Web Browser "standards mode" & "quirks mode" and doctypes in html & xhtml

Aug 19, 2007 at 11:15 AM
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If you search for Web Browser "standards mode", "quirks mode" and doctype, html, xhtml, xml you'll find plenty of information about the "problem" that certain browsers have but little about the "solution" !

I'm still confused but thinking that a solution might just to use PHP instead of HTML and add the following header to my web pages

<? // if (HTTP_USER_AGENT <> a-bad-browser) echo "<?doctype ...stuff...>" ?>

Before I actually code this in PHP do you think it would work ?

Or do you have a better solution ?

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Unfortunately it is required to disable caching to use this solution.

thanks for the tip ! are you talking about browsers or proxy servers ? and new or existing visitors ?

I'm talking about proxy servers and HTTP-accelerators (reverse proxies). So it is possible that two users with different browsers will receive the same page.

[this is good]

thanks that is very useful information

so is there any point in ever checking HTTP_USER_AGENT then ?

will all google analytics stats also be biased towards the first browser to access that site through that set of forward / reverse proxy servers ?

I think it is possible to use server-side HTTP_USER_AGENT processing only in web applications that have already had to disable caching to organize sessions.

Web Browser "standards mode" & "quirks mode" and doctypes in html & xhtml

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