FAQ 52: Using updater.exe to automatically get new keywords
Category: Initial setup | Updated: 6/9/2010 5:00:42 PM | Read: 3519 (Last: 9/4/2010 9:21:06 PM) updater.exe is used when running DNS Redirector as an Internet Filter, it can retrieve keyword lists from our site, 3rd party sites, or your own custom files and then combine the lists.
updater.exe assumes BlockedKeywordsFile=blocked.txt in dnsredir.ini (because blocked.txt is the output file)
Don't add your own keywords to blocked.txt directly because they will be overwritten when the update is run. Instead, specify a custom file and check the box to incorporate it into blocked.txt
Launching updater.exe results in the update being run, unless it has not been configured. To reconfigure simply delete updater.ini or run updater.exe /setup
You can automatically run updater.exe every X days via... 2000/XP/2003: Control Panel > Scheduled Tasks Vista/Server 2008: Administrative Tools > Task Scheduler ...define the program as C:\DNSREDIR\updater.exe and the start in or working directory as C:\DNSREDIR
Highly Recommended: check "Consolidate redundant keywords" to remove duplicate lines, keywords superseded by another keyword, and keywords superseded by regex. This makes the block list more efficient and lowers memory usage in DNS Redirector.
Highly Recommended: use update server "updt.dnsredirctrl.com" because this is hosted on Amazon S3 for redundancy and global availability.
"When done run updaterdone.bat" create this file in the working directory to do whatever you want, some examples: - stop the exe, copy in an alternate .ini set to block everything, then start, manually change to the updated list later - send an email that the update was done, attaching the log, manually change to the updated list later - copy the latest blocked.txt to other servers - restart processes locally/remotely using pskill.exe, psexec.exe or sc.exe - stop and start multiple services
Note: With DNS Redirector v7.x a restart is not required, the new blocked.txt will be reloaded automatically. In some instances, restarting dnsredir.exe (or the service) after updater.exe can free up server memory. Below is a sample batch used to restart the service:
Caveats when including custom files... - blank lines/spaces do not get removed during consolidation (any blank lines/spaces will cause everything to be blocked when loaded in DNS Redirector) - the comment character ; before a regex keyword does not remove the line during consolidation (any ; before a regex will cause a crash when loaded in DNS Redirector)
Was this article helpful? Votes so far: 50% in 932
