KolbasovAnton
commented
3 months ago @semiazas Greetings! Thank You for detailed comment, we'll take note of these suggestions. Some improvements and changes of filtering log will already be present in 8th version of AdGuard. What about Your case, list of all user's actions since the installation of program can be found in logs (hidden folder "C:\ProgramData\Adguard\Logs" or Settings -> Export logs in AdGuard), though it requires some technical knowledge.
Issue Details
I attempted to determine what resource was triggering an AdGuard block event out of concern that it was a misbehaving web browser. The only resource I found to aid in this was the "filtering log." Clicking the alert balloon did nothing. Unfortunately, once I opened the filter log I discovered multiple elements making it almost useless at figuring out what kicked off the alert. The biggest issue being the log was not a log at all. It wasn't a record of past events, instead it appeared to be "near realtime" event display with records only going back to the moment I started viewing it. This discovery made the alert somewhat useless as the alert did not include the responsible process. Knowing what application responsible is paramount particularly if it's an infection, or misbehaving/adware laden browser. While poking at this I noticed the log does not include timestamps or action taken. Which, at the time being unaware there wasn't a past in the log to search, made finding the event AdGuard's popup warned about VERY difficult. While I now know this is moot given the log's lack of historical data, I think it evident that should the filter log start including past events then including timestamps and action taken in the data displayed will be necessary to aid in its utlity. As it stands, AdGuard is something of a black-box. Having easy access to insight on what an application is doing or, more specifically, what it did, would go a long way to ensuring users of its efficacy. The filtering log helps with this, but it barely does. In my opinion, it fails to serve the purpose most people would look to it for, and finding it was far from intuitive. Not to offend anyone, but as far as an application intended for user protection, such limited insight into what it's doing under the hood is a glaring, almost egregious, lack of usability. Particularly in comparison to directly competing products that do offer these details for anyone curious enough to look. Notifications are nice, but lack context or any relatable details to drill into. If I'm just looking in the wrong place, well, in my defense, there's no clear documentation on where to look anywhere I've been able to find. I did search. Speaking of which, it appears the AdGuard app itself does not have ANY documentation integrated, not even links to online resources (which I personally do not like, web sites die and the internet is unreliable). As well as documentation, the AdGuard GUI could really use links, buttons, and/or drop-downs of all the options only found by right-clicking its system-tray icon.
Proposed solution
If not already doing so, AdGuard needs to record every action taken in a comprehensive but efficient format. These events should be kept for a set amount of time. I suggest at least 90 days if not longer. The filtering log display needs additional timestamp and action taken columns. The AdGuard GUI needs buttons, links, drop-downs, or whatever is appropriate, for all the options available from right-clicking the AdGuard system-tray icon. The GUI needs integrated documentation, particularly documentation explaining settings and how to tell what is AdGuard actually doing. Documentation explaining the elements of the filter log and how to interpret events would be very useful too. Also, if at ALL possible, offer more formats for filter log export than JSON, for example, CSV (PLEASE). Very few commonly available utilties are JSON friendly. For example, Excel/LibreOffice Calc would be very useful for log analysis but not when the data is in JSON.
Alternative solution
No response