Re: Browser sniffing to CG

I would be quite happy to see it discouraged in PAGL. I agree with Daniel
that it seems excessive to get HTTP to do it on a 'clean' properties
basis.

I am also concerned that there are a number of people out there using HTML
in situations where it is not delivered by HTTP. In Australia it is very
common to use CD-ROM - most Universities, and many government and
quasi-governmental information bodies use this, because the
telecommunications infrastructure cannot support connections of any real
quality. (For outback Australia a 28.8 modem will generally outstrip the
capacity of the phone/data network). So the more that we rtely on HTTP to
do, the more that these systems are going to fall between the cracks and
not work properly. And since we cannot build telecommunications hardware,
we should try to avoid the situation.

--Charles McCathieNevile
W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (visiting)
email: charles@w3.org telephone: +1 (617) 258 8143
mail: LCS, 545 Technology sq., Cambridge MA, USA
http://purl.oclc.org/net/charles

On Wed, 9 Dec 1998, Al Gilman wrote:

  to follow up on what Daniel Dardailler said:
  
  > Danield: related to Browser sniffing, it is a server issue but we
  >     could ask the HTTP WG to add a note about it
  > Charles: do we want to add negocation of UA capabilities
  >     there are other ways to do that (CSS + media)
  
  Did we agree to take this issue back to the CG?  It seems to me
  that this area is one where
  
  	- the WAI would probably like to make a statement
  	- it seems to fall in a crack between the scopes of
  		the content and browser guidelines.
  
  The WAI would like to make a statement concerning
  nondiscrimination in the service of information.  We can work
  with W3C and WSG on this, because I think Tim is quite unhappy
  with the commercial forays into defeating the universal meeting
  ground qualities of the WWW.  Maybe it goes in the author guidelines
  as a not under alternative pages.
  
  Al

Received on Wednesday, 9 December 1998 15:44:10 UTC