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http://www.macnn.com/articles/01/12/17/excite.com.cookie/

Excite.com cookie bug plagues Mac users

updated 10:20 pm EST, Mon December 17, 2001

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MacNN Readers Mo Mehlsak and Barbara Riegelhaupt note a very serious problem affecting Mac users running Microsoft Internet Explorer in Mac OS 9:

Apparently, the newly reborn Excite.com deposits a cookie for registered users that corrupts Internet preferences. The result is that IE/E'rage [Entourage] -- and for all I know, any other Internet app that uses the prefs file -- crashes on launch with a Type 2 error. A MS tech support staffer I spoke to said they had "dozens" of calls about it today. The fix is to move Internet prefs and files in the MS Cache folder [also found in the Prefs folder] to the desktop or trash, launch the Internet control panel to create a new prefs file, and either enter a new home page under the Web tab or choose "none."

by MacNN Staff

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scotty321
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Nov 1999

0

12/17, 09:42pm | report spam | close Reply |
This is a serious problem

Yep, this bug is real and extremely serious. I wish excite.com actually had human beings working on their staff to fix awful stuff ilke this!

cejones
Forum Regular

Joined: Jun 1999

0

12/17, 09:55pm | report spam | close Reply |
cookies ???

Cookies should not be able to corrupt anything... this sounds like a major Microsoft IE bug... not a cookie problem.

\0

Joined:

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12/17, 11:09pm | report spam | close Reply | delete
Oh Crumbs!

Are OS X'ers safe? My guess would be that we are.

And yes, this would be a problem with the browser, not the site. They just send the cookie to your browser -- It's the browser's job so store it.

Sounds like Microsoft's got another goof on their hands... (And no, I don't mean Balmer.)

~ Chris
(...or DO I..?)

P. Accas
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Jun 2000

0

12/18, 04:21am | report spam | close Reply |
Netscape/iCab work fine

I also have doubts about this being Excite's fault. I made the move to the "new" Excite.com over the weekend, and haven't had a single problem with Netscape 4.77 (hacked with ResEdit to be more usable). Same with iCab. I haven't checked Opera yet, but my guess is it'll be fine. Why I can't seem to log in and post here on MacNN using Netscape is another matter... (Yeah, yeah, "Netscape sux, blah, blah, blah")

Has anyone tried simply deleting the old Excite cookie(s) from I.E., then re-logging in? What about testing IE using internal prefs, not the Internet control panel's? Yes, I know the idea that an MS product could have a huge bug is hard to believe, but it is possible.

palmberg
Senior User

Joined: Mar 2000

0

12/18, 07:06am | report spam | close Reply |
You don't say!

I simply refuse to believe that Microsoft would let something like this slip.

Luckily, Excite.com is a joke, so I'm virtually safe from this bug.

At least for now....

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12/18, 07:36am | report spam | close Reply | delete
It'll be gone Feb 28th

anyway...so this bug is only temporary...find another search engine.

wau
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Dec 2001

0

12/18, 07:50am | report spam | close Reply |
No need to delete prefs

Hi,

Yesterday morning, one of our Admins was c/o the same problem, launch IE, crashes w/ type 2 error.

I dumped the cache as a usual fix, (she wanted me to delete her prefs only as a last resort) upon relaunching, I noticed that her homepage was set to access excite.com. Thinking the problem was w/ the way her excite homepage was customized, upon restarting & relaunching IE, I quickly hit the stop button, got to edit: prefs, and used none for the homepage. Everything works fine now w/o having to dump her prefs & lose all her bookmarks.

MacOS761
Senior User

Joined: Mar 2000

0

12/18, 10:15am | report spam | close Reply |
not just OS 9

I got a call from a co-worker yesterday asking what to do regarding this same problem. Unfortunately I don't think she ever got it fixed, but I can add a bit to the saga - the same thing happens under OS 8.6. Thanks MacNN... I'll be notifying her of what's going on thanks to your posting of this.

