[villalobos]

All right it used to be that if I entered a keyword in the safari address bar, say cnn, it would automatically change it to www.cnn.com and look for that address. Since very recently,this is not the case. Now I end up with an Earthlink customized 'oops we did not find the server you are looking for' (Earthlink is my provider).
I was under the impression that the auto completion was a feature from Safari, not from my ISP (impression reinforced with the fact that it works fine with Firefox). So what is going on? What is now different with Safari so that autocompletion does not work anymore??

[ChrisF]

Originally Posted by villalobos

I was under the impression that the auto completion was a feature from Safari, not from my ISP (impression reinforced with the fact that it works fine with Firefox). So what is going on? What is now different with Safari so that autocompletion does not work anymore??

Apparently Earthlink has begun doing a DNS redirection, so that any address not found ends up @ Earthlink's "helpful" page.

[ghporter]

As far as I've seen, most browsers try exactly what you type into the address bar first, and then start appending "www." or ".com" as needed (along with ".net", ".org", etc.) as indicated. This would mean that when your first try with "CNN" was first attempted by Firefox, Earthlink could grab it and provide its "help." Since the request is intercepted and gets a reply instead of a DNS error, Firefox can't do its thing with adding the "www." stuff.

[villalobos]

Originally Posted by ghporter

As far as I've seen, most browsers try exactly what you type into the address bar first, and then start appending "www." or ".com" as needed (along with ".net", ".org", etc.) as indicated. This would mean that when your first try with "CNN" was first attempted by Firefox, Earthlink could grab it and provide its "help." Since the request is intercepted and gets a reply instead of a DNS error, Firefox can't do its thing with adding the "www." stuff.

All right I tried Firefox again after emptying the cache, and lo and behold earthlink got me it's 'help' page... Frustrating. Oh well I am moving in a week and dumping them anyways.

[Chuckit]

Yeah, EarthLink started doing that to me too. It's retarded.

[villalobos]

Originally Posted by Chuckit

Yeah, EarthLink started doing that to me too. It's retarded.

Change your DNS to 4.2.2.2, it should solve that.

[dimmer]

The "autocomplete" is actually part of Apple's DNS implementation: you've never been able to just type a domain name "apple" into a PC browser and get to Apple. The logic works as:

I'm in a web browser, I make a request to port 80.
The site I try to connect to says "what the hell are you talking about?" (the master DNS reports no such site found).
The DNS subsystem/client takes a moment and ponders, hmm, if they requested to see a service on port 80, that's a web service most likely, so lets try with www. at the start and .com at the end.
If that fails, try .org, then .net, then .gov, then give up.

This is predicated upon the responding DNS server saying "apple" is invalid, not "apple" is this address. Earthlinks DNS servers don't do this, but feed back a pretend address instead.

This is all part and parcel of how messed up the internet is: if I connect to the domain "apple" froma browser (on port 80), the recieving site should be smart enough to work that out. If I open a connect on port 20, the server should know I'm using telnet and respond accordingly, same with ftp, ssh, whatever you want to bring up. Service prefixes are wasteful, pointless, unnecessary and only exist because certain someones couldn't write a TCP/IP stack if their PC-DOS license depended upon it.

[Chuckit]

Then why doesn't Firefox do it?

[Big Mac]

It appears that Firefox based browsers convert the URL internally (at the browser level), while Safari relies on DNS to do it.

[dimmer]

Yup, you can confirm that with EtherPeek. Firefox behaves "sensibly" on the PC as well, kinda annulling my statement about not being able to do this on a PC browser, d'oh! Still, it shouldn't be a browser deal, it should be in the DNS code. Firefox is making up for the errors of others.

[Big Mac]

I respectfully disagree, dimmer. I think the browser should be the one to reform the request. The way Safari does it, DNS has to be pinged twice instead of once, causing unnecessary traffic. I think Firefox based browsers do the proper thing, from that perspective.

[dimmer]

It's something we could argue about with valid points of view on both sides Big Mac: having the DNS handle it means it's something you don't need all apps to have code inserted to do; having the app do it does take away a DNS request or two. In my favor, I'd say that DNS queries are small, but you could argue back that small isn't as important as latency and load on the DNS servers. If we keep on like this we'll be on some RFC board before you can say "Yes, but..."

[Big Mac]

Yeah, I do agree with you, and I was wondering if there's an RFC on this topic.

[dimmer]

I seem to remember the topic is discussed in the DNS and ZeroConf RFC's--and probably many others. The ZeroConf stuff makes every client a mini-DNS server (when not connected to the internet at large) and that specification calls for the correct handling of request port to service mapping. How many things actually implement that is open to investigation.

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by Big Mac

I respectfully disagree, dimmer. I think the browser should be the one to reform the request. The way Safari does it, DNS has to be pinged twice instead of once, causing unnecessary traffic. I think Firefox based browsers do the proper thing, from that perspective.

Search Google?

[dimmer]

Sorry Chuckit, but WTF do you mean to imply? And BTW, for you it would be "Search http://www.google.com"-- drop that Arselink like a stone dude.

[dimmer]

Ooops, I typod.

