Comments on: IE7 User Agent String published

By: Eeve

Eeve — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 16:24:15 +0000

I for one will HAVE to test for the user agent string. The cursed IE7 will be showing a very frightening and intrusive warning message when you try to visit a page that uses a self-signed or shared SSL certificate. So, since my client can’t afford a personal cert, I have to test for IE7 and then present some instructions that say- don’t worry about the warning- accept the certificate permenantly.

The useragent string remains important as long as Microsoft keeps doing stupid things with their browser.

By: Octal

Octal — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

Using the user agent string to sniff for browsers is very bad...use feature sniffing instead

Could't agree more.

No IE7 in our logs yet.

By: thody

thody — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

Seems like the development is really moving along. It’s come a long way since the browser was announced a few weeks ago…I wonder if they were working on it long before, or if they’re trail blazing. If it’s the latter I hope they slow down and do it right…we’ve already waited this long.

By: Craig

Craig — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

Not sure whether I’m or happy or sad to see there is no “like Gecko” in the string…

By: baekdal

baekdal — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

Ahh... but it is important. There are some applications out there that need browser sniffing.

To name one: Website Statistics Applications

The user agent string is what you use to identify how many users visits your site with a particular browser.

By: Kevin Yank

Kevin Yank — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

It’s worth noting the final release will contain the version number 7.0, not 7.0b, which will be used for the beta.

By: sil

sil — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

Baekdal: very true. That’s why I said “Still, at least you can now start checking your server access logs to see if people with IE7 are browsing your website.”

By: Nicolas Chachereau

Nicolas Chachereau — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

Well, I think they told the world about their User Agent String because they know there are many people who don’t use good, standard, forward-thinking solutions and are still doing browser sniffing (Hey! Wake up! It’s 2005!). So, I wouldn’t say they are “out of touch with the way we should be doing things”. But you’re right, I hope they will release a list about the CSS hacks, too.

By: Val

Val — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

While I agree that feature detection is far preferable, there are many cases in which you need to know the browser, too. Some errors come not from lack of a feature, but from the fact the feature behaves differently in Browser Z than it does in Browsers X and Y. So “feature = getSomeWeirdFeature();” might evaluate to TRUE, and yet STILL cause problems, unless you say “feature = (getSomeWeirdFeature() && browser != ’someBuggyBrowser’;”.

The Box Model is a good case in point — IE did allocate margins and padding, they just did it the wrong way. One way to get around it — without bizarre CSS hacks — is to detect the UA and generate different code to accommodate it.

By: someonewhois

someonewhois — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 19:00:00 +0000

I think I’ll change my user agent to this just to confuse people. At least then it’ll have some use to the tech world. ;)