browserCaps Element (ASP.NET Settings Schema)

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.NET Framework General Reference

browserCaps Element (ASP.NET Settings Schema)

Updated: November 2007

Specifies the settings of supported browsers and the capabilities of the supported browsers. The browserCaps element can be updated as required to specify new browsers and capabilities.

Note:
Using the browserCaps element in the Web.config file to define browsers is deprecated in the .NET Framework 2.0, but it is still supported. The data in this element is merged with the information from the browser definition files (.browser) that is located in the machine-level %SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\version\CONFIG\Browsers folder and any existing application-level App_Browser folders. For more information, see Browser Definition File Schema (browsers Element).

Note:

Using the browserCaps element in the Web.config file to define browsers is deprecated in the .NET Framework 2.0, but it is still supported. The data in this element is merged with the information from the browser definition files (.browser) that is located in the machine-level %SystemRoot%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\version\CONFIG\Browsers folder and any existing application-level App_Browser folders. For more information, see Browser Definition File Schema (browsers Element).

configuration Element (General Settings Schema)
system.web Element (ASP.NET Settings Schema)
browserCaps Element (ASP.NET Settings Schema)

<browserCaps>
   <result />
   <use />
   [browser capability property assignments]
   <filter>...</filter>
</browserCaps>

Attributes and Elements

The following sections describe attributes, child elements, and parent elements.

Attributes

Attribute	Description
userAgentCacheKeyLength	Optional String attribute. Specifies the length of the browser identification string to use as the key for caching browser capabilities objects in the internal cache. For more information about browser capabilities objects, see Browser Definition File Schema (browsers Element). This attribute is new in the .NET Framework version 2.0. The default is "64".

Attribute

Description

userAgentCacheKeyLength

Optional String attribute.

Specifies the length of the browser identification string to use as the key for caching browser capabilities objects in the internal cache. For more information about browser capabilities objects, see Browser Definition File Schema (browsers Element).

This attribute is new in the .NET Framework version 2.0.

The default is "64".

Child Elements

Element	Description
filter	Optional element. Specifies a list of search strings that allow you to apply individual settings to specific browser definitions.
result	Specifies the HttpCapabilitiesBase-derived class that is used to hold the results from parsing the browserCaps section. The capabilities are stored as key/value string pairs for each browser. This element still applies in the .NET Framework version 2.0.
use	Specifies the HTTP request string to use to parse the browser capability information that is stored in the filter and case elements.

Element

Description

filter

Optional element.

Specifies a list of search strings that allow you to apply individual settings to specific browser definitions.

result

Specifies the HttpCapabilitiesBase-derived class that is used to hold the results from parsing the browserCaps section. The capabilities are stored as key/value string pairs for each browser.

This element still applies in the .NET Framework version 2.0.

use

Specifies the HTTP request string to use to parse the browser capability information that is stored in the filter and case elements.

Parent Elements

Element	Description
configuration	Specifies the required root element in every configuration file that is used by the common language runtime and the .NET Framework applications.
system.web	Specifies the root element for the ASP.NET configuration settings in a configuration file and contains configuration elements that configure ASP.NET Web applications and control how the applications behave.

Remarks

The browserCaps element specifies the settings of supported browsers and the capabilities for the supported browsers. The browserCaps element can be updated as required to specify new browsers and capabilities.

For a list of valid browser properties, see HttpBrowserCapabilities.

Lines of the form capsVariableName=regular expression are assignments. Use the syntax %{capsVariableName} or ${captureGroupName} in match attributes and on the right side of assignments.

For more information about how to use regular expressions, see .NET Framework Regular Expressions. For the full browserCaps section, with a complete example of this syntax, see the Machine.config file that is installed with the .NET Framework.

The name/value pairs that are captured with capsVariableName can be accessed through the Item property of the HttpBrowserCapabilities object that is inherited from the HttpCapabilitiesBase class. The Item property is the default indexer property in C#.

Default Configuration

In the .NET Framework version 2.0, the following limited default browserCaps element is configured in the root Web.config file because it is deprecated in favor of using browser definition files to specify supported browsers and capabilities. For more information, see Browser Definition File Schema (browsers Element).

<browserCaps userAgentCacheKeyLength="64">
   <result 
      type="System.Web.Mobile.MobileCapabilities, System.Web.Mobile, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a" 
   />
</browserCaps>

In the .NET Framework versions 1.0 and 1.1, the default browserCaps element that is configured in the machine.config file is too large to list here. For updates to the browser data go to http://www.cyscape.com/browsercaps. Periodic device updates replace this browser capabilities section.

Example

The following code example demonstrates how to parse the User-Agent HTTP header for any version of Microsoft Internet Explorer, as long as the format of the User-Agent string remains approximately unchanged.

The example uses .NET Framework Regular Expressions and the ability of regular expressions to capture subexpressions in order to move version numbers directly from the User-Agent string to the HttpBrowserCapabilities object.

The file specifies name/value pairs in the form of assignment statements, which is similar to Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) browscap.ini files. For example, the line "browser=IE" sets the value of the browser field to the string "IE".

<configuration>
 <system.web>
   <browserCaps>
      <result type="System.Web.HttpBrowserCapabilities, System.Web"/>
      <use var="HTTP_USER_AGENT"/>
      browser=Unknown
      version=0.0
      majorversion=0
      minorversion=0
      frames=false
      tables=false
      cookies=false
      backgroundsounds=false
      <filter>
    <case match="^Mozilla[^(]*\(compatible; MSIE 
       (?'ver'(?'major'\d+)(?'minor'\.\d+)(?'letters'\w*))
       (?'extra'.*)">
       browser=IE
       version=${ver}
       majorver=${major}
       minorver=${minor}
       <case match="^2\." with="%{version}">
          tables=true
          cookies=true
          backgroundsounds=true
          <case match="2\.5b" with="%{version}">
        beta=true
          </case>
       </case>
    </case>
      </filter>
   </browsercaps>
 </system.web>
</configuration>

Element Information

Configuration section handler	HttpCapabilitiesSectionHandler
Configuration member	Browsers
Configurable locations	Machine.config Root-level Web.config Application-level Web.config Virtual or physical directory–level Web.config
Requirements	Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) version 5.0, 5.1, or 6.0 The .NET Framework version 2.0 (deprecated), 1.1, or 1.0 Microsoft Visual Studio 2003 or Visual Studio 2005

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