NAME¶
HTTP::BrowserDetect - Determine Web browser, version, and platform from an HTTP
user agent string
VERSION¶
version 1.75
SYNOPSIS¶
use HTTP::BrowserDetect;
my $browser = HTTP::BrowserDetect->new($user_agent_string);
# Detect operating system
if ($browser->windows) {
if ($browser->winnt) ...
if ($browser->win95) ...
}
print $browser->mac;
# Detect browser vendor and version
print $browser->netscape;
print $browser->ie;
if (browser->major(4)) {
if ($browser->minor() > .5) {
...
}
}
if ($browser->version() > 4) {
...;
}
DESCRIPTION¶
The HTTP::BrowserDetect object does a number of tests on an HTTP user agent
string. The results of these tests are available via methods of the object.
This module is based upon the JavaScript browser detection code available at
<
http://www.mozilla.org/docs/web-developer/sniffer/browser_type.html>.
CONSTRUCTOR AND STARTUP¶
new()¶
HTTP::BrowserDetect->new( $user_agent_string )
The constructor may be called with a user agent string specified. Otherwise, it
will use the value specified by $ENV{'HTTP_USER_AGENT'}, which is set by the
web server when calling a CGI script.
You may also use a non-object-oriented interface. For each method, you may call
HTTP::BrowserDetect::method_name(). You will then be working with a
default HTTP::BrowserDetect object that is created behind the scenes.
SUBROUTINES/METHODS¶
user_agent()¶
Returns the value of the user agent string.
Calling this method with a parameter has now been deprecated and this feature
will be removed in an upcoming release.
country()¶
Returns the country string as it may be found in the user agent string. This
will be in the form of an upper case 2 character code. ie: US, DE, etc
language()¶
Returns the language string as it is found in the user agent string. This will
be in the form of an upper case 2 character code. ie: EN, DE, etc
device()¶
Returns the method name of the actual hardware, if it can be detected. Currently
returns one of: android, audrey, blackberry, dsi, iopener, ipad, iphone, ipod,
kindle, n3ds, palm, ps3, psp, wap, webos. Returns "undef" if no
hardware can be detected
device_name()¶
Returns a human formatted version of the hardware device name. These names are
subject to change and are really meant for display purposes. You should use
the
device() method in your logic. Returns one of: Android, Audrey,
BlackBerry, Nintendo DSi, iopener, iPad, iPhone, iPod, Amazon Kindle, Nintendo
3DS, Palm, Sony PlayStation 3, Sony Playstation Portable, WAP capable phone,
webOS. Also Windows-based smartphones will output various different names like
HTC T7575. Returns "undef" if this is not a device or if no device
name can be detected.
browser_properties()¶
Returns a list of the browser properties, that is, all of the tests that passed
for the provided user_agent string. Operating systems, devices, browser names,
mobile and robots are all browser properties.
Detecting Browser Version¶
Please note that that the
version(),
major() and
minor()
methods have been superceded as of release 1.07 of this module. They are not
yet deprecated, but should be replaced with
public_version(),
public_major() and
public_minor() in new development.
The reasoning behind this is that
version() method will, in the case of
Safari, return the Safari/XXX numbers even when Version/XXX numbers are
present in the UserAgent string. Because this behaviour has been in place for
so long, some clients may have come to rely upon it. So, it has been retained
in the interest of "bugwards compatibility", but in almost all
cases, the numbers returned by
public_version(),
public_major()
and
public_minor() will be what you are looking for.
public_version()¶
Returns the browser version as a floating-point number.
public_major()¶
Returns the integer portion of the browser version.
public_minor()¶
Returns the decimal portion of the browser version as a
floating-point
number less than 1. For example, if the version is 4.05, this method
returns .05; if the version is 4.5, this method returns .5.
On occasion a version may have more than one decimal point, such as
'Wget/1.4.5'. The minor version does not include the second decimal point, or
any further digits or decimals.
version($version)¶
Returns the version as a floating-point number. If passed a parameter, returns
true if it is equal to the version specified by the user agent string.
major($major)¶
Returns the integer portion of the browser version. If passed a parameter,
returns true if it equals the browser major version.
minor($minor)¶
Returns the decimal portion of the browser version as a
floating-point
number less than 1. For example, if the version is 4.05, this method
returns .05; if the version is 4.5, this method returns .5.
This is a
change in behavior from previous versions of this module, which
returned a string.
