getclicky.com and pmetrics.performancing.com [fixed]

[schammy]

Hello, I'm the developer of both Clicky and pMetrics (a rebranded version of Clicky).

There are two problems. First one is that "pmetrics.performancing" was added to the general ad blocking list, instead of the tracking list. I use easylist and noticed that in the last few days when I visited pMetrics, the style sheet wasn't loading. I thought it was a cache issue but after being unable to fix it I finally noticed that easylist was blocking it. This is incorrect, as this is simply an analytics tool, and not an ad server in any way. Please remove this filter from this particular list, it belongs in the tracking list instead - although it needs further modification (as detailed below).

The other problem is that, since you are using a generic "$script" to automatically disable ALL javascript files from a particular domain, it completely breaks the web sites themselves when people try to visit them. We are a "web 2.0" service so we make heavy use of javascript in our interface. Because easylist blocks it, the site completely breaks.

If you could switch the filters for these two domains so they use regular expressions instead (the tracking code script files are always numeric, which indicates the site_id in our database) then it would only be blocking the actual tracking scripts, and not any other files like our general interface javascript, or our CSS files. I noticed your list doens't use Regex anywhere but adblock supports it so these filters should work fine. PLEASE consider doing this!

Here are the regex filters for blocking just the tracking script:

getclicky.com/[0-9]+.js
pmetrics.performancing.com/[0-9]+.js

Thank you!!

[rick752]

Having getclicky in the wrong subscription is my error. That has been fixed.

If it was easy to add a non-regexp rule to target ONLY the tracker, I would do it .. but it is not that easy. One regexp rule in ABP is equal to about 50 'simple' rules in processing time ... that is why they are not used.

Now that those are only in the Tracking Filter and not the ad filter, I wouldn't think that clients interested in running a tracker would also be using a track-blocking subscription ... so your sites should look fine now with the regular ad-blocking subscriptions.

Fixed

[schammy]

You have a good point in that someone who wants to block themselves from being tracked probably isn't using a tracker. I'd still prefer the regex but I understand your point. Thanks for the fast response. I just updated my subscription and now pmetrics works again - yay!

[Josh]

If it was easy to add a non-regexp rule to target ONLY the tracker, I would do it .. but it is not that easy. One regexp rule in ABP is equal to about 50 'simple' rules in processing time ... that is why they are not used.

What about something like this:

Code: Select all

pmetrics.performancing.com/0*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/1*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/2*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/3*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/4*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/5*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/6*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/7*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/8*.js

pmetrics.performancing.com/9*.js

Optionally with $script or similar. Ideally Adblock Plus will give all of those filters the same shortcut, and thus not test any of them unless needed.

[Ares2]

What about something like this:

10 filters for something that can be blocked with 1? Not very effective...

Ideally Adblock Plus will give all of those filters the same shortcut

That's not how it works, every filter gets a different shortcut.

If it was easy to add a non-regexp rule to target ONLY the tracker, I would do it .. but it is not that easy.

Although I don't really know if it's worth it, adding a $third-party (dev-build) to the rule should make it possible to not break the site itself while still blocking every tracker. And as unknown options are ignored, you don't have to worry about backward compatibility either, you could even add it now.