Greasy Fork

Multi-user Version

Hello. I installed your software. It appears to work great. Thank you.

Here are the three things I would be most interested in seeing, in order of decreasing priority.

I would love to see a multi-user version of this. I could easily build the server, if someone could upgrade the
javascript client.

I would also love to see more categories. Highlighted Green Highlight Red, Block, Permaban.

And then it would be great to block the directory, site, or domain.

I did not see a version of this on Github. Is it on some other source code control site?

I am thinking of documenting the function calls as a first step towards understanding and modifying the software.
Where should I put my documents?

Chris

Hi Chris, the script currently is desired around a single string listing the blocked domains followed by :t or :p for the two categories of blocking. You'll see it in the Export dialog.

Multi-user: The script currently has no code for anything but local storage. A while back I was thinking of adding a personal cloud backup or sync feature, but never built it due to the complexity of authentication and privacy. My plan was to only send updates to the server when there is a change to the local list, and to check for remote updates on a schedule (daily?). Let me know what you have in mind and I can think about how best to integrate it.

Option of highlighting instead of blocking: I don't think a lot of plumbing changes would be required to accommodate a few colors, but a lot of UI would need to be built and code written. Would you want to highlight just the heading? Would you want to hide the details?

Site/Domain/Path: In the current design, the script handles full domains like mail.live.com and base domains like live.com. It is not possible to match parts of the path in the current design, that would require significant changes.

The source code is available here and there is no repository anywhere.

If we are mining the web, we need something like this to get rid of the slag.
I would love to be able to have 2 and eventually 10 people mining the web collaboratively.

So step 1 would be to do a personal backup cloud. Without promising anything, I could do the server, you could do the client.

Clearly everytime a site is blacklisted, the server gets an ajax call. URL, user id, timestamp. Eventually I want to do category as well.

Push a browser button every time you want to download the newest data. It can be a little out of date.

Just highlighting the title is fine by me. Whatever is simplest to implement.

I presume that this is open source. If I go down this path, I will start by documenting the function calls. That will help me understand it better.

I am really curious, why you, a lawyer, a senior partner, wrote this application.
PrivavaCV.com and Zopache.com are my websites.

I am also really curious if anyone else needs this functionality?

Chris

Clearly everytime a site is blacklisted, the server gets an ajax call. URL, user id, timestamp. Eventually I want to do category as well.

What about domains removed from the list? Do you want to know about those?

I presume that this is open source. If I go down this path, I will start by documenting the function calls. That will help me understand it better.

Yes, the license is in the source, BSD-based.

It may be that you are describing something a bit different, such as a global dislike button that should be present not only on search engines but also on any page. Depending on how the scope expands, you may want to fork the code.

I am really curious, why you, a lawyer, a senior partner, wrote this application.

It's a bit like asking "Why don't you have normal hobbies?" It started back in January 2011 in response to a request on the Eileen's Lounge forum: http://www.eileenslounge.com/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=5065

I probably would not have invested a lot of time in it, but when people starting posting feature requests on userscripts.org, they were impossible to ignore. The idea that anyone used anything I created and needed help with it gets to me.

Amazingly, it later became useful in my practice because my results got cluttered with numerous websites republishing the same nonauthoritative data over and over.

I am also really curious if anyone else needs this functionality?

Hard to know. I've thought about asking users to reply to a survey, but don't want to be intrusive.

The next big rev for this script needs to fully integrate with Google image search, so that's likely to get my attention for the time being.

What about domains removed from the list? Do you want to know about those?

You are correct. I should have said:

Clearly every time a site OR DOMAIN is blacklisted, the server gets an ajax call.

Hard to know. I've thought about asking users to reply to a survey, but don't want to be intrusive.

If we put up a server, it is easy to record the users search terms, and from that to see how your software is being used. I am really really curious how this software is being used. Who else is mining the web. It is also really easy to add a box in the client for users to post comments.

The idea that anyone used anything I created and needed help with it gets to me.

The desire to create and build is hugely powerful. The dream is to make enough money developing to quit the day job. I spend more of my time creating than recruiting. I "should" be recruiting rather than writing to you. Of course hard to do write software if you live in the heart of expensive Silicon Valley. Come join me in Poland, and you can afford to spend most of your time developing.

It may be that you are describing something a bit different, such as a global dislike button that should be present not only on search engines but also on any page.

A global dislike button is a brilliant idea, but I am more interested in data mining. Categories are where my interest lies. In gemeral, Diamond, Flawed Diamond, and Slag. In my case, "Javascript Developer", "Software Developer", and slag. Next week, when recruiting genomics engineers my category might be "Genomics Python Developer" I wonder what the categories are that you are interested in?

The next big rev for this script needs to fully integrate with Google image search, so that's likely to get my attention for the time being.

Makes sense to me.

Depending on how the scope expands, you may want to fork the code.

My general rule is to not fork or get divorced unless there are "irreconcilable differences".

So here is my question. What would you like from a server? Just backup for 1 person? How about collaboration between multiple people. Between co-workers Maybe people you work with? Between strangers?

How about using a server to find out how your software is being used?

Chris

If we put up a server, it is easy to record the users search terms, and from that to see how your software is being used. I am really really curious how this software is being used. Who else is mining the web.

I don't think most users want anyone monitoring their search terms. I certainly don't.

I've always viewed this extension as allowing users to meet their unique individual blocking needs. That may mean blocking 5 domains or 500, I don't know, and since no one has complained that they maxed out the storage or are getting bad performance, I don't think I need to know.

Crowdsourcing is not a priority for me. I once imported a lengthy blocklist to test de-deduplication, and it had hundreds of domains I can't imagine I would ever see in one my searches. Some people like that sort of thing, but I prefer to decide for myself, and in my work, I need to know exactly what I'm excluding.

With respect to a server, I think the top two uses I have in mind are (1) a backup to protect against local data loss, and (2) a way to sync a block list between different profiles of the same browser or between Firefox and Chrome. Some people like to share, so I thought they might have the option to publish their list for others to consume in some manner. When I started thinking about how to keep the lists private, how to authenticate users without creating more privacy issues, and how to limit use of the data store to properly formatted block lists, it became a little too much for me to develop.

Hi.

I am using this every day, great software, and am thinking about what to do next.
I do not want to do anything which would upset Google.

I think that my next step is to do some software archaeology. Document
what your software functions do. I am not sure what happens after that. We will see what I learn in the process.

Chris