NAME
    HTTP::BrowserDetect - Determine the Web browser, version, and
    platform from an HTTP user agent string

SYNOPSIS
        use HTTP::BrowserDetect;
          
        my $browser = new HTTP::BrowserDetect($user_agent_string);
        if ($browser->windows) {
          if ($browser->winnt) print "WinNT";
          if ($brorwser->win95) print "Win95";
        }

        print $browser->netscape;
        if (browser->major(4)) {
          ...;
        }
        if (browser->minor(5)) {
          ...;
        }
        
        $browser->user_agent($another_user_agent_string);
        print $browser->mac;
        print $browser->ie;
        if ($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://developer.netscape.com/docs/examples/javascript/browser_t
    ype.html.

  CREATING A NEW BROWSER DETECT OBJECT AND SETTING THE USER AGENT STRING

    new HTTP::BrowserDetect($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.

    user_agent($user_agent_string)
        Returns the value of the user agent string. When called with
        a parameter, it resets the user agent and reperforms all
        tests on the string. This way you can process a series of
        user agent strings (from a log file, perhaps) without
        creating a new HTTP::BrowserDetect object each time.

  DETECTING BROWSER VERSION

    major($major)
        Returns the portion of the browser version up to the first
        decimal point as a string. If passed a parameter, returns
        true if it equals the major version specified by the user
        agent string.

    minor($minor)
        Returns the numeric portion of the browser after first
        decimal point as a string. If passed a parameter, returns
        true if it equals the minor version specified by the user
        agent string. 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 numerically equal to the
        version specified by the user agent string.

    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.

  DETECTING OS PLATFORM AND VERSION

    The following methods are available, each returning a true or
    false value. Some methods also test for the operating system
    version.

      windows win16 win3x win31 win95 win98 winnt win32 win2k
      mac mac68k macppc
      os2
      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

    os_string()
        Returns one of the following strings, or undef. These are
        the same set of strings returned by the
        HTTP::Headers::UserAgent module.

          Win95, Win98, WinNT, Mac, Win3x, OS2, Unix, Linux

  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.

      mosaic
      netscape nav2 nav3 nav4 nav4up nav45 nav5 navgold
      ie ie3 ie4 ie4up ie5
      aol aol3 
      neoplanet neoplanet2 
      webtv
      opera
      lynx
      emacs

    browser_string()
        Returns one of the following strings, or undef.

        Netscape, MSIE, WebTV, AOL Browser, Opera, Mosaic, Lynx

  DETECTING ROBOTS

    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.

      wget
      getright
      yahoo 
      altavista 
      lycos 
      infoseek 
      lwp
      webcrawler 
      linkexchange 
      slurp 

AUTHOR
    Lee Semel, lee@semel.net

SEE ALSO
    perl(1).

COPYRIGHT
    Copyright 1999-2000 Lee Semel. All rights reserved. This program
    is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
    the same terms as Perl itself.

