IE9 & EasyList

[Gingerbread Man]

Another possibility: Do you have enough time at your hand to volunteer?

I'm sorry, no. I first subscribed to EasyList because I didn't want to have to spend so much time adding my own filters. Having to maintain it for other people — for a browser I never use, no less — sounds like a complete nightmare. And besides, you're all doing such a great job already; you don't need me meddling in your affairs

The essential syntax, such as element hiding and item types, was purposefully omitted from the browser because the company did not want to support "very ad-specific features",

Oh, I understand now. Not that it makes any more sense than before, mind you. You're saying they're making an ad-blocking list available, but they don't want it to do any of that pesky ad blocking.

A subforum won't help much if noone is interested in resolving issues.

Well, that's your call. Last I heard, the way to report bugs and submit suggestions to Microsoft is through Microsoft Connect, which isn't the most user-friendly site (it requires registration for starters). Since they're listing you as the TPL providers, it seems that the burden of support falls on you. But when IE users reach this forum, all they see is "EasyList & Adblock Plus", and I can see them walking away confused rather than asking for help.

Thank you for the detailed explanations of this tangled situation.

[Ares2]

Having to maintain it for other people — for a browser I never use, no less — sounds like a complete nightmare.

And that's exactly why we don't support EasyList TPL either.

Since they're listing you as the TPL providers, it seems that the burden of support falls on you. But when IE users reach this forum, all they see is "EasyList & Adblock Plus", and I can see them walking away confused rather than asking for help.

That's a problem indeed. It makes me wonder which EasyList author actually provides support for the official EassyPrivacy TPL. (Michael?) I can say for sure it's not me given that I don't even have any Windows setup CD around here any more which makes it impossible for me to support a Windows-only browser/list.

[Michael]

I admit that it does seem rather odd that EasyList is listed, but if Microsoft do not want Tracking Protection Lists to remove adverts then I will not promote the subscription.

However, I would propose renaming some of the forum sections to better account for the wider range of systems that we deal with, specifically changing "EasyList subscriptions for Adblock Plus" to "EasyList subscriptions", "EasyList & Adblock Plus" to "EasyList subscriptions" and "Unrelated Content Blocking Topics" to "Content Blocking". Users seeking assistance with the extension itself would be better discussing issues in the Adblock Plus forums, where bugs with the add-on may be more easily identified and changes committed as required.

[Michael]

Specific support for EasyPrivacy Tracking Protection List is not something that is generally required given its similarity to the regular version of the subscription, as most of the items may be detected and blocked using Firefox. However, although I am also unable to deal with most questions pertaining to the browser due to my use of Linux, I would make the necessary alterations to the repository if the specific issue were identified.

[Gingerbread Man]

It's not by any means a convenient solution, but I thought I should point out that Microsoft makes Internet Explorer VHDs available for download. These copies expire at set intervals, and must be downloaded anew at that point. You can run these Windows virtual machines using something like VMware Player (which is free, and also works in Linux).

[Michael]

Unfortunately the requisite Internet Explorer 9 is not provided...

[Gingerbread Man]

Oh, that's right. I've seen several complaints and questions about this, but no answer as to whether IE9 will be made available as a VHD later on.

To make matters more irritating, the available Vista VHD is only SP1. So in order to install IE9 on it, I had to first install SP2 and the Platform Update. And then it expired. That's a few too many hoops to jump through than is reasonable, I think

[IE9Fanboy]

Hi, I am a huge fan of both IE9 and Adblock Plus. The lack of AdBlock Plus on IE9 is really disappointing from my point of view. If you want, I will be more than happy to maintain an Adblocking List for IE9. However, I have almost no idea how these filters work. So,

1. Can you point me towards some links where I can get started?
2. Will you give me the maintenance duty for IE9 filters lists, if you don't have the time to do so?

[ReBoot]

I'm not an official but here's basically what the current draft is
http://www.w3.org/Submission/web-tracking-protection/
Also, you can just read any existing least, it's basically the same except the header having a ms prefix.

Speaking about. I'd like to help aswell. What exactly is to do to help?

[Michael]

We predominantly need people to test the Tracking Protection Lists in Internet Explorer 9 and be used to using the system, including knowing how to determine the addresses that should be blocked. Any issues should be reported in the regular forums for filter suggestions and false positives, and users who demonstrate ability and commitment to the project may be granted access to the development forum and eventually offered authorship, although both of these privileges require an account by which members may be identified.

