News

To participate in the ongoing discussion on hostsblock, check out its Arch Linux forum or its Arch User Repository page.

Version 0.12.3 (03.06.2013)

hostblock-urlcheck: issue with colored prompt on white-backgrounded terminals fixed

Version 0.12.2 (02.06.2013)

whitelist, blacklist not applying fixed

Version 0.12.1 (31.05.2013)

quick fix of previous change.

Version 0.12 (31.05.2013)

changed order of processing of black and while lists.

Version 0.11.3 (31.05.2013)

changed installation path according to new Arch Linux practices.

Debian Package Now Available! (19.02.2013)

Sadi Yumuşak has been so kind as to create a debian package of this util, available in one of the downloads above (zip or tar).

Version 0.11.2 (09.12.2012)

swapped out use of md5sums for ls mod times to improve performance

Version 0.11.1 (13.09.2012)

accumulated fixes with feedback (thanks tlvince)
fixed hostsblock-urlcheck's misidentification of colons in urls

New Webpage (30.08.2012)

In order to centralize resources, I'm migrating all of hostsblock's web presence to github.com.

Description

Hostsblock is a bash script for Linux designed to take advantage of the HOSTS file available in all operating systems to provide system-wide blocking of internet advertisements, malicious domains, trackers, and other undesirable content. To do so, it downloads a configurable set of blocklists and processes and their entries into a singular HOSTS file.

Hostsblock also includes hostsblock-urlcheck, a command-line utility that allows you to block and unblock certain websites and any other domains contained in that website, in the event that the included blocklists don't block enough or block too little on a specific site.

Features

System-wide blocking (all non-proxied connections use the HOSTS file)
Zip- and 7zip-capable (can download and process zip- and 7zip-compressed files)
Non-interactive (can be run as a periodic cronjob without needing user interaction)
Extensive configurability (allows for custom black and white listing, redirection, post-processing scripting, target HOSTS file, etc.)
Bandwith-efficient (only downloads blocklists that have been changed, uses compression when available)
Resource-efficient (only processes blocklists when changes are registered, uses minimal pipes)
High performance blocking (when using dns caching and pseudo-server daemons)
Extensive choice of blocklists included (allows user to customize how much or how little is blocked)
Redirection capability (combats DNS cache poisoning)

Screenshots

Dependencies

Hostsblock only requires a few utilities that are standard on most Linux distros, including GNU bash, curl, GNU grep, GNU sed, and GNU coreutils.

Optional dependencies

Hostsblock allows for additional features if the following utilities are installed and in the path:

Unarchivers, so that archive blocklists can be used instead of just plaintext, e.g.:

unzip for zip archives, AND
p7zip for 7z archives

A DNS caching daemon to help speed up DNS resolutions, such as:

dnsmasq (recommended), OR
pdnsd (untested)

A pseudo-server that serves blank pages in order to remove the boilerplate page and speed up page resolution on blocked domains. Examples include:

kwakd (recommended), OR
pixelserv

Installation

On an Arch Linux system, you can install hostsblock through AUR utilities such as yaourt. If you are not running an Arch Linux system (which you should), follow these steps:

Make sure you have all of the required dependencies above, and that they are in your path.
Download the latest stable source file from the AUR or get the unstable version
Extract the source files from the archive, and then enter the extracted hostsblock directory in a terminal.

Execute the following as root or with sudo:

install -Dm755 hostsblock.sh /usr/sbin/hostsblock
install -Dm755 hostsblock-urlcheck.sh /usr/sbin/hostsblock-urlcheck
install -Dm644 rc.conf /etc/hostsblock/rc.conf
install -Dm644 black.list /etc/hostsblock/black.list
install -Dm644 white.list /etc/hostsblock/white.list
install -Dm644 hosts.head /etc/hostsblock/hosts.head

If you will be using hostsblock without a dns caching daemon, make sure to copy your existing /etc/hosts file to /etc/hostsblock/hosts.head and enable this destination file in rc.conf.
If you want to use hostsblock-urlcheck as a regular user (without having to change to root each time you use it), enter the following via visudo as root:
```
[yourusername] ALL=NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/hostsblock-urlcheck
```
Where [yourusername] is the regular user you allow to use hostsblock-urlcheck.
Once enabled, you can use this utility by entering:
```
$ sudo hostsblock-urlcheck "http://www.example.org"
```
to check if "http://www.example.org" and any domains present on this page are blocked or unblocked and to change them accordingly.

Configuration

Extensive documentation is found in the rc.conf file (installed by default under /etc/hostsblock/rc.conf). Follow the directions therein before running hostsblock. For more details on specific configurations, follow these instructions:

If you want to run `hostsblock` with a dns caching server, e.g. dnsmasq:

Install dnsmasq (e.g. via pacman -S dnsmasq).
Configure dnsmasq as a local caching server.
Add the following to /etc/dnsmasq.conf:
```
addn-hosts=/etc/hosts.block
```
Add the following to /etc/hostsblock/rc.conf:
```
postprocess(){ 
systemctl restart dnsmasq.service 
}
```
Where "systemctl restart dnsmasq.service" is your system's command to restart dnsmasq.

From now on, whenever hostsblock runs, or if hostsblock-urlcheck makes changes, dnsmasq will automatically be restarted.

If you want to run `hostsblock` without a dns caching server:

Make sure you back up your existing /etc/hosts file to /etc/hostsblock/hosts.head:
```
$ cp /etc/hosts /etc/hostsblock/hosts.head
```

In /etc/hostsblock/rc.conf, make sure the following variables are entered as shown here:

hostsfile="/etc/hosts"

postprocess(){ 
/bin/true 
}

hostshead="/etc/hostsblock/hosts.head"

Todo

Drop me any suggestions in the Arch Linux Forum that you might have, or feel free to fork via github. Other ideas:

Port to Perl or Python to improve string processing performance.
Integrate with systemd services
Autodetect archiving utils in order to compress archived hosts file.