Has Netscape's Browser Become Too Self-Serving?

bschoate wrote in with a good question about everyone's favorite browser: "I just installed Netscape 6 and it continues and expands the practice of providing numerous ways to use Netscape.com to promote Netscape, Inc. (or AOL for that matter). I've found at least 42 (hey- there's that magic number again) toolbar or menu options that will take you to netscape.com for everything from buying printer supplies to business Web hosting. That's not even counting any of the side bar stuff like "Find and Book Travel". And, all of those tie-ins are littered with banner ads. So even if you don't buy anything, you're still generating revenue for Netscape on some level. Frankly, I see it as a slap in the face to Mozilla, since all their volunteered hard work has created a product that will line Netscape's pockets. Does any of the money generated by the browser get back to Mozilla? I kinda doubt it." Harsh words, but the more I think about it, the more I believe he has a point. Do any of you feel the same way, and if so, how do you feel that the problem should be solved?

"Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but Internet Explorer's only link back to microsoft.com is through the 'Windows Update' feature where there is nothing to buy. To me, it's quite a double-standard-- Microsoft would be immediately dragged to court if they had one button in IE that led to a service to buy or a banner ad.

What do /.ers think about this practice? Personally, I would cringe every time I used the Netscape browser to even do an in-the-address bar search (using the '? some-text-here' syntax), since the results come with a banner ad served up by 'ads.web.aol.com'.

I find this very troubling and very frustrating."

IE lacks standards support

[TheInternet]

I use ie 5.0 at work all day long and a number of differnet versions of Netscape 6.0, Mozilla M18, Mozilla nightly build (from last week) and Netscape 4.5 at home and I can say without any shadow of doubt in my mind that ie blows the rest away.

It may be true that the IE application is more robust, but the IE rendering engine lacks a lot of the W3C standards support that Mozilla's Gecko rendering engine boasts. Supporting W3C standards means that we won't all be forced to use Windows just to view ESPN.com.

So the solution is for somebody to take Gecko, and build a better application around it.

- Scott.


------
Scott Stevenson

Re:ermm....misinformation

[Wolfier]

While, IE also gives you links to Hotmail and all its channels, there is a crucial fact that they are all files ("internet shortcuts") and are VERY EASILY REMOVABLE.

I can't say the same for Netscape. The shop button is built in and you cannot remove it without editing xresources, and there is no "security zones" (site-specific security levels) like IE has.

You can clean IE up with reletively fewer amount of tweaking than Netscape. It is the point.

Labelling useful options "Advanced" or make them nontrivial to change is just another way MS and AOL is controlling the rights of the end users.

In the next release I'll bet anything that Netscape will go the way RealPlayer has gone with respect to privacy, marketing, partnerships, and advertisements.

Were it not for some idiots who provide RealPlayer-only contents I have no idea why any sane person in the world would choose RealPlayer over Media Player.

More information can be found at www.annoyances.org.

Re:I hate to say it...

[java_sucks]

I use ie 5.0 at work all day long and a number of differnet versions of Netscape 6.0, Mozilla M18, Mozilla nightly build (from last week) and Netscape 4.5 at home and I can say without any shadow of doubt in my mind that ie blows the rest away. In fact it's not even close. As strange as it is to say this I really feel that MS has raised the standard for web browsers with ie. It's fast and it crashed on rare occasion (maybe once a week for me) while Netscape/Mozilla will go down once every couple hours under heavy browsing.

I'm a big open source fan and I have my own open source project so I am biased in a major way towards free software, but I have to doubt the sanity of anybody who can claim that the netscape/mozilla browser is better then ie. Just because we want it to win doesn't mean that it will. Just because we hate to see the giant monopolistic company produce a superior product doesn't stop them from doing so. IMHO the absolute worst thing the OSS community can do is bury it's angry head in the sand and pretend that no matter what we do it's better because we stand for the right cause.

And for those who are complaing about all the links to netscape etc., I suggest you call them up and demand a full refund for your product.

SmartDownload is worse

[Tridus]

The smartdownload feature is a bigger privacy hole, it sends back a list of every file you download to AOL.

Opera is your friend, it doesn't do nonsense like that. :)

Advertising advertising advertising

[Ionizor]

The best (only?) way to make real money with a free product on the Internet is to sell advertising. Large conglomerates (Microsoft is a prime example) usually release free software in an attempt to gain market share. Of course in the case of IE, that really doesn't do them any good except for killing competition. Sounds like it's useful but I don't think it is because if they decided to charge for the next upgrade of IE there would probably be a lynching (or several hundred) in Redmund.

Re:Hypocrisy

[um... Lucas]

The commercialization of the Internet has even caught that old vanguard Netscape. Sad, and shame.

Ermmm... They started the whole commercialization/breaking of the internet in the first place, remember?

Re:Very clever troll...

[sql*kitten]

There's no such thing as IE for Linux.

You could easily run it using VMWarez (or whatever it's called, that thing that's like WINE but isn't, you know the one I mean). And there is a native Solaris version of MSIE.

Problem:Solution

[Sampleman7]

Problem: Netscape is nothing but a web browser that "caught up" to MSIE, with the added feature of being bombarded by "AOL Everywhere" dominance strategies. (AIM, AOL Mail support, etc...)

Solution: Uninstall Netscape!

The only way NS will succeed, is when AOL's agreement with MSIE expires,(Sometime next year, I believe...) and then they force it upon it's AOL members. I liked it, but once again, AOL ruins everything for the people that aren't lazy, and actually find out how to use the net without proprietary crap.

Re:Platform "independance"

[kyz]

x86 is a totally fscked-up CISC instruction set from the 1970s, only hardware emulators (ie Pentium, Celeron, Athlon, Duron, etc) are any good at running it. x86 software emulation is useless, which is why people want open source - at least, then, they can compile it for a modern processor.

Re:Netscape is not a good browser any more.

[roca]

> Every release since the AOL takeover has been
> progressivly worse.

There has only been one: Netscape 6.0, last week. Begone, troll!

I don't care. :-)

[arcade]

I really couldn't care less.

Mozilla / Netscape is the same as emacs. "Eighty Megabytes and Constantly Swapping".

At the moment, I'm using netscape some of the time, and Konqueror a lot of the time. Konqueror is *the* new browser for Linux, in my humble opinion. :)

Also, Opera from Opera Software seems to become a *great* browser. I used the Beta a bit, and was really impressed. It had a couple of bugs, but I think those will be fixed for the next release. When that happens, I will either use Konq or Opera fulltime (as I guess Konq has progressed until then too ;).


--

You get what you deserve

[ca1v1n]

Listen to the dulplicity of the slashdot crowd. This is why the critics of cyber-libertarianism call it "cyber-selfish". You want something to be free (speech and beer) and then you cry bloody murder when the company that makes it packages the consumer version with stuff to make money for them. You block out the banner ads on the sites that are losing money hand over fist to provide you with a service that is worth something to you, when that advertising revenue is the only hope they have of turning a profit.

Much of the Mozilla development was done by full-time employees of Netscape Corporation, now a unit of AOL. As long as they don't block access to competitors (granted, we're still waiting for an open IM, but that's not so much browser-related) we have no right to complain about their self-promotion. They even make it possible for competitors to create sidebars and such things to add on to the browser their own doo-dads if they care to take the effort to develop them and can convince people to install them.