If passed a parameter, returns true if equals the minor version.
On occasion a version may have more than one decimal point, such as
'Wget/1.4.5'. The minor version does not include the second decimal point, or
any further digits or decimals.
beta($beta)¶
Returns any the beta version, consisting of any non-numeric characters after the
version number. For instance, if the user agent string is 'Mozilla/4.0
(compatible; MSIE 5.0b2; Windows NT)', returns 'b2'. If passed a parameter,
returns true if equal to the beta version. If the beta starts with a dot, it
is thrown away.
Detecting Rendering Engine¶
engine_string()¶
Returns one of the following:
Gecko, KHTML, Trident, MSIE, NetFront
Returns "undef" if no string can be found.
engine_version()¶
Returns the version number of the rendering engine. Currently this only returns
a version number for Gecko and Trident. Returns "undef" for all
other engines. The output is simply "engine_major" added with
"engine_minor".
engine_major()¶
Returns the major version number of the rendering engine. Currently this only
returns a version number for Gecko and Trident. Returns "undef" for
all other engines.
engine_minor()¶
Returns the minor version number of the rendering engine. Currently this only
returns a version number for Gecko and Trident. Returns "undef" for
all other engines.
The following methods are available, each returning a true or false value. Some
methods also test for the operating system version. The indentations below
show the hierarchy of tests (for example, win2k is considered a type of winnt,
which is a type of win32)
windows()¶
win16 win3x win31
win32
winme win95 win98
winnt
win2k winxp win2k3 winvista win7
win8
win8_0 win8_1
wince
winphone
winphone7 winphone7_5 winphone8
dotnet()¶
chromeos()¶
firefoxos()¶
mac()¶
mac68k macppc macosx ios
os2()¶
bb10()¶
rimtabletos()¶
unix()¶
sun sun4 sun5 suni86 irix irix5 irix6 hpux hpux9 hpux10
aix aix1 aix2 aix3 aix4 linux sco unixware mpras reliant
dec sinix freebsd bsd
vms()¶
amiga()¶
ps3gameos()¶
pspgameos()¶
It may not be possibile to detect Win98 in Netscape 4.x and earlier. On Opera
3.0, the userAgent string includes "Windows 95/NT4" on all Win32, so
you can't distinguish between Win95 and WinNT.
os_string()¶
Returns one of the following strings, or undef. This method exists solely for
compatibility with the HTTP::Headers::UserAgent module.
Win95, Win98, WinNT, Win2K, WinXP, Win2k3, WinVista, Win7, Win8,
Win8.1, Windows Phone, Mac, Mac OS X, iOS, Win3x, OS2, Unix, Linux,
Chrome OS, Firefox OS, Playstation 3 GameOS, Playstation Portable GameOS,
RIM Tablet OS, BlackBerry 10
Detecting Browser Vendor¶
The following methods are available, each returning a true or false value. Some
methods also test for the browser version, saving you from checking the
version separately.
aol aol3 aol4 aol5 aol6
chrome
curl
emacs
firefox
gecko
icab
ie ie3 ie4 ie4up ie5 ie55 ie6 ie7 ie8 ie9 ie10 ie11
ie_compat_mode
The ie_compat_mode is used to determine if the IE user agent is for the
compatibility mode view, in which case the real version of IE is higher than
that detected. The true version of IE can be inferred from the version of
Trident in the engine_version method.
java
konqueror
lotusnotes
lynx links elinks
mobile_safari
mosaic
mozilla
neoplanet neoplanet2
netfront
netscape nav2 nav3 nav4 nav4up nav45 nav45up navgold nav6 nav6up
opera opera3 opera4 opera5 opera6 opera7
realplayer
realplayer_browser
The realplayer method above tests for the presence of either the RealPlayer
plug-in "(r1 " or the browser "RealPlayer". To preserve
"bugwards compatibility" and prevent false reporting, browser_string
calls this method which ignores the "(r1 " plug-in signature.
safari
staroffice
webtv
Netscape 6, even though its called six, in the User-Agent string has version
number 5. The nav6 and nav6up methods correctly handle this quirk. The Firefox
test correctly detects the older-named versions of the browser (Phoenix,
Firebird).
browser_string()¶
Returns undef on failure. Otherwise returns one of the following:
Netscape, Firefox, Safari, Chrome, MSIE, WebTV, AOL Browser, Opera, Mosaic,
Lynx, Links, ELinks, RealPlayer, IceWeasel, curl, puf, NetFront, Mobile
Safari, BlackBerry.
gecko_version()¶
If a Gecko rendering engine is used (as in Mozilla or Firefox), returns the
version of the renderer (e.g. 1.3a, 1.7, 1.8) This might be more useful than
the particular browser name or version when correcting for quirks in different
versions of this rendering engine. If no Gecko browser is being used, or the
version number can't be detected, returns undef.
