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LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

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Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> as is convention for named options on the command line. Gosh, I really wish that people would follow a convention for named options on the command line. I don't even really care which one, as long as they were all consistent in picking one.

I've seen /, -, --, and +. Any other ones leap to mind? I wonder if there's a complete list somewhere.

The usual convention is a single hyphen for short-form (single-letter) options, and a double hyphen for long-form options:

    > python -v
or

    > python —-version
It’s good practice to offer both. It should also be possible to set multiple options at once by appending one after another in short form following a single hyphen:

    > ls -alR
is the same as

    > ls -a -l -R
Long-form options are technically a GNU thing [0] and are not mentioned in the POSIX standard, but they’re conventional enough now that I think it’s good practice to include them in any CLI program.

There are also a number of looser conventions about the meaning of certain short-form options [1].

0. https://www.gnu.org/prep/standards/html_node/Command_002dLin...

1. http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/taoup/html/ch10s05.html

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#42

What's the CPU usage? I tried Little Snitch, but it was often consuming insane amounts of CPU (40%+) which matters a lot on a 12' Macbook on battery, so I uninstalled it.

Long time Little Snitch user here, that seems ... high

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give it another 25, and you will have to pay a premium for things which are stand-alone, disconnected from the net. Want a car which is not navigating using cloud AI? Only the rich can afford that...

> Want a car which is not navigating using cloud AI? Only the rich can afford that... Good. I sure hope only a small fraction of the population will be able to manually drive their car in the future. It would save lives, time, and money for everyone if the bulk of the idiots were unable to manually drive their car.

I interpreted the alternative to that being locally run AI, which is not implicitly spying on you and capable of doing nefarious things (e.g. not allowing you to navigate until you pay this month’s upgrade fee).

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#44

For those on Windows, http://www.sphinx-soft.com/Vista/index.html does the same using the native firewall (so no 3rd party dependencies, services, or bloat) (though they've ~recently added paid licenses with more features to their basic offering). I only wish it were cleaner and simpler. I don't think the Windows Firewall API is too bad, I should add this to my bucket list of open source software to write that I'll m…

https://github.com/henrypp/simplewall

> Simple tool to configure Windows Filtering Platform (WFP)

So much better than anything else I tested. Easy to import/export rules (XML) and there's also portable mode and advanced options (that goes beyond the simple UI you can see in the image).

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#45
post #24

For those on Windows, http://www.sphinx-soft.com/Vista/index.html does the same using the native firewall (so no 3rd party dependencies, services, or bloat) (though they've ~recently added paid licenses with more features to their basic offering). I only wish it were cleaner and simpler. I don't think the Windows Firewall API is too bad, I should add this to my bucket list of open source software to write that I'll m…

When the native firewall in Windows blocks something, doesn't the connection attempt fail immediately? For example while the Little Snitch popup dialog is waiting for user input the affected application just sees an unusual latency spike and it will not complain immediately that internet access in not available. Afaik, this is not the case with the Windows Firewall: The connection will fail for the application while…

I've had that problem with W10FC, the permission window will often only spawn after the requesting app has notified you it failed to connect.

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give it another 25, and you will have to pay a premium for things which are stand-alone, disconnected from the net. Want a car which is not navigating using cloud AI? Only the rich can afford that...

> Want a car which is not navigating using cloud AI? Only the rich can afford that... Good. I sure hope only a small fraction of the population will be able to manually drive their car in the future. It would save lives, time, and money for everyone if the bulk of the idiots were unable to manually drive their car.

> It would save lives, time, and money for everyone

I'll give you "lives" and "money," but not necessarily time.

I live in a place where self-driving vehicles can be spotted fairly regularly. Once a week or so. You can tell by the special license plates. They are always very ponderous, careful drivers. It's fascinating to see them gently slow to a stop for a red light, then take off like a jackrabbit when it turns green.

Perhaps as the technology matures, they'll start to keep pace with traffic better.

I'm actually looking forward to self-driving cars. It's all the personal time benefits of mass transit (book reading, meditating, general mental health), without worrying about accidentally sitting in someone else's pee.

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#47
post #33

So even open source projects are doing that thing where they immediately cover the page you're trying to read with an annoying spam box?

Wasn't there a note form the Google search team not too long ago that they were going to demote sites that use the splash divs?

How do I know if I want to sign up for your newsletter if I haven't been able to look at your site yet?

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#48
post #18

Nowadays it's more important to control and restrict outgoing connections than incoming connections. Who would had thought of that 25 years ago.

I think Stallman realized that back then.

But yeah, current situation is getting ridiculous. One could always expect malicious actors, but I didn't guess people will be routinely putting in the cloud things that have no business being Internet-dependent. Then again, I remember first reading pg's essays, in which he praised the benefits of running things on your server and delivering them as a webpage, instead of standalone software. I nodded along, and it only occurred to me many years later how incredibly user-hostile that is, too.

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#49
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Want a car which is not navigating using cloud AI? Only the rich can afford that... Good. I sure hope only a small fraction of the population will be able to manually drive their car in the future. It would save lives, time, and money for everyone if the bulk of the idiots were unable to manually drive their car.

I interpreted the alternative to that being locally run AI, which is not implicitly spying on you and capable of doing nefarious things (e.g. not allowing you to navigate until you pay this month’s upgrade fee).

I assumed the same, too. A self-driving car should be able to navigate itself without an Internet connection; any permanent ties to the cloud are just anticonsumer business strategy.

Re: LuLu: An open-source macOS firewall that blocks unknown outgoing connections

#50

Looks promising. I used to use Little Snitch, but last year they decided to charge for the new version, and I uninstalled it. Little Snitch was effective, but overly complex for the average user. I'm sure it's great for someone who configures networks on a regular basis, but as a Mac user, I just want to use my Mac. If I wanted to twiddle with security settings all day long, I'd still be on Windows. This looks like i…

I've gladly paid for Little Snitch twice. OS X attempts so many random connections now I don't know what I'd do without it.
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