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Cookie 5
#47105 12/01/17 10:56 AM
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Re Cookie 5

If using such, waddya think, does this product live up to its hype or is it much ado about nothing?

Your thoughts, musings, and suggestions all welcome.

Last edited by cyn; 12/13/17 12:39 PM. Reason: Topic moved from Mac OS X Applications to the Networking forum.

Harv
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Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
Pendragon #47106 12/01/17 11:32 AM
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I have been using Cookie for several months following artie's recommendation in another thread. I now can't imagine not having Cookie or a product like it.

I keep Cookie's window open all the time where it has a list of locations for whom I want cookies....places like FTM, for example, where I benefit from the retention of things like log-in data. I make the choices about who can be in that list.

When I go to various other places, Cookie immediately tells me who has placed cookies and what kind. i.e. regular cookies or tracking cookies. And I can immediately erase those cookies with a click, rather than wait until some time down the line when a tracking cookie may have, well, tracked me.

I am also surprised by the number of my favourite sites who will decide that they should add a tracking cookie or cookies after I've popped by to conduct regular business. My bank, for example, adds tracking cookies every time I visit but, like any cookies, those tracking cookies can immediately be banished with a click.

FYI, FineTunedMac never adds a tracking cookie.

Long story short....I like being able to know, in real time, exactly what's happening with cookies on my drive.

Last edited by ryck; 12/01/17 11:34 AM.

ryck

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Re: Cookie 5
ryck #47110 12/01/17 07:10 PM
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Decided to check out COOKIE.

Downloaded the DMG and then clicked to open. Received the following SETUP message :

"You will only need to run the setup once. When done, Cookie will require minimal intervention, (sic) to help keep your computer free from any privacy threats."


So . . . What, in practical terms, is the meaning of "minimal intervention?"



Many thanks,
MG2009
Re: Cookie 5
MG2009 #47111 12/01/17 07:18 PM
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Originally Posted By: MG2009
So . . . What, in practical terms, is the meaning of "minimal intervention?"

I assume it refers to the fact that Cookie can be set up to delete all cookies accumulated during an on-line session, including tracking cookies, when you close your browser.

It is my choice to keep the window open and deal with cookies as I go....particularly tracking cookies. I just figure the folks at any particular site have no business prying into where I go after I leave their site.


ryck

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Re: Cookie 5
ryck #47112 12/01/17 09:59 PM
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What I'm hoping for is that I won't need to spend an inordinate about of time just managing cookies. Sadly, I fear that getting ads is fact of life. And I would prefer getting "targeted" ads rather than "Russian porn queen" ads. And besides, with the ad blockers I have, I get very few ads.

That the cretins track my every move, now that offends me. Ergo my hope that Cookie 5 can do all I want. Or, is that asking too much?


Harv
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Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
Pendragon #47115 12/02/17 12:33 AM
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Originally Posted By: Pendragon
That the cretins track my every move, now that offends me. Ergo my hope that Cookie 5 can do all I want. Or, is that asking too much?

Not knowing what all you want, I can't answer with certainty. However, I can say with certainty that Cookie makes management of the cretins much easier.

I used to use the function in Safari (Preferences>Privacy>Manage Website Data) periodically but, to be quite frank, it's not convenient. You need to remember, you need to comb through the list, and blah, blah, blah. Cookie is much easier and immediate.

Last edited by ryck; 12/02/17 01:46 AM. Reason: Spelling

ryck

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Re: Cookie 5
ryck #47118 12/02/17 08:37 AM
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I've been running and beta-testing Cookie for 6 years...pretty much since day one, but I've got no experience with it and any browser other than Safari, either individually or in combination, although from reading release notes I gather that my Safari experience will run true in other/multiple-browser situations.

My Cookie setup is vastly different from ryck's!

I've got Cookie configured to clear all cookies other than my "Favorites" and white listed items every minute while Safari is open, and the same cookies, plus Safari's cache and history, when I quit it; I pretty much never look at my Cookie window.

Originally Posted By: MG2009
So . . . What, in practical terms, is the meaning of "minimal intervention?"

