Monday, November 11, 2013

How to view, edit and delete cookies without CookieSpy

Hi there! In this quite a long blog post I will describe how you could manage cookies with help of build in tools of browser’s itself. I will cover all the browsers that are supported by CookieSpy. By the way, the images are clickable so click on them to see better.

 

Internet Explorer

Let’s start form the most popular web browser in the word Smile. Internet Explorer has very limited abilities to manage cookies. There is no ability to view and edit cookies or delete a specific cookie. You can delete all cookies only  but half a load is better then nothing.

1. Open “Internet Options” dialog (press on Options button image and click on Internet Options menu item).

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2. on the “General” tab press “Delete…” button. “Delete Browsing History” dialog will appear.

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Make sure that option “Cookies and website data” is on and press “Delete” button.

Google Chrome (Google Chrome Canary, Opera 15 and above, Comodo Dragon, Yandex and other Chromium based browsers)

Google Chrome has the advanced means for managing cookies. You can search for cookies, view and delete specific cookie and remove all cookies with click of a button but there is no ability to edit a cookie.

1. Press on  Google Chrome Options button image and click on “Settings” menu item.

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2. Scroll down settings to the end and click on “Show advanced settings” link.

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3. Locate “Privacy” settings group and click on “Content Settings…” button.

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4. The “Content Settings” box will appear. Click on “All cookies and site data” button

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5. The “Cookies and site data” box display cookies grouped by web site name (by domain in terms of CookieSpy). In order to view cookies for a web site click on the row for the web site.

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To view details of a cookie click on the cookie name box

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Firefox (Mozilla SeaMonkey, Pale Moon)

Firefox along side with Google Chrome has very good tools for managing cookies. You can search for and view cookies. Delete specific cookie or all at once but as a common practice there is no ability to edit cookies data.

In order to view cookies in Firefox do the following steps:

1. Press on Firefox button image then click no “Options” menu items and “Options” sub menu item.

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2. Switch to “Privacy” tab and click on “remove individual cookies” link.

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3. “Cookies” box will appear. Cookies presented in a tree are grouped by web site name

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Apple Safari

Apple Safari has very limited abilities to manage cookies. No build in means to view, edit or delete specific cookies.

To view cookies in Safari do the following:

1. Press on “Options” image button and click on “Preferences” menu item.

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2. Switch to “Privacy” tab and click on “Details” button

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3. The Privacy details box with web sites cookies, cache and other data will occur. Data are groped by web site name.

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Opera 12 (and below)

That version on Opera browser has the most advanced tools to manage cookies.

1. Click on Opera button image, then select “Settings” menu item and click on “Delete Private Data” sub menu item.

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2. On “Delete Private Data” box press on  “Manage Cookies” button

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3. “Cookie Manager” box will appear. Cookies are grouped by web site name (domain). if one expand a node for a web site the site’s cookies are shown. In order to view and edit properties of a cookie select it and press on “Edit…” button.

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Maxthon

Maxthon similar to Internet Explorer has very poor tools to manage cookies. You can only delete all cookies for all web sites with build in tools of the browser.

1. Press on Options button and click on “Clear browsing history” menu item

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2. Make sure that option “Delete cookies” is turned on and press on “Clear now” button.

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Wednesday, October 30, 2013

How to clear cookies with help of CookieSpy

There is no special command in CookieSpy to delete all cookies for specific browser but it is easy to do with a shortcut for selection of all cookies – Ctrl+A. So in order to clear cookies in CookieSpy do the following:

  • Press Ctrl+A shortcut to select all cookies for a browser.
  • Press Delete key or select “Delete” menu item from content menu.

Clear cookies in Google Chrome

That is it. CookieSpy will delete all cookies except one that marked as protected.

Monday, October 21, 2013

What is new in CookieSpy 5.0

The new version of CookieSpy is packed with a bunch of new features. In that article I will describe what are they, where they reside and how to use them.

 

Protecting of cookies from being edited or deleted in CookieSpy

CookieSpy allows you to marks some cookies as “protected”. It means that such cookies will not be able to modify or delete with help of CookieSpy. Protected cookies are marked with an icon of a lock and the color of font of entire row becomes gray. On the screenshot below a cookies “s_ppv” for apple.com is marked as protected.

Protect2

In order to protect a cookie select it first, then by right click show a context menu and select “Project” menu item. To remove protection form a cookie select “Unprotect” menu item form content menu of the cookie.

Keep in mind that protection of a cookie in the CookieSpy does not prevent it from modification with help of a browser or other applications.

 

Statistics of cookies usages

That feature displays how many times a cookie’s name occurs on different web sites that you have visit in a browser. CookieSpy calculates statistics for each web browser individually.

To view statistics for a browser do the following:

1. Open Options of CookieSpy (Press clip_image004 icon on the right top corner)

2. Select the menu item “Statistics for <Browser Name>”. For instance, if a tab for Internet Explorer cookies is active the menu item has name “Statists for Internet Explorer”. If you switch to Firefox cookies, the menu item will change it name to “Statists for Firefox”.

As you can see on screenshot below, for web sites I visit most in Internet Explorer, the Google Analytics cookies are most popular.

CookieStat

 

Displays information about known cookies

CookieSpy can provide you short description of some widespread cookies. In order to view information about a cookie select “Get Info” menu item form context menu of the cookie.

CookieSpy shows name of the cookie, short description and a URL to the page where the cookie information is form.

Cookie Info

 

More browsers are supported

Two more browsers are added in CookieSpy 5.0. They are Yandex browser and Opera 15 (and above).

imageThe Yandex browser is a browser that was built by Russian company Yandex (Яндекс) and is based on Chromium browser.

 

imageOpera 15 is a brand new browser from Norway company Opera Software and it also is based on Chromium source code as well.

 

Please keep in mind if you do not have that browser installed you will not see them in CookieSpy.

Do not hesitate to send me any feedback on new features and thank you for using CookieSpy!

Sunday, October 20, 2013

CookieSpy's blog – the official blog of CookieSpy


Hi there! Let me introduce myself. My name is Andrei. I’m the person behind CookieSpy. In the blog I will announce new releases, post articles with tips, answer frequent questions regarding CookieSpy.

I’d be happy to get your feedback.  If you have any comments, suggestions please email me at support@cookiespy.com.