Re: iceweasel not being recognized by ISP website

[hendrik@topoi.pooq.com]

On Sun, Feb 04, 2007 at 02:28:51AM -0500, H.S. wrote:
> hendrik@topoi.pooq.com wrote:
> >On Sat, Feb 03, 2007 at 07:58:45PM -0600, John Hasler wrote:
> >>H.S. writes:
> >>>IIRC, it used to work before. Maybe the browser identification string is
> >>>causing the problem!? Any suggestions?
> >>Iceweasel identifies as Iceweasel, not Firefox (not my idea).  However, it
> >>works exactly like Firefox and so will work with any site that "supports"
> >>Firefox.  It looks as if they are just warning you that everything may not
> >>work (they're wrong).  If so, just ignore the warning.
> >
> >If this warning is *all* they do depending on the browser identification 
> >you have no problem.  But if they decide to create different content 
> >deoending on it, theyre may be problems.  I'd hope that they generate 
> >standards-complying content for anything that identifies itself as not 
> >being IE, even though they might still spoonfeed IE clients.
> > 
> >>I'd also suggest taking your business elsewhere as these doofuses are
> >>evidently not capable of putting up a standards-compliant site.
> >>-- 
> >>John Hasler
> 
> The website shows that warning and suggests I either download Firefox or 
> IE 6 or 7, all for Windows. They do not support any non-Windows browser 
> at all! Even Safari comes with some warnings, though they claim you can 
> get the work done with Safari.
> 
> Anyhow, I installed the user agent extension and the site now works, 
> both in Mozilla and also in Firefox. I just had to claim I was Firefox 
> running on Windows.

What wasn't clear to me was whether the website was
 (a) refusing to deal with other browsers or
 (b) just warning you there might be problems, but otherwise going ahead 
full-steam.
If (a) they need a lesson in the proper use of web standards.  Give it 
to them.
If (b) they need to add a few browsers and OS's to their list.  Tell 
them so.  I'm sure there are browsers that deserve these warnings 
because they don't work with the site.  But iceweasel isn't one of them.

-- hendrik