9 ms·

For the lay user, what's wrong with AdGuard's free edition?

ADent 6y ago
I was getting several sites not working properly with AdGuard. Yeah you can add whitelists and such, but it’s annoying. Some of was it Safari not working. In the end I just use a browser with built in blocking (AdBlockBrowser or now Brave) and leave Safari alone.
danShumway 6y ago
I haven't looked at AdGuard in specific, but fundamentally, AdGuard's Safari version can't be better than uBlock Origin on Firefox/Chrome, because Safari lacks the APIs to do what uBlock Origin does. The immediate problem is that Safari has a hard limit of 50,000 rules per extension. Some developers do try to get around this with various hacky strategies like splitting their adblocker up into multiple extensions, or moving their blocker to the OS-level, or trying to recompile the list on the fly. But at the end of the day it's just a really weird hoop to jump through, and it ends up being kind of error-prone, and there's no guarantee that Apple won't break those hacks in the future. More fundamental is the list itself -- Safari doesn't allow contextual, dynamic blocking, you have to put everything into a static list. This makes it impossible to build the kind of detailed filters[0][1] that uBlock Origin allows -- for example, there's no way to strip HTML content from a GET request in Safari before it gets parsed by the browser. And so on. See the privacy API[2], dns[3], which is used to block a newer bypass method where 3rd-party trackers are hidden behind 1st-party subdomains. Worse CSS/JS injection, etc... I'm not saying everyone else is crap at adblockers, I'm saying static blocklists are fundamentally less powerful and less capable than Firefox's APIs. That's especially true if AdGuard is doing something like system-wide DNS blocking. No shade at those tools, they have a place, but a browser-based extension will always be better than a setup like PiHole, because the browser has more access to a given request's current context. [0]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Static-filter-syntax https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Static-filter-syntax [1]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering [2]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/privacy https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/Web... [3]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/dns https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/Web...
- stephenr 6y ago
  > for example, there's no way to strip HTML content from a GET request I'm quite curious what legitimate use this has?
  - danShumway 6y ago
    There are a couple of reasons, but the biggest one is that intercepting HTML at the network level allows you to filter inline script tags from documents[0]. If you want to stop an inline script from running (say to defuse an anti-adblocker popup/redirect), you can't wait until after it gets parsed to remove it. Once it gets added to the page, the browser will execute it. Of course, note that uBlock Origin also supports scriptlets[1] that can be used to rein in scripts after they get added to the page, instead of by doing resource rewriting. You're not restricted to only doing your filtering at the network level, HTML filtering is just another tool that filter authors have at their disposal. Helpfully, at the scriptlet wiki page I've linked each entry also shows a practical example rule that relies on the scriptlet. You can also take a look at the uBlock Origin's default filter lists[2] if you want more examples of people using both HTML filtering and scriptlets in the wild. Many of these block rules are impossible to implement in Safari. [0]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Inline-script-tag-filtering https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Inline-script-tag-fil... [1]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Resources-Library https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Resources-Library [2]: https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uAssets https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uAssets
    - specialist 6y ago
      Nice ELI5s/TLDRs, thank you. Sharing notion (dumb question) here, since you're smart about this stuff: At what point will "ad blocking" flip to "content scrapping"? All this cat & mouse, arms race seems like a bad ROI. I imagine an adaptive super reader view mode. Meaning emphasis on content scrapping rules vs ad blocking rules. Take snapshots of top websites, do some rendered page aware content diffing, with some user directed setting & curation, infer where the content is, distill that down to "good enough" scrapping rules. Any way. Thanks for answering some of my lingering questions.
saagarjha 6y ago
It requires an Electron app to run in the background to provide much of its functionality.
- jerrysievert 6y ago
  it quite clearly says: "Please note that content blocking in Safari operates even when the app is not running" considering that the free extension is built to block ads in Safari, it seems to be doing this just fine without the app running.
  - saagarjha 6y ago
    No, I know that. The issue is that the actual app extension itself (which is written in Swift and useful for things like picking elements from the page, etc.) will pretend like it cannot function without the Electron app running. Some more details: https://github.com/AdguardTeam/AdGuardForSafari/issues/84#issuecomment-443849653 https://github.com/AdguardTeam/AdGuardForSafari/issues/84#is...
- GeekyBear 6y ago
  They also have a set of free public DNS servers with a built in blocklist. No additional software required at all. https://adguard.com/en/adguard-dns/overview.html https://adguard.com/en/adguard-dns/overview.html
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
tyingq 6y ago
Imagine a malware scanner that relied only on a fixed size static list of md5 hash signatures. No heuristics.
austhrow743 6y ago
If adguard’s VPN adblocking solution is anything like NextDNS’ Then it doesn’t block ads on YouTube, which is a pretty big source of ads for the lay user.

