The BrowserHawk Reports Web Service (BRWS) and BrowserHawk4J Reports Web Service (BRWS4J) allow you to easily collect the statistics needed to understand the browser demographics of your site’s audience. Armed with this information you can easily gauge the popularity of browser features and target new development to those capabilities. This information is also very useful for rapid troubleshooting of end-user compatibility issues with your site.
The BRWS can be used to determine what percentage of your audience has cookies, JavaScript, applets, or ActiveX controls disabled. Want to know the average connection speed of your users, what Java versions are popular, what percentage of your users are using each plug-in and version, or what percentage are using wireless devices? BrowserHawk Reports capitalizes on cyScape’s position as the worldwide market leader in browser capability detection to bring you the level of detail in your statistics you’ve been asking for.
BRWS and BRWS4J are functionally equivalent. The difference between them is that the BRWS is implemented as an ISAPI extension that logs to either SQL Server or MS Access databases. Whereas BRWS4J is implemented as a servlet that logs to most databases including SQL Server, Oracle, DB2, mySQL and several others. BRWS is typically used by BrowserHawk ActiveX/.NET developers on Windows with IIS. BRWS4J is typically used by BrowserHawk4J users on any platform. BRWS is installed automatically by the BrowserHawk for ActiveX and .NET installer. BRWS4J is included with the BH4J installation files – see the brws4j.txt file.
Throughout this document we refer to both the BRWS and BRWS4J just as BRWS for simplicity.
Here are just some of the things you can do by querying the statistics collected by the BRWS:
Gauge the popularity of browser features and settings: Knowing how popular a particular feature or setting is can help tremendously in evaluating future development needs. For example, if the statistics show that only 30% of your audience is using a 1024x768 screen size, you know it may not be appropriate to design your site for that resolution. If on the other hand you see that 85% of your audience is using that screen size, you can justify revamping your site to take advantage of the larger size.
Determine impact of disabled settings: Does you site rely on cookies, JavaScript, Java, ActiveX controls or other browser settings that a user may have disabled? BrowserHawk Reports collects information on what percentage of your user’s are not meeting your minimum requirements, and what impact this is having on their browser experience.
Determine versions of Flash and other plug-ins available: Do your users have the latest and greatest Flash plug-in installed? How about RealPlayer, MediaPlayer, or Acrobat? Before targeting specific plug-in versions, consult the BrowserHawk Reports stats to determine the suitability of the technology being considered for your particular audience.
Follow important trends within your user base: Use the BrowserHawk Reports stats to watch trends within your user base. For example, you may notice an increasing number of people coming to your site with wireless devices, new browsers, new versions of plug-ins, or new capabilities such as DHTML and XML. When is it time to exploit these new features? Use the BrowserHawk Reports stats to know for sure.
Rapidly troubleshoot reported issues: Another popular use of the BrowserHawk Reports stats is to automatically log the capabilities and settings of each user’s browser as they log into your site. In the event they report an issue, you have all their browser settings and capabilities at your fingertips to assist them with troubleshooting.
Track over 100 statistics on browsers and browser settings: BrowserHawk Reports tracks and logs statistics on over 100 properties, most of which are not provided by any other product on the market. These statistics include details on browser versions, platforms, screen resolutions, plug-in and plug-in versions, user language, time zone differences, Java versions and vendors, connection types and speeds, DHTML, XML and XML parsers, style sheets, PDA / WAP / DoCoMo / wireless devices, JavaScript engines and versions, security settings such as disabled cookies / JavaScript / Java / ActiveX / scripting of applets, SSL key sizes, AOL versions, font sizes, file upload capabilities, numerous display-related properties, and much more. In short, every property detected by the BrowserHawk component is available for collection by the BrowserHawk Reports.
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