[zerostar]

Never-mind they do not add the www. or .com thought they did...

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by dimmer

Sorry Chuckit, but WTF do you mean to imply?

That Firefox searches Google when it can't find the IP for the string you put into the address bar.

[dimmer]

That's an interesting fall back, basically treating the whole address bar as if it were the search bar. Not a bad thing, I guess. Does it change if you set a default search engine? Why were you looking for Mary Tyler Moore Naked With Muskrats Playing Poker anyway?

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by dimmer

That's an interesting fall back, basically treating the whole address bar as if it were the search bar. Not a bad thing, I guess. Does it change if you set a default search engine?

It doesn't change depending on what search engine you have selected, if that's what you mean.

[dimmer]

Yeah, that's what I meant. Should be turned off in an option somewhere. But it's pretty innocuous, it only tells a search site that is determined to never tell anyone what you've looked for about your MTM fetish stuff.

[Chuckit]

I just found it odd that Big Mac thought Googling was the "proper way." It's certainly one option, but I don't see why appending www. and .com is worse.

[Apfhex]

I had the same problem when I switched to Comcast last year. I always assumed that Safari added the prefix and suffix internally too (I think this would be better). It fixed itself after a week or two though...

[TETENAL]

Originally Posted by Apfhex

I always assumed that Safari added the prefix and suffix internally too (I think this would be better).

Then you couldn't reach anything without the www. and .com like localhost. Firefox does a "I am lucky" search at Google, so there's an extra DNS lookup as well. The one for Google. I think neither is the "correct" way to do it. They are just different ways. I just like Safari better because it is more predictable.

[Chuckit]

Yeah, Firefox's behavior is kind of weird. And it totally falls for Googlebombs (type "failure" into the address bar).

[Apfhex]

Originally Posted by TETENAL

Then you couldn't reach anything without the www. and .com like localhost.

Makes sense. I never though about that.

[dimmer]

Nope, because when the lookup fails, it will fall back to "fugit, lets just do what they said, not what they meant".

[Kar98]

You could of course type "example" into the address bar, hold down the Apple key, press return and Firefox will complete it to, and navigate to "http://www.example.com".

Apple key, shift, enter = "http://www.example.ORG"
Shift, enter = "http://www.example.NET"


What you want from Safari is not auto-completion but DNS lookup. What my post describes is auto-completion. Btw, both IE and Firefox behave like that. It's Safari and Camino that behave weird.

[Curiosity]

Originally Posted by ghporter

As far as I've seen, most browsers try exactly what you type into the address bar first, and then start appending "www." or ".com" as needed (along with ".net", ".org", etc.) as indicated. This would mean that when your first try with "CNN" was first attempted by Firefox, Earthlink could grab it and provide its "help." Since the request is intercepted and gets a reply instead of a DNS error, Firefox can't do its thing with adding the "www." stuff.

Firefox has a search default that goes to Google. Why would it not just send the word to Google? Was fixup set? If so, should Firefox not append "www." and ".com" before sending the request out?

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by dimmer

Nope, because when the lookup fails, it will fall back to "fugit, lets just do what they said, not what they meant".

If there is ever a computer that does what I meant, I'll pre-emptively destroy it, because I've seen Terminator.

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by Chuckit

I just found it odd that Big Mac thought Googling was the "proper way." It's certainly one option, but I don't see why appending www. and .com is worse.

That is not what I meant, Chuckit. On my system (and apparently dimmer's as well) Firefox based browers reform the string into a proper address without pinging DNS (as Safari does). That's what I called "proper behavior."

[Chuckit]

Really? So if you type in "failure," it takes you to failure.com rather than the biography of George Bush? Because performing a Google "I'm Feeling Lucky" search is the intended default behavior of Firefox.

[Big Mac]

Oops. I was using Camino when I wrote the posts and thought it would behave like Firefox. I guess my comments apply only to Camino. My mistake.

[CharlesS]

One thing I prefer about Safari's method over Firefox's is that you can type something like "apple/macosx/" and it will autocomplete to Apple - Mac OS X. On Firefox, though, you'll just get Apple.

[Chuckit]

Yeah, that is handy. But usually if I remember a long URL like that, it means I've been there before, which means Firefox also remembers it.

[CharlesS]

Not really. There are a bunch that are easy to remember without having been there too often:

google/maps
google/images
apple/macosx/feedback
apple/swupdates
Lots of web hosts have you get to your e-mail with something like domain/mail/
or your control panel with something like domain/admin

Plus, there's the fact that sometimes you're not on your own computer. Sometimes you're accessing the Internet from a public machine. When this happens, if the public machine is a Mac, you can use the shortcuts I outlined above. If it's a PC, then I usually find it really annoying to have to add the www. and .com.

[philm]

Just noticed that when I type:

bbc/1

in Camino, it resolves to:

"http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcone"

Interesting.

[kick52]

Im with orange broadband UK (previously wannado)

type in any web site address with out the prefixes and suffixes and it works.

[Chuckit]

Originally Posted by philm

Just noticed that when I type:

bbc/1

in Camino, it resolves to:

"http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcone"

Interesting.

That's because bbc.com/1 redirects to that.