Facebook Purity removes annoying quiz messages etc from your Facebook Homepage
If you are like me and are sick to death of seeing messages about quiz results and other silly facebook applications, then you have come to the right place! I wrote a greasemonkey script that removes all the annoying quiz messages and other silly application spam from your facebook homepage. Leaving behind just the standard Facebook apps such as status updates, wall posts, links, notes, photos, etc.
Facebook Purity – Cleans the stains other powders leave behind!
The script is compatible with Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera and Safari.
Donate
If this script helps you out, and makes your life easier why not repay the favour, by making a donation, big or small, anything is welcome
Firefox Installation Instructions
The easiest way to install the script is to first be using the Firefox web browser. If you dont already have it its simple to download and install. Once you have that running, you need to install the Greasemonkey addon, which is very fast to download and again is easy and straight forward to get going.
Once you have that installed, you can then install the script by simply clicking this link: Facebook Purity Greasemonkey Script
Installing on other browsers
Installing the script on other web browsers, is a bit more complicated, the following links explain how to install GM scripts on Chrome, Opera and Safari.
Google Chrome – Greasemonkey instructions: http://bit.ly/chromegm
Opera – Greasemonkey instructions: http://bit.ly/operagm
Safari – Greasemonkey instructions: http://bit.ly/safarigm
Tell your friends about the script too
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Script updated 2nd November 2009
v2.1
- reset show/hide mode to default when user changes fb filter
- added workaround for fb still showing apps that you have “blocked”, script now “hides” app as well as blocking it
- fixed bug with whitelisted apps being displayed via the “show hidden apps” filter
- fixed – “block application” link wasnt showing up on dynamically inserted app messages
Script updated 31st October 2009
v2.0
- fixed the Show / Hide logic of the application and “extra” filters
- made the application + “extra” filters mutually exclusive
- made sure newly added elements obey the current filter
- optimised the script a lot
- moved the fbpurity panel to right of the livefeed/newsfeed links to regain vertical space on the righthand column
Script updated 28th October 2009
v1.9 As well as blocking application messages it now also blocks messages telling you “x became friends with y”, “x is attending an event”, “x joined a group” and “x became a fan of y”, you can easily click the new “extras x [ Show ]” link to see them again if you so wish.
Script updated 26th October 2009
v1.8e script now hides certain apps that were getting past the filter, and should also now be restricted to running on the homepage, also the blocked app message counter should work better now.
Script updated 23rd October 2009
Well looks like facebook have updated their code again, which means ive had to update the script to work with the changes again, also fixed some other minor issues, see release notes in script for more info.
Script updated 22nd October 2009
In this update I added a “Block Application” link that lets you block the applications rather than just simply hiding them. This stops them getting any information about you, stops people sending you requests to add the app and sending you messages etc. I also changed the way the “Show/Hide” app messages link works, the [ Show ] link now isolates the application messages and hides the normal newsfeed messages while you look them over, clicking the [ Hide ] link, will return your feed to normal, i.e hide the application messages, and show the normal feed messages. I’ve also added the Blackberry application to the default whitelist. Remember, if you have edited the application whitelist in the previous version of the script, to copy the application IDs from there, and paste them into the new version
Script updated 14th October 2009
I optimised the script a bit and also added a few more apps to the default whitelist ( tumbler, digsby and tweetdeck ). Please note if you have previously edited the scripts whitelist, please make a copy of your list of IDs before updating the script, as you will need to paste in your list to the new version after you have updated the script.
Script updated 4th September 2009 – Rather than a change in the FB code, this time the reason for the update is the new Facebook application for the Iphone, which posts messages to your homepage as if it was a third party application, and therefore gets blocked. Ive updated the script so it no longer blocks messages from the Iphone app. I’ve also altered the code to make it easier to add other applications to your own personal whitelist, which means a list of applications that won’t get blocked by the script. I’ve also added “Selective Twitter” and “Living Social” to the default whitelist. Instructions on how to edit the whitelist
Script updated 26th August 2009 – Yet another code change at FB, means yet another update to the script. Reinstall the script from the link above for the fixed version. If it still doesn’t work after reinstalling, try clearing your browser’s cache, then reinstalling again, as the browser might have cached an old copy of the script. Also check whether you have more than one version of the script running at the same time, you can check this in the Tools/Greasemonkey/Manage Userscripts menu. There should only be one version of the script running, if theres more, uninstall the old version/s.
