diff --git a/CONTRIBUTORS b/CONTRIBUTORS
index 172058b3b..1b1d8698f 100644
--- a/CONTRIBUTORS
+++ b/CONTRIBUTORS
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ Andrew Eisenberg
 Andrew Everitt
 Andrew Stevens
 Andrey Urazov
+André-John Mas
 Andy Wood
 Anil K. Vijendran
 Anli Shundi
diff --git a/contributors.xml b/contributors.xml
index 9b663e7b6..88cd45221 100644
--- a/contributors.xml
+++ b/contributors.xml
@@ -90,6 +90,10 @@
     <first>Andrey</first>
     <last>Urazov</last>
   </name>
+  <name>
+    <first>André-John</first>
+    <last>Mas</last>
+  </name>
   <name>
     <first>Andy</first>
     <last>Wood</last>
diff --git a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/MagicNames.java b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/MagicNames.java
index 01668b11b..bc39a2578 100644
--- a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/MagicNames.java
+++ b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/MagicNames.java
@@ -282,5 +282,12 @@ public final class MagicNames {
      * @since Ant 1.9.1
      */
     public static final String ATTRIBUTE_NAMESPACE = "attribute namespace";
+
+    /**
+     * Name of the property which can provide an override of the
+     * User-Agent used in &lt;get&gt; tasks.
+     * Value {@value}
+     */
+    public static final String HTTP_AGENT_PROPERTY = "ant.http.agent";
 }
 
diff --git a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/Main.java b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/Main.java
index debfb8843..6be945d2f 100644
--- a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/Main.java
+++ b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/Main.java
@@ -1060,6 +1060,11 @@ public class Main implements AntMain {
      */
     private static String antVersion = null;
 
+    /**
+     * Cache of the short Ant version information when it has been loaded.
+     */
+    private static String shortAntVersion = null;
+    
     /**
      * Returns the Ant version information, if available. Once the information
      * has been loaded once, it's cached and returned from the cache on future
@@ -1078,10 +1083,11 @@ public class Main implements AntMain {
                     Main.class.getResourceAsStream("/org/apache/tools/ant/version.txt");
                 props.load(in);
                 in.close();
+                shortAntVersion = props.getProperty("VERSION");
 
                 StringBuffer msg = new StringBuffer();
                 msg.append("Apache Ant(TM) version ");
-                msg.append(props.getProperty("VERSION"));
+                msg.append(shortAntVersion);
                 msg.append(" compiled on ");
                 msg.append(props.getProperty("DATE"));
                 antVersion = msg.toString();
@@ -1094,6 +1100,24 @@ public class Main implements AntMain {
         }
         return antVersion;
     }
+    
+    /**
+     * Returns the short Ant version information, if available. Once the information
+     * has been loaded once, it's cached and returned from the cache on future
+     * calls.
+     * 
+     * @return the short Ant version information as a String
+     *         (always non-<code>null</code>)
+     *         
+     * @throws BuildException BuildException if the version information is unavailable
+     * @since Ant 1.9.3
+     */
+    public static String getShortAntVersion() throws BuildException {
+        if (shortAntVersion == null) {
+            getAntVersion();
+        }
+        return shortAntVersion;
+    }
 
      /**
       * Prints the description of a project (if there is one) to
diff --git a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Get.java b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Get.java
index 70529e69d..d1125ae26 100644
--- a/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Get.java
+++ b/src/main/org/apache/tools/ant/taskdefs/Get.java
@@ -31,6 +31,7 @@ import java.net.URLConnection;
 import java.util.Date;
 
 import org.apache.tools.ant.BuildException;
+import org.apache.tools.ant.MagicNames;
 import org.apache.tools.ant.Main;
 import org.apache.tools.ant.Project;
 import org.apache.tools.ant.Task;
@@ -80,7 +81,10 @@ public class Get extends Task {
     private boolean skipExisting = false;
     private boolean httpUseCaches = true; // on by default
     private Mapper mapperElement = null;
-    private String userAgent = System.getProperty("http.agent", DEFAULT_AGENT_PREFIX + "/" + Main.getAntVersion()); 
+    private String userAgent = 
+        System.getProperty(MagicNames.HTTP_AGENT_PROPERTY,
+                           DEFAULT_AGENT_PREFIX + "/"
+                           + Main.getShortAntVersion());
 
     /**
      * Does the work.
@@ -406,6 +410,18 @@ public class Get extends Task {
     public void setSkipExisting(boolean s) {
         this.skipExisting = s;
     }
+    
+    /**
+     * HTTP connections only - set the user-agent to be used
+     * when communicating with remote server. if null, then
+     * the value is considered unset and the behaviour falls
+     * back to the default of the http API.
+     *
+     * @since Ant 1.9.3
+     */
+    public void setUserAgent(String userAgent) {
+        this.userAgent = userAgent;
+    }
 
     /**
      * HTTP connections only - control caching on the
@@ -421,16 +437,6 @@ public class Get extends Task {
         this.httpUseCaches = httpUseCache;
     }
     
-    /**
-     * HTTP connections only - set the user-agent to be used
-     * when communicating with remote server. if null, then
-     * the value is considered unset and the behaviour falls
-     * back to the default of the http API.
-     */
-    public void setUserAgent(String userAgent) {
-        this.userAgent = userAgent;
-    }
-
     /**
      * Define the mapper to map source to destination files.
      * @return a mapper to be configured.
@@ -657,6 +663,9 @@ public class Get extends Task {
             if (hasTimestamp) {
                 connection.setIfModifiedSince(timestamp);
             }
+            // Set the user agent
+            connection.addRequestProperty("User-Agent", this.userAgent);
+            
             // prepare Java 1.1 style credentials
             if (uname != null || pword != null) {
                 String up = uname + ":" + pword;