"Minimal intervention" could be, but I'm certain isn't limited to,
  • clearing cookies before their configured time,
  • checking a new website as a "Favorite",
  • unchecking a no longer desired "Favorite",
  • white-listing a single cookie, i.e. prefs or login ID, out of a website's entire compliment,
  • undoing a white-listed cookie,
  • pausing your timer to deal with a website or individual cookie before it's cleared, or
  • pausing your timer to prevent clearing of a cookie, i.e. one that supports a shopping cart, while your browser is open.
Caveats:
  1. Through no fault of its own, Cookie doesn't do what it hopes to do. Safari > Prefs > Privacy > Manage Website Data often lists cookies that do not appear in Cookie's window, but it's because they're persistent (not evercookies), i.e. they're cached some-unknown-where and reappear after Cookie clears them...even after you delete them yourself via Safari's "Manage..." pane, although sometimes, multiple deletions banish them for good. (Apple is a notable offender.)
  2. Cookie's documentation isn't as explicit as it should be about how it deals with Safari's cache and history, which cannot be cleared by any app while Safari is open. (Cache can be cleared by command-option-E...history by History > Clear History [but any "Clear History..." option will probably clear all or some of your Cookie database (which I just learned the hard way frown )], and that, by the way, is new behavior in Safari 11; "Clear History" in Safari 10 did that, and only that, by default.)
Originally Posted By: Harv
What I'm hoping for is that I won't need to spend an inordinate about of time just managing cookies. Sadly, I fear that getting ads is fact of life. And I would prefer getting "targeted" ads rather than "Russian porn queen" ads. And besides, with the ad blockers I have, I get very few ads.

That the cretins track my every move, now that offends me. Ergo my hope that Cookie 5 can do all I want. Or, is that asking too much?

Cookie will certainly work towards your desired end, and with no more than a minimal investment of your time, if you configure it to clear tracking cookies regularly, but I'll note that joemike pointed out in another thread that Cookie's definition of "tracking cookie" may be "loose" and result in the clearing of some cookies that may not be undesirable.

The bottom line is that in running apps such as Cookie and ad blockers we're running blind.

Without a investing a hugely disproportionate amount of time in comparing results - if we can even discern them - with/without this/that we're stuck with whatever we get, so the best I can say is that I never see anything that I can attribute to Cookie's NOT doing what I expect of it. crazy


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
Pendragon #47123 12/02/17 02:54 PM
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Originally Posted By: Pendragon
Ergo my hope that Cookie 5 can do all I want. Or, is that asking too much?

What he said.

Last edited by ryck; 12/02/17 02:55 PM.

ryck

"What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits" The Doobie Brothers

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Re: Cookie 5
ryck #47128 12/02/17 03:34 PM
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Clearly, the problem is mine, e.g., I am unwilling to spend more than 5 minutes a week to maintain Cookie 5. I want it to work for me, not vice-versa. Of course, now that Apple has stifled cross-linking or such, that helps mitigate the problem. In short, I want it like SpamSieve, e.g., has some sort of Bayesian algorithm that “learns” my preferences.

I know that’s an unfair/unrealistic requirement, but the ravages of time & tide and poor health hath taken a toll…

No doubt my ego would be swaged, but that aside, and from a practical standpoint, I remain unsure how I would be better off or how I would measure success.

Still, the trial is free, and when the spirit and time allow, it can’t hurt to give it a go…

My many thanks to those who have shared their thoughts and expertise. Indeed it is appreciated (and I learned much).


Harv
27" i7 iMac (10.13.6), iPhone Xs Max (12.1)

Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
Pendragon #47131 12/02/17 06:16 PM
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Ditto. Thanks for all the added info, Folks.

Re: Cookie 5
Pendragon #47134 12/04/17 12:49 AM
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Originally Posted By: Pendragon
Clearly, the problem is mine, e.g., I am unwilling to spend more than 5 minutes a week to maintain Cookie 5. I want it to work for me, not vice-versa. Of course, now that Apple has stifled cross-linking or such, that helps mitigate the problem. In short, I want it like SpamSieve, e.g., has some sort of Bayesian algorithm that “learns” my preferences.

I know that’s an unfair/unrealistic requirement, but the ravages of time & tide and poor health hath taken a toll…

No doubt my ego would be swaged, but that aside, and from a practical standpoint, I remain unsure how I would be better off or how I would measure success.

You're laboring under the misapprehension that Cookie is demanding of your time, but that's not the case at all.

