If you’re a Firefox junky like me, you probably take the built in pop-up blocker for granted. It’s a dandy little feature that helps make browsing bearable. However, you may have noticed that over the past few months, the blocker seems to be letting stuff through. This is due to scumbag pop-up spammers taking a new tactic by using Flash to trigger the new windows. The honeymoon is looking to be at an end.

But, before you hang yourself from the shower curtain rod, there’s a way around this issue. Pour a stiff drink, sit down, tear up the suicide notes (you really aren’t sorry for all the trouble you’ve caused anyway, c’mon) and prepare to do some fixing!

How to stop pop-ups from Flash in Firefox

1. Open a window in Firefox (…duh) and type about:config in the address bar.
2. Right-click (CTRL + click for Mac users) on the page and select New and then Integer.
3. Name it privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins
   
4. Set the value to 2.

That’s it motherfucker! You’re a man now. Have a cigar or something. Buck the fuck up, you did it yourself. Stop slouching. It’s okay to smile, but ain’t a damn thing funny…yadda, yadda, yadda.

To take it further, you can adjust the value of the integer (we’d set it at 2) to customize how strong the pop-up spanking should be:

• 0: Allow all popups from plugins.
• 1: Allow popups, but limit them to dom.popup_maximum.
• 2: Block popups from plugins.
• 3: Block popups from plugins, even on whitelisted sites.

Just thought I’d spread the word. Thanks Pete Bevin for figuring it out and thanks StumbleUpon for bringing it to my attention.

Dongle! It’s true, the only purpose of this post is to use “dongle” as many times as possible. Dongle, dongle, dongle. *sigh*

Seriously though, daveb has been struggling all day with a technical conundrum and endless googling turned up scarce and confusing info. Having finally figured it out, he feels bound to post the steps as simply as he can so that other brain-damaged squirrel humpers like himself can get the job done. With that said, daveb presents to you:

How to install your GPG keys to a USB dongle for WIN XP

1. Install the latest binary version of GnuPG
2. Attach your USB dongle and create a folder named keys, or whatever’s appropriate for you. If you have pre-existing keyrings, place them here.
3. Open REGEDIT (START > RUN > type regedit)
4. In REGEDIT, navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\GNU\GnuPG
5. Right click in the folder and select NEW > STRING VALUE
6. Name it “HomeDir” (without the parenthsis, of course)
7. Right-click the entry and select MODIFY.
8. Under VALUE DATA, type the full path to your desired key folder. For example, daveb’s is F:\keys\ (”F” being the USB dongle). Hit OK.
9. Open a command prompt and type “gpg –version” or “gpg –list-keys”. Check for the Home that is listed, it should now be your dongle and any keys in that folder should now be listed. You’re done!

Now that you’re finished, use a file-shredding program like Eraser to destroy any locally saved copies of your keys. With that done, the only way to encrypt or decrypt with your keys is to have possessin of the dongle. So, keep it safe. You also might want to consider hiding a backup on floppy somewhere (safe deposit box, deserted island, anal cavity) due to the fact that although dongles last a long time, they do have a write-life, depending on your model.