Killfile scripts?

August 13, 2014 5:54 AM

What are the currently functioning killfile scripts and where can they be found? I see threads from 2005 or 2006, but it's unclear if there's anything newer and/or if those scripts still function properly nowadays.
posted by shivohum to MetaFilter-Related at 5:54 AM (48 comments total)

Are you looking to block specific users, or posts that contain specific content?

If you're looking to block posts with specific content, the "My Mefi" feature will let you exclude posts with specific tags.
posted by DWRoelands at 6:03 AM on August 13, 2014

How did this blank thread make it past the mod queue?
posted by gman at 6:03 AM on August 13, 2014 [18 favorites]

How come this thread says two comments total, but the only one I see is by DWRoelands?
posted by cjorgensen at 6:31 AM on August 13, 2014 [9 favorites]

Macbeth: Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand?
Mrs Mac: You don't see shit, kilty man!
posted by Wolof at 6:37 AM on August 13, 2014 [3 favorites]

There are examples on newer threads - from 2009 and 2011. Check the killfile tag.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:41 AM on August 13, 2014

How did this blank thread make it past the mod queue?

The killfile is coming from inside the thread!
posted by nubs at 6:55 AM on August 13, 2014 [2 favorites]

If you're looking to block posts with specific content, the "My Mefi" feature will let you exclude posts with specific tags.

True, but as was discussed recently, tags are not reliable.
posted by shivohum at 7:02 AM on August 13, 2014

Well, there's a page on the wiki which lists Greasemonkey scripts, including killfiles. I had issues with userscripts.org last month when I got a new PC at work and my Firefox migration blew up, but diediedead is still working.
posted by crush-onastick at 7:03 AM on August 13, 2014

How has this thread existed for two hours now and no one has made the tedious and predictable pretending-to-have-other-posters-killfiled joke?
posted by shakespeherian at 7:51 AM on August 13, 2014 [7 favorites]

How has this thread existed for two hours now and no one has made the tedious and predictable pretending-to-have-other-posters-killfiled joke?
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:56 AM on August 13, 2014 [26 favorites]

Jesus, give it a rest klang.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:07 AM on August 13, 2014 [23 favorites]

I worry about you people sometimes.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:16 AM on August 13, 2014 [23 favorites]

I am Groot.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 8:24 AM on August 13, 2014 [3 favorites]

but diediedead is still working.

Thanks, but diediedead has a bug or two. With FPPs, it deletes everything but the title. Anyone who knows Javascript want to venture a guess at what the problem is?
posted by shivohum at 8:28 AM on August 13, 2014

You people?
posted by cjorgensen at 8:46 AM on August 13, 2014 [2 favorites]

I am Groot and so is my wife.
posted by octothorpe at 8:49 AM on August 13, 2014

This must be what its like at Cabal meetings.
posted by marienbad at 9:13 AM on August 13, 2014 [2 favorites]

Sometimes?
posted by Curious Artificer at 9:16 AM on August 13, 2014 [1 favorite]

Thanks, but diediedead has a bug or two. With FPPs, it deletes everything but the title.

Seems perfect.
Actually I have doubts about some of the titles, but it's a start.
posted by Wolfdog at 11:26 AM on August 13, 2014

Crikes, I haven't looked at the script in forever, I'm surprised it works at all considering the time that's passed and the site changes. Well, thanks for dropping me a note, I'll take a look later this week, post back here when it works.

I probably should do a matching Chrome extension while I'm at it, for all the people who use, need, or want the functionality outside Greasemonkey, but won't mention it in public because of the drama and pushback from the morally righteous "you must read everything from everybody" crew. Personally, I'm more a Chrome extension guy, but I don't use killfiles myself. Eh, maybe I won't bother, matters not to me one way or the other. Anyway, anybody wants a Chrome version, drop me a MeMail or whatever, otherwise it goes on the possibly-do-sometime-in-the-next-10-years list.
posted by mdevore at 11:38 AM on August 13, 2014 [3 favorites]

wat
posted by lalochezia at 12:02 PM on August 13, 2014

This killfile, it vibrates?
posted by killdevil at 12:17 PM on August 13, 2014 [1 favorite]

Thanks mdevore! Your work's much appreciated.
posted by shivohum at 12:35 PM on August 13, 2014 [1 favorite]

I worry about you people sometimes.
posted by cortex

You people?
posted by cjorgensen

Sometimes?
posted by Curious Artificer

Worry?
posted by RedOrGreen at 1:30 PM on August 13, 2014

I think most user would keep in mind that the "evil/nasty/disagreeable" person is still around and posting, or else they wouldn't be using the script/extension(s).

