yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
First you'll have to explain what the problem is. All you show is something that looks like it might be a screenshot with an error message about something that quit playing. I can't even guess how this would relate to AdAway, since even if you're trying to view a video on a site that you blocked, the video wouldn't even start.

Remember the common steps to check if Adaway is responsible for something:

keep your hosts file but temporarily uninstall AdAway. If the problem persists, AdAway is not responsible but your hosts file might be.

Revert to the default AdAway source lists (disabling any additional file you may have loaded). If the problem goes away, the culprit was the additional file.

Easiest step: use the DNS Request Log feature of AdAway to see which sites are accessed and which ones should be black/white listed.

---------- Post added at 08:23 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:18 PM ----------

The same way you can block any URL: blacklist the ad server. If you're not sure of the exact URL, use the DNS Request Log function. If nothing shows in the log, that probably means that your app is directly invoking the ad without going through DNS, and there's nothing AdAway or the hosts file can do about it.

I suggest you read this thread where similar queries have been answered countless times... ;)
[Android Apps and Games] :
My bad. Posted it right before going to bed. Was really tired. So basically that's YouTube. It has problems playing videos from time to time. Refreshing won't fix it. Restarting won't fix it either. This happened to other apps too, like Vessel. Only way to fix this is by restarting the phone. Restarting the phone everytime this happens is annoying and takes time. I'm on running 5.0.2 on my Xperia Z3. I'm rooted with only an audio mod installed. It's possible that the audio mod might be causing it but I'm trying out AdAway first. I'm reseting my phone later on without installing AdAway or the audio mod. See if that works.
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
I don't know what "audio mod" you are referring to, but AdAway has nothing to do with video playback, and furthermore the official YouTube app displays its ads and videos without going through local DNS resolution. I have no idea why you'd even think that AdAway is involved and post in this thread, but I suggest you discuss your issues wherever your ROM and device are supported.
[Android Apps and Games] :
True. AdAway has nothing to do with video playback. I didn't know how AdAway actually works. I thought it might be trying to block YouTube ads. So it failed and caused problems. Thanks anyways.
[Android Apps and Games] JoeFCaputo113:
I'm a bit confused.... In the OP it says last update was in June, but the link brings you to a build from April?!
[Android Apps and Games] kingvortex:
It does?

That's what I see. No mention of a version from June. If you're referring to the edit reason, mrRobinson probably didn't change the reason the last time he edited the OP in June.
[Android Apps and Games] ZeGuitarist:
Hello everyone! I'm having some issues with AdAway breaking functionality of some mobile websites.

Some websites which use a similar mobile layout (examples are runnersworld.com and eatclean.com) have pages where you can side-scroll by swiping left/right. Here's one such page:

http://www.runnersworld.com/the-sho...id=619355384831086594&adbpl=tw&adbpr=14882900

The problem I've noticed is that this side-scrolling is broken when certain hosts are enabled in AdAway. With all 4 default hosts enabled, I can't scroll past the first entry on any of these types of pages - it always gets stuck halfway along the way to the next page.

I've tested this and narrowed it down to the 1st and 3rd host in AdAway's list ("hosts-file.net" and "winhelp"): if I uncheck these and re-apply hosts, the scrolling issue is gone - but I see ads again as well.

Anyone else have this problem, and know of a solution?

And as a sidenote, are there any good custom hosts sources that I could/should add to AdAway for better ad-blocking without any of these functionality-breaking issues?

Thanks in advance!

EDIT: forgot to mention this - Nexus 5, Lollipop 5.1.1, stock kernel, Xposed, latest AdAway version installed with stock settings.
[Android Apps and Games] mattisekk722:
Edit
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
AdAway isn't breaking any web site, but the URLS you chose to block might have that effect, whether redirected with help from AdAway or in any other way.

The default source files included with AdAway are merely common sets of URLS that block most ads for most people, Clearly they can't be ideal for everyone and that's why you can also tweak them by using the black and white lists. As explain many times in this thread, you should enable the DNS Requests log, access the sites that give you trouble, then decide which of the URLs shown must be whitelisted.

Note that only YOU can do that as many sites will serve ads based on location, device, login, etc. Deleting or importing an entire source file is an unnecessarily drastic procedure that will almost certainly cause more problems than it solves.

