[thelist] User-Agent for Aural Readers

Shawn K. Quinn skquinn at xevious.kicks-ass.net
Wed Mar 31 18:11:42 CST 2004


On Wednesday 2004 March 31 14:44, Jeff Howden wrote:
  [responding to Sam Carter who wrote:]
> > Do Aural Readers (like JAWS) leave a specific User-Agent
> > string?
>
> So, I'd say you can't rely on the user-agent string to identify aural
> browsers. 

Indeed, it never was a good idea to rely on the User-Agent string for 
anything. Proxies such as Junkbuster and Privoxy will filter or replace 
User-Agent with something likely to be completely misleading (the last 
version of Junkbuster I used would identify as Netscape Navigator 3 on 
a Mac Classic). If I remember the HTTP specification right, User-Agent 
is completely optional (at least through HTTP/1.1).

About the only use left for the User-Agent string is to identify search 
engine robots, and even then only in combination with the originating 
IP address.

-- 
Shawn K. Quinn


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