uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari • Hacker News Board

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#291

Post by amoeba » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:04 PM UTC

jer0me wrote: post #287

When I try to turn it on in Safari (iOS 18.5) I get: Unable To Load “uBlock Origin Lite”

Same issue on macOS with Safari 18.5. I think it might require a newer version (18.6), see https://github.com/uBlockOrigin/uBOL-home/issues/405.

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#292

Post by cocoto » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:05 PM UTC

wazoox wrote: post #96

JoeriBe wrote: post #2

This app is currently not available in your country or region.

Neither in France.

Seems to be available now but it was not some hours before.

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#293

Post by deanishe » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:14 PM UTC

dylan604 wrote: post #230

zelphirkalt wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is mind-boggling, how in this day and age search functions can still be soooo bad in so many places on the web and inside applications. At the very least a 100% substring match should be very visible in the result. If not at the top, then there should be sorting criteria, to make it appear at the top, so that one can sane-ify the search result, when it is not sane. A good example for bad search is the windows star…

It helps to realize that the search is less of a tool for you to find information and more of a tool to show you an ad targeted on your search query. That's why ads are the top results and the organic data you wanted is after the fold. You're asking an ad company for information, and you don't expect an ad as a result? They are only continuing to show the organic results to tease you into coming back..

Is Apple really an ad company?

I think it's reasonable to expect better from them.

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#294

Post by badosu » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:20 PM UTC

I don't understand why someone, with some technical education, would use any chromium based browser instead of firefox, any ideas?

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#295

Post by saagarjha » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:22 PM UTC

thimabi wrote: post #173

Citizen8396 wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can disable the menu bar icon in settings...

That’s in fact one of the gripes I have with certain MacOS software. It would be far better if menu bar icons were opt-in rather than opt-out. The average non-technical user eventually ends up having tons of these icons in the menu bar.

The latest version will let you remove them even if the app itself doesn't let you.

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#296

Post by lulzury » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:23 PM UTC

badosu wrote: post #294

I don't understand why someone, with some technical education, would use any chromium based browser instead of firefox, any ideas?

That’s a pretty limited way of looking at the world: “Why would someone only do x instead of y?”

Part of learning to understand others means developing cognitive flexibility.

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#297

Post by saagarjha » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:23 PM UTC

forgotoldacc wrote: post #38

I've been using Adguard for a couple years and have had no problems. I think I've only seen ads slip through a couple times. If there's anyone who's able to compare, is there any real difference between these ad blockers?

Adguard on macOS constantly runs an Electron app in the background :(

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#298

Post by saagarjha » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:24 PM UTC

diebeforei485 wrote: post #286

Doesn't Safari block trackers already?

Yes, but not ads.

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#299

Post by MortyWaves » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:24 PM UTC

apozem wrote: post #277

MortyWaves wrote: post #44

So I tapped the link on my iPhone and was taken to the App Store. The download button is available. Great! Finally I can block ads in mobile too. It installs, opening it is a simple message saying I need to enable it in Safari settings. Strange, but ok. I go to Settings -> Safari -> Extensions -> uBlock Origin Lite. > “uBO Lite” is not available for this version of Safari. This feels like a series of failures, why is…

> It installs, opening it is a simple message saying I need to enable it in Safari settings. Strange, but ok. I’ve made several Safari extensions for iOS, and they all have to do this. Apple provides no API for an app to enable its own Safari extension. It also has no public API on iOS to deeplink to the Settings page for enabling the extension. You just have to tell users where to go and hope they don’t get lost. (T…

Does an app for that even need to exist? Why can’t extensions be a standalone thing in the store?

Re: uBlock Origin Lite now available for Safari

#300

Post by saagarjha » Tue, Aug 05, 2025, 6:25 PM UTC

lapcat wrote: post #61

shawnz wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ad blockers on Safari effectively have the same weaknesses as ad blockers on Chrome now have since the deprecation of the blocking webRequest API (which Safari never supported). See https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-b... for some examples of things you can't do without those APIs.

> the blocking webRequest API (which Safari never supported) This is inaccurate. Safari (Mac) supported it until 2019, and indeed there was a version of uBlock Origin for Safari back then.

I don't think uBlock Origin ever supported Safari?