I applaud AOL for their self-promotion method. They have given us massive amounts of open-source code to do with what we please. They have done most of the work to produce Mozilla, and they have made a polished and specialized binary for the average user. Their binary adds features that the average user wants. The average user buys the 18 gig hard drive because the nice person on the phone tells them it's good. They don't care about code bloat. They don't understand memory footprints. They just know that they have a nice, fast computer, and that it can play their mp3s while browsing the web and talking to their friends on IM. AOL has given them what they want, and has given us what we want, too.

Thank you, AOL.

Netscape is a product of Mozilla .. not vice-versa

[Andrew Dvorak]

I'm not exactly sure how developers view this potentially negative aspect of such a cooperative, but Netscape/Mozilla is quite unique in that .. sure, Netscape is a variation of Mozilla, but Mozilla is always there. If you don't like Netscape, something of the equivalent is Mozilla. Use that. Something not there that Netscape has? Either bid on the developers doing it or do it yourself. As for me, I have no complaints about Netscape, but any allegedly justifyable complaints are countered by the availability of Mozilla.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Case and point...Redhat, Caldera, Suse, etc...

[Anonymous Coward]

Well gee, these companies are lining their pockets on open source software too, right? And they all provide clear self promotion with logos and links galor. Guys, this is how the business world and the Open Source world will best interact. Business has to make money. Not only do they benefit from reduced R&D costs, but they also benefit from a more level playing field and from standards that help keep competitors from "adopting and extending". And in turn, the OSS benefits from donations, equipment loans, active development participation, and in the end - protection. I see it as a symbiotic relationship and take no offense at promotional garnishments...

Mike

Mozilla is volunteer?

[Bad_CRC]

I was under the impression that a very large percentage of the people writing mozilla were being paid by Netscape (AOL)

Is that wrong?

________

Re:Some Comments

[roca]

> Netscape employs a number (the majority?) of the
> Mozilla people.

Yes, almost all of them in fact.

This is partly because just about every volunteer who gets deeply into the project and demonstrates competency is immediately offered a job at Netscape :-). This has good and bad consequences...

Re:What do you do about it?

[Anonymous Coward]

you see there is another piece of logic that you are missing here. some people choose not to use IE precisely because of the difference of moral values behind the creation of the software. that is the user's choice. in fact, as consumers, the only means that an individual has to get his/her influence to be felt is through their use of their buying power. that is, not using a piece of MS software such as IE is a statement in and of itself, one which every individual has the right to make. now people will argue against me, but these are probably the same f00ls who believe that 'a vote for nader is a vote for bush', an idea which is grounded in the same false logic. the simple fact of the matter is that a vote for nader is a vote for nader. to believe anything else is to deny democracy--in the case of software, to suggest that an individual should only base their decisions on the utility of the software in effect purport to place utility as a higher ideal than moral values. the concept of doing something in order to make a moral point must never be belittled. in fact, it could very well be argued that an individual who uses buggy OSS is acting in a manner more noble than an individual who uses proprietary software simply because it works better. if everyone chose to use non-proprietary software, then real change would be effected because all of the companies which make proprietary software would shrivel and die. the end result would be a proliferation and improvment of OSS. this would have the effect of providing development resources to the OSS movement, at which point it could maintain its philosophy while improving the quality of the product.

Re:Whatever happened to GPL'd mozilla

[asa]

We're still working out the details. keep an eye on n.p.m.license to monitor the progress. With a project of this size (with many files contributed under a number of different licenses) it takes a little time to make these kinds of changes.
-Asa

AOL Yanks Banner Blocking Feature

[sterno]

One thing I noticed in the release version of Netscape 6 is that the image management options are gone. You can tell it to not load images or you can tell it to load all images just like previous versions.

One of the features I most love about mozilla is that you can right click on an ad banner and block all images from the originating server. Thus I can go through and block the ads from annoying places like doubleclick, but leave ads if they don't actively annoy me. Of course since ad banners make the net go 'round, AOL can't very well have a netscape that provides the ability to block banners.

---

Re:Just use Mozilla?

[Tet]

It's got email and browsing and news. What more do you need?

I need a browser without email and news. I have perfectly good mail programs and news readers already (exmh and trn, if you're interested). I just wish Galeon was ready. I can't even try out their development releases without upgrading virtually everything else on my system...

Re:Netscape 6 is a hog

[ejbst25]

I understand this. But this does not make it entirely modular as I think of modular. Maybe I have a bad definition. Loading and unloading functionality is what I think needs done. i.e. When I close the goofy My Side-whatever that should take up less mem. The current design seems to resemble MS OS design. When you turn something off on a MS OS...you just can't see it any more. It does not necessarily release any resources. When a turn a panel off (now a panel isn't modular...but this such system would work) from my current X session or I remove a module from my Linux kernel. It actually releases the resources. Wouldn't this help?

It is GPLed

[Galvatron]

It's now dual-licensed. They need to keep the Mozilla license around in order to allow closed source plugins, but you can also use it under the GPL. See Mozilla's faq [mozilla.org] for details. And, contrary to your claim, it did not get "up to snuff" "within DAYS." The Mozilla license is actually pretty good, IMHO, but now you've got no basis for complaint.

The money

[Syberghost]

Does any of the money generated by the browser get back to Mozilla?

Paying for the hosting of an extremely high volume web and ftp site isn't putting money back into the community?

BTW, if you don't like Netscape 6, use Mozilla or Galeon. Neither of those would exist if Netscape hadn't seen a way to continue to make money; they would have just disposed of the source code and payed those people to do something else instead of cleaning it up.

-

It's not Wrong, it's just Stupid.

[PrismaticBooger]

The charge of Netscape revenue not going back to mozilla.org is more than a little ridiculous. Netscape/AOL pockets have been the primary funding for mozilla.org for some time now, in terms of both equipment and manpower. I don't see any reason why mozilla.org ought to resent the ads in Netscape. Users, OTOH, will likely find plenty of reasons to resent the gratuitous nature of Netscape's commercialization. And they should. It's insulting. It's Netscape saying, "We think our users are such mindless tools that we can deliver them a browser overflowing with ads that they could otherwise get for free."

There's absolutely nothing wrong with leveraging open code for commercial ends. The problem is that Netsape/AOL have bungled it badly. What value do their commercial additions add to the product? Is the additional software and advertising actually useful to many users? Is it useful enough to those users that they'll endure the ads rather than turn to ad-free alternatives?

A fine balance must be struck between annoying ads and the useful features that justify them. Not only has Netscape failed to achieve this balance, it has failed badly--partly due to gratuitous ads, and partly due to not-quite-finished software.

The result will be that users will turn to competing products--including, in all likelihood, the mozilla.org distribution of the browser. That wasn't supposed to *be* a competing product--Netscape was supposed to be able to add enough value that Mozilla would only be of interest to developers.

Re:Netscape doesn't exist anymore.

[Fervent]

IE 5.0 performed fine...

Re:Whatever happened to GPL'd mozilla

[pjrc]

Asa,

Looking over the comments you've posted (from your user info page), you're obviously involved in the Mozilla development. Now I'm a bit frustrated with the slow progress on the relicensing, but it's understandable.

Now I know everyone working on Mozilla/Netscape has probably been frustrated with lots of criticism over features vs memory/bloat and standards compliance vs delivery dates. I know that is gets difficult when it comes from "all directions" with conflicting opinions, where the only common theme is everyone is upset. Please try to understand the viewpoint of anyone waiting and trying to make plans to integrate mozilla code into a GPL'd project.

