NextDNS Installer

[XIII]

Enabled YouTube restricted mode?
(In nextdns parental control)

Oops. That was indeed enabled in my own settings...

However, I still also get complaints from family members for which I’m 100% certain I did not enable that option. I also disabled logging because I respect their privacy. Might investigate further together with them, in the near future.

 

[dave14305]

Oops. That was indeed enabled in my own settings...

However, I still also get complaints from family members for which I’m 100% certain I did not enable that option. I also disabled logging because I respect their privacy. Might investigate further together with them, in the near future.

My opinion: if you're going to do domain-level blocking on your network, you need to have some logging enabled while you stabilize (i.e. whitelist) broken sites. Even if you retain only for a day, it gives you a way to troubleshoot your own problems in real-time.

 

[SomeWhereOverTheRainBow]

My opinion: if you're going to do domain-level blocking on your network, you need to have some logging enabled while you stabilize (i.e. whitelist) broken sites. Even if you retain only for a day, it gives you a way to troubleshoot your own problems in real-time.

my tiny bit of advice is to supplement at what @dave14305 has brilliantly pointed out, make sure you start with a block-list that may not require you to be there all hours of the day fixing things. Especially if others on the network share that blocklist. if you find something stable for them and you want to explore a bigger list for yourself, then go for it. Follow @dave14305 advice and log & whitelist when needed.

Many others have followed in @dave14305 advice and achieved brilliant success/results. There is no contemplation necessary when following in those pearls of wisdom.

 

[XIII]

Which list do you recommend to start with?

(Not the NextDNS default one?)

 

[jackiechun]

Which list do you recommend to start with?

(Not the NextDNS default one?)

3 lightweight ones I'd recommend checking out are MVPS HOSTS, someonewhocares.org (Dan Pollock), and Peter Lowe.

 

[asmopul]

MVPS hosts
http://winhelp2002.mvps.org/hosts.htm.
Updated March 3.

 

[XIII]

However, I still also get complaints from family members for which I’m 100% certain I did not enable that option.

Turns out they use the YouTube App on their devices and Restricted Mode was turned on in that App (rather than NextDNS) by someone (probably me...).

 

[iJorgen]

Which list do you recommend to start with?

(Not the NextDNS default one?)

I'm using 25 blocklists since I really prioritize privacy/security. They complete each other well and won't give any performance issues according to Olivier [emoji41] The only lists that gave me issues are the ones called "Energized" that often broke stuff, so not using them anymore.

 

[Smokey613]

Looking over my logs I realized that the NextDNS client is reporting time entries as Greenwich mean time and not my local time. Is there anyway to adjust this so the entries coincide with my router time?

 

[dave14305]

Looking over my logs I realized that the NextDNS client is reporting time entries as Greenwich mean time and not my local time. Is there anyway to adjust this so the entries coincide with my router time?

I seem to remember that I needed to add an "unset TZ" command to the nextdns.init script to get the timezones to work. I don't have it installed at the moment to verify it. But I remember learning that the source code would ignore the localtime file if the TZ variable is set.

 

[XIII]

The author of Scribe is asking for help because some people report that it uses about 200 MB of memory on HND models:

https://www.snbforums.com/threads/scribe-syslog-ng-and-logrotate-installer.55853/page-60#post-560392

When I checked on my AC86u I noticed that NextDNS is way worse: 782 MB!

How is this for others?

(Maybe I should try the new stubby in 384.16 Beta 1 instead of the NextDNS CLI client?)

 

[RejZoR]

The author of Scribe is asking for help because some people report that it uses about 200 MB of memory on HND models:

https://www.snbforums.com/threads/scribe-syslog-ng-and-logrotate-installer.55853/page-60#post-560392

When I checked on my AC86u I noticed that NextDNS is way worse: 782 MB!

How is this for others?

(Maybe I should try the new stubby in 384.16 Beta 1 instead of the NextDNS CLI client?)

How can it use so much memory when most routers don't even have that much? My AC87U shows 140MB of RAM is used out of 256MB available. That's the total figure on the status page. And I'm really hammering it with torrents this moment...

 

[Puremin0rez]

What is the default NextDNS Starter List based off?

I noticed that it blocks my local newspaper site (https://chicago.suntimes.com) and it doesn't block any Microsoft telemetry from Windows / Xbox systems (v20.events.data.microsoft.com, etc)

I'm considering turning that filter off and using something else, but since it has 80k entries I assume it's the most comprehensive...

 

[RejZoR]

What is the default NextDNS Starter List based off?

I noticed that it blocks my local newspaper site (https://chicago.suntimes.com) and it doesn't block any Microsoft telemetry from Windows / Xbox systems (v20.events.data.microsoft.com, etc)

I'm considering turning that filter off and using something else, but since it has 80k entries I assume it's the most comprehensive...

The starter list is horrible. A mishmash of just some lists and it's dreadful.

• Disconnect Ads
• Disconnect Tracking
• Disconnect Malvertising
• Lightswitch05 - Ads & Tracking
• 1Hosts (Pro)
• WindowsSpyBlocker (Spy)

I've been using these lists for months and they are by far the best. They are aggressive on trackers but haven't made any false positives yet.

 

[XIII]

How can it use so much memory when most routers don't even have that much? My AC87U shows 140MB of RAM is used out of 256MB available. That's the total figure on the status page. And I'm really hammering it with torrents this moment...

I might need a Linux memory 101...

VIRT is 728M, but RES is only 9020 in htop.

 

[Puremin0rez]

The starter list is horrible. A mishmash of just some lists and it's dreadful.

• Disconnect Ads
• Disconnect Tracking
• Disconnect Malvertising
• Lightswitch05 - Ads & Tracking
• 1Hosts (Pro)
• WindowsSpyBlocker (Spy)

I've been using these lists for months and they are by far the best. They are aggressive on trackers but haven't made any false positives yet.

Thanks for the feedback!

Yeah, I feel like the default list should definitely be more curated and less a bunch of merging together... blocking legitimate domains could be quite bad for a user who doesn't know better. I've ran into at least 5 domains over the last 3 months of using NextDNS which were entirely legitimate and non existent on the most popular filters (Steven, EasyList, etc).

 

[RejZoR]

Thanks for the feedback!

Yeah, I feel like the default list should definitely be more curated and less a bunch of merging together... blocking legitimate domains could be quite bad for a user who doesn't know better. I've ran into at least 5 domains over the last 3 months of using NextDNS which were entirely legitimate and non existent on the most popular filters (Steven, EasyList, etc).

I've found that listed ones have the widest blocking scope without really making mistakes I had no need to manually block or whitelist anything, they are that good. Especially Lightswitch05 when I found it replaced bunch of other lists including EasyLists. I still keep Disconnect around coz the lists are small anyway and I have great experience with them. They never trigger false blocks, but block the most offending trackers. Use only Disconnect lists and nothing else if you want to block trackers while keeping things to minimum.

 

[RejZoR]

Scratch that, 1Host Pro is garbage. Keep the rest, but just remove this one. Tried playing NFS Heat just now and it was blocking bunch of EA connections to a point game couldn't connect online. RUbbish.

 

[iJorgen]

Scratch that, 1Host Pro is garbage.

That's my experience too.

 

[maghuro]

Thanks for the heads up, it's fixed in master: https://github.com/nextdns/nextdns/commit/6dbbfa21d0d2388f975791669e3be818fb9cfd43

I have this problem right now on latest release!