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For example the facebook favicon will not load:

http://static.ak.fbcdn.net/rsrc.php/yi/r/q9U99v3_saj.ico

I can type this into the browser address bar for Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and Opera and all works fine.

But when I type it into the address bar of IE (10) I get a broken image instead of the actual favicon.

I'm concerned that IE cached a failed URL response, so I cleared everything I could under Tools->Options->Delete.

I'm troubleshooting why it won't load directly in the browser address bar b.c. the image links in my page won't load either ( for ie10 ).

return_of_the_drunken_coder
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    This might help - http://stackoverflow.com/questions/16943609/which-versions-of-ie-support-png-favicons - that image is actually a 16x16 PNG - `q9U99v3_saj.ico: PNG image data, 16 x 16, 8-bit/color RGBA, non-interlaced` – NG. Feb 16 '14 at 16:04
  • Some favicons aren't IE-friendly AFAIK, http://jayl.ee/blog/2013/04/30/the-definitive-way-to-create-a-favicon – Marco A. Feb 16 '14 at 16:07
  • But if I load the site directly -> `www.facebook.com` -> the favicon works fine. It's when I type in the path to it in the address bar as described in the question. – return_of_the_drunken_coder Feb 16 '14 at 16:10
  • According to those links a PNG inside an ICO file should be supported in IE10, and it is, as you can see when you visit facebook.com. Howerver if you type in the path directly, that is where you get the fail. Perhaps this is a browser bug? – return_of_the_drunken_coder Feb 16 '14 at 16:34

1 Answers1

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IE indeed downloads that icon to your hard disk, you can verify this by

  1. Clear your cache entirely
  2. Paste that address
  3. Go into Internet Options->Settings->Show Files, the only file that should show up is the favicon.ico image

The icon is thus recognized as a favicon and saved to your hard disk. The link between your favicon and the website is stored into your browser's history, if you search for

http://static.ak.fbcdn.net/favicon.ico

you should get the real icon you downloaded. Unfortunately IE treats favicons in a special way from normal images and unless you're "forcing" the "this-is-an-image" thing, it will treat those in a "special way". There are also some people who consider this a bug, it's up to you.

Take also a look at: http://jeffcode.blogspot.de/2007/12/why-doesnt-favicon-for-my-site-appear.html

Marco A.
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  • How do I use the "forcing" "this is an image" thing. What do you mean? – return_of_the_drunken_coder Feb 16 '14 at 18:19
  • For the favicon to appear you can either put a file in the root of your domain called favicon.ico or by using a tag with the rel="shortcut icon" value and the href value set to the URL for the Icon you wish to display. It seems by using that path you can't respect neither. – Marco A. Feb 16 '14 at 20:17