot'ing. On some systems this reduces the number of files
that must be copied into the chroot tree.
If the configfile is not specified on the command line, Privoxy
will look for a file named config in the current directory. If no con-
figfile is found, Privoxy will fail to start.
DESCRIPTION
Privoxy is a non-caching web proxy with advanced filtering capabilities
for enhancing privacy, modifying web page data and HTTP headers, con-
trolling access, and removing ads and other obnoxious Internet junk.
Privoxy has a flexible configuration and can be customized to suit
INSTALLATION AND USAGE
Browsers can either be individually configured to use Privoxy as a HTTP
proxy (recommended), or Privoxy can be combined with a packet filter to
build an intercepting proxy (see config). The default setting is for
localhost, on port 8118 (configurable in the main config file). To
set the HTTP proxy in Firefox, go through: Tools; Options; General;
Connection Settings; Manual Proxy Configuration.
For Internet Explorer, go through: Tools; Internet Properties; Connec-
tions; LAN Settings.
The Secure (SSL) Proxy should also be set to the same values, otherwise
https: URLs will not be proxied. Note: Privoxy can only proxy HTTP and
HTTPS traffic. Do not try it with FTP or other protocols. HTTPS
presents some limitations, and not all features will work with HTTPS
connections.
For other browsers, check the documentation.
CONFIGURATION
Privoxy can be configured with the various configuration files. The
default configuration files are: config, default.filter, default.action
and default.action. user.action should be used for locally defined
exceptions to the default rules in match-all.action and default.action,
and user.filter for locally defined filters. These are well commented.
On Unix and Unix-like systems, these are located in /etc/privoxy/ by
default.
Privoxy uses the concept of actions in order to manipulate the data
stream between the browser and remote sites. There are various actions
available with specific functions for such things as blocking web
sites, managing cookies, etc. These actions can be invoked individually
or combined, and used against individual URLs, or groups of URLs that
can be defined using wildcards and regular expressions. The result is
that the user has greatly enhanced control and freedom.
The actions list (ad blocks, etc) can also be configured with your web
browser at http://config.privoxy.org/ (assuming the configuration
allows it). Privoxy's configuration parameters can also be viewed at
the same page. In addition, Privoxy can be toggled on/off. This is an
internal page, and does not require Internet access.
See the User Manual for a detailed explanation of installation, general
usage, all configuration options, new features and notes on upgrading.
FILES
/usr/sbin/privoxy
/etc/privoxy/config
/etc/privoxy/match-all.action
/etc/privoxy/default.action
/etc/privoxy/user.action
/etc/privoxy/default.filter
detect them automatically.
NOTES
This is a UNRELEASED version of Privoxy. Not all features are well
tested.
Please see the User Manual on how to contact the developers, for fea-
ture requests, reporting problems, and other questions.
SEE ALSO
Other references and sites of interest to Privoxy users:
http://www.privoxy.org/, the Privoxy Home page.
http://www.privoxy.org/faq/, the Privoxy FAQ.
http://www.privoxy.org/developer-manual/, the Privoxy developer manual.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/ijbswa/, the Project Page for Privoxy
on SourceForge.
http://config.privoxy.org/, the web-based user interface. Privoxy must
be running for this to work. Shortcut: http://p.p/
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=11118&atid=460288, to submit
``misses'' and other configuration related suggestions to the develop-
ers.
DEVELOPMENT TEAM
Fabian Keil, lead developer
David Schmidt, developer
Hal Burgiss
Mark Miller
Gerry Murphy
Lee Rian
Roland Rosenfeld
COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE
COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2001-2011 by Privoxy Developers <ijbswa-develop-
ers@lists.sourceforge.net>
Some source code is based on code Copyright (C) 1997 by Anonymous
Coders and Junkbusters, Inc. and licensed under the GNU General Public
License.
LICENSE
Privoxy is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
under the terms of the GNU General Public License, version 2, as pub-
lished by the Free Software Foundation.