If you are running an ad-blocker or script-blocker in a browser, you may experience high memory usage because of it.

Depending on how it is working, it may bring the memory easily over the 1 Gigabyte mark. One test to find out how well your extension works is to load the VIM Color Scheme Test website (no longer available).

If you are using Windows, hit Ctrl-Shift-Esc prior to that to monitor the browser process or processes to see if loading the page increases the memory use of it significantly.

The Chrome extension µBlock has been designed as a lightweight alternative for those heavy ad-blocking extensions. I reviewed the extension back in June for the first time and found it to be light on resources and excellent in regards to the blocking of contents on the Internet.

It is using filter lists of which several are used by default including popular lists such as Easy Privacy, Easy List or Peter Lowe's ad server list.

It is possible to subscribe to more lists and even add your own rules to the extension in Chrome.

The author of the extension revealed recently that a Firefox port is in the works. Even better, a sample Firefox add-on file was posted at the same time by Deathamns that users can check out.

The released add-on is a work in progress and not complete yet but it shows that the author is dedicated to bring the extension to Firefox.

To try it out visit the linked Github comment page above and click on the uBlock.xpi file listed on it. This will launch the regular installation process in the browser and should produce a uBlock icon in the interface in the end.

The icon highlights how many requests were blocked on the active page. A click on it displays the number again and total number of blocked requests since installation.

A click on the green icon disables the extension for the site in question, and when you click on the down arrow icon at the very bottom of the interface, you can manage the following:

3rd party scripts. 3rd party frames.

These can be denied for the current site or globally using the menu.

A click on options loads the preferences window. There you find listed all third-party filter lists that you can subscribe to as well as options to add your own filters and whitelist sites.

The list loaded by default are the uBlock filters list, EasyList, Peter Lowe's list, EasyPrivacy, and Malware Domain lists.

The core functionality is included already. You will find that some features won't work yet though including the element picker that you can select in the interface.

Firefox's upcoming multi-process system e10s seems to refuse to work with the extension as well right now.

Cautious users may want to wait until µBlock gets released officially before they give it a try. It needs to be noted that Mozilla has not reviewed the add-on yet as it has not been made available on the official Add-ons repository.

Closing Words

While Firefox has no shortage when it comes to ad-blockers and blockers in general, it is good to see that a popular Chrome extension is being ported to the browser.

Update: The add-on is now available on Mozilla's Add-on repository.

Update 2: The original author of uBlock has released an official version of the add-on for Firefox. It is highly recommended to download and use it instead of the -- now no longer updated -- add-on that was released earlier for Firefox.

Summary Article Name Dev version of popular blocker extension µBlock for Firefox released Description A development build of uBlock for Firefox has been released by its author recently indicating that the blocker will soon be available for the browser. Author Martin Brinkmann Publisher Ghacks Technology News Logo

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