Checking if adblock works?

[applemagic123]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 3_1_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/528.18 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile/7E18 Safari/528.16)

So I've installed adblock (from xsellize). What are some websites I can go to on my iphone's safari to check if adblock is working or not?

I know it does not work for apps (even though in cydia, the package stated that it works for safari & other apps), as I am still seeing ads in apps on my iphone. Thanks for your time.

 

[karsten]

go to cnn.com, there's a big ad on the right of the main page that your adblocker will block

 

[IMADV8]

Use SBAdBlockToggle from the ModYouri repo instead.
It allows you to toggle between a regular hosts file and one that blocks all ads systemwide, it patches those apps like SBSettings and iFile that normally won't run with such a hosts file, and it auto-updates the blocklist every time it's enabled.

 

[applemagic123]

Use SBAdBlockToggle from the ModYouri repo instead.
It allows you to toggle between a regular hosts file and one that blocks all ads systemwide, it patches those apps like SBSettings and iFile that normally won't run with such a hosts file, and it auto-updates the blocklist every time it's enabled.

Ok thanks. Should I delete "adblocker" that I originally installed from xsellize or should I keep it?

Anyhoo...

Also, for CNN.com would I have to use my user agent faker or will it work for the mobile version of it? UPDATE: Nevermind, the full version of the site (non mobile) has a white space on the right side, which I'm assuming is the fat ad that you're talking about. Thanks.

 

[8767092]

Ok thanks. Should I delete "adblocker" that I originally installed from xsellize or should I keep it?

Anyhoo...

Also, for CNN.com would I have to use my user agent faker or will it work for the mobile version of it? UPDATE: Nevermind, the full version of the site (non mobile) has a white space on the right side, which I'm assuming is the fat ad that you're talking about. Thanks.

Adblocker is much more thorough than any ad blocking hosts file they're recommending earlier in the thread. Regular expressions can handle far more than a simple hostname block.

 

[IMADV8]

Adblocker is much more thorough than any ad blocking hosts file they're recommending earlier in the thread. Regular expressions can handle far more than a simple hostname block.

The main advantage of using the hosts file is that it blocks ads systemwide, while Adblocker only does so in the browser. It seems to me that this makes the hosts file much more thorough. Could you elaborate on how exactly Adblocker is more thorough?

 

[applemagic123]

Hey, wth!! I followed these directions:

Option 2 (Toggle Above Updates Automatically)

1. Download and unzip the attached hosts.zip file below

**Updated 12/6/09** v2.0.3.6
- most current

2. Unzip and place it here:

/private/etc/ (no need to set permissions)

3. Respring or Restart iPhone

ENJOY

And when I open 'categories' this popup comes up: "Error admob blocking has been detected in your hosts file. I have worked many hours on this app. It cannot run with this block in place." When I press OK, the popup comes up again, like an endless loop. The phone resprung itself into safe mode, and then I resprung again to get out of safe mode, and now I'm out of safe mode. In all honestly, I have all of my categories set up (the only 'folder' I have is for games, the folder works fine and I'm able to access my game apps, but the app itself for categories is impossible to use.

Now how in the WORLD do I get passed this??? I'm not a super noob, but all the other options on that page IMADV8 linked me to seemed beyond my ability. Can someone help me with this?

Note: I do not do 'ssh' as it seems way too complicated, but I use a program on my mac called, "iPhone Explorer" it gives me root access to all the file systems on my iPhone.

 

[IMADV8]

SBSettings, Categories, iFile, and several other apps normally refuse to run if you block their ads using the hosts file. The toggle, which is listed as option 1 on the page I linked to, patches them so they'll run anyway.You need to add repo.modyouri.com to your sources in Cydia, install SBAdBlockToggle from there, and turn it on in SBSettings. It should force a respring, after which everything will run fine.

Before you do all this, put your original hosts file back on the phone, or you won't be able to open SBSettings to add the toggle to the dropdown menu. If you don't have a backup of it, let me know and I'll upload it for you.

 

[8767092]

The main advantage of using the hosts file is that it blocks ads systemwide, while Adblocker only does so in the browser. It seems to me that this makes the hosts file much more thorough. Could you elaborate on how exactly Adblocker is more thorough?

www.macrumors.com/ads/massive_blinking_banner_with_music.swf

You want to browse macrumors.com so you can't just add:

0.0.0.0 macrumors.com
0.0.0.0 www.macrumors.com

to your hosts file.

Adblocker will check against that same URL finding that it contains the word "ads" and block it.

Edit: It does work in other applications, but will only block based on content loaded via the MobileSafari frameworks if enabled via the Settings menu.

