Slashdot Mirror

1. Yeah I'm not seeing pictures either.
2. Use this (if you're under Windows or use Wine) and you won't see any ads. (Just a friendly suggestion.)

Use Proxomitron with a simple web filter:

replace:
<P>*terroris*</P>
with
"" (nothing)

Voila!

Nifty little tool. Actually it's the most used piece of software on my computer[s].

I've spent a fair bit of time playing with various pieces of software, and here's what I keep running on my home PC:

Virus Killer

AVG Anit-Virus, a virus killer from Grisoft where a gratis version (free edition) is available. I'm not sure of its protection level but updates are available fairly frequently.

It's also quite poor in its appearance but it's hard to complain at a free virus killer when it must take a lot of time to maintain such a project. However, I'd not put all your trust in it, keep a wary eye on your system, a false sense of security is not a good thing!

Firewalls

Of the firewalls, I use an old version of Tiny Personal Firewall. They used to do a free version but unfortunately they now charge leaving you with few options other than the 'firewall for dummies' known as Zone Alarm.

Virtual Desktops

For desktop switching, a very useful thing you you program or work with graphics or CAD, there is an app called Multidesk from Tech Superior.

Unlike other products, it's light and onobtrusive. It puts an icon (or several -- your choice) in the system tray and you can switch desktop with a click of the icon or the keyboard shortcuts.

Web Browser

For web browsing, it's hard to beat Mozilla Firebird (formerly Phoenix). It's fast, supports tabbed browsing as is open source. You can get it from Mozilla.org

Web Filtering

Proximitron, a web filtering and page alteration proxy that lets you remove annoyances and even rewrite web-sites on the fly. The product is no longer supported or developed but some sites still have the download, best look at Proximitron.info.

The product is great in that you can match any HTML and replace it with whatever you like. The Proximitron author provides many such filters with the product and clever use of JavaScript allows all sorts of annoyances such as adverts, pop-ups, pop-unders, browser unloads, right mouse disabling to be removed or altered. I'm very sad it is no longer maintained.

Email Client

A good email client is really hard to find. I've been using an old build of the Mozilla suite but Mozilla Thunderbird is looking promising. I've used many other free clients including Outlook Express (discontinued), Sylpheed Claws (poor), et al but they are all flawed in some way. I'm not using Thunderbird yet but I soon will be. You can get it from Mozilla.org.

Email Spam Protection

POPFile, a great, free, open source baysian filter for email, hosted on Sourceforge.

TweakUI

I'm not sure if they do one for XP, I've never upgraded for political reasons but TweakUI has been available for other versions of Windows since Windows 95 at least. It provides a lot of advanced features that Microsoft left out of the rest of the user interface and allows you fix a lot of the common problems such as corrupted icon cache, manually removed applications as well as setting advanced preferances such as double-click rectangle size, etc. A must for any seasoned user running Windows. Available in PowerToys from the MS website.

Cygwin

Ports of many popular tools from GNU etc. that are normally available on a Linux/BSD environment. If you're dual booting Windows and Linux, then these are a must. Available from the Cygwin website.

Virtual Machine Emulation

If you're serious about dual booting, then you may want to cosider VMWare. It's very pricey but a fantastically cool product than effectively emulates an I386 PC and its hardware, allowing a second OS to run in a window on the native OS.

It's a

I used to be an avid Opera fan but when they became militant about registering or be force-fed a gazillion obnoxious ads (I hate ads!), I looked around and found the Mozilla Firebird. It is free, ad-free and it just plain work for me and the places I frequent.

Now, for that ad-free surfing experience I never go anywhere without The Proxomitron. It can be tuned so that almost everything works but those pesky ads are completely removed. In addition it kills many pop-up ad-windows while leaving those real pop-up windows working, and it also takes care of troublesome javascript, webbugs and much, much more!

Works with all browsers! Don't leave home without it! :)

Funny, yes, but this is an important need.

The Proxomitron Is probably the best thing avaible.
It's free, and as a generic HTML filter it not only blocks pop-ups but can allow right clicks, disable audio, the works.

For web ad/pop-up blocking, I still recommend the no-longer-maintained Proxomitron. A proxy-based filter that screens for banner ads and pop-ups. It's got a very active user base and mailing list.

While I question the value on a laptop, for desktops, I always install the latest version of Motherboard Monitor. It keeps an eye on your system's health - temperature and fans. Again, probably not as useful (or even compatible) for a laptop.

If you must use IE, download the CrazyBrowser (Tabs and pop-up blocking) enchancement. Or use Proxomitron, the ultimate pop-up/flash/ad blocker.

The developer of Proxomitron has killed it - he no longer supports it, but you can still download it at proxomitron.info.

Incidently, Windows users can use Proxomitron to strip the Referrer header from HTTP requests.

Stupidity like this won't affect me at all. I use the Proxomitron, and I have the referrer field set to \u (which I think is the default setting). \u inserts the current URL into the referrer field. So, for example, if I hit a link on www.slashdot.org/foo.htm to www.aol.com/foo.htm, the Proxomitron will send www.aol.com/foo.htm and not www.slashdot.org/foo.htm to the server. This is especially helpful for sites that return 404's to requests with blank referrers (since the server always thinks the request is coming from its domain when in reality it may not be.)