ASP in a Nutshell, 2nd Edition

Comments/Troubleshooting

The Browser Capabilities component is fairly easy to use. The most important issue with its use is to include the most up-to-date version of the BrowsCap.ini file. The latest copy of the BrowsCap.ini file is available from cyScape, a Microsoft Certified Solution Provider (http://www.cyscape.com/browscap/). On this web site, cyScape also touts its own product, BrowserHawk, which is a highly advanced replacement for the Browser Capabilities component.

Note, however, that you are not limited to the properties in the BrowsCap.ini file from cyScape. You can add you own custom properties and refer to them just as you would to one of the standard properties.

Finally, as noted previously, the new ability of the Browser Capabilities component to retrieve data from a cookie has been added to the Browser Capabilities function. Unfortunately the automatic generation of this information requires that the client browser supports behaviors. Currently, behaviors, a way to utilize new behavior in the context of a web page on the fly, are supported only by Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0. Without the use of behaviors, you would have to query the user to obtain the information to make this cookie, which is unacceptable to most web users. As such, you will likely not use this new feature of the Browser Capabilities component in conjunction with a client not using MSIE 5.0. See the end of this chapter for more information about this new feature of the Browser Capabilities component. ...