Not matching SiteConfidence and as such classifying as mobil

[JDWilliams]

Hi

We use a tool called SiteConfidence to monitor our sites. This is a desktop emulator and should be classified as desktop and not a wireless device. This was the case until recently when we upgraded our code to use API 1.4.0.3 and the latest database file.

Unfortunately now the user agent is not being matched and as such is showing as wireless device = true. This means that the SiteConfidence tool is being served mobile content which is incorrect and a problem for us.

The user agent is as follows:

Code: Select all

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-gb; SiteCon/8.8.16)

This seems to be a part of a more general problem that if WURFL is not able to match a user agent it defaults to wirless device is true. This seems wrong to me but is there a reason you do this?

Thanks
Matt

[sm_support2]

Hi JD

We use a tool called SiteConfidence to monitor our sites. This is a desktop emulator and should be classified as desktop and not a wireless device. This was the case until recently when we upgraded our code to use API 1.4.0.3 and the latest database file.

Unfortunately now the user agent is not being matched and as such is showing as wireless device = true. This means that the SiteConfidence tool is being served mobile content which is incorrect and a problem for us.

The user agent is as follows:

Code: Select all

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-gb; SiteCon/8.8.16)

We were not aware of this tool. As an immediate fix for you, you can easily create a patch file and associate a profile to that UA string. Of course, you may want to have the profile fall_back into "generic_web_browser" in order to inherit all web browser capabilities.

This resource here explains how to create a patch file.

http://wurfl.sourceforge.net/patchfile.php

You can load the patch through Spring configuration (for the Java API).

This seems to be a part of a more general problem that if WURFL is not able to match a user agent it defaults to wirless device is true. This seems wrong to me but is there a reason you do this?

The question is: when each and every strategy to detect a UA string and its family have been exhausted, what should WURFL do? in the worst possible scenario we have no choice but to return the "generic" unrecognized device. Currently, the choice is to assume that generic is a wireless device. This has to do with the origin of WURFL (originally only aimed at the detection of mobile devices), but also with the fact that the majority of WURFL adopters still prefer to err on the side of mobile. Of course, not everyone agrees.
Fortunately, the patch mechanism allows users to manage their own delta of device information independently of the big WURFL.

We are working on products that will further simplify the management of patch files, but your case can be solved with a few lines of XML, so there's no reason to hold your breath just yet.

Please give the patch file a spin. If you still have trouble, post your patch file here and we will provide whatever extra guidance is needed.

Out of curiosity, how popular is this SiteCon tool as far as you know?

[JDWilliams]

OK I take your point about the wirless device indicator.

Could you post a simple example of how to just map this user agent to a generic web browser?

Thanks
Matt

[JDWilliams]

OK so I've used:

Code: Select all

<wurfl_patch>  
	<devices>    
		<device id="SiteConfidence" user_agent="Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-gb; SiteCon/8.8.16)" fall_back="generic_web_browser"/>
	</devices>
</wurfl_patch>

Which serves the purpose on this occasion. However, we could do with implementing a patch file that will default any device that is not recognised to generic web browser i.e. NOT return true for wireless_device_ind. Is there a way to do this?

Thanks
Matt

[sm_support2]

Happy the patch file did its job.

we could do with implementing a patch file that will default any device that is not recognised to generic web browser i.e. NOT return true for wireless_device_ind. Is there a way to do this?

You can create a patch file that switchs is_wireless_device to false for generic (sub devices all override this capability anyway, so we don't expect this to trickle down unexpectedly. If you experience issues after that, please notify us right away).

Of course, your question is about the core of the service that we provide. We constantly monitor and update the WURFL repository and the APIs to recognize HTTP clients of different kinds. If you are aware of such issues, please let us know and we will look into that.

In fact, we may even add the SiteCon UA to the big WURFL and fix this for everyone.

Thank you

[JDWilliams]

How would I do this as advised?

WRT the other point, I guess the problem is that you can never 100% identify all user agent strings at any given time. We use WURFL partly to determine whether the device is a mobile or not (and as such whether to serve mobile content). So we need the fallback to be wireless = false because we wish to serve desktop content if there is any doubt about the type of device being used.

Ta
Matt

[sm_support2]

How would I do this as advised?

WRT the other point, I guess the problem is that you can never 100% identify all user agent strings at any given time. We use WURFL partly to determine whether the device is a mobile or not (and as such whether to serve mobile content). So we need the fallback to be wireless = false because we wish to serve desktop content if there is any doubt about the type of device being used.

Simply create a patch file that overrides the generic device:

<device user_agent="" fall_back="root" id="generic">
:
</device>

Thanks