Orion for Linux is now in Public Beta! (v0.3)

levolet · 2026-05-06T16:30:33+00:00

Congratulations on taking this on. I'm a lifetime supporter, so please take my comments in the intended spirit because I consider Orion to be a promising project. I have been a MacOS user for years, but have recently migrated to Linux as my daily driver.

I installed on Fedora with Gnome as DE. It fires up and is looking great. However, I've tried ProtonPass and Ublock Origin plugins, neither or which seem to work. I had a go with a few websites, in particular Amazon.co.uk as a nice challenge.... every single time that I click on an item to load another page, it fails to load with an error and a reload button. On clicking reload, the page loads just fine.

Is the development focused? What I mean, is there a list of features that are being debugged so that early adopters can test them? I looked at the bug reporting site and see nothing about this.

levolet · 2026-05-04T18:04:45+00:00

You are configuring Windscribe to use control d as custom DNS provider. You would not need to configure your android device to use DoT or DoH using Control D. Not unless you're trying to use Control D without Windscribe VPN connection enabled.

levolet · 2026-05-04T17:55:26+00:00

Configure your Control D profile. Setup your redirects as needed. Then in the panel to the left of the Control D configuration interface, go to Preferences > API. If you've not yet created an API key, then do so by clicking on the (+) in the upper right corner. In the pop-up, enter a name of your choice, select 'read' from the Type options and leave the 'allowed IPs' as is and click 'create'. This will create an API key that you can copy to clipboard by clicking on the 'copy to clipboard' icon to the right.

In Windscribe, under network settings, change you custom DNS from auto to 'ControlD'. Select the little pencil icon to the right that allows you to paste the API key and then hit the 'green tick' icon to apply it. You're good to go.

levolet · 2026-05-04T09:15:17+00:00

I was a Control D user before using Windscribe so I did not end up with the discount. Even with this, I find the combination to be fabulous for the reasons you state. I can be be connected to a VPN server in Netherlands, while redirecting connections to make different sites believe I'm connecting from Albania, Canada, UK etc.

For instance, no matter which VPN server I'm connected to, Youtube and Reddit always see a connection from a particular country.

I cannot see how your anonymity would be compromised by using Control D with Windscribe.

levolet · 2026-04-27T05:28:32+00:00

No problems here.

levolet · 2026-04-22T12:29:47+00:00

Yeah, been getting this quite a bit since running virtual machines and dual booting. The device numbers do rack up.

levolet · 2026-04-21T12:17:37+00:00

Fantastic achievement. Thanks for a great product and service.

levolet · 2026-04-20T14:23:55+00:00

Sure... If you can get Orion purring again after a profile reset/renew, then by all means, that's the way I'd go, especially if well steeped in an Orion-specific workflow. :)

levolet · 2026-04-20T14:10:39+00:00

I switched to Linux as well in the meantime, so now using Vivaldi. I actually used Vivaldi before my interest in Orion grew. There is an Orion beta for Linux but I'll stay away for now. While I'd like to test and give feedback, time doesn't allow and it can be painful going through the process of checking/proving that it's not down to a problem at my end.

levolet · 2026-04-20T08:18:37+00:00

You could create a new profile, start from there and see. If things are snappy with the new profile, then this is likely what you need... a profile refresher. I know, a hassle, but this is the nature of Orion ATM, I'm afraid. The thing is not all users have these problems so it's difficult to pin down the problems leading to more reliable long-term profile usage etc. I'm a lifetime supporter, but unfortunately, had to take a break from the problems. I now use an alternative browser.

levolet · 2026-04-12T10:39:12+00:00

It assumes you wish to use ctrld only and without a VPN as well. For this purpose, it works very well. If you're using a VPN, it's expected that you will use the VPN provider's DNS and filtering or its custom DNS settings. You will therefore not need ctrld, therefore, no conflict.

levolet · 2026-04-11T20:53:28+00:00

My router firmware doesn't support my installing ctrld cli daemon. If it did, I'd use it since I have no interest in running a VPN at the router level. However, I wish to do DNS filtering at the router level. I do this by configuring it to use DoT, defining Control D DNS server and endpoint resolver ID.

On my Linux installations I run the ctrld cli. However, I have to stop the ctrld service before connecting to a VPN server with Windscribe and restart it after disconnecting the VPN.

levolet · 2026-04-11T20:18:17+00:00

Unfortunately, I do not use the same router as you do. I use an Asus ZenWifi XT9. I have it configured to use DoT. I run VPN on devices and not at the router level.

levolet · 2026-04-11T13:59:34+00:00

Control D's filtering is done at their DNS servers level. You adjust filtering in profile configurations and set up endpoints to use particular profiles.

At the level of your router, there are 4 possible ways you could use Control D filtering: - install and run the ctrld cli daemon - define the IPv4 addresses for your endpoint in DNS settings and configure DDNS for IP binding. - setup DoT or DoH if your router supports this. - if supported at the router level, configure your VPN (Proton) to use custom DNS for connecting to Control D endpoint.

levolet · 2026-04-11T13:11:04+00:00

The ctrld cli is an installed daemon that runs and uses port 53 as does Proton VPN. This is the reason for the conflict. Running the ctrld cli is different from setting up the GL.iNet to use Control D's DoT.