Script updated 5th August 2009 – Yet another code change at FB, means yet another update to the script. Reinstall the script from the link above for the fixed version.
Script updated 29th July 2009 - Due to a code change at facebook, the script was hiding the whole newsfeed. To remedy this, first uninstall the old version of the script, by going to the Firefox “Tools” menu, then selecting “Greasemonkey” then “Manage UserScripts” then click the Facebook Purity script then click the uninstall button, then re-install the updated version from the link above. ( N.B) if fb purity still isnt working for you after this, try clearing your browsers cache, then re-installing again, as your browser may have cached a copy of the old script.
Script updated 24th June 2009 - to fix a bug. Due to a code change at facebook, the whole newsfeed was getting hidden. Simply re-install the script from the link above for the fixed version.
Script updated 27th April 2009 – script is now compatible with Google Chrome , Opera and Safari.
[...] now. If you have the script installed, i would recommend you reinstall it, you can get the script here addthis_url = [...]
ps. I still appreciate the work done by the author of this code. Works like a charm on everything else! Thank you.
Great job on this userscript — made me reenable Greasemonkey again after several months of dormancy.
Tod glad u like it
facebugged ah i understand now, sorry, for the misunderstanding. dont know of anything that will do what you want
I’d like to make a $10.00 US donation. Paypal is pricing it in some other currency – the Euro? Anyway, how much is the equivalent of $10.00 US?
tom, the currency GBP is english pounds (£) and according to http://xe.com the currency converter site, $10 is £6.82 english pounds, cheers!
Absolutely wonderful Greasemonkey script. No longer will I have to find out what character someone is in Twighlight.
Thank you!
This is an awesome script and works on my Mac with Firefox 3, but in Linux Firefox 2 it doesn’t seem to work. Might just be my setup but just thought I’d mention it in case it really is a bug.
thanks again for this great, clever script!
r yes the script requires FF3
This script is just what I needed. Thanks!
You are a beautiful person and if I was a woman I would want to have your child.
hehe
Thank you very much for FB Purity! It’s great!!! I like FB without quiz messages… Ou, happy day
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
Works great and hope you get rich on this little gem.
S Ferguson, thats highly unlikely, considering virtually nobody bothers donating…
Installed today and most things have been blocked, but I just had a quiz show up on my newsfeed about an hour ago. Has the script been compromised?
Thank you so much, I’m actually happy to use Facebook again!
Thanks for this great script… works like a charm!
i love you! thx!
no more stupid quizzes, yay!
thanks
Excellent! Thank you!
You are truly an awesome human being. Thank you thank you thank you. I love my Facebook friends but I really do hate quizzes…
Great idea – thank you
You are a genius!!! One of the most impressive script I have ever wished and installed!
Thank you! I am turning all of my friends on to Facebook Purity. May your coffers fill with donations for this incredible contribution.
All hail to the genius who did this script! I can finally use facebook again without having 3 million new quizzes about how close my friends are alike stuff.
Thanks a lot – I hope that donate button will be used by a lot of other people as well!
Brilliant!
Thanks so very much.
you’re the best!
I am using the script with Safari (under OS/X 10.4.11 and OS/X 10.5.6) and works great. One feature is that the script name ends up being very large because of the @name line content. Suggest a shorter line and rely on @description.
I also use your script with Firefox on Ubuntu Linux. Very easy to install and use.
Hacked the script to eliminate messages with “tired”, “work”, “gym” and “Yankees”. Changed the message to say “FB Purity hid: n apps + m msgs”. My new counter is called inanemessagecounter. I copied your loop and trigger on UIIntentionalStory_Message.
Hope this is OK with you as long as I don’t distribute my version.
Thank you so very much for this! Finally my life can be reclaimed from knowing which Star Trek captain / WWII fighter jet / web browser / flavor of muffin all my friends are.
Seems ok now. I hope that doesn’t happen again. I like how it blocks all the Mafia Wars and silly quiz stuff.
