Re: LYNX-DEV user agent?

[Nelson Henry Eric]

> does anyone (apart from Fote) believe Netscape would bother
> to sue Lynx developers about anything ever?

Doesn't concern me a great deal what Netscape would or wouldn't
do, but it does irk me to no end that Lynx users should feel a
need to change the user agent string.  I really love Lynx, enough
that I sacrifice the use of sites that refuse to accept connections
except from the big two.  When I have the time, I write to web
authors to try to persuade them to throw their prejudices away.

What I do "believe" is that changing the user agent string to
something other than Lynx does not help Lynx in the bit.
Making it easy for any joeblow to change the user agent string
seems to be just asking for flippant changes that could lessen the
statistical weight of the Lynx user base, as well as possibly make
it harder to debug Lynx and help new users if we ever get a cgi
help form in place.

I would vote that the option for "present session" change to the agent
string AND the mechanism to change the agent string at compile time is
as it should be, and no change to the Lynx code is warranted.

> > So nobody knows how to get lynx to save the user agent? 
> I have it on my to-do list to verify (it's probably just a missing chunk

Not a "missing chunk" of code, a "misguided" piece of code, if you ask me.

> If lynx starts shipping with code to make it easy to lie about the
> type of browser it is, and with code that is technically illegal to
> ship from the US, you can be sure that a number of folk will drop off
> this list as well as quit supporting and recommending lynx as a browser.

Well said, Larry!  I back you 100% on this comment.

>   But why MSIE have to lie it's identity, is there something wrong in www
> sites too.

Hit the nail on the head!  It's like the Pinocchio story.  Once a person
starts lying, it just seems to get larger and larger.

__Henry