Both ryck and I use it in the extreme, albeit in opposite directions, but all you've really got to do is select your "Favorite" websites and set its "Removal" parameters the first time you launch it (...your 5 minutes, but only once), and unless you want to select a new "Favorite", it runs on its own from there...no oversight required...no personal preferences for it to learn, as they've all been pre-set.

As for how you'd be better off, Cookie will clear tracking cookies at your chosen interval or event with no required action on your part, and thereby reduce (I won't say "eliminate".) data collection...data about YOU, that is.

And as for how you'd measure success, it's a lousy analogy, but think of Cookie in CO detector terms: you can't measure its success, you can only measure its failures (and, as I've said, I've never noticed any).

Aside: As a result of this discussion it occurred to me that it would be nice if new "Favorites" cold be selected via contextual menu, i.e. without dealing with Cookie's window, and although it turns out to be a big job because separate coding is required for each browser, Russell said he'll give it a shot in his next upgrade.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
artie505 #47135 12/04/17 09:43 AM
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I know that my browsing set-up (especially the dialup aspect) is often cause for snickering, but I can't remember when I last saw any ad on any site (other than those associated with and within such site).
With my admittedly outdated Firefox browser arrayed only with Adblock Plus and tracking 'prohibited' and selectively blocking images on various sites (to eliminate slowness of loading, on news media sites in particular) which I by and large don't care about, I am blissfully oblivious to such intrusions.
In fact, when I have occasion to use broadband internet access, it freaks me out to see the number of ads which accompany virtually all the websites I regularly access, including email.
So, as long as I can hold out, I'm sticking with what I've got ... and commiserate with those who aren't as fortunate. smirk

Re: Cookie 5
grelber #47136 12/04/17 11:08 AM
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Well, I've got "Ask websites not to track me" checked in Safari > Prefs > Privacy, but I'm not sure what it accomplishes, because I still get plenty of tracking cookies.

Also, you're misunderstanding tracking cookies: their purpose is accumulating information about you, which resides in your dossier(s) regardless of the fact that the unwanted ads placed by the purchasers of that information aren't afflicting you because Adblock Plus is preventing them from reaching you.

Those of us who are proactively protecting our privacy (trying to, anyhow) by deterring the collection of information about us are in no way "less fortunate" than you, but we may be a wee bit wiser. smirk


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
artie505 #47137 12/04/17 03:11 PM
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I quite well understand what tracking cookies are and what they're meant for.
Similar to you "who are proactively protecting [y]our privacy", I use Firefox's built-in TRACKING PROTECTION to block sites which use trackers; I can disable that feature if it's compromising access to any given site, either per session or permanently. (In the latter sense it functions almost exactly like Adblock Plus.)

Re: Cookie 5
grelber #47152 12/06/17 09:01 AM
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Originally Posted By: grelber
I quite well understand what tracking cookies are and what they're meant for.
Similar to you "who are proactively protecting [y]our privacy", I use Firefox's built-in TRACKING PROTECTION to block sites which use trackers; I can disable that feature if it's compromising access to any given site, either per session or permanently. (In the latter sense it functions almost exactly like Adblock Plus.)

Thanks for clarifying you original post.

First, this: Firefox's Tracking Protection, which I believe you can make use of only in private browsing mode, is "Always" available beginning in v 57.

It sounds like the same functionality Apple has introduced in High Sierra's version of Safari.

You're understanding of cookies is a bit off-target.

Tracking Protection blocks the really odious cookies placed by cross-site aggregators of information, but it doesn't block same-site information gathering.

A cookie manager such as Cookie blocks both.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
artie505 #47153 12/06/17 10:32 AM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
Firefox's Tracking Protection, which I believe you can make use of only in private browsing mode, is "Always" available beginning in v 57.

Not likely, since that option was offered and I enabled it.
(The option in private browsing mode only was the default/initial setting of Firefox.)

Re: Cookie 5
grelber #47154 12/06/17 11:17 AM
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I relied on

Originally Posted By: Naked Security
The nightly build shows that the Tracking Protection option is still only applied to private windows by default but can, for the first time, be enabled for all browsing by going to Preferences > Privacy & Security > Tracking Protection, and clicking Always. (Emphasis added)

More: I just reverted to Firefox 56.02 (Scroll down here for v 55 and earlier.) and found [sic]...

Originally Posted By: Firefox Prefs
Tracking Protection

Tracking is the collection of your browsing data across multiple websites. Tracking can be used to build a profile and display content based on your browsing and personal information.