Without access to the newsgroup, the relicense process appears to be at a standstill.

The FAQ says "Yes, as more questions are asked, updates will be made to this page", but there been no update in three months. The answers are vauge and provide no real information that anyone planning to work with the code together with other GPL'd code could use to plan their future activities. There is no estimate of when the contributors will be contacted, how long they have to reply, or any other time oriented info. In fact, there isn't even an indication of when these things may be known and added to the page. There is no indication of what parts of the project the staff of mozilla.org can speak for, and say with certainty that they will be dual licensed.

I know there's a limited number of hours in a day, and a limited number of people to work on any project. You need to work on the most important things first. I can agree that standards compliance and bug fixing has been a well chosen high priority.

The flip side of the coin is that, judging from the Mozilla Relicensing FAQ [mozilla.org] it would appear that the dual licensing to GPL has completely fallen off the radar. In fact, there may be someone working dilligently on it, but anyone considering using mozilla in a GPL'd setting can't know that from a FAQ with vauge answers, claiming it will be updated, but has in fact not been updated in three months.

Now maybe I'm the only one who doesn't get n.p.m.license, but I doubt it. If there really is work being done on the relicense AND if the mozilla team really is interested in people using the code in GPL'd projects, it'd probably be worth the 15-20 minutes to update the FAQ page, linked right from the main mozilla.org, so that folks working on GPL'd projects could plan accordingly. Judging from what I can actually see (the FAQ), the only plans I could realistically make ammount to "it looks like they've completely forgotten about it (so I'll have to look at XmHTML, XDE, etc, instead of waiting just a little longer)".

Ok, enough complaining and whining.

Re:Simple logic

[Wolfier]

I own my desk.

I like ch0c0lat3s!!

Therefore my desk likes ch0c0lat3s!!

I use my desk to sit my monitor.

My desk owns 4 corners.

Therefore, my desk uses its 4 corners to sit my monitor.

Re:Just like halloween memo said back in '98

[MikeFM]

Mozilla is not like Netscape 6. Anyone that says it is obviously do not follow it very closely. Very few things, none that I can think of but I'm sure some are there, take you to nasty Netscape/AOL banners and it is much more stable, speedy, and full of features. A lot of the developers of Mozilla do of course work for Netscape but many also do not and as time goes on more people get involved around the edges and even now and then deep into the core.

I guess my only point is to not tie Mozilla in with the Netscape crowd. The first is made by many fine engineers and the later by many fine engineers forced to add stupid crap by stupid managers. At this point even if Netscape stopped supporting Mozilla it'd doubtlessly stay alive. Some of the Netscape engineers would still work on it in their own time and other companies would be bound to try to take over. I'd most like to see a Linus like leader emerge from the non-commercial ranks but that has yet to be seen. All we can do is watch and see.

Well...

[MWoody]

Well, I was about to post about how Netscape sucks these days and agree with the pro-Mozilla folks who want a compact, reliable browser from Netscape. But as I clicked submit, IE crashed.

I'll hold my tongue. ^_^
---

Re:Some Comments

[roca]

> I do belive Netscape is doomed (which is sad).

Netscape is only doomed if AOL stops funding them.

But AOL managment must know that such an act would dramatically increase Microsoft's control of the Web. Netscape/Mozilla is also crucial to any effort to build Internet access devices that don't require a tax to be paid to Microsoft. AOL is very interested in that.

Self Serving? Its barely even functional

[Ars-Fartsica]

Mozilla is semi-stable, sluggish, and a memory hog.

Netscape is all of these but not even semi-stable.

I don't see how you can even form a coherent argument with regards to the branding issues of this product when it doesn't even work.

Re:Microsoft IE vs Netscape mentality

[kinkie]

I installed it on MS Windows, and just selected Custom, and unchecked all the extra garbage.
Got a clean Netscape, no junk. No AIM, no Winamp, no Realplayer, no spellcheckers which I wouldn't use anyways.

Exactly WHAT did you guys install?

First rule of the software installer: no matter what the source, NEVER use the "typical" setups. ALWAYS go Custom and remove the cruft.

Welcome to corporate America folks

[!Xabbu]

Lets face it... portals are still profitable. What does Netscape have that makes them serious profit? Their servers? Web servers? Email Sever backends? Hardly... it may pay the bills, but it doesn't get their shareholders off.

When you use Netscape you are getting the product you prefer at the tradeoff price of ads. Sure they sell it at Staples(TM), but how many people are going to shell out $40+ bucks for a web browser when you can use IE or a downloaded copy for free. They know this and are capitalizing on it. Personally speaking I don't use any of the crap they offer.. I turn off the "My Sidebar", don't use Messenger (to avoid the ad in my preview pane) and I redefine my homepage on the first startup of Netscape. What this leaves me with is a nicely bloated web browser just like the rest.

Back to why they do it.. profit.. its quite simple.. they aren't gonna make a dime off netscape if they don't shove their corporate identity in your face. I honestly don't blame them. Your average internet user likes these things... the average Slashdot reader doesn't. Thats about 1 or 2 million of us.. and about 40 Million plus of them.. you do the math.

Sofar I'm impressed with NS 6.0, now all I want to do is wait until the big webdesigners tell me whats wrong with how it renders pages so I can fix mine accordingly.

- Xabbu

Re:Create Your Own User Interface

[roca]

> Personally, I want to see a MacOS X/ Aqua theme.

Dave Hyatt wrote one as a testbed for the theme engine. I think it was never released for fear of Apple's lawyers.

Re:It wouldn't bug me if

[Janthkin]

the 4.7x bunch just absolutely will not let you take the preformated sections out of your bookmark file.

I'm using 4.75 for Windows, and clearing the preset bookmarks isn't exactly brain (or registry) surgery: Click on "Bookmarks", then "Edit Bookmarks": this brings up the Netscape bookmark editor. Next, left click the first thing that bothers you. Use Ctrl/Shift selecting to get the rest of the stuff that bothers you. Now, hit the "delete" key. The end.

"What's Related" can be disabled in preferences, leaving you only the "Netscape" button on the Toolbar. I can cope.

Next generation browsers

[oneiros27]

Although I agree that I Netscape has a disproportionate number of links to their own banner ads, I'm guessing that IE has a few more than just one.

It's things like this which make me look towards the next generation of browsers-- I love iCab's ability to ignore images based on what path they have (eg, any path with '/ads/' in it, or on a machine named 'ads') or the image size (1x1 pixels, or the standard banner sizes).

How they handle cookies is nice, too, as you're allowed to reject or accept domains as a whole, while still prompting for all others.

For those people who don't have a Mac, you probably have one or two hold out friends with one, so have them grab a copy, and you'll see what I mean:

http://www.icab.de/ [www.icab.de]

[oh...and it's under 2megs, too....although they're still working on CSS support]

All I see from Netscape is a much needed update for a buggy product; it's not a significant break through, even if it was a complete code re-write..

Re:NS6 is junk

[roca]

> it still doesn't conform to the standard.

Which standard? NS6.0 is more compliant with REAL standards than almost any competing browser.

Re:SmartDownload is worse

[Tridus]

I can sit here watching it with Etheral and not cach it trying to do things other then what its supposed to be doing.

If its managing to send information back to Opera Software secretly without going across the network to do it, then thats quite impressive.

Obviously I can't know everything it does without the source, but do I have the time to go through all the source of Netscape 6 to find things they changed from Mozilla? For that matter, do I have the time to go through the Mozilla source looking for things?