FYI, from a quick glance at the first few lines of code on the runnersworld page you mention, I see that it requires access to, among others

runnersworld.com

cloudfront.net

janraincapture.com

googletagservices.com

yldbt.com

revsci.net

adobedtm.com

brightcove.com

...​

Any one of those many sites may effectively prevent the scrolling feature to behave as you'd like. Since many of those are common ad servers, they are probably rightfully blocked by common "ad blocking" lists. Clearly, neither AdAway nor the source files you select have any way of guessing which ones also serve a scrolling script, or which ads you wish to see (the entire runnersworld.com site is just a big ad for running attire, after all) and which ones you wish to block. Chances are that merely whitelisting one of those will give you full functionality but then don't be surprised if a few unwanted ads sneak through from that same server... ;)
[Android Apps and Games] ZeGuitarist:
I should have phrased my original post better, but yes, that's what I meant.

Thanks, I'll try to log DNS requests and whitelist a few of the requested URLs to see which one(s) control(s) the scrolling behaviour. Note that I never deleted any source files, I merely checked/unchecked each of the hosts sources in AdAway for testing purposes - that's how I narrowed it down to being an ad-blocking issue.

I'll test it out and see what the results are - if some ads are unblocked but I get to use a fully functional website again, that'd be a worthwhile tradeoff.

Thanks for all the input!

---------- Post added at 04:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 04:15 PM ----------

Looks like the assets.adobedtm.com domain being blocked might have been the culprit - I've whitelisted that one and changed nothing else, and now the scrolling seems to function again.

Hooray! Thanks for your help. I've become a bit more proficient in using and understanding AdAway too, and I have you to thank for that.
[Android Apps and Games] JoeFCaputo113:
Yes that was what I was referring to lol, thanks!
[Android Apps and Games] warriorsach:
Not working with euphoria rom for nexus 4, always shows ad in browsers and apps not able to control any AD
[Android Apps and Games] jaibar:
What measures did you take to rule out pebcak??

It is repeated over and over and over again, AdAway doesn't "block" or controls anything in browsers and apps.

What it does, is to put a hosts file in your phone, in the system/etc partition (and then, some other functionalities such as tcpdump / logging dns requests, white/black listing etc).

You can manually download some hosts file and copy to mentioned location to achieve the same result. An app is just easier to manage things on regular basis.

Now, if it doesn't work for you, you need to check why. Are you rooted? Did you give root permissions to Adaway? Did you verify that the hosts sources are checked? Did you change hosts sources? Did AdAway actually downloaded and integrated the hosts from various sources, or it simply said process failed? Has your rom similar hosts file function integrated?

And so on... you get the idea.

As you didn't provide any useful information, and nobody knows what homework you did before posting a complain, I'm not sure how useful help you can expect in return.
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
Good thing one of us reads the thread! You posted a similarly vague message THERE and I even responded immediately THERE barely two days ago.

We try very hard to help as many users as possible but you need to do your part. Even if you don't want to read replies to your posts, at least try to

SEARCH THE THREAD

for "euphoria".
[Android Apps and Games] stephendt0:
I want to install adaway on my families' devices, but the app update system is not user friendly enough. F-droid is very confusing for them to use and doesn't update automatically like the Play Store. It's just another app that I don't want to bloat their devices with. If I don't download updates for them manually, ads start to creep in and next thing you know my grandma is filling her tablet with all sorts of crap. Additionally, if I download an update here, I can't use F-droid. Is there ever going to be an integrated notification system for updates? The app works well apart from this.
[Android Apps and Games] jaibar:
What updates?

Adaway (the app) doesn't update quite frequently, and probably because there's no need to.

You can still update the hosts lists periodically from within adaway itself.

Anyway, you don't need f-droid for that.

But you need to have all your family's phones rooted for that. If someone can't handle updating an application, maybe it's not so good to use a rooted device, imho.
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
There is no obvious reason to download AdAway from F-droid or any other place. Whatever version you find on there is simply an occasional recompile of the publicly available open source but they don't support, maintain, or develop AdAway.

The easiest approach is to simply uninstall whatever version you had from F-droid (their signature is incompatible), download AdAway from the OP here (currently at version 3.0) and let it update its source files daily automatically. As long as grandma reboots her tablet every so often, the new hosts file will get activated and she'll remain up-to-date without having to do anything special. In those few times when the app itself gets an update (separate from updated source files), you will be able to optionally download that update from here but you won't have to change anything else.
[Android Apps and Games] ZeGuitarist:
Sadly, it appeared this issue has not been fixed by whitelisting DNS requests from the runnersworld.com example page.

Anyone else experience this issue, and know of a solution?
[Android Apps and Games] stephendt0:
Yes, there is no problem with the hosts files, but in 6 months time when the apk needs to be updated there will be no way for grandma to be able to easily install it herself. She doesn't even know what a thread is, at least outside of the sewing room.

