macromedia flash sitedesign: It doesn't seem that my Flash sites will send a referer variable no mater what
I try. I've been searching and it doesn't seem like too many people have this
problem because I can only find a links about it with no solutions.

I run a web design company and I want to keep track of my sites that link back
to me. I want to do this by parsing the HTTP_REFERER variable in PHP. It
doesn't seem to work at all. I've even tried making the site link to a local
file such as 'redirect.php' and redirecting with PHP's header('Location:
http://mysite');

Can anybody think of a work around besides adding a query string to the link?
As I said I really don't want to edit all my sites to add a query string, but
I'll be forced to if there is no way that Flash will send a referrer variable.

BTW, It seems Safari for Mac will send the referer like the rest should do..

Thanks,
Mike

I have the exact same issue. I think its more like an IE issue. I can get
referer using Mozilla and FireFox, but not IE. So a combination of IE and Flash
is the issue.

I can not believe more people have not seen this issue. Does anyone have a
solution, or a known bug?

-Jesse

This is an issue I am familiar with but unable to solve as well.

I bookmarked a thread at Flashkit years ago where there's a possible
explanation:

"The reason you don't get the HTTP_REFERER environment variable is because it
is not filled in by the Flash Player ActiveX Plug-in for IE.

The feature is disabled due to a conflict between the Flash Player ActiveX
plug-in and IE4 - which MacroMedia are commited to supporting. The plug-in and
browser crashed when attempting to fill out this variable and thus MM disabled
the feature in its IE plug-in. "

From thread
http://www.flashkit.com/board/showthread.php?s=2285ef998322794017727fb45d30beb2&
threadid=119457

There must surely be a solution by now? If there isn't, I doubt you will ever
see a major portal use Flash

What a piece of crap. Since 90% of users seem to be using IE does anyone have
any idea whether MM is going to address this at all? This is utterly useless
for capturing log data and renders flash useless in that capacity which if
you're tracking referrers through your stats, will not show. I ran my own
tests and sure enough Firefox/Netscape worked fine but IE produced nothing.
Seems like a fairly important oversite considering that log data drives a lot
of statistical information.

I have the same problem for a lot of costumers, on our office were we use Mac's
whe didn't saw the problem... we have to find a sollution quick. IE version 5.2
for mac works fine! but on windows this whole thing is crab!