Star date 6/20/2007 2:44 AM by teletype, Thunderbird leader
baobob@my-deja.com called the control tower to announce :
> I'm not too Web savvy, so bear with me.
>
> IE 6 lets you block ActiveX from executing. Does FF 2.0.0.4 have that
> vital feature?
>
> There's this European eBay seller who embeds immense ShockWave objects
> in the page of every item he's selling. They download from God knows
> where, taking forever, so that opening even a few pages in separate FF
> tabs hard-crashes my Win 98 SE system and I gotta reset. Whereas
> normally FF has no prob opening dozens of tabs at a time.
>
> The SchlockWave app, or applet, or whatever you call it, also
> downloads without my permission. Every time I delete folders \Windows
> \System\Macromed and Windows\Application Data\Macromedia then re-
> launch a page of his, the folders & their contents reappear.
>
> In IE, I prevent download of SWFs and their craplet by disabling
> ActiveX.
>
> How do I do it in FF? Alternatively, how do I block download of
> certain file types in FF?
>
> Sure, FF lets you block scripts, but where's ActiveX even mentioned?
>
> To FF's credit, Tools / Options / Content / File Types / Manage lets
> you select an action for file type SWF. HOWEVER, your only choice is
> execute or save. There is no IGNORE or DO NOTHING selection. Nor is
> there an option to block download to begin with.
>
> A final important piece of interface logic:
>
> In IE 6, ActiveX suppression is still not practically usable. Every
> page you launch displays a modal error box saying that ActiveX is
> blocked, so the page might not display as intended, quack quack.
> Unbelievably, it redisplays on every page you load, even within the
> SAME INSTANCE of IE, and I can't find a way to suppress it.
>
> As Ben Stein asked in Ferris Bueller: "Anyone...? Anyone...?"
>
> Thanks.
>
> ***
>
>

First point, FF does not have any form of Active-X support. If you need
such, there are extensions.

Second, there is a great extension named Flashblock that will stop those
flash downloads. It puts a placeholder icon in the center of the flash
space. Only by you right clicking the icon can the flash be allowed to
load and run. You can White list sites to give permission for flash to
run automaticaly, nice for critical sites or ones you trust.

So head on over to the mozilla add-ons site and put this monster at
e-bay under your control, not his.

--
Ron K.
Don't be a fonted, it's just type casting

Ron K. wrote:
> Star date 6/20/2007 2:44 AM by teletype, Thunderbird leader
> baobob@my-deja.com called the control tower to announce :
>> I'm not too Web savvy, so bear with me.
>>
>> IE 6 lets you block ActiveX from executing. Does FF 2.0.0.4 have that
>> vital feature?
>>
>> There's this European eBay seller who embeds immense ShockWave objects
>> in the page of every item he's selling. They download from God knows
>> where, taking forever, so that opening even a few pages in separate FF
>> tabs hard-crashes my Win 98 SE system and I gotta reset. Whereas
>> normally FF has no prob opening dozens of tabs at a time.
>>
>> The SchlockWave app, or applet, or whatever you call it, also
>> downloads without my permission. Every time I delete folders \Windows
>> \System\Macromed and Windows\Application Data\Macromedia then re-
>> launch a page of his, the folders & their contents reappear.
>>
>> In IE, I prevent download of SWFs and their craplet by disabling
>> ActiveX.
>>
>> How do I do it in FF? Alternatively, how do I block download of
>> certain file types in FF?
>>
>> Sure, FF lets you block scripts, but where's ActiveX even mentioned?
>>
>> To FF's credit, Tools / Options / Content / File Types / Manage lets
>> you select an action for file type SWF. HOWEVER, your only choice is
>> execute or save. There is no IGNORE or DO NOTHING selection. Nor is
>> there an option to block download to begin with.
>>
>> A final important piece of interface logic:
>>
>> In IE 6, ActiveX suppression is still not practically usable. Every
>> page you launch displays a modal error box saying that ActiveX is
>> blocked, so the page might not display as intended, quack quack.
>> Unbelievably, it redisplays on every page you load, even within the
>> SAME INSTANCE of IE, and I can't find a way to suppress it.
>>
>> As Ben Stein asked in Ferris Bueller: "Anyone...? Anyone...?"
>>
>> Thanks.
>>
>> ***
>>
>>
>
> First point, FF does not have any form of Active-X support. If you need
> such, there are extensions.
>
> Second, there is a great extension named Flashblock that will stop those
> flash downloads. It puts a placeholder icon in the center of the flash
> space. Only by you right clicking the icon can the flash be allowed to
> load and run. You can White list sites to give permission for flash to
> run automaticaly, nice for critical sites or ones you trust.
>
> So head on over to the mozilla add-ons site and put this monster at
> e-bay under your control, not his.
>
Supposedly the latest and greatest version of IE comes with
Active-X turned off by default. If you need your "fix" of Active-X, you
actually have to turn support on. And supposedly MS is considering (if
they can get their Business customers weaned away) of discontinuing
support for Active-X. This has been reported in past articles from ZDnet
News and cNet News. Its been found That there is no way to make Active-X
as implemented by MS, to be made security. Its far more a security risk
than JAVA ever was.