I’ve been loving this script for awhile… but just tonight I think Facebook updated something. Now ALL updates are blocked not just the quiz/app things. Took me awhile to figure out why my feed was empty.
Help?
Wow! I’ve been searching for something like this for months. And like another user, I dusted off Greasemonkey (which I had been using to clean up MySpace, which I haven’t used in months). If it works as well as I suspect, you’ll definitely be getting my donation. I’ve already tweeted it.
ive updated the script to work with the latest facebook code change, please re-install the script to get it working again, cheers!
thanks for the quick fix!! i love this script.
this. is. brilliant.
thank you!
i would like to thank you with money (words are cheap) but can’t do a cc donation/paypal. if you’re willing to accept cashola by mail, please email me an address and £5 will find their way to you.
best to you,
hal
thanks for the quick resolution, i’ve made a small (3 pound) donation via paypal.. keep up the good work..facebook is a better place with this
Great script! THANK YOU so much!
Thanks for fixing the bug so quickly! Love this app!
I reinstalled; all better now. Thanks. Keep up the good work!
I didn’t realize how I truly adored you until this broke and I was subjected to those freakin quizzes again! Thanks for fixing and here’s some paypal coming your way. Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you.
I LOVE YOU WILL YOU BEAR MY CHILDREN
Installed Firefox 3.5 and while greasemonkey is there, FB Purity no longer works.
Right click on Greasemonkey and it says No Scripts Installed.
So I brough up Greasemonkey and manually uninstalled FB Purity and then re-installed it.
Now it works.
Great script. As others have noted, thanks for staying on top of updates.
what I’d love next: a greasemonkey script for Facebook that folds and unfolds comments to posts on one’s wall. With a +/- control widget for unfolding/folding.
Thanks for the update!
Thanks for making Facebook usable again!
This is a godsend, FB is usable again. Thanks for the update as well! Keep up the good work!
Thank you SOOOOO much!!!!!!!!
you have given a gift to humanity. I will now make a gift to you.
Thanks for making Facebook actually useful again. The important bits of information were getting lost in the spammy deluge… This is simply a must have for anyone that uses Facebook as a productivity tool.
Thank you!
-b
Well, it looks like Facebook have it in for FB Purity. They’ve broken it again, and it’s hiding everything
Do you think Facebook is making changes deliberately to cause Facebook purity break?
Between FB Purity and Adblock Plus on Firefox, makes my Facebook experience a whole lot more pleasant.
Thanks.
Yup, same problem today with the script blocking the whole Home page. Would love to see an update – you don’t realize how much you depend on the script until it goes wonky.
Yeah, same problem here … all home page posts are now blocked. Sounds like Facebook is trying to fight back against this … now why would they do that?
I apologise for my rudeness in my last comment in which I basically just sort of grunted “broken again.” I should’ve also mentioned that I love this script, it makes me happy.
Yeah it’s blocking everything again.. Bloody FB! Though I must say your purity might be a small step for man, it’s a gigantic step for mankind!!
This is one of the best greasemonkey scripts ever, can you please update it? Since today, it’s blocking the whole feed.
Thanks for the great work!
It’s blocking ALL the messages again. Please Fix It!!!
I’m getting a cramp in my index finger from all the scrolling, and if I have to see one more Farm Town or Mafia War – I’m going to run screaming.
Broken again…thanks so much, FB, for making look at your stupid polls and surveys.
Maybe there’s a “polls & surveys (& quizzes!)” lobby out there pressuring Facebook to subvert FB. *sigh*
steeev, I still think your script rox. It makes Facebook bearable. Looking fwd to the fix! THANK YOU.
I really hope FB isn’t doing this on purpose.
@tuff, I agree. They keep changing FB to break FP.
I just donated 20e for some motivation
looks like FB have changed it again aaaargh its horrible
Toff, I wouldn’t be surprised if FB was intentionally trying to shut down Purity. I think they make money from those polls & surveys.
I absolutely love the script, and think facebook sucks balls for making their code interfere with this script. Looking forward to a fix because facebook just became unbearable again.
For those of you whose eyes gloss over at the talk of “scripts”, all I did was uninstall and re-install. It works. It seems that the edits proposed by nrgyz were already included in the new script included above.