If there were some email list I could subscribe to that would be a simple way around the issue for the meantime...
[Android Apps and Games] kingvortex:
Why would the apk urgently need updating though? If it works without issue now, then it will work in 6 months time. The only thing I can think is if a system update breaks AdAway (which would probably also break root), but if they're struggling to update an app manually, then I can't see them updating their device with no help from you, in which case you can update any apps that need it. :)
[Android Apps and Games] FPSUsername:
Because the webserver doesn't work on some devices. I have a GT-I9505, tried it with 3 roms (5.0.2 and 5.1.1) and it doesn't start. I tried it too on my friends S4 (same model as mine) and I had the same results.

I will post a logcat soon on this post.

Here is the log: http://pastebin.com/KFVXYWV3
[Android Apps and Games] kingvortex:
But that wasn't what we was being discussed. If it works now, then it won't suddenly stop working and need urgently updating. :)
[Android Apps and Games] stephendt0:
There have been situations in the past where web servers have changed and the app stops functioning correctly. It could happen again. I'm half tempted to whip up a Google Site with an email subscription service with Google drive as an apk server to get around this but a more official solution would be the way to go.
[Android Apps and Games] kingvortex:
Where is this talk of webservers coming from? If the hosts are set to automatically update and it works fine now, then it won't just stop working for no reason and require the app itself to be updated.
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
I believe we already discussed your issue extensively. If those pages use DNS resolution, you need to find which server(s) need to be whitelisted (or NOT blackisted in the fist place). This is something only YOU can do, using the tcpdump log as a guideline. If the pages use numeric IPs instead, there is nothing AdAway can do.

Note that when I tried to look at your example page, I couldn't see any difference in functionality whether I enabled or disabled AdAway and its defaultl source files, under either Chrome or Firefox.

---------- Post added at 09:17 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:10 AM ----------

AdAway is very seldom in need of an update and grandma might need a new device before she needs to update AdAway. That said, if you wish to keep abreast of AdAway development, you can subscribe to this thread. If somehow an essential update were to appear, email or pushbullet it to grandma and she can install it with a single click.

The whole point, though, is that you don't need to update AdAway. Based on past history, you could easily leave the same version alone for several years without any ill effects and it's simply not a realistic concern.

---------- Post added at 09:26 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:17 AM ----------

This is unrelated to the need to update AdAway. Since AdAway runs fine on a number of S4s, whatever issue you encounter is not a generic one and might be coming from interference from some other application (or Xposed module??) , an incomplete root method, etc.

---------- Post added at 09:33 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:26 AM ----------

You're in luck, AdAway already does that on its own, checking for and installing new versions of the source files daily. Note that AdAway keeps on "functioning correctly" whether your source files are up-to-date or not. I don't recall a time when AdAway would magically stop functioning... ;)
[Android Apps and Games] stephendt0:
I think version 2.3 stopped connecting to 2/4 servers which started to cause issues. It was released a year or two ago. I'm aware it updates the host files automatically without issues but I don't see why an apk couldn't be updated in a similar manner. Either way it would be nice to see this sort of thing in the future.
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
I think you are simply referring to various source files which may or may not be available at times or may or may not be updated often. I'm not sure which "it" you refer to, but if you don't like a source file, you can easily remove it from the list that AdAway checks. An unreachable source file will not cause any "issue" and you're free to replace that source file with another one if you so desire.

There is no reason to worry about updates to the apk itself, NOTHING has changed in Android DNS resolution in ages and you could still happily run very old AdAway versions. The latest 3.0 update from the OP only addressed trivial cosmetic issues (ability to use "Material" colors under Lollipop) but made no significant functional changes. Yes, it would be possible to add a self-check to Adaway and have it look at an unspecified server (that you would fund?) for any new compiles, but it would be rather pointless and wasteful for no obvious benefit. While possible it's extremely unlikely but AdAway is open source and you should feel free to suggest a commit or even compile your very own version.
[Android Apps and Games] FPSUsername:
I tried it on several roms (JDC Team Optimized CM12, CM12.1 and SlimLP, official CM12.1) with and without xposed, I flashed SuperSU v2.49 Beta. I flashed CM12.1 Beta on my brother's note 2 and also SuperSU v2.49 Beta and it works fine on his phone.

I'm not good at reading logs for android phones. The only logs that are easy to understand are from minecraft server (as I hosted a home server for over a year).
[Android Apps and Games] onetik:
Hi can someone please help me. I installed the latest apk from here on my cm12 LG G3, but no ads are being blocked. I have the latest Busybox on Rails installed as well. Adaway works fine on stock ROMs, not just in cm12. Has anyone else experienced this? What was your solution? Thanks!
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
Let's take it one step at a time.

Did AdAway install without any error messages and did you remember to reboot afterwards?

Did you verify that your APN doesn't have a proxy? It it does, remove it.

Did you verify that your browser (Chrome?) doesn't go through a proxy? Try another browser if unsure.

