Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Jari Aalto+mail.emacs]

This is your copy. Article has been posted to the newsgroup(s).

* 1999-12-31 Karl Kleinpaste <karl@justresearch.com> gnu.emacs.gnus
* <http://search.dejanews.com/msgid.xp?MID=%3Cvxkg0wjjrib.fsf@beaver.jprc.com%3E&format=threaded>
| Jonadab the Unsightly One <jonadab@bright.net> writes:
| [+]
| > I'd like to have it be more specific, for example: 
| > User-Agent: Gnus v5.8.2 GNU Emacs 20.4.1 (i386-*-windows95.1212)
| > Is there an easy way to do this?
| 
| No.  User-Agent, in the USEFOR draft, has a rather particular syntax.
| The general form for each segment is "name/version (free format string)"
| and its generation is fixed.  If there were an architecture string
| naturally part of Emacs 20.4's environment, that would go into the
| parenthesized part at the end, but there isn't one.

...But Emacs knows it Karl :-)

I suggest that the architecture info is added to next Gnus release

jari


(defadvice gnus-extended-version (around my act)
  "Add Architechture string to User-Agent: string."
  ad-do-it
  (setq
   ad-return-value
   (format "%s (%s)"
           ad-return-value
           system-configuration )))


(gnus-extended-version)
--> "Gnus/5.0802 (Gnus v5.8.2) Emacs/20.4 (i386-*-windows98.1998)"

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Stainless Steel Rat]

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* jari.aalto@poboxes.com (Jari Aalto+mail.emacs)  on Fri, 31 Dec 1999
| I suggest that the architecture info is added to next Gnus release

Of what utility is having the system architecture included with every
message?
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-- 
Rat <ratinox@peorth.gweep.net>    \ If Happy Fun Ball begins to smoke, get
Minion of Nathan - Nathan says Hi! \ away immediately. Seek shelter and cover
PGP Key: at a key server near you!  \ head.

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Per Abrahamsen]

Stainless Steel Rat <ratinox@peorth.gweep.net> writes:

> * jari.aalto@poboxes.com (Jari Aalto+mail.emacs)  on Fri, 31 Dec 1999
> | I suggest that the architecture info is added to next Gnus release
> 
> Of what utility is having the system architecture included with every
> message?

I'd often use that information when making technical comments to posts
from Mozilla users, and have wished for similar information from posts
and mail from Gnus users.

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Eric Marsden]

>>>>> "per" == Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk> writes:

  ssr> Of what utility is having the system architecture included with
  ssr> every message?

  per> I'd often use that information when making technical comments
  per> to posts from Mozilla users, and have wished for similar
  per> information from posts and mail from Gnus users.

IMO that information would be a breach of user privacy; I for one
would seek to disable it. 

-- 
Eric Marsden

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Arcady Genkin]

Eric Marsden <emarsden@mail.dotcom.fr> writes:

>   per> I'd often use that information when making technical comments
>   per> to posts from Mozilla users, and have wished for similar
>   per> information from posts and mail from Gnus users.
> 
> IMO that information would be a breach of user privacy; I for one
> would seek to disable it. 

Although I would vote against including more stuff in User-agent, I
don't understand how it would be any more breach of privacy than
including Gnus and Emacs versions. Comments?
-- 
Arcady Genkin                                 http://www.thpoon.com
"'What good is my pity? Is not the pity the cross upon which he who
loves man is nailed?..'" (Zarathustra - F. Nietzsche)

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Florian Weimer]

Arcady Genkin <a.genkin@utoronto.ca> writes:

> Although I would vote against including more stuff in User-agent, I
> don't understand how it would be any more breach of privacy than
> including Gnus and Emacs versions. Comments?

I don't want people to know that I'm actually running Windows 2000,
you know.
\f
Just kidding.

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[William M. Perry]

Florian Weimer <fw@s.netic.de> writes:

> Arcady Genkin <a.genkin@utoronto.ca> writes:
> 
> > Although I would vote against including more stuff in User-agent, I
> > don't understand how it would be any more breach of privacy than
> > including Gnus and Emacs versions. Comments?
> 
> I don't want people to know that I'm actually running Windows 2000,
> you know.

This is why Emacs/W3 has a paranoia setting that you can tweak:

-----------
url-privacy-level's value is 
(email)


Documentation:
*How private you want your requests to be.
HTTP/1.0 has header fields for various information about the user, including
operating system information, email addresses, the last page you visited, etc.
This variable controls how much of this information is sent.

This should a symbol or a list.
Valid values if a symbol are:
none     -- Send all information
low      -- Don't send the last location
high     -- Don't send the email address or last location
paranoid -- Don't send anything

If a list, this should be a list of symbols of what NOT to send.
Valid symbols are:
email    -- the email address
os       -- the operating system info
lastloc  -- the last location
agent    -- Do not send the User-Agent string
cookie   -- never accept HTTP cookies

Samples:

 (setq url-privacy-level 'high)
 (setq url-privacy-level '(email lastloc))    ;; equivalent to 'high
 (setq url-privacy-level '(os))

::NOTE::
This variable controls several other variables and is _NOT_ automatically
updated.  Call the function `url-setup-privacy-info' after modifying this
variable.

You can customize this variable.
-----------

Perhaps gnus should have something similar.

> Just kidding.

Suuuure.

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Stainless Steel Rat]

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* wmperry@aventail.com (William M. Perry)  on Mon, 03 Jan 2000
| This is why Emacs/W3 has a paranoia setting that you can tweak:

Hmmm... okay.  But this seems to be more useful for developers and beta
testers, right?  So I am thinking that maybe it should be there for
development versions of Gnus (like keeping Incoming* files) and not there
for released versions.  Or something like that.
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-- 
Rat <ratinox@peorth.gweep.net>    \ Do not use Happy Fun Ball on concrete.
Minion of Nathan - Nathan says Hi! \ 
PGP Key: at a key server near you!  \ 

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Kai Großjohann]

Stainless Steel Rat <ratinox@peorth.gweep.net> writes:

> * wmperry@aventail.com (William M. Perry)  on Mon, 03 Jan 2000
> | This is why Emacs/W3 has a paranoia setting that you can tweak:
> 
> Hmmm... okay.  But this seems to be more useful for developers and beta
> testers, right?

Hm?  It is useful in the same way as a firewall is useful, and for the
same reasons, I think.

kai
-- 
A preposition is not a good thing to end a sentence with.

Re: User Agent string: making it more specific?

[Steinar Bang]

>>>>> Kai.Grossjohann@CS.Uni-Dortmund.DE (Kai Großjohann):

> Hm?  It is useful in the same way as a firewall is useful, and for
> the same reasons, I think.

Hmm... "it forces users to be inventive to circumvent it", is that what 
you meant...?