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meetDeveloper / Dictionary-Anywhere

Dictionary extension that helps you stay focused on what you are reading by eliminating the need to search for meaning.
GNU General Public License v3.0
253 stars 53 forks source link

Dictionary not working when VPN is enabled #37

Open Tarkus56 opened 3 years ago

Tarkus56 commented 3 years ago

Any idea why NordVPN running on pfsense would block results from returning? It works fine when I turn off the VPN.

meetDeveloper commented 3 years ago

I use google to find meaning and it is possible that that is being blocked by the VPN. @Tarkus56

Tarkus56 commented 3 years ago

Would it be possible to add in options radio buttons for preferred translators? Google by default and perhaps duckduckgo.com and perhaps others that a user could select from?

Thank you for a wonderful app!

zboor1234 commented 3 years ago

SOLUTION It has something to do with Googles interpretation of the IP address that the VPN assigns. There is currently a problem with my VPN (ExpressVPN) where google thinks the address assigned is in the United Arab Emirates. If you're not logged in to Google with your language set to English, then everything is in Arabic. This Dictionary extension does not query Google through a login.

Specific to ExpressVPN: The default smart location for me (I'm in Virginia) is Washington DC. This is the offending location!! If you choose to connect instead through New York, Google recognizes this as a United States IP, sets your language to English, and the Dictonary extension works through the VPN. Problem solved (for me).

Possible Resolution?: If you're using the Google API, is there a way to manually set the location or the language for the query? Or maybe mask the IP address of the user, or assign them some generic IP through trickery (doubt it). Could you go through Startpage instead (I don't think they have an API)? Otherwise everyone will have to try out different connection locations through their VPN until they find one that works. This sucks because the default location optimizes connection speed, so for other locations you may pay the price of a slower connection. To be clear, this is a Google problem and not a VPN problem. If you do a whatsmyip lookup, you'll see that you have a United States IP address even when Google thinks you do not.

Thanks for working on this! You make good stuff!