Can't add custom blocklists

Windows 10 22H2
Brave Version 1.47.171 Chromium: 109.0.5414.87 (Build officiel) (64 bits)

Hi Folks,

i’m trying to add a custom blocklist (e.g. easylist) but brave is not able to create the “list_text.txt” file. When i click “display source” on the added filter, brave opens a new page saying “unable to access your file, it has been perhaps modified or deleted”. When i tried to open the directory where the “list_text.txt” file should be, i just realised that the “FilterListSubscriptionCache” folder was not there.

I’m using brave (same version) on another computer with Windows 10 ( version 1803), and i was able to add those filters.

FYI i was able to add bookmarks, and i even recently made a synchronisation between 2 devices on the faulty brave installation.

Thanks in advance for your help.

What list are you trying to add, is it online or local? is it yours or some other person’s list? your information is just not good enough.
It is better if you just show a screenshot of the custom lists in Brave://adblock.

1 Like

Hi Emi,
those lists are from someone else. Here they are:

https://raw.githubusercontent.com/hagezi/dns-blocklists/main/hosts/ultimate.txt
https://codeberg.org/spootle/blocklist/raw/branch/master/blocklist.txt
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jerryn70/GoodbyeAds/master/Hosts/GoodbyeAds.txt

They are not meant to be used in the adblocker, that’s why they fail to work.

Ultimate and GoodbyeAds are not even the right format, they are for the Hosts file, which they are even telling you that information in the link URL.
The one blocklist is the one that Brave ‘could’ use it but they are useless, seems like they are more for DNS, or something where you add domains to block.
Yeah I just read in the description of the page and it says “Pi-Hole optimized”

If you want to block websites in Brave.

Brave uses uBlock syntax for the rules, so the same rules that work in uBlock, most will work in Brave.
But the right format, you are looking for is this:

||domain.example^
or at least
||domain.example$document

The difference between them is that the first one will show a warning screen about how website might be dangerous, then it blocks every Network element, images, scripts, fonts, spreadsheets, and only will make the 1 connection to the plain html file (since everything was blocked only plain text will be in the page).

The second one will only show the warning message but you can click ‘proceed’ and it will work.

So the first one is the preferred one.

Of course I am only referring to ‘blocking’ domains Adblock is really deep, but just to tell you how to tell if a rule will work or not.

I don’t know what lists you are looking for but it is better if you find them here https://filterlists.com/
You can filter the syntaxes to be:

  • Adblocker-syntax domains
  • uBlock Origin Static
  • and uBlock Origin scriptlet injection

To make sure they will be mostly compatible.

Brave supports most uBlock features, the only one that you might find in these lists that are still WIP are $all, $popup and denyallow. It doesn’t mean they can’t be workarounded in Brave, because you can do the same thing in Brave by using other features. But it means the rules will be ignored, so, if a lists has $all everywhere, then it is not good.

Anyway, one thing about DNS you have to understand is that DNS based blocking is pretty, not that good, because DNS servers can only block per domain, they can’t really do anything else.
While Adblockers can see each and individual connection and element in a page, and it will be better, Brave already blocks most stuff on the internet, so you can block anything you want, you can block just scripts or only images etc etc, also you can apply more advanced features like redirect which DNS based adblockers mess with.
Plus adblockers can inject JS to change things about pages that nothing else would do that.

Anyway, Brave already includes all default uBlock lists and you can find more as regionals, they are actually including lists for porn and chat apps (at least on Nightly) and all that and per language and annoyances, so the lists included are already pretty good, if you are looking to block ads, better than any list you sent.

Thank you for your reply, the information is interesting. But i doubt this would solve my problem, as it seems that brave does manage to create the file mentionned on my OP. Sounds more like a file access ??? problem.
BTW, https://raw.githubusercontent.com/badmojr/1Hosts/master/mini/adblock.txt
doesnt work either…

I only reply what you said in your post, I don’t read minds and I won’t try to respond anything else, I am not here to hold anyone’s hand, especially when I asked for information and you didn’t provide anything but links to lists that aren’t compatible with Brave.
If you didn’t want me to comment on the lists, why did you link them? while ignoring everything else I said in my post. I only said they were useless even if you could add them in your other computer, which is true, and it is obviously the most important information since they won’t ever work in Brave.

I told you get a screenshot of the Brave lists and you didn’t. If it was a permission issue then it would say something like

image
or
image

You didn’t say what happened when you clicked on the update button, because for whatever reason you are only looking at the ‘source’.

You never mentioned which OS you have, you didn’t mention pretty much anything but FilterListSubscriptionCache. You didn’t take a screenshot of your User Data/Default either where you say you don’t see the cache folder.

I mean, you could rename Default folder, open Brave and let it create the folders, then close brave and move files from old Default to New Default folder.
Or do the same with User Data, custom lists and custom filters and regional lists information is in the Local State file, so it works in any profile.

You could also, reinstall Brave, by uninstalling it, then make sure the updater and scheduler is removed, guess it is better if you just restart computer. Then reinstall but without admin rights, that way everything will be in %Localappdata% instead of program files and maybe that will fix the issues, if it was permissions or anything, then re-creating the folders should fix it and then you can move all your files to where they belong to and don’t add the useless ones like caches and all that.

I don’t especially appreciate your condescending tone and attitude. If you’re not able to read what people post it’s not my problem.

Rather than having to stand your attitude in order to get help, i’ll prefer to dump you get help by myself.

Discussing is closed.

lol okay weak human. I don’t get paid, I should literally stop trying to help that obvious people who can’t do simple things. What you need to do, is get ‘other’ type of help.

Especially when you expect other people in forums to read your mind, know your OS, know your installation, get to know what error Brave displays, what happens when X and Y happens…
Yes, better do it yourself, maybe format your PC or some dumb thing only ‘normies’ would do because you can’t do simple things.
As you can see, my posts had enough information, you were the one who didn’t provide poo.

I mean, do you think I even care? it’s not my problem, it’s obvious I will care 3 frogs if you can add lists or not, especially when you don’t even understand lists are compatible or not, so even you adding useless or redundant lists, shows your lack or knowledge. But sure, go ahead! Let’s see if you can do it in the corner where you are crying because nobody talked you with sweet words and held your hand in the process.

It’s laughable how weak, ignorant and absurd humans are.

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