Pith Helmet 2.0 Beta

Due to using a Windows XP based computer at work, I have become very familiar with Firefox. By far, one of its vest features is an extension for it called “Ad Block.” This sweet little add-on lets you quickly and easily block ads or other content. It’s completely intuitive. Right click on something and it will give you an option to “Block Image” or “Block iFrame” dependent upon what the ad is contained within. It will then allow you to edit the URL to replace sections that are variable with an asterisk (*). Quick, easy, effective, and has a hugely significant effect upon load time.

While on my Macs, I still prefer Safari (call me a purist for liking native widgets). I used PithHelmet to block ads. Its stock rules are fairly effective, but if they aren’t effective enough, you can write your own rules. However, they are significantly harder to write (but infinitely more flexible) because it uses regular expressions. Pith Helmet was hard to understand, add rules to, and generally didn’t speed up the page load times because it seemed to be doing post filtering (if you watched, all the ads would load, then quickly disappear). This obviously was not as good as Ad Block.

Versiontracker still lists 0.7.2b as the lastest version. However, not only has it been updated to 0.7.3, but there is a 2.0 beta. 2.0 still makes it a bit hard for a layman to make new rules, but this new version has a dramatic effect on page load speed, as well as boasting Shiira compatibility. It’s worth a look.

Update: Versiontracker now lists 0.7.3 as the current version.