I was getting several sites not working properly with AdGuard. Yeah you can add whitelists and such, but it’s annoying. Some of was it Safari not working. In the end I just use a browser with built in blocking (AdBlockBrowser or now Brave) and leave Safari alone.

danShumway 6y ago

I haven't looked at AdGuard in specific, but fundamentally, AdGuard's Safari version can't be better than uBlock Origin on Firefox/Chrome, because Safari lacks the APIs to do what uBlock Origin does. The immediate problem is that Safari has a hard limit of 50,000 rules per extension. Some developers do try to get around this with various hacky strategies like splitting their adblocker up into multiple extensions, or moving their blocker to the OS-level, or trying to recompile the list on the fly. But at the end of the day it's just a really weird hoop to jump through, and it ends up being kind of error-prone, and there's no guarantee that Apple won't break those hacks in the future. More fundamental is the list itself -- Safari doesn't allow contextual, dynamic blocking, you have to put everything into a static list. This makes it impossible to build the kind of detailed filters[0][1] that uBlock Origin allows -- for example, there's no way to strip HTML content from a GET request in Safari before it gets parsed by the browser. And so on. See the privacy API[2], dns[3], which is used to block a newer bypass method where 3rd-party trackers are hidden behind 1st-party subdomains. Worse CSS/JS injection, etc... I'm not saying everyone else is crap at adblockers, I'm saying static blocklists are fundamentally less powerful and less capable than Firefox's APIs. That's especially true if AdGuard is doing something like system-wide DNS blocking. No shade at those tools, they have a place, but a browser-based extension will always be better than a setup like PiHole, because the browser has more access to a given request's current context. [0]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Static-filter-syntax https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Static-filter-syntax [1]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering [2]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/privacy https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/Web... [3]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/dns https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/Web...

stephenr 6y ago
> for example, there's no way to strip HTML content from a GET request I'm quite curious what legitimate use this has?
- danShumway 6y ago
  There are a couple of reasons, but the biggest one is that intercepting HTML at the network level allows you to filter inline script tags from documents[0]. If you want to stop an inline script from running (say to defuse an anti-adblocker popup/redirect), you can't wait until after it gets parsed to remove it. Once it gets added to the page, the browser will execute it. Of course, note that uBlock Origin also supports scriptlets[1] that can be used to rein in scripts after they get added to the page, instead of by doing resource rewriting. You're not restricted to only doing your filtering at the network level, HTML filtering is just another tool that filter authors have at their disposal. Helpfully, at the scriptlet wiki page I've linked each entry also shows a practical example rule that relies on the scriptlet. You can also take a look at the uBlock Origin's default filter lists[2] if you want more examples of people using both HTML filtering and scriptlets in the wild. Many of these block rules are impossible to implement in Safari. [0]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Inline-script-tag-filtering https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Inline-script-tag-fil... [1]: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Resources-Library https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Resources-Library [2]: https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uAssets https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uAssets
  - specialist 6y ago
    Nice ELI5s/TLDRs, thank you. Sharing notion (dumb question) here, since you're smart about this stuff: At what point will "ad blocking" flip to "content scrapping"? All this cat & mouse, arms race seems like a bad ROI. I imagine an adaptive super reader view mode. Meaning emphasis on content scrapping rules vs ad blocking rules. Take snapshots of top websites, do some rendered page aware content diffing, with some user directed setting & curation, infer where the content is, distill that down to "good enough" scrapping rules. Any way. Thanks for answering some of my lingering questions.

saagarjha 6y ago

It requires an Electron app to run in the background to provide much of its functionality.

jerrysievert 6y ago
it quite clearly says: "Please note that content blocking in Safari operates even when the app is not running" considering that the free extension is built to block ads in Safari, it seems to be doing this just fine without the app running.
- saagarjha 6y ago
  No, I know that. The issue is that the actual app extension itself (which is written in Swift and useful for things like picking elements from the page, etc.) will pretend like it cannot function without the Electron app running. Some more details: https://github.com/AdguardTeam/AdGuardForSafari/issues/84#issuecomment-443849653 https://github.com/AdguardTeam/AdGuardForSafari/issues/84#is...
GeekyBear 6y ago
They also have a set of free public DNS servers with a built in blocklist. No additional software required at all. https://adguard.com/en/adguard-dns/overview.html https://adguard.com/en/adguard-dns/overview.html

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

tyingq 6y ago

Imagine a malware scanner that relied only on a fixed size static list of md5 hash signatures. No heuristics.

austhrow743 6y ago

If adguard’s VPN adblocking solution is anything like NextDNS’ Then it doesn’t block ads on YouTube, which is a pretty big source of ads for the lay user.