I've watched it, and I'm reasonably confident its not doing things it shouldn't be. I can live with that, seeing as how it also works as a browser far better then anything Netscape has released in years.

Netscape-bashing

[BZ]

I'm saddened by seeing that Netscape-bashing has become so popular. Netscape is not just getting a free ride from the hard work of the Mozilla contributors. Speaking as a Mozilla contributor, I have to say that it's Netscape engineers who do about 70-90% of the work (my estimate). This means that Mozilla would have taken more like 15 years to get to where it is right now if it were not for the time and money invested by Netscape

Having tried Netscape 6.0 on Linux, I have to say that it is noticeably faster than the current Mozilla nightlies and somewhat more stable. Yes, there are several known bugs, but overall it is an excellent product.

You ask whether Netscape has gone too far? I ask you whether you have gone so far in your hubris that somehow an open-source project to which you have not contributed (and yes, in this case that means Netscape) owes you something. Netscape is offering its Netcenter service to the people using its browser. No one is forcing you to use these menu options or buttons. All the buttons that go to netcenter can be turned off in the preferences! A desktop icon can be deleted. From what I recall of the last time I installed Windows software, creating a courtesy desktop shortcut to the software or to resources related to that software was a common practice....

As for those Slashdor readers who have contributed to Mozilla, I would like to hear your views on the matter. I believe that the Mozilla community has a much better opinion of Netscape than the Slashdot community at large.

netscape 6 search

[Barbarian]

Incidentally I have the search in Netscape 6 set to google right now.

Kind of interesting how CNN.com gets a prominent sidebar place -- AOL TW merger at work Here?

Now if someone would only make a /. headlines sidebar.


--

Who's care about the self-promotion...

[Malc]

... when the browser crashes every few minutes? I don't even have time to really enjoy these 42 ways of investigating Netscape. I thought that before they went to beta, they needed to get the mean time before failure to over an hour? I crash for no reason every 5 - 10 minutes! This is the most unstable version of Netscape that I've tried. Perhaps it still isn't SMP friendly?

Very clever troll...

[opus]

But this is a dead giveaway:

IE, at least on Windows, and in the versions I've tested on Linux, is just faster, more stable, more flexible in terms of add-ons it will accept without problems... better.

There's no such thing as IE for Linux.
--

Re:Links to Microsoft

[frankie]

IE 5 for MacOS has a few M$ tie-backs:

• default home page
• default search service
• a few default bookmarks
• support link in the About... box
• Tools menu includes MSN, Hotmail, and Encarta

Much less obnoxious than Netscape 6. AOL's marketroid's really did a number on that puppy. Too bad for Netscape, because I really wanted to see their share go up in next month's UserAgent logs. Too bad for me, because I really wanted to use it (Mozilla Mac still has too many showstoppers).

Re:Help your Mozilla

[lunatik17]

That's an aweful amount of work for such as easy process. Just do this:

go to the ftp, and find the Netscape6 directory for your platform. Find the xpi/ directory and download all the crap in there. Then, all you have to do is open up the files in the borwser and they will install themselves. That's all there is to it, theres an AIM component as well as a java package and many more. The directory for my browser would be: /pub/netscape6/english/6.0/unix/linux22/xpi, but of course, YMMV depending on platform.

It uses less RAM (IE)

[ackthpt]

Only because all that crap to support it is already loaded into the "OS" If Microsoft were open with their internals then I'd expect NS to run smaller too. The play the shell-game of saying, "Don't do direct calls to this or that, use the 'official developers methods'" then directly do whatever the hell they want to to make their sw run more efficiently. Naive to believe they play on the same level field as everyone else.

--

Re:What do you use instead???

[roca]

> What browser is the best open source soloution
> on Windows

Mozilla. Brought to you primarily by the developers at Netscape.

Re:Whatever happened to GPL'd mozilla

[Chris Siegler]

Without access to the newsgroup...

Why not just connect to mozilla's news server? If you use slrn, add a line with server ``news.mozilla.org'' ``newsrc-mozilla'' to your .slrnrc file (so your regular newsrc file doesn't get overwritten), and run slrn -h news.mozilla.org -create to create the newsrc file.

The net has been commercial for years.

[Planesdragon]

Notice how much bandwidth is out there? Or how many ISPs? How how cheap parts and service have gotten?

This is *directly* linked to the so-called "commercialization" of the internet.

Everything costs money, because our society is based on money. If the coders don't get fiscal benefit from working on N6 / Mozilla, then it's "recreation", and they literally have more important things to do.

And if they want to get some money by their choice of default bookmarks and homepage... then so what? Better that than scrounging for a grant, or having no full-time workers, or charing for the browser, or having a continual pop-up banner ad.

Re:Microsoft IE vs Netscape mentality

[roca]

It isn't over yet. The NS6.0 release is really just the first step.

Netscape usually doesn't fix bugs.

[Tridus]

I reported a bug to Netscape back in 4.00 (a way back when) about a missing ; in a stylesheet being able to crash the browser.

By 4.6 (the last version I bothered to put on my computer), the bug was still there. Thats what, a year?

Ahem.

[Denial of Service]

Allow me to reply to 100 comments with one sentence:

Fine, then use whatever works best for you.

This is not a good topic to discuss when there are at least four other browsers available in the same (or higher) league as this new failure from Netscape. Don't like the ads? I've got a secret patch that Netscape doesn't want you to know about -

It's called "uninstall".

---

Re:It wouldn't bug me if

[overshoot]

Yes, the bookmarks file is a text file. And yes, I edit it by hand. And no, if Netscape doesn't like what I did it 'fixes' the 'error' for me.

Example: try replacing one of your bookmark descriptions with an <img="file://foo.jpg"> reference to make a graphical index file (REALLY handy if you want to use your bookmarks for your home page.) This used to work, but since (iirc) 4.74 the freaking tags get replaced by ampersand codes. Thanks loads, Netscape.

And if you 'accidentally' delete the "Personal Toolbar Folder" or the "New and Cool" stuff in it, including "What's New," they get thoughtfully replaced despite your best efforts, thus chewing up half a screenful of valuable homepage space for absolutely no value.

Netscape doesn't exist anymore.

[topher71]

Netscape is a brand in the AOL family.

AOL controls all decisions from the top down. It's not like Netscape is still it's same old self, nice and independent within AOL. AOL management moved in and they run _everything_.

The idea is make Netscape appeal to the people who don't use AOL, but keep the users in the family. These users are techie weenies who don't want to be coddled by the AOL client.

So rather than the old 'What's Cool' stuff that went all over the web. They need to keep the users on their web site (because that's how they make money).

Personally, I like Netscape 6, but it's not stable enough for me just yet. It's just like _any_ major product release; stay away from the first version!

Re:This is the STUPIDEST Netscape complaint I've s

[Tackhead]

> > [NS6 is bloatware]
> Users expect a certain minimum set of features. That set is larger now than it was 2 years ago.

I guess what I was really getting at is best addressed by another response I have to the orignal post.

> > > Why can't we get people on Slashdot to talk about the REAL developer issues surrounding Mozilla instead

Why can't we get developers of Mozilla to talk about the real user issues surrounding Mozilla?

Or is Mozilla supposed to end up like Amaya - a useful testbed for standards compliance, but something which is never used by anyone?

(Yes, that's a gross overstatement, but there's a kernel of truth to it.)

You're right that users expect a certain minimum feature set. What I'm arguing is that the features the Netscape developers haven't considered their user base.