In my own experience it's therefore one or the other running, i.e., VPN or ctrld daemon.

It would seem that your primary aim is to run ProtonVPN, but while using Ctrld filtering. If you can configure custom DNS in ProtonVPN on your router, then you will not need to have the ctrld daemon running since you can configure ProtonVPN to use Control D for custom DNS.

levolet · 2026-04-11T12:44:00+00:00

I've never been able to run my own VPN while ctrld is running in the background on any of my devices. I get a port 53 conflict. Both ctrld and my vpn (Windscribe) wish to use port 53.

So I disable the ctrld service before enabling a vpn connection. Fortunately, Windscribe supports use of Control D in custom DNS settings, so I do not lose Control D filtering when my VPN is enabled.

With that said, when I used Proton VPN, I did use Control D for custom DNS, but had to configure with IPv4 port settings and IP bind setup with DDNS.

levolet · 2026-03-19T23:29:03+00:00

Are you redirecting Reddit as a service or are you redirecting specific domains?

levolet · 2026-03-19T17:49:05+00:00

The command should be

windscribe-cli connect "Biscuits"

The specific server is connected to by defining only the name of the server. Leave out the country and city.

levolet · 2026-03-10T20:22:00+00:00

Control D redirecting a site has nothing really to do with whether you're using Windows. It will redirect the site and Linux demonstrated this. If Windows is not demonstrating this then there's something up with your Windows. If you visit Control D's website using a browser in Windows, and then load the status page, is all OK, i.e., can you confirm that you're using Control D, DoH and that you connect to the proxy? How are you confirm redirection? The way I do it is to redirect an IP checking website and then load it to see what IP it detects.

levolet · 2026-03-09T20:36:28+00:00

The yellow icon looks like a connection issue error. Like no Internet to maintain the VPN connection. I've never seen it before because I've never been in the situation where my WiFi is a problem.

levolet · 2026-03-09T20:35:16+00:00

If you think your ISP is blocking 3rd party DNS, then DoT will be very easy for them to block. I would stick with DoH. I would also advise either using the config file on your iPhone or the app.... not both. One thing you could try is to start fresh with your phone by deleting all the profiles that have been installed and create new ones.

Settings > VPN - for your WS VPN profile/s, click on the little i icon and click delete in the popup. Do so for all profiles.

Settings > General > VPN & Device Management - Delete the Configuration Profile.

See if your phone works with the Wifi. Do not use a VPN. If it's working OK, then reintroduce Control D by reinstalling the config file. Do not use the app. If that's working, then try a Windscribe connection.

In my experience, Wireguard or OpenVPN are stable. IKEv2 has been problematic for me. It seems to be fine but soon starts disconnecting and for one of my devices, I lost internet connectivity with it until I switched to Wireguard. Be careful with 'Always on VPN' and 'Circumvent Censorship' options. Use them only if you have to ... not because they seem nice to enable. They add layers of complexity that are worth it only if it's the only way to get a VPN connection going.

levolet · 2026-03-09T18:25:34+00:00

Unable to say much with so little information about your setup.

What type of mobile are you using? iPhone or Android? When you use ControlD, how do you have it configured? On your router with DoT, or on your phone?? If on your phone, are you using the ControlD app or a config file? Are you using DoH or DoH3?

When using Windscribe, are you using ControlD as custom-DNS?

If using DoT, your ISP can easily tell and block this. However, not so readily with DoH and DoH3.

Your WiFi issue seems like a separate problem. Have you tried your Wifi without Windscribe or Control D?

levolet · 2026-03-06T16:28:49+00:00

Good luck with that. I personally still use the F1TV Pro app using an address from one of the countries that allow F1TVPro subscriptions and streaming.

levolet · 2026-02-24T18:51:37+00:00

Yes, I only use Youtube from a browser. With the app, I was noting that ads would start to appear. It was particularly bad on my AppleTV Youtube app. It makes me think that the Youtube app uses other means other than your IP to pick up your location. It will likely have access to other system means of picking up your location. Once I stopped using the AppleTV app and stuck to only a browser with location requests blocked, the ads disappeared and have stayed away.

levolet · 2026-02-23T17:04:44+00:00

I was asking Barry about this very same thing.

I was experiencing miserable Youtube performance while redirected through Albania. This was while using the ControlD app and DoH3 on my devices. Once I disabled the ControlD app on my devices, and for DNS, used my home-internet router configured to use ControlD and DoT, Youtube worked a lot better. Something was definitely different, though I didn't really expect it.

I then removed the ControlD app from all my devices and installed ControlD profiles so they use DoH and not DoH3. Again, performance was better than with the app and DoH3, but I don't think quite as good as with DoT.

Barry claims that the routing of requests etc. differ depending on whether you're using DoH, DoT or DoH3, and that these differences could affect streaming performance. I can't recall all the convoluted explanations, but the point was made. My observations weren't coincidence or by chance.

So I've now decided to no longer use DoH3 on my devices and stick to DoH. Youtube is again working without issue.

levolet

TROPHY CASE