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A Parent's Guide To Linux Web Filtering

Roblimo writes "Not all parents want their children exposed to everything on the Internet, especially porn. So far, virtually all home-level Net filtering software has been for Windows. This tutorial on NewsForge, by Joe Bolin, shows Linux-using parents how to set up Web filtering for *their* children -- and shows them how to customize filters to fit their own tastes and beliefs instead of relying on a commercial software company's ideas of 'good' and 'bad,' too."

6 of 529 comments (clear)

  1. Bumper Car for OS X by bennomatic · · Score: 4, Informative

    Those fun-loving shareware dudes and dames over at Freeverse have a customizable browser for kids, aptly named BumperCar. Don't know much about it, but I happened to see it on a browsing jag yesterday, and thought I'd mention it here.

    --
    The CB App. What's your 20?
  2. Re:Just wondering.. by eln · · Score: 2, Informative

    Yes, and they do generally charge more. They are usually run by religious organizations. The PAX network has been advertising their own filtered Internet service, for example.

  3. Re:Stumbles right out of the gate by tsg · · Score: 3, Informative

    That's two too many, as far as the target audience is concerned.

    Netfilter is part of the linux kernel and doesn't require a separate installation. As for the other two, the entire unix philosophy is build small tools that do one thing well and connect them together. If someone doesn't like Squid, they can use another proxy server without ditching Dan's Guardian (or the other way around). It's called choice. It's a good thing.

    Not that it matters; they'd probably already lost most of their target audience.

    Their target audience is mostly parents who are already running Linux. The "hoops" (that you admit to not reading yet feel the need to criticize anyway) they have to go through are little different than configuring any other Linux app.

    --
    People's desire to believe they are right is much stronger than their desire to be right.
  4. ClarkConnect by nick13245 · · Score: 2, Informative

    I have done several network installs for people who have kids, and want web content filtering. Generally what is set up a gateway machine with a distribution of linux called "ClarkConnect" clarkconnect.org which is designed specifically to be used as a gateway. It already has dansguardian and squid installed, as well as a iptables, dhcpd, and other various useful features. What I really like about it, is that it has a nice web interface which allows my customers to actually make changes to dansguardian/squid, the firewall, and other services without having to actually know any linux commands. It's very user friendly.

  5. quick (and fairly easy) by oneishy · · Score: 3, Informative

    I have used dansguardian on ipcop for several different sites (schools, homes etc), and have been please by the relative ease of installing (as far as linux stuff goes) and the configuration options.

    I have used IPCOP v 1.2 and 1.3 w/o any problems. Sidenote :it runs well on an older pentium 133 box.

  6. What about TV filtering? by FrankAnemaet · · Score: 2, Informative

    Long ago my parents where visiting friends, I was bored and checked tv to watch cartoons.
    (I was 10/11 by then)
    I turned on tv and saw porn.

    --
    -- Frank Anemaet irc.freenode.net frank