user.js VS Pi-hole

Re: firefox and privacy, if you want to use firefox for privacy, consider using https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js . There is a case to be made that Firefox (with arkenfox's user.js) is one of the best privacy-respecting but still fairly usable browsers.

For extensions, I recommend people follow the recommendations[1] in the arkenfox repo and either harden their firefox or use librewolf. Umatrix is unmaintained since 2019.

[1] https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js/wiki/4.1-Extensions

For macOS : Thunderbird and you can harden it even more with this : https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js

only arkenfox

This article is shit. https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js/ is what you want.

If you make time to dig through settings and change them away from their official use (99% of users don't), then you should use a customized setup (in this case, a user.js). That way, you're good to go no matter what Firefox fork you use.

> Firefox remains a stable option to come back to everytime

Don't get me wrong, I've been using Firefox for the last decade and I don't intend on using anything else for the foreseeable future, but Mozilla has no idea what they're doing with Firefox nowadays. Firefox View is the most useless thing I've ever seen, that expiring "independent voices" theme picker was some weird hippie stunt[1], the latest UI redesign which split the tab from the window looks hideous, and it's not like Firefox doesn't have things you can tweak for a more private experience[2]. I miss Firefox Test Pilot where they tried out different new features, I found a lot of them to be very useful but sadly lots of them didn't make it.

[1] https://blog.mozilla.org/en/products/firefox/firefox-news/in...

[2] https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js/

Like others have said you can customize the browser to the point that it doesn't even look like the default anymore. Or customize it to maximize privacy.

Si te preguntas, ¿por qué no usar Adguard o Pihole? 🤔

This is an overreaction, almost to the point of absurdity.

Risks inherent to pipe installers are well understood by many. Using your logic, we should abandon Homebrew [1] (>38k stars on GitHub), PiHole [2] (>46k stars on GitHub), Chef [3], RVM [4], and countless other open source projects that use one-step automated installers (by piping to bash).

A more reasonable response would be to coordinate with the developers to update the docs to provide alternative installation methods, rather than throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

[1] https://brew.sh/

[2] https://github.com/pi-hole/pi-hole

[3] https://docs.chef.io/chef_install_script/#run-the-install-sc...

[4] https://rvm.io/rvm/install

Pi-hole to block ads and tracking for my less technically savvy relatives

https://pi-hole.net/

I ran a competing project[0] on my home network for a few years before I discovered NextDNS[1]. What I lost in performance (requests don't leave my house) I gained in portability: ALL my devices can take advantage – at home and away – and time-saved. PiHole works 90% of the time, but when it did stop working, I'd have to spend a bit of time fixing it. At $20/year, I simply couldn't compete with NextDNS.

Note: This isn't a shill for NextDNS; I love these kinds of projects and think they absolutely should exist, but NextDNS just happens to be one of those dead-simple SaaS tools that is an insanely good value.

0 - https://pi-hole.net/

1 - https://nextdns.io

It definitely IS an option, but at the network level.

https://pi-hole.net/

It runs on damn near everything, and is a DNS level adblocker for the whole network.

I recently switched to Wipr [0]. It’s dead simple to use, and will auto update its filter lists in the background.

Adguard [1] is a decent free option.

I also use a Pi-hole [2] on my network.

[0] https://kaylees.site/wipr.html

[1] https://adguard.com/en/adguard-safari/overview.html

[2] https://pi-hole.net/

Are you trying to build a DNS proxy (similar to Pi-hole) that intercepts DNS requests and checks for the ones that look harmful? If so, I would suggest trying to separately build a DNS client and a DNS server, before trying to integrate them together. Start with Beej's Guide to Network Programming if you need to learn the basics of sockets, and then take a look at the documents that define the DNS protocol itself (RFC1034 and RFC1035).

Setup a pi-hole.

It's definitely not as simple as installing an app on your phone, but I run a Pi-hole on my home network, and it does block ads in many games.