A better pop-up window killer: WebWasher

WebWasher started up and knew what to do without a mouse click or keyboard clack from me.

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Al Fasoldt's reviews and commentaries, continuously available online since 1983

A better pop-up window killer: WebWasher (and it's free)

Nov. 28, 2001

By Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 2001, Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 2001, The Post Standard

   Pop-up windows continue to be the No. 1 annoyance on the Web.
   I recently praised Pop-Up Stopper (www.panicware.com), a free program for Windows that keeps pop-up windows off the screen. But Pop-Up Stopper does not work on Macintosh or Linux computers.
   Many readers wrote to remind me that a review I wrote in May, 1999 introduced them to another browser utility that gets rid of pop-up windows. It's WebWasher, a free program from a German company of the same name. I had mistakenly assumed that WebWasher worked only on Windows PCs, but I learned from some faithful Mac fans that there's a version for Macintoshes. When I went to the WebWasher site to find out more, I was surprised to find out that the company has a version for Linux, too.
   The download site is www.webwasher.com. You're expected to pay for WebWasher if you are going to use it in an office or any other commercial setting, but it's free otherwise.
   I quickly downloaded the latest Windows version and installed it on my Windows 2000 PC. I don't have a Mac at home, where I do all my Web testing, so I wasn't able to check the performance of the Mac version. Other users, however, have praised the Mac version and have not reported serious problems. My Linux PC has a bad part and could not be fired up for testing the Linux version.
   The first thing I noticed was that WebWasher started up and knew what to do without a mouse click or keyboard clack from me. It needed no configuration. I run Internet Explorer 5.5 on my Windows 2000 PC, and that might have helped WebWasher, so I can't say for sure if Netscape and Opera browser users will need to change the defaults in WebWasher.
   I also found that WebWasher banished pop-up windows better than any other program I've tried. (I've installed four or five others besides the ones I've written about; they weren't even worth mentioning.) It never asked me to decide anything and never wanted me to hold down a key while clicking on a link, the way some of the other pop-up stoppers do. It just plain worked.
   WebWasher also blocked a lot of banner ads and other annoying items. It did a splendid job.
   As a confirmed fan of the world's greatest Web cookie filter, Cookie Pal, I didn't dare let WebWasher take over cookie management, so I can't say how it did in that area. But if you don't want to buy Cookie Pal ($15 from www.kburra.com), you can use WebWasher's cookie filter instead. (Let me urge you to do the right thing and run Cookie Pal if you are a Windows user who cares about privacy, however.)
   The Windows version of WebWasher is known to work well under Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows NT and Windows 2000. It should work fine under Windows XP also.