[guptaneil]

That is exactly what he is saying. They added KHTML to the user agent string to improve compatibility with servers, since Webkit was essentially KHTML anyway, not to try to hide the actual user agent. Internet Explorer is what they used when hiding the user agent.

[georgemcbay]

If he is trying to say that, then he has my sincere apologies, but it doesn't read like that, at least to me.

eg. he says "the names of other browser engines", not "the name of the browser engine our code was originally based on".

The "like Gecko" part is a bit of a red herring here and mostly irrelevant, as that is simply what KHTML/Konquerer used in its own UA ("KHTML, like Gecko").

[guptaneil]

The full quote is:

"That allowed me to tweak the string for maximum compatibility with the websites of that time. Which explains why the Safari user agent string has so much extra information in it, e.g. KHTML, like Gecko — the names of other browser engines."

I interpret that as KHTML and Gecko are names of other browser engines that are listed in Safari's user agent string for compatibility purposes.

[georgemcbay]

Fair enough, I'm not trying to suggest this is some grand conspiracy, it just struck me as a funny phrasing given the shared history of the two layout engines.

[donmelton]

I'll be clarifying that shared history in a later post. Specifically, what made me select KHTML/KJS over Gecko and other engines.

[glhaynes]

Will be fascinated to read that. I remember during the keynote when Safari was announced thinking it was bizarre (not to mention risky) that Gecko wasn't used, but, I knew you all must've had your reasons. As a regular user of Safari and/or WebKit on at least five different platforms, I'm rather happy with how it turned out.