Microsoft breaks HotMail for Linux users?

[LinuxMint-4]

Microsoft breaks HotMail for Linux users?
Nov. 07, 2008

http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS6023147333.html

[Updated 8:30] -- A Linux-Watch reader today reported difficulties using Microsoft's Hotmail service with Firefox browsers running on Linux operating systems. We confirmed that creating a new Hotmail account was not possible, due to an error message suggesting a "browser upgrade."

The screenshot below depicts the error message received when trying to use the Iceweasel browser on Debian Sid to create a new account. However, reader Carl Bolling says he experienced errors using the newest Firefox 3.03 browser on Ubuntu 8.10, CentOS 5.2, and Fedora 9.



Iceweasel of course produces an error, even though it works identically to Firefox
(Click to enlarge)


Bolling wries, "I have been a Hotmail user since before it was bought by Microsoft. I guess I still use it because I have used it for so long, even though I mostly run Linux. Imagine my surprise when after an "upgrade" of Hotmail that happened over the weekend I can no longer send email from any Linux client."

Bolling says that when attempting to use Linux and Firefox to access HotMail, he is unable to put text into the subject or message fields, and that the text is cleared from forwarded messages. He explains, "So, to be technical, I found I can still send BLANK emails, but nothing new."

Bolling said that for weeks prior to the loss of service, Hotmail entreated him to "try upgrading your browser." However, he writes, "I was already using Firefox 3.03, so I thought it was odd that Hotmail was telling me to upgrade to a new browser (like Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Safari). I would press the "just keep going" button and it would work. Well it works no more."

Bolling adds, "And I have checked and if I run Windows and Firefox it works fine, so clearly, MS has broken their service to only work on MS systems. What do you think of that?"

Ironically, Hotmail itself runs in part on Linux servers, according to Netcraft's analysis. Your reporter recalls a scuttled effort shortly after Microsoft purchased Hotmail to switch all the business's servers to Windows. Additionally, a Linux and Hotmail user famously paid delinquent DNS charges on behalf of Microsoft to rescue the service from an outtage.

They should be nicer to us.

UPDATE -- In testing with Firefox 3.03 on Mepis Linux, Linux-Watch was able to create a Microsoft Live ID and Hotmail account, and to successfully send and receive email from the account. This led us to experiment with modifying Iceweasel's "UserAgent" setting, so we could use our Debian system with Hotmail, too. We loaded "about:config" in the address bar, entered "iceweasel" in the search bar, and then changed the value of the the "general.useragent.extra.firefox" entry from "Iceweasel/3.03" to "Firefox/3.03". After that, Hotmail worked as expected. As an added bonus, we could also use the Rhapsody music streaming services, and other websites that use loose browser qualification by parsing the UserAgent string sent by the browser in the HTTP header.

[MattKingUSA]

Yeah, I was getting really angry the other night and I had to change my agent thingy. But I think that Firefox or the distros that are bundling the browsers need to fix this.

[MattKingUSA]

Well, they killed it again so I had to change the ff version number.

[eddie]

If I use the agent, I can log in easier but can not delete messages, so i put up with the browser warning to use hotmail. I am in the process of moving my mail. Maybe that is what they want.

update: this works for me....

[MattKingUSA]

As long as MS is paying for it, i'll use it.

[dpkgregor]

I have to get rid of my hotmail account.

[jstgtpaid]

gmail is the cure.... IMHO

Especially, when you use the better gmail 2 skin... mmmm tasty...

[MattKingUSA]

And it's broken again...

[mowestusa]

Wow, am I hot over this one. At first I thought it was an isolated problem, because my wife has been using Hotmail on Foresight Linux without issue for weeks, but today, they finally did it.

MS will let you log in and view and search, but actually write an email, forget it. I used Firefox on Foresight and on Fedora 9. The Fedora 9 version is the newest, the Foresight version is version 3.0.1. You can do everything but write in the text window of the email message. You can add an email, you can give it a subject, but the body of the email is a complete no go on both systems.

I booted up Windows XP however, on one machine that never gets booted. It has been so long that I believe it had a really old version of Firefox from the 2.0 days. That had no issue at all, no warning about it not working, and it simply just worked, you could send an email and everything. I would really like to know what MS is doing to Hotmail to make it impossible to run on Linux, it is a web app after all.

So, now, I have to move my very non tech savvy wife off of the only email client she knows or understands to something else, thank MS!!!

Actually, I have been using Hotmail forever, this just stinks. I will admit that it has just gotten worse and worse, but when you have all of your email addresses saved there, and other things it just stinks.

[MattKingUSA]

Try the agent switcher fix. It should work.Mine is working now.

[gordonmarkus]

I too have just come up against this problem - and have managed to get around it with the user agent switcher.

To be honest, this is probably the push that I needed to bin the hotmail account anyway, despite the fact that I've had it since '98.

-Gordon.

[Claudio]

Ironically, I'm able to access it under Ubuntu Linux 8.10 installed on an iMac G5. Yet, it won't work on the x86 version.

[dpkgregor]

In the end, the only thing that really works is my tuxfamily address.

[eddie]

Hotmail works for me now without any fixes.