Ancient Browser Sniffing
Posted January 14th, 2005 @ 12:16am by Erik J. Barzeski
Check this out. Hit up http://www.pgatour.com/tourcast/ and get to the page pictured below (they're running a free trial currently). Look at the mess of JavaScript. This is the PGA Tour's "TourCast" system - a Flash-based "thingy" that can show you (almost live) a player's progress as he plays a round of golf on the PGA Tour.
Look at the JavaScript. Look at that absolute mess of JavaScript. It's horrid! It's wretched! It's hideous! TourCast works in one browser on my Mac: Internet Explorer.
Yes, the only browser I have that's not been significantly updated within the past four years is the only one with which it works. Why? Because it's IE, no doubt. Even if I launch TourCast in IE and grab the URL, I cannot view the page in my other browsers. I cannot copy the URL to the .swf file.
iCab (2.x): loads up blank "pgatour.com-like" page in javascript-created window.
Safari: javascript-created window is blank, has no URL.
Camino: loads up blank "pgatour.com-like" page in javascript-created window similar but not the same as iCab.
OmniWeb: see "Safari"
Firefox: see "Camino"
The site works fine within Firefox on Windows. I've got the latest Flash plugin, the latest OS (10.3.7), and the latest REALPlayer. Cookies work perfectly fine. I'd "edit" out some of the JavaScript detection in Firefox and click the links then, but I don't know what code to edit at this point. It's a huge jumble.
But hey, if you can figure out how I might make it work in Firefox, I'll give you a copy of PulpFiction, $25 via PayPal, or somesuch. I'm not sure it's worth your time, though. I find it completely ridiculous that a service that costs $50/year works only in a browser that's 4 years old.
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Posted 14 Jan 2005 at 12:26am #
Uh huh. Sure.
Posted 14 Jan 2005 at 12:45am #
OK, if I view the source, and copy the URL to the tournament (i.e. "http://start.real.com/3rd?pid=pgatour_tc&url=R2005006/apppaid&pcode=pgatour&cpath=CNT") and paste that URL into Firefox, it works.
If I paste that code into OmniWeb, Safari, etc. I get a solid blue screen and never get beyond that.
Posted 14 Jan 2005 at 12:46am #
I haven't tried it as I'd prefer not to give out my credit card, particularly to anything affiliated with Real, but have you tried the Firefox User Agent Switcher extension?
https://addons.update.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?application=firefox&id=59&vid=617
It won't work if they check for the existence of an ActiveX object or anything like that, but that it works on firefox on IE suggests this isn't the case.