Elisabeth is right, ive updated the script to work with the new facebook code change. To get it working again, uninstall the old version of the script, then install the new fixed version. Cheers!
–steve
Thanks! you rule.
Thanks for staying on top of the code changes!!!!
I really love this script! Thanks!
God, I love this script. steeev, yu da bom.
Thank you! Dropping a fiver in the PayPal kitty…
THANK YOU !!!!!!
Hey normally I don’t reply to things like this, but I’m really greatful for the wonderfull Script and especially routine updates when needed. Thanks so much!
Works great now, thanks for your dedication!
Awesome work on the fix/update. Damn FB for constantly changing their script to mess with this app. This is great work guys, keep it up.
Thank you
For Google Chrome users, things have changed since the first few script updates.
How To is here…
http://dev.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/user-scripts
Once again, thanks!
It’s alive again… Thank you for this wonder.
Some paypal bucks on their way dude.
Again. Thank you for this awsome script… 
good work, thanks for the update!
Glad that you updated this again, you’ve put down my level of annoyance a notch or two! Thanks!
Thanks for the quick fix. You are awesome.
Thank you so much, I was waiting for the update on fire
var crappyappmsgcounter=0;…
cleartheshizzle(document);…
LOL gotta love the say-it-like-it-is attitude!!
keep up the good work, mate! excellent!
thank god for that update! cheers!
Now it is not blocking the quiz , only hides the time it was posted, comments and ‘like’ column…
seems facebook dislike ppl like us !!!
fb has changed their code yet again, this is getting silly… ive updated the script yet again… reinstall the script from the link above, for the new version (5th August 2009) if it doesnt work, clear the browser cache then reinstall again.
Facebook are worse than Microsoft in terms of aggravating their users…
Steeev, you are a hero. You make FB bearable. Thank you for being so on top of this. Paypaling you a beer. (unless you’ve been able to write a script for Paypal, you’ll have to order it yourself)
dude ur awesome, Just logged on this mosring to FB and saw a load of these stupid quizes and was like “goddamn, hope the script updated too” and behold it was, very nice.
Keep up the great work, thanks
Thanks kids- appreciate that someone is fighting the war! Keep up the good work for the sake of our children
Thanks! It works again!!!
Thank you million times! You saved the world again!
You are awesomeness personified!!!
I am still loving this wonderful script and showing it to all my friends… If you can manage to get FB to stop with the “Become a Fan of” suggestions you would make the world a better place.
Thanks for making facebook useful again.
Would just like to echo what Steeev said about clearing the browser cache.. I was worried for a second that the newest version was broken the very day I install it… But no.. a good flush out of the cache does the trick.
Do you have a Facebook account that we can subscribe to in Facebook? That way, any time you update the script, you could let us all know instantly by simply updating your Facebook status.
I LOVE this. Thank you!!!
It has stopped working! Why so??? Has facebook changed again?
yes facebook have changed their code again, am working on a fix now… stay tuned …
ive updated the script again, clear your browser’s cache ( http://www.wikihow.com/Clear-Your-Browser%27s-Cache ), then reinstall the script to get it working again.
Thx steeev…work perfectly again
Thanks for the update Steeev, You rock!
Thanks once again!
As much as I appreciate the constant updates by the Purity scriptwriters, it really stinks that I have to come and update it every few weeks when Facebook changes their code.
Is this going to be an ongoing issue with them? In other words, is Facebook actively trying to keep making the Purity script obsolete to its users?
Seems like FB Purity is blocking all updates posted by the new iPhone Facebook app (version 3.0).
Also…. The script is blocking users who post status updates from the new Facebook app on the iPhone (just released this evening.)
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! …
Hello steeev!
First of all, thanks for great script. It really does what it should do. Remove all the messages of apps. But maybe you should reconsider this. All App-Messages? Today, there are a lot of iphone-users and they use the facebook-app for iphone to post their state-updates. But this updates also get hidden by your script. I looked inside your script and added an exception so that this posts do not get hidden:
footernodes[i].innerHTML.match(’facebook\.com\/apps\/’) && /* ADD EXCEPTION */ !footernodes[i].innerHTML.match(’id=6628568379′ /* EXCEPTION END */)
Just a little tip you might to think about. I don’t know if FB will change the application ids that often, so this might be a good solution to add exceptions.