Who's served by Mozilla and NS6?

• Advertisers in NS6.
• Developers through the debugging code.
• Developers through all the discussions on standards-compliance.
• People who think XML is cool, not because of what it can do, but because it's XML.

Who's not served by Mozilla or NS6?

• Users on Linux boxen who want something that renders their most commonly-referenced web pages anywhere near as fast as Konqueror, etc.
• Users on Windoze boxen who want something that renders their most commonly-referenced web pages anywhere near as fast as IE.
• Basically, anyone without an Athlon at 1.2 GHz and 256M of RAM.

Two years ago, it was possible for Netscape to say "We've written a better browser, and you web developers better code your web sites so our browser can render it".

Today, the balance of power has swung - rightly or wrongly (and I think wrongly) - back to the web developers. Web developers don't care that NS6 is standards-compliant. And end users don't care either - the typical end user cares only that www.cnn.com renders. If it renders in IE and not NS, NS's market share will continue to diminish.

Ask yourself this: Does Joe Luzer want a standards-compliant browser (whatever that may mean :), or does he want something that they can use - today, not after the Glorious People's Revolution and All Web Pages are rewritten to conform with the spec - in place of IE?

Linux without Netscape?

[Bad_CRC]

where would it be now?

don't forget mozilla wouldn't exist without netscape, so don't go there.

there are starting to be some acceptable options, Konqueror and Opera aren't bad, but I'd guess 70% of my computing (maybe more? yikes) is probably related to web surfing, and I doubt I'm alone.

Sure, there are the insane people who insist you can see everything you need from lynx, but for the rest of us, Linux would be far less useful if Netscape didn't exist for it, and as much as we HATE to admit it, we'd be better off if the one browser which has bulldozed it's way to a userbase of what, 90% now, was available for us in linux.

We need Netscape, and we need it to be good.

________

Re:My thoughts as a developer

[roca]

Then you'll be pleased to know that Netscape 6.0 is the most standards-compliant browser on the planet, with the possible exception of IE5.5 Mac.

Re:Counterpoint

[mozkill]

remember that developers did not start the mozilla project to make money, they are doing it to prove that an open source project can work, and Netscapes commercialization of it is proof that it worked. bravo to Netscape for making money using a great open source project.

What do you do about it?

[JurriAlt137n]

Easy, you said it yourself. Use Internet explorer. Who cares who made it, as long as it works? And like you stated, no funny banners, no crap.

Try the mozilla cvs

[11thangel]

I took the time to grab mozilla from the cvs tree, and spent almost an hour compiling the code (du -hs revealed 218megs of it after ./configure and half of make), but it runs very nicely now. Premade binaries do tend to be slower and more crash prone, so if possible, compile stuff yourself. It's annoying, but it works =) (unlike the rest of my system)

Solution proposal...

[hwilker]

Here's how:

1. Build a "proper" browser distribution out of Mozilla sources
2. Put it on a big server
3. Buy banner ads pointing to this server on both MSN and netscape.com, the default home pages of millions of unknowing internet users. MSN ads look like "THE latest browser for Microsoft users!". netscape.com ads look like "THE better Netscape!". Graphics to match.
4. Go back two steps. Make a deal with a lawyer to make sure ads are legally watertight. Incentive to the lawyer: damages for the time MSN and netscape.com block your ads though you paid for them.
5. Lo! Everyone's using a proper, open-source browser.
6. Now you can go and use your own server to generate rev... eh, enlightenment.

Problem is wasted development effort.

[DunbarTheInept]

I don't really care that Netscape is making advertising money off of Mozilla's work. I consider that fair payment for their opensourcing the code in the first place. What bugs me is that they are wasting development effort on irrelevant stuff. It's not the ads themselves that bother me - it's the fact that we are getting ads *instead* of product enhancements.

Internet Explorer

[BlueHexahedron]

All the more reason for Microsoft to get on with a port of IE to Linux. As much as MS seem to be evil incarnate and the Anti-GNU (Compare Anti-Christ). Their Browsers still seem to be more stable, and trouble free (even under Windoze). Netscape froze my box twice last week, not simply a segfault, but total lockup.

A little off topic: No matter what people say, the user interface of MS software is one of the best thought up, the back end, of course does leave a bit to be desired. I personally am waiting for MS Window Manager. With this in front and Linux as the engine, you couldn't go wrong.

A point-by-point comparison is in order here...

[Tumbleweed]

Okay, the IE versus Navigator 4.x vs Mozilla discussion is woefully weak on specifics.

Here's my take:

1) Standards Compliance

IE for Windows has better standards compliance than Nav 4.x, but nowhere near as good as Mozilla. IE for Mac is almost as good as that of Mozilla, from what I've read (but no way am I gonna use a Mac just for that!) IE 6 is just around the corner, apparently - let's hope it ups their standards. "We've upped our standards, so up yours!" and all that...

2) Speed

IE seems to connect & download pages faster, and displays very fast (and incrementally reflows, too, even on browser resizing). Nav 4.x connects fast, downloads okay, and displays fairly fast, but has no incremental reflow - very annoying. Mozilla connects, displays, and reflows faster than anything (at least, as of the last night's nightly build). Fastest of all - K-Meleon (Galeon for Windows, basically). Any native framework around the Gecko rendering engine is likely to be faster than anything else. You may pay the price in other features, though (K-Meleon is currently _extremely_ barebones, though that will change soon, I hope.)

3) Stability

IE on Win98SE - not the greatest, on a par (for me, on four completely different machines) with Nav 4.x - only problem is, when it crashes, it often forces you to reboot, or just locks up the whole machine, which Nav 4.x doesn't do. Mozilla - as of last night's daily build, it's 'okay' - the main problem is the Manage Bookmarks feature, which is SLOW SLOW SLOW, and buggy as hell. It doesn't correctly import older Nav 4.x bookmarks (my bookmarks file is rather huge), and moving them around you can lose things entirely, and it's just amazingly slow. It causes the browser to slow down on loadup with a large bookmarks file, too. Very irritating. Hopefully this will change - stability & speedups are currently in the works. Numerous reports of major memory leaks in Mozilla - obviously this browser is still in heavy development though.

4) Interface

IE - pretty standard Windows - easy to figure out if that's what you've been using. Horribly crippled interface for managing bookmarks. Just Horrible. And I hate how they're stored, too (each URL as an individual file, though that's a personal preference).
Nav 4.x - mostly standard for Windows - has some quirks. Very good bookmark management - allows much better bookmark access than any of the others, including Mozilla.
Mozilla - needs to take a look at managing bookmarks & accessing bookmarks in Nav 4.x and implement it. Needs 10-50x speed improvement (not exaggerating) in bookmark management. Something seriously wrong there. In the interface arena, Mozilla will have major advantages for heavy customization, and customization more easily accomplished than for IE, but with the possibility of loading down the browser with a lot of junk - but that's the user's choice! Lean and mean theme or heavy on the eye candy - it's up to you. Choice is Good(tm). I prefer a native widget set framework around the Gecko engine, so I like Galeon for Linux, and I think the K-Meleon project for Windows will do quite well in the future. I've heard that there may be a similar project for the MacOS, but I don't know. Considering the reported quality of IE for the Mac, I'm not sure how necessary that is, unless someone wants a native Mac OS X type browser.

5) Platform Independence

IE - total joke. "Multiple platforms" from MS means Win2K, WinME & Win98 at best. Nav 4.x - excellent. Mozilla - also excellent.

