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Transformations

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Transformations

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Here is the full list of transformations that are available:

  1. ConvertToAscii
  2. TrimLines
  3. RemoveComments
  4. Compress
  5. RemoveModifiers
  6. InvertAllow
  7. Validate
  8. ValidateAllowIp
  9. Deduplicate
  10. RemoveEmptyLines
  11. InsertFinalNewLine

Please note that these transformations are always applied in the order specified here.

RemoveComments

This is a very simple transformation that simply removes comments (e.g. all rules starting with ! or #).

Compress

[!IMPORTANT] This transformation converts hosts lists into adblock lists.

Here’s what it does:

  1. It converts all rules to adblock-style rules. For instance, 0.0.0.0 example.org will be converted to ||example.org^.
  2. It discards the rules that are now redundant because of other existing rules. For instance, ||example.org blocks example.org and all it’s subdomains, therefore additional rules for the subdomains are now redundant.

RemoveModifiers

By default, AdGuard Home will ignore rules with unsupported modifiers, and all of the modifiers listed here are unsupported. However, the rules with these modifiers are likely to be okay for DNS-level blocking, that’s why you might want to remove them when importing rules from a traditional filter list.

Here is the list of modifiers that will be removed:

  • $third-party and $3p modifiers
  • $document and $doc modifiers
  • $all modifier
  • $popup modifier
  • $network modifier

[!CAUTION] Blindly removing $third-party from traditional ad blocking rules leads to lots of false-positives.

This is exactly why there is an option to exclude rules - you may need to use it.

Validate

This transformation is really crucial if you’re using a filter list for a traditional ad blocker as a source.

It removes dangerous or incompatible rules from the list.

So here’s what it does:

  • Discards domain-specific rules (e.g. ||example.org^$domain=example.com). You don’t want to have domain-specific rules working globally.
  • Discards rules with unsupported modifiers. Click here to learn more about which modifiers are supported.
  • Discards rules that are too short.
  • Discards IP addresses. If you need to keep IP addresses, use ValidateAllowIp instead.
  • Removes rules that block entire top-level domains (TLDs) like ||*.org^, unless they have specific limiting modifiers such as $denyallow, $badfilter, or $client. Examples:
    • ||*.org^ - this rule will be removed
    • ||*.org^$denyallow=example.com - this rule will be kept because it has a limiting modifier

If there are comments preceding the invalid rule, they will be removed as well.

ValidateAllowIp

This transformation exactly repeats the behavior of Validate, but leaves the IP addresses in the lists.

Deduplicate

This transformation simply removes the duplicates from the specified source.

There are two important notes about this transformation:

  1. It keeps the original rules order.
  2. It ignores comments. However, if the comments precede the rule that is being removed, the comments will be also removed.

For instance:

! rule1 comment 1
rule1
! rule1 comment 2
rule1

Here’s what will be left after the transformation:

! rule1 comment 2
rule1

InvertAllow

This transformation converts blocking rules to “allow” rules. Note, that it does nothing to /etc/hosts rules (unless they were previously converted to adblock-style syntax by a different transformation, for example Compress).

There are two important notes about this transformation:

  1. It keeps the original rules order.
  2. It ignores comments, empty lines, /etc/hosts rules and existing “allow” rules.

Example:

Original list:

! comment 1
rule1


# comment 2
192.168.11.11   test.local
@@rule2

Here’s what we will have after applying this transformation:

! comment 1
@@rule1


# comment 2
192.168.11.11   test.local
@@rule2

RemoveEmptyLines

This is a very simple transformation that removes empty lines.

Example:

Original list:

rule1


rule2




rule3

Here’s what we will have after applying this transformation:

rule1
rule2
rule3

TrimLines

This is a very simple transformation that removes leading and trailing spaces/tabs.

Example:

Original list:

rule1
   rule2
rule3
    rule4

Here’s what we will have after applying this transformation:

rule1
rule2
rule3
rule4

InsertFinalNewLine

This is a very simple transformation that inserts a final newline.

Example:

Original list:

rule1
rule2
rule3

Here’s what we will have after applying this transformation:

rule1
rule2
rule3

RemoveEmptyLines doesn’t delete this empty row due to the execution order.

ConvertToAscii

This transformation converts all non-ASCII characters to their ASCII equivalents. It is always performed first.

Example:

Original list:

||*.рус^
||*.कॉम^
||*.セール^

Here’s what we will have after applying this transformation:

||*.xn--p1acf^
||*.xn--11b4c3d^
||*.xn--1qqw23a^