Note that the TPLs are automatically generated from the Adblock Plus versions of the subscription, and that this syntax is therefore used when adding filters.

[arflech]

Microsoft's new TPL site lists EasyList (not just EasyPrivacy): http://ieaddons.com/us/trackingprotecti ... fault.aspx

[ReBoot]

Well, I do want to help.

[Michael]

In my opinion Microsoft should not promote any advert blocking subscriptions until they can properly support them by providing item type specification and element hiding capabilities, which is why I do not advertise EasyList TPL.

ReBoot, if you want to help, simply start reporting issues as mentioned in my previous post. There are plenty of examples of how to do so in the filter suggestions and false positive reports forums.

[Michael]

I have renamed the forum sections as previously proposed to offer more platform neutral discussion.

[arflech]

Why was the perl script removed?

[Michael]

A different method of conversion from Adblock Plus to Tracking Protection List format was implemented by Wladimir; the function is a part of combineSubscriptions.py. All subscriptions remain available as TPLs.

[arflech]

A different method of conversion from Adblock Plus to Tracking Protection List format was implemented by Wladimir; the function is a part of combineSubscriptions.py. All subscriptions remain available as TPLs.

What version of Python is required? I'm planning to re-work this for my project to make TPLs from popular ABP lists that currently lack them, just as I had done with the Perl script.

[Michael]

What version of Python is required?

I believe that the latest release from the Python 2 branch is required.

[arflech]

What version of Python is required?

I believe that the latest release from the Python 2 branch is required.

That's very convenient, because I still have not made the Python 3 branch my default, because I see that most Python-related applications still use Python 2 (and I keep both up-to-date).

[IE User]

Hey folks, sorry to bump an old thread. I'd like to request a change in the easylistcombinations script.

As it stands currently, the script correctly imports all rules with $third-party into TPL format (obviously stripping the extra variable), this is good.

However, the script also imports rules with $~third-party, this is actually bad. Imagine this rule:
||domain.com$~third-party
So we're telling ABP to block this when it's first party only, however, IE doesn't support this, first party is always allowed. When this is imported, it's imported as a blanket deny rule, in other words, it will block third party even though the original rule wasn't designed to. This gets worse if we imagine an allow rule:
@@domain.com$~third-party
We want to only allow first party, however when this is imported into IE, it will allow all 3rd party also. Keep in mind IE always allows first party, so this rule isn't needed at all.

In summary, I'm asking if the script can be tweaked to NOT import $~third-party rules (but continue to import $third-party rules)

Thanks!

[MonztA]

While your comment makes sense, I currently do not see a need for action as our whitelist rules are specific enough (there is no rule like "@@||example.com^$~third-party") and there will never be a blocking rule like "||example.com^$~third-party" in any of our lists because it does not make much sense. But that does not mean the script will never be changed. Personally, I do not know how to change the script.

[IE User]

Actually I've seen many rules that use the ~third-party tag, here is some examples:
@@||ads.seriouswheels.com^$~third-party
@@||buy.com/buy_assets/addeals/$~third-party

In IE, this will be imported as a blanket allow rule, so it will always be allowed no matter what, which is bad. The reason this rule exists is obviously because a generic rule was blocking it in the first place, in IE, allow takes precedence over block, so where this SHOULD be blocked it will infact be allowed.

Who can I contact to fix the script?

[MonztA]

I think it is subscriptionlist at adblockplus dot org.

[Wladimir Palant]

@MonztA: No, subscriptionlist is the wrong contact, they are only managing the list of subscriptions. I think that the TPL conversion was originally written by Michael but with him gone I guess that I "own" it now. Will look into this issue.

[MonztA]

Alright, sorry then. Yes, Michael wrote it. Thank you!

[Wladimir Palant]

Fixed: https://hg.adblockplus.org/sitescripts/rev/9fb22bfd0396
Please watch out for false positives and let me know if this causes problems.

@MonztA: Feel free to update the copy of this file in easylistcombinations repository as well.

[arflech]

Today I decided to update my unofficial TPLs and found that the URL for the Malware Domains ABP subscription had moved, it was blocking my script (and I imagine a bunch of more-aggressive applications), and most importantly, there is a proper TPL available at http://easylist-msie.adblockplus.org/ma ... s_full.tpl

My list of TPL-subscription links has therefore been updated (I found that although it is hosted on the EasyList download server, it is not linked from Dayngo's site): http://jansal.net/TPL.shtml