Detecting Other Devices¶
The following methods are available, each returning a true or false value.
android
audrey
avantgo
blackberry
dsi
iopener
iphone
ipod
ipad
kindle
n3ds
obigo
palm
webos
wap
psp
ps3
mobile()¶
Returns true if the browser appears to belong to a handheld device.
tablet()¶
Returns true if the browser appears to belong to a tablet device.
robot()¶
Returns true if the user agent appears to be a robot, spider, crawler, or other
automated Web client.
The following additional methods are available, each returning a true or false
value. This is by no means a complete list of robots that exist on the Web.
ahrefs
altavista
askjeeves
baidu
facebook
getright
google
googleadsbot
googleadsense
googlemobile
infoseek
linkexchange
lwp
lycos
mj12bot
msn (same as bing)
puf
slurp
webcrawler
wget
yahoo
yandex
yandeximages
CREDITS¶
Lee Semel, lee@semel.net (Original Author)
Peter Walsham (co-maintainer)
Olaf Alders, "olaf at wundercounter.com" (co-maintainer)
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS¶
Thanks to the following for their contributions:
cho45
Leonardo Herrera
Denis F. Latypoff
merlynkline
Simon Waters
Toni Cebrin
Florian Merges
david.hilton.p
Steve Purkis
Andrew McGregor
Robin Smidsrod
Richard Noble
Josh Ritter
Mike Clarke
Marc Sebastian Pelzer
Alexey Surikov
Maros Kollar
Jay Rifkin
Luke Saunders
Jacob Rask
Heiko Weber
Jon Jensen
Jesse Thompson
Graham Barr
Enrico Sorcinelli
Olivier Bilodeau
Yoshiki Kurihara
Paul Findlay
Uwe Voelker
Douglas Christopher Wilson
John Oatis
Atsushi Kato
Ronald J. Kimball
Bill Rhodes
Thom Blake
Aran Deltac
yeahoffline
David Ihnen
Hao Wu
Perlover
TO DO¶
The "_engine()" method currently only handles Gecko and Trident. It
needs to be expanded to handle other rendering engines.
POD coverage is also not 100%.
SEE ALSO¶
"Browser ID (User-Agent) Strings",
<
http://www.zytrax.com/tech/web/browser_ids.htm>
HTML::ParseBrowser.
SUPPORT¶
You can find documentation for this module with the perldoc command.
perldoc HTTP::BrowserDetect
You can also look for information at:
- •
- GitHub Source Repository
<http://github.com/oalders/http-browserdetect>
- •
- Reporting Issues
<https://github.com/oalders/http-browserdetect/issues>
- •
- AnnoCPAN: Annotated CPAN documentation
<http://annocpan.org/dist/HTTP-BrowserDetect>
- •
- CPAN Ratings
<http://cpanratings.perl.org/d/HTTP-BrowserDetect>
- •
- Search CPAN
<https://metacpan.org/module/HTTP::BrowserDetect>
BUGS AND LIMITATIONS¶
The biggest limitation at this point is the test suite, which really needs to
have many more UserAgent strings to test against.
CONTRIBUTING¶
Patches are certainly welcome, with many thanks for the excellent contributions
which have already been received. The preferred method of patching would be to
fork the GitHub repo and then send me a pull request, but plain old patch
files are also welcome.
If you're able to add test cases, this will speed up the time to release your
changes. Just edit t/useragents.json so that the test coverage includes any
changes you have made. Please contact me if you have any questions.
This distribution uses Dist::Zilla. If you're not familiar with this module,
please see <
https://github.com/oalders/http-browserdetect/issues/5> for
some helpful tips to get you started.
AUTHORS¶
- •
- Lee Semel <lee@semel.net>
- •
- Peter Walsham
- •
- Olaf Alders <olaf@wundercounter.com> (current maintainer)
COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE¶
This software is copyright (c) 2014 by Lee Semel.
This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same
terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.