--
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Phillip M. Jones, CET http://www.vpea.org
If it's "fixed", don't "break it"! mailtojones@kimbanet.com
http://www.kimbanet.com/~pjones/default.htm
Mac G4-500, OSX.3.9 Mac 17" PowerBook G4-1.67 Gb, OSX.4.8
------------------------------------------------------------------------

baobob@my-deja.com wrote in
news:1182321879.607644.113590@o61g2000hsh.googlegr oups.com:

>
> I'm not too Web savvy, so bear with me.
>
> IE 6 lets you block ActiveX from executing. Does FF 2.0.0.4
> have that vital feature?

It doesn't need it, because it cannot run ActiveX in the first
place.



--
Mozilla & Netscape FAQs: http://www.ufaq.org/
Mozilla/Firefox/Thunderbird/Seamonkey solutions: http://ilias.ca/
Web page validation: http://validator.w3.org
About Mozilla: http://www.mozilla.org

If you were everyone but one person i would listen to everyone
else.

Ron, Phillip, Chris:

Thanks VERY much for replying.

Thanks to you & a Web-savvier friend that I, I've learned:

1) Yeah, I was a doofus for not knowing that ActiveX is an IE-only
thing, and that FF implements ShockWave thru an add-on (if I've got
that wording right).

2) I was a double-doofus for not noticing that FF V2's Manage
Filetypes DOES have a "Remove" button for type SWF after all. I didn't
notice it because it's grayed out. I'll initiate a new thread on that
problem.

3) My problem was better expressed as: How do I cause Web pages with
SWF content to display the little green "Download the ShockWave plug-
in" placeholder, and stop there without downloading?

4) Until I find out how to reactivate the Remove button, we prevented
FF from downloading SWF content by hiding file \Program Files\Mozilla
Firefox\plugins\NPSWF32.dll.

I do understand that SWF content will NEVER download, on any page.
I'll live with that for the time being.

5) IE 7's "ActiveX is blocked" reminder is improved over IE 6 by its
no longer being modal--or at least, you can choose to make it not-
modal. (Not that I'm gonna switch to IE.)

Thanks again all.

***

baobob@my-deja.com wrote:
> Ron, Phillip, Chris:
>
> Thanks VERY much for replying.
>
> Thanks to you & a Web-savvier friend that I, I've learned:
>
> 1) Yeah, I was a doofus for not knowing that ActiveX is an IE-only
> thing, and that FF implements ShockWave thru an add-on (if I've got
> that wording right).
>
> 2) I was a double-doofus for not noticing that FF V2's Manage
> Filetypes DOES have a "Remove" button for type SWF after all. I didn't
> notice it because it's grayed out. I'll initiate a new thread on that
> problem.
>
> 3) My problem was better expressed as: How do I cause Web pages with
> SWF content to display the little green "Download the ShockWave plug-
> in" placeholder, and stop there without downloading?
>

If you wish to avoid loading SWF files, I suggest that a more flexible
approach is to load the extensions Adblock Plus and/or Flashblock as
that will give you the ability to allow a .swf file, and to view a Flash
file should you find that necessary.


