RE: [school-discuss] filtering with FOSS browsers

["Schmitt, Mark" <MSchmitt@dcds.edu>]

My school currently uses Websense as a filter, and I use Firefox.  I am subject to the exact same filtering rules when using Firefox as I am when I use IE.  The only difference I have noticed is that it harder to get information about the blocking when using Firefox.  For instance, in IE, if a site is blocked, I can see what user Websense thinks I am and what rules apply to that user.  On Firefox, I am unable to get that information, but that is the only difference I have noticed.

 

 

Mark Schmitt

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From: Aaron Tyo-Dickerson [mailto:aaron@tyodickerson.com]
Sent: Friday, October 15, 2004 7:40 AM
To: schoolforge-discuss@schoolforge.net
Subject: [school-discuss] filtering with FOSS browsers

I am attempting to convince a technology coordinator in an local school district to install Firefox in their library and have encountered and unexpected question. "Does Firefox work with Websense?" (Websense is that district's filter.) He seems to believe that IE is uniquely recognized by Websense for filtering purposes. I have taken my iBook to his district and connected to the Web using both Firefox and Mozilla to demonstrate, but he "need[s] to see it on a Windows box", which I do not have.

While I have every confidence that a web browser is a web browser and if Websense blocks access to "bad" sites for one browser, it will block that access for all browsers, I would appreaciate some jargon on this so that I can assure this person that FOSS web browsers so not somehow circumvent his district's need to filter content. (I apologize for all of the forehead-slapping that this may cause among the readers on this list.)

Aaron TD

-- 
"Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem."

William of Ockham (ca. 1285-1349)