I also think that Chrome now supports pre-load capabilities on its extensions, so you wouldn't necessarily see a flash of the miscreant's post, although I've not checked into that feature. Greasemonkey is still under development and gets new features on occasion (which can break old scripts, sigh), might have the same capability by now.

Well, something else to research and possibly implement, anyway. You ain't learning, you're dying.
posted by mdevore at 1:44 PM on August 13, 2014 [1 favorite]

On a related note, now that at least two people reading this topic have contacted me about it, there is an update from a few days ago to the semi-popular Howls Of Outrage Greasemonkey script, which stopped working on some platforms due to recent Greasemonkey updates. I won't post a link to the blog post about the issue, pretty sure that admins would not like that, but I guess I can post the direct download update link here, since the public userscripts Greasemonkey script repository is deader than a killfiled user: http://www.devoresoftware.com/gm/hoo/HowlsOfOutrage.user.js
posted by mdevore at 1:52 PM on August 13, 2014 [3 favorites]

Isn't it totally fine to link to personal stuff on MetaTalk?
posted by oceanjesse at 2:03 PM on August 13, 2014

I worry about you people sometimes.

Yes, but you get paid to worry about us.
posted by Michele in California at 2:09 PM on August 13, 2014

Isn't it totally fine to link to personal stuff on MetaTalk?

I dunno, theoretically I can make money when people go to my blog if they click on an ad, and my revenue there-derived should reach Google's $100 minimum in approximately 17 more years . True story, didn't make that up, extrapolated the pennies from 3 or so years of ads and it was Big Payday looming in 2031. Anyway, lots of people get really touchy about posting links which are tied to revenue, regardless of amount, because of the spam potential. Easiest to just post the no-possible-revenue bare download link in a topic, avoid the potential fuss and muss.
posted by mdevore at 2:12 PM on August 13, 2014

Um I get adsense money ALMOST EVERY YEAR. And the mods have not been all up in my shit about posting the occasional blog link in MeTa when it was on topic and blah blah blah.

So I kinda sorta suspect it would be okay.

You just can't use it in an FPP. That's a banning offense.
posted by Michele in California at 2:16 PM on August 13, 2014

I'm surprised none of the mods have weighed in on this.
posted by double block and bleed at 2:21 PM on August 13, 2014 [1 favorite]

If others are curious about mdevore's Howls Of Outrage blog post, I imagine it's OK if someone else posts a link to it.
posted by benito.strauss at 2:26 PM on August 13, 2014 [2 favorites]

BTW, I mentioned sharing a GreaseMonkey script I wrote with another member. What's the best way to do that these days? Used to be one would just stick it up on UserScripts and let people get it from there, right? Is there an alternative to userscripts, preferably one where I wouldn't have to link it to a Facebook or Google+ account or some other on-line identity?
posted by benito.strauss at 2:30 PM on August 13, 2014

greasyfork.org is what I just moved my single script to.
posted by squinty at 3:09 PM on August 13, 2014 [2 favorites]

Anyone know of a good way to use GreaseMonkey with Safari?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:34 PM on August 13, 2014

No issue with linking in a comment to a relevant post on your blog now or then, mdevore, ads or no. I appreciate the spirit of caution but we're really only worried about people seeming to be doing so abusively or to the exclusion of other site activity, which 99% of the time is brand new users who signed up to spam in the first place.
posted by cortex (staff) at 3:59 PM on August 13, 2014 [1 favorite]

Killfiles are a really bad idea.
posted by Justinian at 5:03 PM on August 13, 2014

I worry about you people sometimes.
posted by cortex

You people?
posted by cjorgensen

Sometimes?
posted by Curious Artificer

Worry?
posted by RedOrGreen

About?

I?
posted by JiBB at 12:07 AM on August 14, 2014

Anyone know of a good way to use GreaseMonkey with Safari?

I've turned a few GreaseMonkey scripts into Safari Extensions in the past (MeFi Navigator and Deleted Posts), but some site changes have since broken them. It was a relatively trivial process, with almost no code changes; I should probably update the extensions, and perhaps share them publicly.
posted by JiBB at 12:12 AM on August 14, 2014 [2 favorites]

I wish I could see whose killfile I am on. Part of me thinks I'm on many but that could just be my naturally stultifying presence.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 1:44 PM on August 14, 2014

I use a patched version of diediedead w/ Tampermonkey to fix some of bugs caused by revisions to the site, but some of them are only kinda fixed. It's absolutely essential to my enjoyment of the site.