6) Features

IE - very very good, especially considering it's target market. Very good feature set if you're not concerned with security by default (yes, Microsoft, I mean you). On an Intranet basis, IE and it's ActiveX controls can do some fantastic things. On the Internet at large, freaking scary. It's got good regular browser features except for the horribly-crippled bookmark management & access, which should be an easy fix (you'd think).
Nav 4.x - pretty good, better cookie & cache management than IE (though I think there may be an update for additional cookie features for IE - not sure). Very good bookmark management (on a par with Spry Mosaic of old...). Incremental reflow - none, which is very very bad.
Mozilla - very very good, easily on a par with IE for Internet usage - better bookmark management, though still quite buggy in that department. Better cookie management, also has better image loading management (ability to only load images from the same domain as the website - which is not present in the Navigator 6). Very extensible, albeit in a different way than IE.

So that's my take on the situation. Each browser has it's good and bad points - like anything else, it's a matter of how things work on YOUR systems (some people find IE more stable than Nav 4.x, some less so - depends on your machine). Many interface issues are a matter of personal preference. Some people don't need the extensive bookmark handling that I demand. Some people want better security. Some people don't run Windows as their primary platform (or at all). Keep in mind many of IE's loading speed advantages are being it loads many DLLs at bootup - Nav & Mozilla aren't allowed to do that. Also note that using a native widget framework around the Gecko renderer can help approach that loading speed (you folks really should check out the K-Meleon project).

Okay, that's enough for now...

This is the STUPIDEST Netscape complaint I've seen

[Byter]

The original contents of this comment were clear copyright violation. They were cut & pasted from this site [hbs.edu]. This text has been removed at the request of the copyright holder.

Re:fork the tree, baby!

[roca]

> Let's us take the latest Mozilla code, cut out
> all the AOL-related and other useless cruft,

There is little or no AOL-related cruft in the Mozilla tree. The cruft was added for Netscape 6.0 by Netscape engineers working on their own private tree. So there is no need to fork.

> First couple of goals: stability, no memory
> leaks, and 100% W3C standards compliance.

That's pretty much what everyone's been working on in Mozilla for the last several months.

> Galeon is doing this.

No. Galeon is not a fork. They use Mozilla as their engine. They are not developing their own version of Mozilla, they are tracking the standard Mozilla tree.

Just use Mozilla?

[Jafa]

What does nutscrape provide that Mozilla doesn't? Couldn't you just continue to use Mozilla on it's own? It's got email and browsing and news. What more do you need? And with the mozilla engine available, I'm guessing we'll be seeing a LOT of packaged programs to choose from, not just from AOL.

Haven't the inclination yet to try netscape 6, so we'll just see what Mozilla matures to...

Jason

Help your Mozilla

[Khopesh]

Well, NS6 gave me more AOL junk, but it has a bunch of stuff that I couldn't get for mozilla.

Rather than fix up NS6, try this on for size:

Copy the contents of the PLUGINS folder from Netscape 6 into the BIN/PLUGINS folder of Mozilla (except for npnul32.dll) to increase plugin compatability for Mozilla.

This was the final step for me; now I use Mozilla for all browser activities. - oh, and this is for Windows, so I don't know how it will work on Linux or Mac.

oh, and don't overwrite anything, and do include the CVS subdirectory. enjoy!

Netscape

[digitalwanderer]

Netscape has been going downhill since 3.0, they started playing the 'be like IE' game and lost most of what made their browser great. Can't they just stick with something to get me where I want to go?

I'm stubbornly sticking with 3.0 until someone comes up with a small-footprint 6.0.

Junkware...

[AtariDatacenter]

I, too, am sick of the increasing number of junk buttons and junk features that have been creaping into Netscape. I don't use them. I want them eradicated. They provide negative value to me.

Re:Positives and Negatives...

[Tackhead]

> When mozilla appears in a fully materialized and non-beta state, I am sure someone will kindly remove every reference to Netscape's annoying web-services and their paid-for bookmarks.

s/When/Until/g

The problem with "Until" is that we're still waiting. For three fscking years.

And every one of those years has given IE more market share and marginalized Nutscrape.

I'll believe it when I see it.

And I'm someone who also prefers NS3 over NS4. It renders stuff twice as fast as NS4. And what I've seen out of Mozilla hasn't been encouraging in that regard either.

P.S. I preferred NS3 to NS4 because

NS3's its toolbar is narrower - no "My Netscape", no "Search" button - and why did "Security" have to be a menu button? My NS4 session has to take up over half the screen just to let me click "Stop"

Turning image-autoload on/off, enabling/disabling Java and Javashit are several mouse-clicks and moseovers faster in NS3 than NS4.

Until I see an offering from Nutscrape/Mozilla that makes it easier for me to turn off the spam than NS3, I'll remain skeptical.

Re:So what if it has extra stuff?

[Tackhead]

> If you don't want certain buttons, open the appropriate JAR file and change the XUL (e.g. communicatorOverlay.xul). The button goes away.

I parse this as "We spent all this time doing the skinning and XML-fu so that you could turn off the chrome"

I got a idea. The user base never wanted a "development platform", they wanted a web browser.

How 'bout just writin' a web browser and not puttin' the chrome in there in the first place.

The only advantage I see to NS6 over NS4 is that it's easier to turn off the extra crap in NS6. Maybe if they'd spent more time writing a web browser and less time writing an extensible chrome display platform, they'd have ended up with a better browser.

The reason people are "bashing Mozilla" isn't because they're ungrateful, it's been three years and it still sucks harder than NS3.

(Or to put it another way - for those of us who just want a friggin' web browser that sucked less than NS3, what do we have to be thankful for?)

When was the last time an end user cared about standards-compliance, especially when standards-compliance means that many of the web pages they use on a daily basis will no longer render correctly?

Counterpoint

[omarius]

At the same time, Netscape's rampant self-serviness illustrates a valid commercial open-source model. Companies don't just want to make money, they have to! And self-referencing/promoting is a very valid way to keep generating revenue while using open source software.

I make no argument concerning the fair treatment of Mozilla developers; I don't know enough about that to comment. But I did want to throw the above into the mix!

-Omar

failing to see the point

[JimRay]

If the point is that releasing mozilla as open source is only "lining Netscape's pocket", what's your point. The point to me is that they released the damn thing. I mean, isn't the idea of open source that anyone can use it for anything they want to? Who cares if they just point back to their own crappy travel services. The source is out there--if you don't like it, write your own!
Furthermore, open source software is used across the board for profitable operations. What about Apache? This is a true community project, that is used left and right for commercial purposes (ahem...Slashdot?). Should we bitch and complain that Apache is being used by nefarious corporate entities with the sole purpose of making a buck?

What I like most about this version...

[SkyIce]

besides the fact that the installer is one of those downloaders, is the fact that you get to watch flashing advertisements while you download. They're kind of small unfortunately.

Re:What about Opera?

[roca]

> *massive* JavaScript/DHTML insufficiencies

Hah. Mozilla and Netscape 6.0 have the best implementation of the W3C HTML, CSS and DOM scripting standards among all competing browsers.

Re:It wouldn't bug me if

[Jose]

as others have said, its just a text file...edit it.

to take it another step..read this [linux.com]
That will get rid of all the crap on the tool bar. Also edit the Netscape.ad file (forget where it is), to make a ton of changes to the way netscape looks, and feels.

