Question about Opera:

Question about Opera:

Unter tools/quick preferences, there is an IDENTIFY option... such as:

Identify as Opera
Indentify as Mozzilla 5.0
etc...

MY default, I guess, is: Identify as MSIE 6.0 (that is what is checked and I have not changed it).

What is this option for? What is doing the identifying and why does Opera want to be MSIE and not Opera?

Please help me understand the insanity.

 

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Websites poll your browser to see what it is. To see how it should proceed with html. The reason the option is there is because there is a tendency for sites not to show properly if you're not identified as using IE. Exclusionary tactic? You be the judge.

There's probably other reasons as well.

 

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of course there are other reasons

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-- some of microsoft sites used to deprive you of options if you didn't use IE.
For instance - could not log in just because you don't have their beloved Suxplorer, although it was technically possible. You could get pass that if were identified as IE user.

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Compatibility might just be an Issue with some sites i would guess... But really i am nonplussed too...
bye!

 

When you send off a request for a uri you send off certain information about the protocols you can use, the site that referred you, your user agent etc. In opera you can change your user agent to other things. This is quite useful, MSN used to sabotage its pages so they don't render correctly under opera. http://www.darkglass.org/archives/2...ng_in_opera_sabotage_or_innocent_mistake.html Also you imagine situations where a programmer wrote alternative pages for other browsers thinking that they couldn't handle stuff that IE could. Stuff that the latest opera may be able to do.

 

It's not just Formatting that a Browser Agent can help with, it can also aid with "Authentication" and passworded areas using either .htacecces files or Apache conf inserts.

Namely someone can construct their own personal agent, and that agent would be allowed through to a password box where other users get taken to a different page.

The reason I mention this is because of my recent realisation that a IE6 patch from February blocks out the use of username and password pairing in URL's for .htaccess authentication. This means if anyone has a website where they use a username

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assword combo and a javascript parser to construct a http://username:password@www.domain.com/folder/ method of accessing a sercure folder it will fail to work while other browser are still using the otherwise "Industrial Standard" of password authentication.

It's as if Microsoft actually does try to manipulate industrial standards by it's userbase and weight rather than actually point why they alter these things out to the relevant committees.

(Admittedly it could be understood that the user

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ass pairing could be saved into the Address box history, or your browser history, and potentially viruses could datamine for such accesses. However that should of been a simple enough fix to deal with by just adding a "Filter" for removing things that you want to remain hid [and of course a user method of configuring it rather than just being default].

However saying that it's not like they can close that authentication method from the net since the transport and method is still there even if the browser agent can't handle it.[unless the server is of course ISS.])

 

That's actually not true. Turned out it really was a mistake.