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There is a point when enough is enough. And it is now. Ads, vids, pop up, hover, cover, whizz-bang doodle bling and autoplay … I can't stand it any more. With HTML5, this ad crap has become a plight on the Internet, and decisive counter-measures have to be taken.

I'm using IE11 on Windows 7 and 8.1 (no Edge/10 for me, no Firefox, no Chrome, no thanks). You can neutralize Flash by uninstalling or via menu » Security » ActiveX filtering. But there is no way to disable iframes of html5 video in IE11, which are major sources of annoyance.

So I decided to go nuclear and disable Javascript. Whow! A massive improvement! Tons of crap pulled in via ridiculously inefficient pre-alpha Javascript garbage won't be downloaded to your computer any more, and your CPU won't be sent spinning any more, taskmgr will only spike for page loads and spend most of its time peacefully flatlining away.

The war on ads really can be led as a war on (unsolicited) Javascript.

The downside, of course, is that, as collateral damage, many sites will lose functionality, so you have to add them to IE's Trusted Zone where you still allow Javascript execution. To transfer your list of trusted sites to another machine, dump this key:

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\Domains

To find out what sites you need to allow, use the network tab on the F12 tool.

So I find things are much improved using this simple and efficient nuclear Javascript blocker, but IE still seems to be requesting Javascript files from sites. (It does request these files when opening the F12 tool.) So, hmm, why download stuff you're not allowed to execute anyway? That doesn't seem to be very smart.

Is there a way, in IE11, to prevent HTTP requests for Javascript files, at least those for URLs ending in .js, which is the large majority of Javascript out there, from being executed?

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    I voted this question down because you don't seem to actually have a question that is on topic. You indicate what your problem is, you then proceed to resolve it, but then ask some really broad question that would only lead to a discussion on said topic. I voted to close for similar reasons.
    – Ramhound
    Oct 21, 2015 at 16:56
  • Like Ramhound said, this question needs to be a little more concise and address the actual problem you're intending to solve. As it is, it's very broad and will simply lead to discussion rather than a solution.
    – user201262
    Oct 21, 2015 at 16:59
  • You may get better results with something like Blocking Unwanted Connections with a Hosts File. Other hosts files are available.
    – Andrew Morton
    Oct 21, 2015 at 17:50
  • @Ramhound: My question is precise and on topic, not broad as you bizarrely claim; looks like you didn't read the title, nor the last paragraph. I fear you do not know the answer because you don't know IE well enough (which is perfectly okay) and hence elect to act against a question that a more knowledgeable user may be able to answer (which is questionable demeanour). As a rule, if you don't have anything useful to contribute, then don't. - @Andrew, HOSTS.TXT won't prevent requests (but yes, it can defeat them to 127.0.0.1); another problem is it cannot single out Javascript requests.
    – Lumi
    Oct 21, 2015 at 21:18
  • So what exactly is this clear ontopic question because I don't see it. If you make it clear I am more then happy to reverse my vote and retract my close vote.
    – Ramhound
    Oct 21, 2015 at 23:29

1 Answer 1

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To hook into the request phase, IE provides the BeforeNavigate2, where you can make use of the Cancel parameter. However, it is reported (haven't tried it yet) that this hook won't fire for derivative requests (Javascript, CSS, etc). In order to suppress that kind of request, you'd need to follow Igor Tandetnik's Passthrough APP approach referred to in the page I linked to. You'll then find it'll serialize requests, thus hurting performance; which can be avoided by patching the vtbl of the COM object on the HTTP/S protocols as suggested on that page. Which is a rather involved approach. You then end up with a BHO, which is not Bosnia-Herzegovina, but a Browser Helper Object.

While the question clearly fits the SuperUser format, it just so happens that Microsoft has not made this configurable and not even satisfactorily programmable, so the answer is a bit more involved than installing a browser extension …

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