Browser Spoofing

Group Moderator

Apr 7, 2009 7:51:29 PM

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This tip from Small Dog written by Mikhael Cohen is worth sharing with all Mac Users. It is from their most recent Newsletter.

John E Cleek, Ph.D., e-PRO,

Realtor® and Marketing Consultant

The CrownPlatinum Team

Crown Realty of Kansas

Miami County - Linn County - Johnson County

1005 W. Amity • Louisburg, KS 66053

Licensed in Kansas and Missouri

johncleek@crownplatinum.com

www.crownplatinum.com

Pho: 913-709-4423 • Fax: 913-837-2549

Finding the RIGHT REALTOR . . . Priceless!

Today we had a wonderful customer in the store who had just
switched to Apple by buying a new MacBook. He was running
into trouble with his company's web-based calendaring and collaboration system, as the site required Internet Explorer 6 or
greater to run. He'd browse to it using Safari or Firefox, and the
site would throw an error and refuse access, presumably to make
it easier for novice users to know which browsers work and which
don't. Turns out, it was compatible with Safari after all. We just
had to tell Safari to masquerade as Explorer.

Unfortunately, not all web developers keep up with the times. It's
likely that this site's administrators hadn't conducted compliance
testing since at least the release of Internet Explorer 7. It's
getting rarer and rarer, but plenty of sites out there still require
Explorer. This trick won't work on all of them, but it will for a
good chunk of them.

While in Safari, select Preferences from the Safari menu. Now,
click the Advanced button at the top right of the Preferences
window, and check "Show Develop menu in menu bar." Close the
Preferences window, and notice the new Develop menu on top of
your screen. In the Develop menu is the User Agent sub-menu.
From the sub-menu, select Internet Explorer 7.0. Once this is
done, the web sites you visit will think you're using Explorer, and
some of the especially restrictive sites will work for you!

Be mindful of the setting you choose, as Safari will not render
some web sites correctly when pretending to be Explorer.

Ronald Gorman

Group Organizer

Apr 7, 2009 8:47:27 PM

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Hi John,

I attempted to access our MLS (Rappatoni) using your tip. Unfortunately, it did not work as your last line indicated.

I did talk to a representative at MARIS who indicated that considering is being given to make the MLS Mac friendly. Let's pray. I am sure we all are tired to being treated like third class members.

Ron Gorman

John Cleek, Ph.D., e-PRO

Group Moderator

Apr 7, 2009 9:56:59 PM

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Ron, Well, I haven't attempted to access a site with Safari masquerading as Explorer but I am going to try it. It will be interesting to hear from others who try this trick.

John

Quoting Ronald Gorman:

Hi John,

I attempted to access our MLS (Rappatoni) using your tip. Unfortunately, it did not work as your last line indicated.

I did talk to a representative at MARIS who indicated that considering is being given to make the MLS Mac friendly. Let's pray. I am sure we all are tired to being treated like third class members.

Ron Gorman

RaytheRealtor

Group Member

Apr 8, 2009 5:35:41 AM

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Awesome tip John! Unfortunately there is still no hope for REXchange which Rhode Island uses for it's MLS. That is still Windows only!

Ray Paulk, LMC
Loss Mitigation Certified Specialist
RaytheRealtorTeam.com
Keller Williams Realty
(508) 922-1961 cell

SHORT SALE ... FORECLOSURE .......
• Are you fighting a losing battle with your mortgage?
• Are you worried about losing your home to foreclosure?
• Is your home worth less than what you owe?
There IS HOPE ... Call me ... Let's talk!
==========================================

KarenSTL

Group Member

Apr 8, 2009 7:07:38 AM

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Ron, I spoke with Rapattoni a couple of months ago and was told they were looking to change the IE requirement, but it wasn't to make it more Mac compatible. It was because IE is becoming less and less desirable. I'm afraid they still have us at the bottom of the heap.

John Cleek, Ph.D., e-PRO

Group Moderator

Apr 8, 2009 2:18:54 PM

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I agree it doesn't solve all problems but I have already set my Safari browser to masquerade as IE 7 and plan to try it on every site that insists it is necessary to use Explorer to visit their site.

John

Quoting RaytheRealtor:

Awesome tip John! Unfortunately there is still no hope for REXchange which Rhode Island uses for it's MLS. That is still Windows only!

Ray Paulk, LMC
Loss Mitigation Certified Specialist
RaytheRealtorTeam.com
Keller Williams Realty
(508) 922-1961 cell

SHORT SALE ... FORECLOSURE .......
• Are you fighting a losing battle with your mortgage?
• Are you worried about losing your home to foreclosure?
• Is your home worth less than what you owe?
There IS HOPE ... Call me ... Let's talk!
==========================================

Morgan Mason

Group Member

Apr 9, 2009 8:22:08 AM

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Quoting John Cleek, Ph.D., e-PRO:

This did not work with my MLS either, but then very little does!! I agree we need to get these dinosaurs clued into the Mac ASAP. My MLS even takes months to work on the next upgrade to IE!

I agree it doesn't solve all problems but I have already set my Safari browser to masquerade as IE 7 and plan to try it on every site that insists it is necessary to use Explorer to visit their site.

John

Quoting RaytheRealtor:

Awesome tip John! Unfortunately there is still no hope for REXchange which Rhode Island uses for it's MLS. That is still Windows only!

Ray Paulk, LMC
Loss Mitigation Certified Specialist
RaytheRealtorTeam.com
Keller Williams Realty
(508) 922-1961 cell

SHORT SALE ... FORECLOSURE .......
• Are you fighting a losing battle with your mortgage?
• Are you worried about losing your home to foreclosure?
• Is your home worth less than what you owe?
There IS HOPE ... Call me ... Let's talk!
==========================================

Peggy Sue

Group Member

May 12, 2009 10:39:35 AM

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Hi John,

This is a great tip. Fortunately, my MLS uses Flex and it works on a multitude of browsers including Firefox for Mac and Safari, albeit there are little quirks here and there. Mostly, I use Firefox. Unfortunately, there are other sites that I need that do not work in any Mac Browser.

I tried this tip for trying to get into our county's GIS interactive mapping system. They used to use another mapping software that worked universally and then switched what the are using now. They called it an "upgrade" and heralded it as the latest and greatest. When I (and some other Mac using agents) discovered that it didn't work properly on a Mac we tried to call the county and ask why we as taxpayers could not access this public information. It has fallen of deaf ears. I did do some calling around to other municipalities who are using the "old" software. Apparently our software is the "old" stuff, but our Commissioners decided not to spend the extra bucks so that Mac users could access the information.

Anyway, that's my soapbox stance on that. I only need Windows now for GIS, RE/MAX Leadstreet and to order print materials from Merrill-May. This tip worked for Leadstreet, although it doesn't display completely correctly all of the links are accessible, clickable and perform their duties. It did not work for the GIS site, however, I accidentally opened IE 5.2 for Mac (forgot I had it) and found that there is more functionality there that i didn't know existed.

Again, thanks for the tip. I have passed it along to my colleagues who are smart enough to be on Mac.

Peggy Sue

Group Member

May 12, 2009 11:55:24 AM

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I forgot to add one more site that does not work in a Mac browser: the back end of Realtor.com. Give me a break!

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