> 4) Until I find out how to reactivate the Remove button, we prevented
> FF from downloading SWF content by hiding file \Program Files\Mozilla
> Firefox\plugins\NPSWF32.dll.
>
> I do understand that SWF content will NEVER download, on any page.
> I'll live with that for the time being.
>

See above.


> 5) IE 7's "ActiveX is blocked" reminder is improved over IE 6 by its
> no longer being modal--or at least, you can choose to make it not-
> modal. (Not that I'm gonna switch to IE.)
>

It seems that even MS has decided that the security implications of
ActiveX are more significant than its advantages.


> Thanks again all.
>
> ***
>


--
Ron Hunter rphunter@charter.net

baobob@my-deja.com wrote:
> Ron, Phillip, Chris:
>
> Thanks VERY much for replying.
>
> Thanks to you & a Web-savvier friend that I, I've learned:
>
> 1) Yeah, I was a doofus for not knowing that ActiveX is an IE-only
> thing, and that FF implements ShockWave thru an add-on (if I've got
> that wording right).
>
> 2) I was a double-doofus for not noticing that FF V2's Manage
> Filetypes DOES have a "Remove" button for type SWF after all. I didn't
> notice it because it's grayed out. I'll initiate a new thread on that
> problem.
>
> 3) My problem was better expressed as: How do I cause Web pages with
> SWF content to display the little green "Download the ShockWave plug-
> in" placeholder, and stop there without downloading?
>
> 4) Until I find out how to reactivate the Remove button, we prevented
> FF from downloading SWF content by hiding file \Program Files\Mozilla
> Firefox\plugins\NPSWF32.dll.
>
> I do understand that SWF content will NEVER download, on any page.
> I'll live with that for the time being.
>
> 5) IE 7's "ActiveX is blocked" reminder is improved over IE 6 by its
> no longer being modal--or at least, you can choose to make it not-
> modal. (Not that I'm gonna switch to IE.)
>
> Thanks again all.
>
> ***
>
If you use the Flashblock extension, Flash content will not load until
you click the little icon it puts over the space where the video will be.
If you want to download SWF content, you may be able to do it if you use
the Unplug extension. Also, after you have played a Flash movie all the
way through, you may be able to find it in your browser cache.

Star date 6/21/2007 2:55 PM by teletype, Thunderbird leader EE called
the control tower to announce :
> baobob@my-deja.com wrote:
>
>> Ron, Phillip, Chris:
>>
>> Thanks VERY much for replying.
>>
>> Thanks to you & a Web-savvier friend that I, I've learned:
>>
>> 1) Yeah, I was a doofus for not knowing that ActiveX is an IE-only
>> thing, and that FF implements ShockWave thru an add-on (if I've got
>> that wording right).
>>
>> 2) I was a double-doofus for not noticing that FF V2's Manage
>> Filetypes DOES have a "Remove" button for type SWF after all. I didn't
>> notice it because it's grayed out. I'll initiate a new thread on that
>> problem.
>>
>> 3) My problem was better expressed as: How do I cause Web pages with
>> SWF content to display the little green "Download the ShockWave plug-
>> in" placeholder, and stop there without downloading?
>>
>> 4) Until I find out how to reactivate the Remove button, we prevented
>> FF from downloading SWF content by hiding file \Program Files\Mozilla
>> Firefox\plugins\NPSWF32.dll.
>>
>> I do understand that SWF content will NEVER download, on any page.
>> I'll live with that for the time being.
>>
>> 5) IE 7's "ActiveX is blocked" reminder is improved over IE 6 by its
>> no longer being modal--or at least, you can choose to make it not-
>> modal. (Not that I'm gonna switch to IE.)
>>
>> Thanks again all.
>>
>> ***
>>
>>
> If you use the Flashblock extension, Flash content will not load until
> you click the little icon it puts over the space where the video will be.
> If you want to download SWF content, you may be able to do it if you use
> the Unplug extension. Also, after you have played a Flash movie all the
> way through, you may be able to find it in your browser cache.
>

Flashblock now has a save option in it's right click contest menu.

--
Ron K.
Don't be a fonted, it's just type casting