Re:This is the STUPIDEST Netscape complaint I've s

[locust]

And just why shouldn't it run fine on a 486/50? NS3 did.

but isn't part of the point of open source that we can develop better software instead of bloatware?

Do you actually code?

You want full (compliant) implementations with all sorts of things like style sheets, javascript, the latest html standard, and at the same time you want the brower to run like hot shit off a greased shovel. Hate to break it to you, but with the amounts that those things have evolved its a hell of a lot more than the NS3 team ever had to even think about. Even if you go feature for feature with NS3 (lets say javascript support) I garuantee you the current implementations are going to be slower (and larger), because the standards have grown to encompas more things. You have to put in new hooks and rewrite your code to support more stuff. Its not bloatware. Users expect a certain minimum set of features. That set is larger now than it was 2 years ago. The software has to grow to accomodate it, it has to do more work to implement them. Now add in some debugging code and hell no wonder its slower than 4.76 (at least on my P200 MMX) but it doesn't crash half as much.

--locust.

Picture it...

[AntiPasto]

Incentive programs for developers.

Just try to kick IE's ass... that's all that needs to be focused on.

Strive for standards.

Become a small and efficient browser that works on all platforms

Try to think of *one way* to make money for the company -- do the AOL no-homepage thing, or sell it for $10 a crack.

and then I don't think anything could stop it from being the best / most profitale browser.

----

Of course the money goes back to Mozilla

[Jeffrey Baker]

Tons of AOL/Netscape money goes back to Mozilla. They employ dozens of programmers and peripheral support people, they provide the network which hosts the Mozilla project, and they provide the build farm upon which Mozilla is built.

Get serious!

[Eric Smith]

Everyone knew from the outset that the open-source Mozilla effort would contribute in a major way to the next commercial Netscape browser, even before AOL bought them. Anyone who thought that Netscape (and AOL) wouldn't do everything possible to capitalize on that is incredibly naive.

Instead of complaining about it, we should be glad that Netscape is still heavily supporting Mozilla development. So in fact, some of those dollars do go back into Mozilla.

Netscape moot?

[ziegast]

A recent survey of my (pretty popular) web site showed 78% IE-derived browsers and 18% Mozilla-derived. I wonder what percentage of the Mozilla users were actually from AOL. There's not much incentive for a Windows user (95% of our users) these days to actually go out and download a second bloated browser suite onto their system.

As I surf web sites, more are putting features into the browser that are best viewed on Windows boxes. The old standard for HTML-rich sites used to be "Our web page is best viewed with a Netscape or Microsoft browser". Now people mainly develop for IE first and work in compatability for Mozilla, AOL and/or WebTV (still a significant percentage, but dwindling into unimportance).

AOL bought Netscape, so AOL will keep it alive until it make more sense to put something else on their direct-mail CDs. Long live Mozilla.

What's up with Neoplanet? They used to be a cool alternative to Mozilla when it didn't crash my Windows PC.

-- EZ

Re:This is the STUPIDEST Netscape complaint I've s

[Tackhead]

> Or they think Mozilla should run just fine on their 486/50's, and yelp "IT'S SLOW!" when it doesn't. In otherwords, people who are completely uninformed, and wish to stay that way. :P

And just why shouldn't it run fine on a 486/50? NS3 did.

OK, so we're both exaggerating with that 486/50 crack, but isn't part of the point of open source that we can develop better software instead of bloatware?

I can understand "haha, u luzer, gotta upgr8d!" coming from Micros~1, who has a vested interest in making sure we all get on the upgrade treadmill with each revision of the OS and office suite - the corporate purchaser then purchases more Dells and Compaqs, and MSFT gets to sell more OS licenses.

But from the open source camp, I find that attitide to be disgusting.

Sort of a Well Duh statement

[doublem]

Personally, I gave up on Netscape itself a long time ago. I'm using Mozilla when I can but still end up falling back on IE 5 pretty often.

From the beginning of the Mozilla project, I've just seen Netscape as a "Real Browser Plus AOL advertizing" product, and can't for the life of me think of a single reason to even consider using full-blown Netscape instead of Mozilla.

The Netscape browser exists for the single purpose of selling something. If you just want a (relatively) clean, simple browser use Mozilla.

Of course the Netscape browser is full of ads and flashy eye candy, that's the whole point of not just calling Mozilla Netscape.

This article is not very different from complaining about a Ford logo on a Ford truck. Of COURSE Netscape's browser is full of links, it exists for advertizing purposes. IE doesn't have that extra fluff because IE isn't there to sell a browser, but claim market scare for Microsoft. IE isn't a product on it's own, it's a grab for market share.

www.matthewmiller.net [matthewmiller.net]

This is to be expected.

[Auckerman]

Not being a OSS minded person, this question calls into question the whole idea put forward by OSS minded people on how OSS can make money: Services. This is EXACTLY how OSS will make money. Red Hat sells you tech support, Gnome litters your desktop with links to its web page, so does KDE. Nautilus is going to make money by selling "web services" that are tied to their interfaces (Apple's iTools for Linux) and Netscape makes money by putting links in its browser to it's services, just as Microsoft does with IE (no wonder MSN gets so many visits, the the default home page for IE, which most people don't even know how to change).

If there is demand for a different project based of the Mozilla code that doesn't spam you every step of the way to go to Netscape.com, someone will compile it. Noone forced you to use Netscape, and if Netscape dies, oh well, Mozilla will live and someone else will take up the project.

Mozilla team has given us a great browser.

[Pengo]

Same could be same for any commercial company that uses open source software. Redhat has linux, HelixCode has Gnome. TT has KDE (Look at GPL of KDE if you don't believe). To make a long story short, that is the food chain.

The reality of it, 90% of mozilla engineers paychecks come from netscape/aol. They are not forced to be there.

The fact that AOL lets players like Galeon and Eazel use GTKMozEmbed for applications is great. That is where the real value of Moz lies. Also, the platform capabilities of mozilla have not even begun to be touched yet.

Only they really know the magnitude of what they created.

;-) It will only get better, faster and more optimized. (As will IE/Opera/Konqu./etc). For me and you as the end user, thats great! Choices , remember.




--------------------

Yes... Netscape is Dead...

[LHOOQtius_ov_Borg]

First off, MSIE does actually have another link back to M$... MSN is the default home page... big deal...

Now, this will come as heresy to /.ers, but MSIE is better than Netscape, and Netscape's money-grubbing is doing nothing about this. While the Mozilla crew has done a great job with Mozilla, on Windows, at least, it lags behind MSIE. IE renders faster, and, horrors, is more stable. (This seems to be true on Linux, too... My Linux Netscape dumps core about every 5 minutes, whereas IE only does it about every 15 minutes...)

Plug-ins in IE are - just by empirical observation here folks - more stable, too. Flash, Shockwave, Acrobat, etc. all cause various problems on my Netscape installs, more so than under IE. Microsoft's JVM is better, as is their implementation of ECMA/JavaScript (embarrasingly for both Sun and Netscape, really). After being lambasted for being nothing but a marketing organization, Microsoft has put a lot of time and money into making the last couple versions of IE really good...

Netscape seems to have decided to take just the opposite approach and become nothing more than a marketing arm of AOL... all the good work is being done for by the Mozilla folks, and as volunteers they're having a hard time keeping up with the big bucks of M$. AOL seems to not give a damn about putting any money into the project to give the engineering effort a fighting chance against the stuff M$ is doing.