Load iAdsKiller if you want to block ads inside applications (NYTimes app for example).

 

[IMADV8]

www.macrumors.com/ads/massive_blinking_banner_with_music.swf

You want to browse macrumors.com so you can't just add:

0.0.0.0 macrumors.com
0.0.0.0 www.macrumors.com

to your hosts file.

Adblocker will check against that same URL finding that it contains the word "ads" and block it.

Ah, now I understand you.
I believe a subdomain devoted to ads could be hostname blocked, but I'm not sure about subdirectories. Thankfully this doesn't pose much of a problem, as nearly all online ads are served via third party servers for tracking purposes.

Edit: It does work in other applications, but will only block based on content loaded via the MobileSafari frameworks if enabled via the Settings menu.

Correct. This leaves out many apps, however.

Load iAdsKiller if you want to block ads inside applications (NYTimes app for example).

That would only block ads served by Apple.


That brings us to this choice:
Adblocker: block all ads in most apps.
Adblock Toggle: block most ads in all apps.

I will say that I have yet to run into any ads while using the Adblock toggle hosts file. It's likely extremely rare for a site to host the ads they display.

 

[8767092]

It's likely extremely rare for a site to host the ads they display.

Blocking advertising via a hosts file was previously the only way to block advertising on iOS so I am very familiar with it. I also use it internally when I can't be bothered to add a new .dev address to my internal network. It is appropriate for what it was designed for, but it has been replaced.

Ask yourself why we use Adblock Plus, Adblock Plus: Element Hiding Helper, Adblocker, Ghostery, and so many other addons for Firefox, Chrome, Safari, etc when we could just add one global hosts file for everything.

The reason: It isn't all that effective.

 

[IMADV8]

It isn't all that effective.

We'll just have to agree to disgree on that one. As I said, I've yet to run into any ads using this method. You're right that some ads won't be blocked, but there clearly aren't nearly as many as you'll see in the apps that Adblocker doesn't work with.

 

[applemagic123]

SBSettings, Categories, iFile, and several other apps normally refuse to run if you block their ads using the hosts file. The toggle, which is listed as option 1 on the page I linked to, patches them so they'll run anyway.You need to add repo.modyouri.com to your sources in Cydia, install SBAdBlockToggle from there, and turn it on in SBSettings. It should force a respring, after which everything will run fine.

Before you do all this, Put your original hosts file back on the phone, or you won't be able to open SBSettings to add the toggle to the dropdown menu. If you don't have a backup of it, let me know and I'll upload it for you.

Ok....no WONDER I couldn't find it in cydia at first. I thought that was one of the default repos that came with cydia, but I mistook it for modMYi haha!! I'm a dumb a$$!

 

[THE dAY]

I had tried SBAdBlockToggle from ModMyi months ago and remember all pages loading slower in Safari.

AdBlocker the $1.99 app from Cydia actually loads Safari pages faster than SBAdBlockToggle from my experience.

 

[8767092]

I had tried SBAdBlockToggle from ModMyi months ago and remember all pages loading slower in Safari.

AdBlocker the $1.99 app from Cydia actually loads Safari pages faster than SBAdBlockToggle from my experience.

That comes from using a very complete hosts file. It is virtually impossible to check 10+ DNS records per page against a list of IPs as long as an adblocking hosts file without some performance hits. A desktop can do it because it has a lot of spare resources, but the iPhone doesn't. On the other hand, the device only needs to evaluate the regular expression once per page and it is highly optimized via compilation.

 

[IMADV8]

I had tried SBAdBlockToggle from ModMyi months ago and remember all pages loading slower in Safari.

AdBlocker the $1.99 app from Cydia actually loads Safari pages faster than SBAdBlockToggle from my experience.

Interesting, I hadn't noticed that. I'll have to try going without for a bit and see what kind of difference it makes.

 

[applemagic123]

The adblocker I had from xsellize made safari slow. But now safari is back to normal for me.

 

[THE dAY]

Interesting, I hadn't noticed that. I'll have to try going without for a bit and see what kind of difference it makes.

You should time your most used websites with SBAdBlockToggle enabled and then disabled to see what kind of speeds you get. Like I said I used it months ago and was not impressed, maybe the dev has made it more efficient since then. Most important thing for me with these adblockers is a faster Safari experience.

The adblocker I had from xsellize made safari slow. But now safari is back to normal for me.

Maybe the cracked version you have is an older copy.
I bought it when Yllier first released it and it was slightly slower to load Safari than without it, he has added a few updates since then and it has gotten faster.
He has also made a SBSettings toggle for it which works great with no respring required between toggles so I was able to quickly test a few sites to see the speed. Some pages actually load faster now than without it.