527603 - img src does not display dynamic image with .php extension

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[AusBorne]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091102 Firefox/3.5.5 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091102 Firefox/3.5.5 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)

Dynamic images are not displayed when the file extension is .php

Example: <img src="http://website.com/myimage.php" />

myimage.php on the server:

header("Content-Type: image/gif");
header("Location: http://website.com/some-image.gif");

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Create a PHP script using dynamic images, i.e

<?php
header("Content-Type: image/gif");
header("Location: http://website.com/some-image.gif");
exit;
?>

2. Create the html with an img tag using the php file as the src, i.e.

<img src="http://website.com/myimage.php" />
Actual Results:  
No image is displayed

Expected Results:  
An image should have displayed

A temp fix is to have a random extension in the img src URL, i.e.

<img src="http://website.com/myimage.php?x=.anything" />

Comment 1

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

What is the content-type sent by the server for this URL ?
( You can use http://web-snffer.net for public URLs)

Extensions doesn't matter and it can only be a content-type header issue.

Comment 2

[AusBorne]

Matthias, the Content type is that of the image type displayed (image/gif, image/jpg, etc..).

Not to worry, I found the cause. It is Apache sending this header:

X-Pad: avoid browser bug

Seems the img src URL that I was using in my HTML code was exactly the length that causes Apache to send this header. 1 character longer or shorter and the X-Pad header is not sent and the image displays fine.

Cheers

Comment 3

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

The borwser ignores this header, it doesn't explain why the image isn't displayed.
The header itself is for an old Bug in old Netscape browsers.