Hey!
Thank you for your efforts. Great work! I can’t use FB without it anymore.
BTW one call for Roberts suggestion above!
Greets Josef!
Thanks for the script!
And thanks Robert (recent commenter) for the iPhone app fix!
Hi Steeev,
Many thanks for this script and in keeping it so regularly updated. I was going to post something similar to Robert, except I thought that the iPhone app updates being blocked was a mistake, now I see it’s part of how you block the other apps. The iPhone updates are legitimate status updates so they need to be able to get through the filter. I’m going to try adding Robert’s exception for the time being until your next update. Thanks again!
Hello Steeev!
Thanx for the fast update of your code.
.
Nice work on the application-id-whitelist-array.
I would’ve done something similar
I’m lucky that in the meantime i could help some people with a dirtier solution til you posted your updated script.
Have a nice sunday!
Greetings from austria, Robert
Wow this is amazing! LOVE it, helps a lot to clean up the feed of all that trash =)
Thanks for the script!
It makes my life easier. Haha!
ps.
otherwise this is a GREAT script i’ve suggested it to many people…
probably my most valued greasemonkey tweak
I do not like facebook apps – thank you!
thank you sooo much!!!
Many thanks for this script! Fecking facebook apps were starting to make the whole thing impractical.
I just tried to post a heads-up about the new revision of the script in my Facebook news feed, and added a link to the script itself. Facebook refused to post it, saying it was “Some content in this message has been reported as abusive by Facebook users”! So tried to post a link to this page instead – same “Blocked content” error. Remove the link, the post works fine.
Methinks someone at Facebook doesn’t like FB Purity.
I just did the same as Anthony and got the same result. Damn Facebook don’t want too many ppl using this great Greasemonkey script!
Oh and by the way, thank you so much!!!
As Brad and Anthony did, so did I try – and with the same result. However, you can post a remark in your status (I don’t know if that’s what you call it since I use Facebook in danish) if you insert a space between each charracter in the link. Just remember to include a remark about removing the spaces in the link…
Thanks for updating again, must be annoying when FB keep making updates
brad and anthony and asbjorn and everyone else, i just tested posting a link to this page on facebook and it worked fine, the link i used is http://bit.ly/fbpure it redirects here, its nice and easy to remember and works fine!
oops, was a small bug in the latest release. if the script stopped working for you after installing this latest version, please clear your browsers cache and reinstall it,
cheers,
steve
Thanks for a great script and for your tireless efforts in keeping it updated. Sent you a beer via Paypal.
it looks like facebook is blocking both bit.ly and direct links to my website now, but ive come up with a solution, please use the following link http://flic.kr/p/7b8iw8 to link to my site, it is an indirect link, but gets round facebooks stupid block on my site.
I’m impressed – your script is so good at circumventing FB’s attempts to ‘improve’ the interface (e.g. inundate us with B.S.) that you finally pissed them off. Keep up the good work!
thank u so much for the script… u make FB so much more frndly to use…
cool script man, thank you very much!
This is, hands down, the best script for facebook.
thanks holly, cherub, markus, andre and all for the positive feedback, and thanks to those that have donated, its much appreciated! you may be pleased to know a new version that fixes some of the scripts quirks is imminent!
I ADORE Facebook Purity! It gives me exactly what I want on my live feed! Thanks again for also blocking all the friending and fanning on the live feed. That was at least as annoying as all the apps! You might want to know, though, that I can’t link to your site anymore. It looks like some facebook users have marked it as abusive and I keep getting a message that it’s blocked. That is very sad! I want all my friends to know about this program and use it!
hi jeri,
im glad you like the script, im aware that facebook are blocking links to my site, i guess they dont like people having control over what they want to see in their facebook homepage…
there is a solution though, if you want to tell your friends about the script, please use the following link http://www.facebook.com/fbpurity its the facebook purity fan page, and it has a link in the left hand column, under the title “Get Facebook Purity Now!”, this link is not affected by the block, i.e you can click the link from the fan page and get directly to this page. though if you try and copy and paste the http://bit.ly/fbpure link directly in facebook, it will get blocked. i hope that makes sense…
steeev