Use Tracking Protection in Private Browsing to block known trackers (Learn more)

and the page to which I'm taken when I click on "Learn More" displays...

Originally Posted By: Tracking Protection
Tracking Protection

(Redirected from Tracking Protection in Private Browsing) (Emphasis added)

So, I don't know what's up with your Firefox, but mine is precisely as (apparently) expected.

Last edited by artie505; 12/06/17 12:30 PM. Reason: More

The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
artie505 #47157 12/06/17 03:28 PM
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Thanks for the clarification.
Since I use private browsing with tracking protection enabled, the point is perhaps moot.

Re: Cookie 5
grelber #47158 12/06/17 04:06 PM
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Moot as far as you're concerned, but not as respects other Firefox users who may be unaware of the new functionality (for whose benefit I posted the info).

Much has been made of the same functionality having been added to Safari (around here, anyhow), but there's been silence as respects Firefox.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
artie505 #47159 12/06/17 07:02 PM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
Much has been made of the same functionality having been added to Safari (around here, anyhow), but there's been silence as respects Firefox.

True. And given the utility of Firefox's Tracking Protection without the apparent fuss and muss of an app like Cookie, it's good info for those who need it.

Re: Cookie 5
grelber #47162 12/06/17 09:32 PM
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Originally Posted By: grelber
Originally Posted By: artie505
Much has been made of the same functionality having been added to Safari (around here, anyhow), but there's been silence as respects Firefox.

True. And given the utility of Firefox's Tracking Protection without the apparent fuss and muss of an app like Cookie, it's good info for those who need it.

As I explained above, there's neither fuss nor muss nor bother involved with Cookie, but Tracking Protection and whatever Apple calls its version thereof, alone, may be enough for most people


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Cookie 5
artie505 #47163 12/06/17 10:28 PM
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By fuss and muss I meant those sorts of things integral to the management of Cookie — which you detailed in your post (#47118) above.
Pretty much nothing is required for the management of the browser's built-in tracking protection.

Re: Cookie 5
grelber #47167 12/07/17 09:45 AM
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Originally Posted By: grelber
By fuss and muss I meant those sorts of things integral to the management of Cookie — which you detailed in your post (#47118) above.
Pretty much nothing is required for the management of the browser's built-in tracking protection.

The portion of post #47118 to which you referred...

Originally Posted By: MG2009
So . . . What, in practical terms, is the meaning of "minimal intervention?"

Originally Posted By: artie
"Minimal intervention" could be, but I'm certain isn't limited to,
  1. clearing cookies before their configured time,
  2. checking a new website as a "Favorite",
  3. unchecking a no longer desired "Favorite",
  4. white-listing a single cookie, i.e. prefs or login ID, out of a website's entire compliment,
  5. undoing a white-listed cookie,
  6. pausing your timer to deal with a website or individual cookie before it's cleared, or
  7. pausing your timer to prevent clearing of a cookie, i.e. one that supports a shopping cart, while your browser is open.

Of the items you've labeled as "integral to the management of Cookie", #s 2, 3, 6, & 7 are equivalent to toggling Tracking Protection off and on in situations which you've already enumerated, with items #6, & 7 being pertinent only if you've got a timer set to clear cookies while you're browsing, not of necessity.

Items #1, 4, & 5, on the other hand, relate to aspects of Cookie's functionality that transcend those of Tracking Protection, i.e. the reason people run cookie managers in the first place.

I don't want my Mac littered with cookies from every website I've ever visited (I wonder how many people have cleared their browser's history without realizing that their cookies still gave them away? Hmmm... I'll bet that's why Safari > History > Clear History now clears cookies, too.), and that's what Cookie is for: once you set your favorites, it clears all the others at your chosen interval or the occurrence of your chosen event. And it can be set to clear cache, history and other items, as well.

The point I've been trying to make is that Cookie is neither a time nor even attention consuming app! Once you configure it, which takes just a few minutes, it runs on its own unless you want to adjust your configuration - no muss, no fuss, no bother - same as Tracking Protection, except that TP's minimal or inadequate, depending upon how you look at it, configuration is pre-set.

Sure, you can make extra work for yourself as ryck and I have done, but it's ONLY a function of personal taste, need, or neurosis.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire

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