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12/18, 10:18am | report spam | close Reply | delete
something goofy for sure

even with OmniWeb. I click a article link and get a errordocs page, same with My Weather, etc...and several times when I click Start Page icon to take me to apple.excite.com, its been hijacked by some Netscape/apple url

rayntosca
Fresh-Faced Recruit

Joined: Apr 2000

0

12/18, 10:48am | report spam | close Reply |
Did I miss something?

Let me make sure I have this correct:

IE/Entourage stores cookies in ICP (which it shouldn't).
Excite sets a valid cookie.
ICP Prefs gets corrupted.
IE/Entourage crashes (which it shouldn't) when it reads the corrupted prefs.

Therefore, since the valid Excite cookie exposed that IE/Entourage wasn't written correctly and crashes when it reads a corrupted record it wrote to a file that it shouldn't have been storing cookies in in the first place, it is Excite's fault?

And this has nothing to do with the other times that MS's software corrupts ICP's Prefs, correct?

\0

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12/18, 11:16am | report spam | close Reply | delete
Here's the deal

Hi folks,

Here's my take on this: Excite.com was the default search page when you bought your Macintosh. So, if you had not changed the search page in the Internet control panel, your computer would have downloaded the new cookie when the site redesign was launched yesterday; the cookie corrupted your Internet preference file as explained in this news article; and without the Internet control panel working properly, any program that relied on it wouldn't work -- that's why IE, OE, and OmniWeb break but Netscape doesn't.

I can confirm this because we have ten Macs in our office, and only one still had the original search page setting. That's the only one that had the problem yesterday. Trashing the Internet prefs but not IE or OE prefs did the trick!

Since this problem affects non-Microsoft programs (OmniWeb) but doesn't affect Microsoft programs on computers that were set to use another search page, it seems clear to me that Excite and not Microsoft is to blame.

Regards,
Arlo Leach
www.typea.net

hinson
Dedicated MacNNer

Joined: Feb 2000

0

12/18, 04:29pm | report spam | close Reply |
What's the deal again?

Okay, first let me say that while excite.com as a search engine seems quite inadequate to me, excite.com does offer one of the most versatile portals out there! That's why I use it, and I like it a lot! I thus am aggravated at these problems and would like to see them solved as soon as possible.

Now, as to whose fault this is, the question I have is this: If you go to excite.come using a non-Microsoft web browser that also relies on the Internet Prefs, do you get the same problems? If so, then the fault must logically lie with either excite and how it does its cookies or with Apple's Internet preferences and how it allows a cookie to corrupt it.

Since I've never heard of this sort of thing happening before, I first pointed a finger at excite. Then I, like others, wondered why ANY cookie setting should EVER be able to mess up ANYTHING like Internet Preferences. That made me wonder a lot about IE. However, I haven't heard of the above test being performed with a non-MS, Internet-Prefs-reliant browser, so who knows. Finally, has anyone thought about whether there's a hole in the Internet Prefs system that could cause such corruption?

Hoping for answers soon...

-Jay

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Excite.com cookie bug plagues Mac users

updated 10:20 pm EST, Mon December 17, 2001

This is a serious problem

cookies ???

Oh Crumbs!

Netscape/iCab work fine

You don't say!

It'll be gone Feb 28th

No need to delete prefs

not just OS 9

something goofy for sure

Did I miss something?

Here's the deal

What's the deal again?

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Excite.com cookie bug plagues Mac users

updated 10:20 pm EST, Mon December 17, 2001

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This is a serious problem

cookies ???

Oh Crumbs!

Netscape/iCab work fine

You don't say!

It'll be gone Feb 28th

No need to delete prefs

not just OS 9

something goofy for sure

Did I miss something?

Here's the deal

What's the deal again?

Login Here

Register for our weekly email newsletter:

Connect tools:

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Most Read

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