Tune ubuntu for web browsing

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In order to tune web browsing on ubuntu we need to make tiny configuration changes ranging from disabling ipv6 to tuning Firefox browser.

Disable IPv6

Open the file "/etc/modprobe.d/aliases" as super user and change the line from 

alias net-pf-10 ipv6
to 
alias net-pf-10 off
save the file and close it.

Cache DNS requests

We are going to install a local DNS server to cache first time requests. Subsequent lookups will be resolved locally with out contacting remote DNS server. dnsmasq is a tiny DNS server and it is useful for this purpose. To install dnsmasq execute following command.
sudo apt-get -y install dnsmasq
Open the file /etc/dnsmasq.conf as super user and change the line from 
#listen-address=
to 
listen-address=127.0.0.1
save the file and close it. Open another file /etc/dhcp3/dhclient.conf as super user. Find the following line and uncomment it. 
#prepend domain-name-servers 127.0.0.1;
save the file and close it. Restart the system for changes to take effect.

Firefox Tweaks

  • Install Adblock plus addon to remove unnecessery ads from webpages.
  • Install Fasterfox addon to tweak max simultanious connections, http pipelining, dns caching, web page rendering, etc...

Tips

  • Use opendns DNS servers to block malicious urls, and speedup initial lookups. Use opendns "Get Started" guide to congiure your machine or router.

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