Was really leaning toward Android (BB Priv), but now I may have changed my mind back to 950XL

[Adam Frix]

I currently have Lumia 635, and like it fine. But, I'm ready for flagship. The Android ecosystem and the ability to change screen keyboards is a strong driver for me, and then Blackberry came out with a physical keyboard Android phone! I thought that was the answer. I've always loved Blackberries and their physical keyboards.

So I've been mulling things over, waiting for the 950XL to come out before I decide. My 950XL that I ordered awaits me at the local MS store, ready for pickup as early as today. I've been pondering this.

But then something just happened. Today my wife (Samsung Galaxy S4/Android 4.4) and her friend (iPhone 6) said they tried to find what was on the Thanksgiving buffet at the Hollywood Casino in Columbus. They said they couldn't find it.

Huh. I pulled out my 635 and asked Cortana, "Hollywood Casino Thanksgiving buffet". She gave me a bunch of other Hollywood Casino links from other cities, but several down I found the result for Columbus:

Epic Buffet - Columbus Buffet :: Hollywood Casino Columbus

I clicked it, and it popped right up and told me everything.

My wife and her friend were aghast, said they couldn't find it. Huh, really?

Turns out that if you click on that link on an Android or iPhone, you get something different than if you click that link on Windows Phone 8.1 or in a computer web browser (I use Firefox). Android and iOS give a generic page for that restaurant, with a different title and different wording and without any holiday-specific information.

How much of this is Android and iOS, and how much of it is the responsibility of that web developer? Even if the web developer screwed up somehow, does this mean that IE on my 635 is doing a better job of handling web browsing than Android or iOS? Can someone with a 950XL try this for me on Edge?

For the record, I can't make Windows Phone or Firefox, either one, give me the generic page. I'm sure it's back there on the web site somewhere, and that's what Android and iOS are pulling for some strange reason, but it's not accessible to Windows Phone or to Firefox on my Mac.

 

[Jens Ansorg]

It's called "user agent sniffing". The Browser tells the server: 'Hey, I'm Firefox, running on Windows 10. Give me that page'
Some servers then react to that Greeting and dig out a special version for that Browser or OS or a combination of both.
And Web Developers, the one responsible for the server response, often do a poor job with that and only cater for "is it an iDevice?" and perhaps "is it Android?" and forget about the rest which makes Windows Phones or Firefox OS or whatever receive the general desktop version of that site.

You can install an addon in your desktop Firefox like "User agent switcher" and then try this yourself.
Although when I tried that with your link I get no difference no matter what browser I fake.