One issue I made no attempt to address is that the "x new comments" button will show posts by people on the blocked list, so I've just trained myself to refresh the page with F5. I spent about an hour trying to hook up to that event but I gave up because it would have been more effort than just learning to deal.
posted by blue t-shirt at 2:19 PM on August 14, 2014

Also, echoing squinty, greasyfork.org have positioned themselves as the most credible replacement for userscripts.org since that site's abandonment.
posted by blue t-shirt at 2:21 PM on August 14, 2014 [2 favorites]

Yeah, I just cleared my final app update for the week, so I'm about to dive in to the old code and see what's what. I think to amuse myself, and because I've already got a couple MeMails for new feature requests from this topic, I'll see about making the whole thing a rather less minimalist, and possibly more automatic, process.

It's too bad Greasemonkey is so horrible in user configuration support. Needs built-in options support like Chrome extensions do. All that roll-your-own stuff gets tedious.
posted by mdevore at 2:37 PM on August 14, 2014 [3 favorites]

Groot?
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 6:34 PM on August 15, 2014 [1 favorite]

Frist Psot!
posted by dg at 1:25 AM on August 16, 2014

OK, I just now finished a first version of the enhanced Greasemonkey script, you can direct download here if you want to play with or help me test it. Sufficiently complicated to doubtless have bugs, it's been briefly tested by me on Windows 7 and OS X, please try not to break it too badly before I get up and back to work. The script is featured enough to need a decent write-up, which I'll do in the daytime, and post a link to the full entry here.

Basics to know are you configure via the context (right-click) menu selection, or via Tools/Greasemonkey/User Script Commands/Configure filters browser menu to show the main configure box, while on a Metafilter site. I recommend the context menu for adding filters; it is intelligent enough that you can right click on 1) one or more user names to add a filter for their posts, 2) any post link to add a filter for the post if it contains the base URL, or 3) any post text you highlight (e.g. via cursor or double-click)to add a filter for posts containing the (case-insensitive, whole word or set of words) highlighted text. Manual entry also works. You can use the context menu, or main configure box, to show all content (i.e. ignore filters); filter posts and comments; filter posts only; and filter comments only. Seems to work on all subsites except Jobs, Podcast, and IRL. And yes, it is possible to filter out every single message, should you be of a nihilistic frame of mind.

Filtering is performed before page display, so no flash, although possibly a delay. It's actually kind of amusing to play with, more than I anticipated. Remember, if you get too deep, you can always quickly switch back to full view with the Show All Content selection, or clear out all the filters in the main configure box.

Oh yeah, remember also that if you Show All Content, your filters won't be working while it's selected. I've already been bit by that a couple times, when I went looking for how I broke the goddam script once again. More to come....
posted by mdevore at 2:44 AM on August 19, 2014 [2 favorites]

As promised, I've written up a full description of how to use the enhanced diediedead Greasemonkey script with its new features. For the graphically oriented, there's four screencaps, so, you know, something for everybody.

As noted on the write-up, there appears to be a problem with TamperMonkey+Chrome using the context menus. That is displeasing, since much of the power of the script is the usability of the context menus, but everything can be done via manual entry. One or two users here have posted or mailed me requesting a native Chrome extension, so I'll be doing that over the next week or three, and then post a pointer on Metatalk after I submit and it is available in the Chrome Web Store.
posted by mdevore at 7:34 PM on August 20, 2014 [1 favorite]

Feels like I'm talking to myself here, but the topic is still open and I have update info, so, yup, back again. Two users MeMailed about the script not removing the trailing line break (or two line breaks depending on location) of a post or comment, with the result that they could tell when a post or comment was filtered out of view. I had been focused on filtering unwanted content from one's personal and private browsing experience, and didn't consider the full invisibility aspect that (at least some) users desired.

This was a learning moment for me, and I have updated the script. If you want the line breaks to go away on a filtered message, so there's no visual indication of a missing post or comment, you'll want to re-download it. Same download link, same basic script, updated filtering, new version number: 3.1.

I'll try to get to the native Chrome extension next week, for those users here who have requested that particular tool. Could be closer to two weeks, life is like that here sometimes. Thanks for your patience.
posted by mdevore at 12:41 AM on August 29, 2014 [3 favorites]