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  • Hacker News
  • One man's bloat is another man's feature.

    (Sidenote: Over/misuse of the word "slop")

    by xnx
  • I concur with the misuse of the word "slop". But this is almost exactly how i setup my browser anyway and since I only do that on once i am nor sure how useful this is actually... maybe for setting up systems for others?
    by blkhawk
  • Yeah, I was gonna say. These are reasonable defaults for a technical user and I do much of the same, but it's also reasonable for many users to want the features that are being disabled here. It's not slop just because the author personally does not want them.
    by coldpie
  • Multiple machines, multiple instances or profiles
    by duskdozer
  • I find it most useful for a shared family computer with multiple users, but I also appreciate any type of config-as-code where possible
    by cullumsmith
  • Anyone know where to put the policy file on MacOS? And can you do this even on a corporate machine?
    by gampleman
  • I think most people use an enterprise MDM like JAMF or Intune, but manually creating the file at /Library/Managed Preferences/com.google.Chrome.plist might also work.
    by cullumsmith
  • If you have write permission to the folder, you can do this on a corporate machine, but your IT department probably has a preferred configuration that will overwrite your changes.

    In short: Ask your system administrator.

    by thesuitonym
  • I use user.js to harden the browser settings but this is local to the user's account. It's good that someone is describing using policies.

    I ended up a bunch of trial and error while looking at copies of the prefs.js file in the browser profile folder to determine what settings correlate to settings in the browser, when I couldn't search for the feature.

    by Throwthrowbob
  • I have been using https://helium.computer/ as a sane default of ungoogled chromium and I like it a lot
    by hmokiguess
  • The firefox bit has these:

    > Disables native privacy and anti-tracking features

    > Disables DNS-over-HTTPS

    Why?

    by alance
  • My guess for privacy and anti-tracking is that trying to resist fingerprinting is, ironically, very fingerprintable.
    by protoster
  • I prefer to let uBlock handle all the blocking. Also I run my own DNS server where I have my own blocklists and internal records etc.
    by cullumsmith
  • With DNS-over-HTTPS, your DNS queries are sent to Cloudflare (by default; it is configurable). Without it, your DNS queries are sent to your ISP. The question is which company you trust more with your DNS queries.

    Given how often ISPs and/or countries do stupid things with DNS, I think DNS-over-HTTPS is a reasonable default. But some people don't trust Cloudflare with that info, so they use the ISP option instead.

    Both are reasonable choices.

    by coldpie
  • > Disables all extra functionality (Pocket

    Wasn't Pocket discontinued and no longer exists?

    by OroPla
  • Why DNS over HTTPS?

    Not sure if i'm missing something, but i don't consider privacy protection slopware.

    by rapatel0
  • I run a local DNS server that has its own blocklists, internal DNS records, etc. I imagine most people who might bother to deploy an enterprise browser policy do something similar.
    by cullumsmith
  • Unless you're running your own local DoH server, it's just privacy theater, and not even good theater. It's the same bogus argument made in favor of retail VPNs. "Encrypt your traffic so your ISP can't spy on you!" Meanwhile failing to recognize that you're just moving the spying agency to some free service owned by--oh, let's look at the top providers... Cloudflare (not great), Brave (advertising company), Google (Bad)... Need I go on?

    Perhaps you've forgotten that old adage: if you're not the customer, you're the product.

    by thesuitonym
  • Or just use LibreWolf. I've been using it for quite a while now and it has been great.
    by crassus_ed
  • Librewolf is Firefox with user-respecting default settings. It even includes and enables uBlock Origin.

    Presumably the Google money is what keeps Firefox from doing the same.

    by RunSet
  • Most of these are not good choices for most people.

    And "I use a real operating system" alongside a list of seven different non-obvious and seemingly arbitrary config locations is pretty funny.

    by rafram
  • Don't use regular Firefox. Use Waterfox or LibreWolf which rip all this out with prejudice. Not worth the endless rat chase of disabling settings.

    As for Chromium browsers, none of them are safe.

    by VCFundedGenYer
  • "Allegedly, these policies are also supported on Windows via Group Policy and MacOS using plist files. I wouldn’t know, since I use a real operating system."

    Real 2006 Slashdot energy here. Very rare to see in the wild these days.

    by purpleflame1257
  • I don't understand your sentiment - not sure about MacOS, but I'd definitely argue that Windows was much more of a real OS in 2006. These days, it's basically indefensible.
    by throwuxiytayq
  • There are some wandering sages who still practice the old ways.
    by cullumsmith
  • If you go from using Linux for years to having to use an OS like macOS or especially Windows, it really does feel like using a computer with padded walls and safety scissors so you don't hurt yourself. You do get used to the limitations eventually, but for technical users it's a pretty noticeable step down in terms of how you may use and configure your own system. Calling them "not real operating systems" is definitely a little cheeky, but it resonates, and isn't out of character for a blog post about configuring your browser with JSON overrides.
    by coldpie