Does your /system/etc/hosts contain a bunch of lines or just the few default ones? If it's only few lines, something resets /system on your device.

Do you have other '/system/hosts.*" files, suggesting that your ROM includes a conflicting "ad blocker"? If so, completely disable that ad blocker and delete the other hosts.* files, then try again.
[Android Apps and Games] ChazzMatt:
I'm running CM12.1 and my ads are being blocked just fine.

Gmail ads (at the top of the gmail app) are showing up, but I think you would have to block Google servers to hide those, and that would cause major problems.

But no other ads are showing, like in news articles and such.
[Android Apps and Games] ZeGuitarist:
Something doesn't check out, then, because in fact I can see a difference in functionality when I disable AdAway. More specifically, when I disable the default "hosts-file.net" and "winhelp2002" hosts files, the webpage I referred to works flawlessly (albeit with ads poking through). On the other hand, whitelisting DNS requests from these pages doesn't result in the issue being resolved.

To me then, something doesn't add up in this equation. If the server(s) causing the problem didn't use DNS resolution, how is it possible that the issue is resolved by disabling AdAway altogether? And if DNS resolution is used, how is it that the DNS request causing the problem doesn't show up in TCPdump?

Thanks again for taking your time to look into this with me.
[Android Apps and Games] californicated:
After last clean flash of latest of cm nightly ads aren't blocked here, either. No proxy, no bandwidth saving, hosts file is filled. Adaway got root and reports the latest list to be applied.

Let's see, if reapplying and a reboot will fix that. It worked before on cm, so I can't image what should have went wrong.
[Android Apps and Games] ChasingShadows:
Which browser do you use? AFAIK the new CM browser is based on Chrome. Chrome has a bandwith saver feature which actually is a proxy. So disable the bandwidth saver and you should be fine...
[Android Apps and Games] californicated:
AOSP browser, but that wasn't the culprit. Recent nightlies feature new APN settings. On my phone the wrong APN was set. Everything fine now :)
[Android Apps and Games] Mike B.:
Let''s get one thing clear, what matters is which hosts file you use, not whether you "disable" AdAway or not. If keeping the full hosts file but uninstalling AdAway altogether still gives you trouble, then the problem is clearly not AdAway but merely the servers you choose to block.

Whitelisting an entry is the same thing as removing that entry for the hosts file, but it's more convenient. After any such change you MUST remember to reboot fully. In your example, make sure to try whitelisting ALL entries in the tcpdump log one at a time.

I can't reproduce your symptoms here and I'm not sure what scrolling you have in mind, but apparently you are referring to actions triggered by scripts, (probably Javascript) from remote servers what may in turn invoke other URLs and those might be the ones you block, causing those scripts to fail. On a technically-oriented site, the webmaster may be eager to help you get to the bottom of this, but I suspect runnersworld farms out their web activities and won't be much help.

The only way to get to the bottom of this is for you to keep trying to whitelist various sites what either appear in the log or in the web page's source. I assume or course that you have first established that it's not a browser-specific issue on your device. Try with at least a WebKIt browser (Chrome?) and a non-WebKit such as Firefox. Alternatively you could accept a few ads, live without that scrolling script... of buy your shoes somewhere else... ;)
[Android Apps and Games] ZeGuitarist:
I know what I mean when I say I'm disabling AdAway, or when I say I'm disabling certain hosts sources. I do in fact revert to the default hosts file (or re-apply hosts when I change sources) and reboot afterwards.

That's what I did - or I must still have missed a few, I'll check again and report back.

Here's a screenshot:

In this example, you're supposed to be able to scroll sideways through 11 pages by either tapping the arrow or by actually swiping sideways. With AdAway's default hosts file enabled, neither option works - tapping the arrows simply reloads the same page over again, and swiping sideways results in the page getting stuck halfway between the previous and next image, after which the page freezes and no manipulation works anymore.

I always use Chrome, I'll try Firefox for good measure. I plan to keep using Chrome, however, since all my synced bookmarks, passwords etc. are in there on all my devices.

But... but... Without Runner's World, how ever shall I spend too much money on running shoes again? :confused:

In all seriousness though, it's not just RW.com where I experience this issue, as I stated in my original post. It appears this scrolling script is part of some sort of mobile website framework that's used by many different website makers, since I've encountered plenty of other webpages with the same kind of side-scrolling pages - and they all have the same freezing issue, which disappears when I revert to the default hosts file.
[Android Apps and Games] ChasingShadows:
Runnersworld and many others take there scripts from cloudfront.net ... maybe you just need to whitelist *.cloudfront.net .... however, the buyin might be more ads...

And the control itself checks for janraincapture.com .... so whilelisteing *.janraincapture.com might help too ...