MVPS Hosts

He who is Rene Lamontagne said on Thu, 26 Oct 2017 10:20:04 -0500:

Is the MVPS hosts file a good choice, Or is it too Big?
Does it slow the system to any noticeable extent?

Are there better choices for blocking URLs?

Hi Rene,
Nobody has directly addressed your main issue in detail, so I will address
all your points, bearing in mind that I'm no expert - but I have been using
the MVP Hosts file for as long as I can remember - so I have some
experience.

Q: Is the MVP Hosts file a good choice?
A: There are others out there, but I believe it's the *best* of those.
You'll note this thread which concationates multiple hosts' files:
Suggestions for improving /etc/hosts concatonation & unique
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.os.linux/KQQyBr6vgI0/4qi-KlZHaNsJ
1. wget -O dan_hosts.txt http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/
2. wget -O mdl_hosts.txt http://www.malwaredomainlist.com/mdl.php
3. wget -O pgl_hosts.txt http://pgl.yoyo.org/adservers/serverlist.php

Q: Or is it too Big?
A: I concatonante and sort all the hosts plus add the hosts from adAway
plus add hosts manually, so, I can definitely say it's *not* too big
because mine is about *twice* the size of the MVP Hosts file.

Q: Does it slow the system to any noticeable extent?
A: In a way, it could *speed* up the system, and in other ways, it could
slow it down. I am assuming it's a wash as I don't feel any perf hit
myself.

However, in the olden days, in WinXP, as I recall, we had to mess with dns
or some other service, as a large hosts file was slowing things down. Also,
as I recall, in Firefox, we had to set a switch to force firefox to not
cache the hosts file, but those were in the WinXP days. I don't do that
with Win10 and I haven't seen a performance hit (either way).

That doesn't mean it's not there. Just that I haven't felt it.

Q: Are there better choices for blocking URLs?
Q: You're not blocking URLs, so I presume you meant "domains".

Mayayana uses Acrylic DNS, which isn't the same thing, but which does some
of the same things, using regular expressions, so, that might be "a better
way".

My method has been honed over the decades, which is to maintain a single
hosts file on a single desktop and then to propagate that hosts file out to
all the other devices on the home network over the WiFi.

As another solution, I would guess that people might tell you a firewall,
either software or hardware, at the router or in your transceiver if you
have the type that I have where you control it, might be a better place to
block domains.

After having provided you that advice, realize that I'm not even close to
an expert. I'm just trying to help. My only claim to fame is that I devise
the simplest most direct solutions to each problem set that I can devise.

All my solutions are models of simplicity, so if you know of a *simpler*
as-effective solution, then let us know as I'm all ears for better
functionality.

On 10/27/2017 12:11 PM, harry newton wrote:
He who is Rene Lamontagne said on Thu, 26 Oct 2017 10:20:04 -0500:

Is the MVPS hosts file a good choice, Or is it too Big?
Does it slow the system to any noticeable extent?

Are there better choices for blocking URLs?

Hi Rene,
Nobody has directly addressed your main issue in detail, so I will address
all your points, bearing in mind that I'm no expert - but I have been using
the MVP Hosts file for as long as I can remember - so I have some
experience.

Q: Is the MVP Hosts file a good choice?
A: There are others out there, but I believe it's the *best* of those.
You'll note this thread which concationates multiple hosts' files:
Suggestions for improving /etc/hosts concatonation & unique
https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.os.linux/KQQyBr6vgI0/4qi-KlZHaNsJ
1. wget -O dan_hosts.txt http://someonewhocares.org/hosts/ 2. wget -O
mdl_hosts.txt http://www.malwaredomainlist.com/mdl.php 3. wget -O
pgl_hosts.txt http://pgl.yoyo.org/adservers/serverlist.php
Q: Or is it too Big?
A: I concatonante and sort all the hosts plus add the hosts from adAway
plus add hosts manually, so, I can definitely say it's *not* too big
because mine is about *twice* the size of the MVP Hosts file.

Q: Does it slow the system to any noticeable extent?
A: In a way, it could *speed* up the system, and in other ways, it could
slow it down. I am assuming it's a wash as I don't feel any perf hit
myself.

However, in the olden days, in WinXP, as I recall, we had to mess with dns
or some other service, as a large hosts file was slowing things down. Also,
as I recall, in Firefox, we had to set a switch to force firefox to not
cache the hosts file, but those were in the WinXP days. I don't do that
with Win10 and I haven't seen a performance hit (either way).

That doesn't mean it's not there. Just that I haven't felt it.

Q: Are there better choices for blocking URLs?
Q: You're not blocking URLs, so I presume you meant "domains".

Mayayana uses Acrylic DNS, which isn't the same thing, but which does some
of the same things, using regular expressions, so, that might be "a better
way".

My method has been honed over the decades, which is to maintain a single
hosts file on a single desktop and then to propagate that hosts file out to
all the other devices on the home network over the WiFi.
As another solution, I would guess that people might tell you a firewall,
either software or hardware, at the router or in your transceiver if you
have the type that I have where you control it, might be a better place to
block domains.

After having provided you that advice, realize that I'm not even close to
an expert. I'm just trying to help. My only claim to fame is that I devise
the simplest most direct solutions to each problem set that I can devise.

All my solutions are models of simplicity, so if you know of a *simpler*
as-effective solution, then let us know as I'm all ears for better
functionality.

Thanks for all the answers which fulfills my original questions, I do
not perceive any slowdowns either and Hosts Contains a lot of the bad
stuff to which I add to when necessary.
So I will continue using it as it serves my needs and I am getting a
little too old to start over (83).

Thanks again for all the information, Rene

He who is Rene Lamontagne said on Fri, 27 Oct 2017 13:35:49 -0500:

Thanks for all the answers which fulfills my original questions, I do
not perceive any slowdowns either and Hosts Contains a lot of the bad
stuff to which I add to when necessary.
So I will continue using it as it serves my needs and I am getting a
little too old to start over (83).

Thanks again for all the information, Rene

We're close in age!

If the SOHO router had the concept of a "hosts" file, that would be a
better place to maintain the master hosts file like I do and then to
propagate it out to all the devices on the LAN over the WiFi.

But I never really learned how to block stuff on the router when that stuff
is 30,000 lines long. People say it can be done inside the router - but
they're gonna hafta show us how.