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Such a shame uMatrix was discontinued.

uBlock Origin comes close, and surpasses in some ways (I used both for that reason) but lacks separate control of cookies, images, scripts, etc. So you can't accept a particular third party's images without also accepting its scripts, cookies, etc.

I mention it mainly in the hope that we can popularise its maintained fork 'nuTensor'.

After trying uBlock (as in attempting to also cover what I used to use uMatrix for) for a few weeks I think it's insufficient and nuTensor is the better option for me, but it quickly won't be if ~nobody uses it and it falls by the wayside.

Alternatively uBO could support the few details it lacks from uM? It seems like the problem basically was difficulty/time constraints in supporting both.. but I don't know why they were ever separate? There's plenty of overlap. If uBO had uM's granularity in 'advanced mode', that'd be perfect.



I'm in the same boat. My main objection to uBO is the cryptic UI. I have no idea what the two columns to the right of a domain are as there's no column headings, or the two nested buttons in each column, one of which is grey (where I'd assume there'd be green to counter the red?), or the "+"/"++" that sometimes appear over said buttons... Or the green bars that creep in from the far left over the domain names, at staggering lengths.

The uMatrix UI on the other hand was incredibly intuitive, and more granular. Then again, maybe that comes down to me not understanding what the hell is going on with uBO's UI.


All your questions can be answered by reading over the documentation in the uBo github wiki.


With the uMatrix UI, the answers were immediately obvious without reading a wiki.


Well-designed software shouldn't require the average user to read documentation to understand basic features


Doesn't that UI only present itself if you declare yourself an advanced user?


Yes exactly. If you don't understand the controls, reading the linked FAQ is really worth it and doesn't take that long.


Having the exact same issues. If someone could clarify that would be awesome.


That panel is described in some detail here [1], though even after reading it the click behaviour is very unintuitive. It's explicitly an advanced-user thing, though, and only shown if you click "More" on the basic popup.

[1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Quick-guide:-popup-us...


That link doesn't seem to actually describe the advanced mode panel in any detail at all. The link that does is https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/Dynamic-filtering:-qu...


> So you can't accept a particular third party's images without also accepting its scripts, cookies, etc.

It's a clunky interface with poor discoverability, but with the uBO logger open in a browser tab you can click on any request right beside the timestamp and define a new rule with the desired granularity. In the URL Rule tab, the unmarked left column sets the allow/noop/block behavior.

Edit: Found the wiki page: https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/The-logger#creating-f...


But this is something I do on a good chunk of websites the first time I visit them. (Not all, because my base - allow first-party, allow all css, allow all images, block all cookies - is also often enough.)

It's just too painful to open a logger, find a request, craft something manually, etc. uMatrix is point and click and it's right there in the toolbar.


> but I don't know why they were ever separate?

I also wonder about this. I still run both side by side. (I haven't noticed any problems with uMatrix so far ...) All I really use uMatrix for is quick coarse grained 2D filtering of various content types. I don't understand why that couldn't be implemented as an optional "first pass" filtering layer in uBlock.

I realize uBlock can mostly already do what uMatrix does, honestly I just find the 2D UI to be incredibly convenient and intuitive.


I find ublock much more granular than umatrix. It can block all js and allow a particular one, block just a segment of inline scripts.

It can block separately a single script, image or any other request. I find it much better than umatrix which can't do many things that ublock does. If someone wantd to they can just install it and forget it also. Much more versatile.


I agree it's a shame, and I hope there is a legit replacement. However, it continues to work for me, so far, without issues.


I too use umatrix, but someone said ubo had an advanced setting that was like umatrix, so I was thinking about switching.

Is this true or not?

wait, here it is: https://news.ycombinator.com/edit?id=25920135


That comment:

> umatrix is built into ublock origin now, just enable advanced mode in ublock.

I have advanced mode enabled and don't see anything remotely resembling the uMatrix source vs type grid. There's a couple overly cryptic { allow block other } columns with rows corresponding to the source and that's it as far as I can tell. No { css image frame etc } columns in my UI.


On the uBO popup, if you click "More" on the bottom left a few times, you eventually get a uMatrix-ish grid on the left side of the popup. (Not 100% sure if that's what you're looking for.) I agree with other commenters though that I don't really understand the uBO grid and found the uMatrix grid much more immediately accessible.


Yeah that's the grid I was referring to. It isn't the same as the detailed 2D breakdown that uMatrix gives you. Instead it simply has a blanket { green grey red } for each source.

(Also I can never seem to remember precisely what each unlabeled colored box does. I never have that problem with uMatrix.)


The uMatrix 2d grid is a vastly superior UI than anything uBO offers for the same functionality. I keep using both because of that. uBO for blocking ads and hiding elements, especially on my phone, and uMatrix to selectively block JS and everything else.


Yes, that's what I tried switching to using (from uMatrix + 'simple mode' uBO for cosmetic stuff only before).

It's just not as granular - you lose the 'type of thing to allow/block' dimension from the uMatrix matrix.



> except you have to write them by hand

Well yeah, no, I don't want to do that. That's why I always ran both, (uBO in 'simple mode' cosmetic blocking only) and now nuTensor seems like a better option than diving into uBO alone. I gave it a go.


nuTensor would be a lot more accessible if it were a signed extension. Having to sideload it is a non-starter for most people.




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