IE, at least on Windows, and in the versions I've tested on Linux, is just faster, more stable, more flexible in terms of add-ons it will accept without problems... better.

I'd like to see Mozilla kick their ass, but to do that, I think N$/AOhelL needs to do more than just sponge off their efforts and build links to annoying adverts...

I've Given Up On Netscape

[/dev/urandom]

I don't know about others, but personally, I've given up on any hope I had of Netscape becoming a good browser. Mozilla is good, but still, it's lacking in many areas.

Here are some of my complaints so far...

1) Netscape's 6.0 installer is very unstable, and has a hard time coping with download problems because of stalls, etc. In fact, it took me a good four tries to get it to actually finish the install. Why can't we just have a tarball or something?

2) Netscape 6 itself breaks a number of standards supported in Mozilla, and is far too oriented to meet AOL's money-grubbing desires. Pardon me, but the browser should be for the user, not JUST the company. Companies have to make money, but I get tired of every single button or menu I click taking me to the horribly-slow Netscape site.

3) Netscape 6 is very unstable, yet the Mozilla code it is based off of runs much more smoothly. Looks like all those commercial tie-ins are causing Netscape to sink under its own commercial weight.

I had high hopes for Netscape. But it just doesn't cut it. I use the Opera for Linux port now, which, even though it is still in the alpha stage technically, can run circles around anything Netscape or Mozilla puts out. Sure there's no Java or plug-in support yet (neither of which I'm desperately needing), and it occasionally crashes, but at least it doesn't have all those weird glitches and standards issues that Netscape has.

On the Linux side, I think it's time we all start looking for or working on something better. I think the BrowseX [browsex.com] browser looks particularly promising. It's open source, very capable already, and with some more development, could give the closed commercial browsers run for their money. But whatever happens, I honestly don't think Netscape will ever get much better. AOL simply has its priorities wrong, and has done a disservice to everyone by not coming through on a viable alternative browser.
-----
Anything that can go wr

Re:SmartDownload is worse

[Tridus]

The difference is that ftp.somesite.com tracks when I downoad from ftp.somesite.com, and not from ftp.someothersite.com, or http.athirdsite.com

Smartdownload sends *everything*, irregardless of where it comes from.

Netscape *does* pay for Mozilla development

[Zagadka]

Does any of the money generated by the browser get back to Mozilla? I kinda doubt it.

Most of the development on Mozilla was done by full-time employees of Netscape, working on Netscape's time. So yes, a lot of the money generated by the browser goes back to Mozilla.

Re:A point-by-point comparison is in order here...

[swb]

(1) Standards compliance is for weenies. I don't give a shit about standards compliance as long as my browser works with the sites I visit. Standards compliance issues seem largely an excuse for the anti-Microsoft camp to bitch about IE when they've run out of meaningful reasons. In the words of a local talk radio program, "A non factor."

(2) IE is much faster than anything else. I'm not interested in fantasy-land, broken browsers that don't work in the real world. You want a complete browsing experience, you need Java and Javascript and in some cases ActiveX if you're a Windows user. All those Gecko jobs just don't cut it as a real browser.

(3) IE55 on Win98SE is fine. It's as stable as any Windows 98 app by and large. It rocks on Win2k.

(4) IE's interface is what makes it a real winner. IE's bookmark management is fantastic -- I love having a hierachical bookmark directory. That they're all files in the filesystem actually works to your advantage -- I stick shortcuts in there to my home machine's favorites folder and we can share favorites in our workgroup.

Netscape's broken HTML file full of bookmarks is nasty.

(5) IE is available across all the Win32 platforms and the MacOSs as well as some UNIX platforms as well (AIX? Solaris? HPUX?) The only meaninful platforms its not on are Linux and FreeBSD.

(6) Security? Well, shit, I haven't lost anything due to my browser. I turn off all the stupid stuff for public browsing. You're more likely to end up at goatse.cx by mistake than get hacked via your browser.

Give me a break

[msouth]

Those bastards! That commercial entity is acting like a, um, let's see...commercial entity, maybe?

Could I see a raise of hands of those that are happy that Netscape is still fighting Microsoft _at all_? How about a show of hands from those that are happy that Mozilla exists? Thanks. I thought there were some non-braindead among us still.

I'll bet it encourages other companies considering open sourcing things when they see us:

1) Scream for the code.
2) Receive the code.
3) Bitch about the code.
4) Bitch about the license.
5) Bitch about the company that gave the code.
6) Goto 3.
--

Netscape engineers . . .

[micromoog]

. . . are weenies.

next "ask slashdot":

[cetan]

"Is Netscape bashing going to replace Microsoft bashing?"

I think it's really pathetic how most people don't take 2 seconds to really investigate anything, but would rather follow whatever bashing trend floats by them. There is a whole sub-cultural phenom. on "popular" bashing of products. Let's look at some examples:
Microsoft, the movie Titanic, Episode 1, Religion, Netscape, any other large corporation...

It's "fashionable" to bash those and many others...you're "hip" and "with it" if you can repeat the same 2 or 3 worn-out phrases that make you seem "in the know"

Pathetic.

[/rant]

sorry, but this is just plain stupid. i hate the "jump-on-the-bandwagon-bashers" because they make so much fucking noise and have so little to say...

What options do we have??

[rhadc]

Well, I had some of the same reactions. Yesterday I installed NS6. I didn't like the profiles. I didn't like the way it didn't quite install correctly. I didn't like the countless references back to NS, AOL, and the time wasted in general when you accidently clicked on something you didn't mean to click on. The fact that it locked up(the app, not the machine) didn't help either.

My frustration comes from not having a feature-rich, yet fast, simple, and non-intrusive web browser. I'd tried all the IE's, Netscapes... Lynx, Opera...

But yesterday night I installed KDE [kde.org](I've been biased toward Gnome for the last year), and I was quite impressed with the Browser and with KDE in general! In fact, it's the closest thing to the browser I've been looking for! Cosmetically, it doesn't look like a rocket ship. It is rather plain. What do we get for it looking plain? It loads quickly . It reacts. It's reads HTML well, from what I've seen. Isn't that what we've been looking for? Here's a screenshot [kde.org] from the KDE screenshots pages.

I've tried mozilla and found it to be inspiring, yet disturbingly buggy. Nobody ever said it wasn't buggy, but it was my light at the end of the tunnel, and still can be. But right now it takes between 60 and 120 Megs of memory while running. How much debug code is in there?? It is debug code.... right?

Well, we do have options. Some of them are GOOD options, depending on whether we're running KDE. It won't surprise me if at some point someone puts out a distribution of Mozilla that is stripped down, quicker, and to the point when it finally hits stable.

In any case, there's my .02 dollars.

rhadc

Re:Get serious!

[update()]

Furthermore, the notion that Mozilla was created primarily by volunteer labor is simply "Oooh, I'm part of the _Community_!" fantasy. For better or worse, the project has been dominated by paid Netscape developers.

He has no point whatsoever

[dizee]

I have two points I'd like to make.

Banner ads, shopping links, etc, etc. These are aimed at the user. This is really cool (tm) for the average joe blow that wants to buy something. As for the banner ads, maybe he's one of those people that just has a deep-seeded loathing of banner advertising. Really, I don't mind them. It's a good way to make money without actually *doing* anything and I understand that. They aren't overly intrusive, they just kinda chill at the top or the bottom.

Second, this guy really has no right to be pissed off at Netscape unless he's a member of the Mozilla project. You don't *pay* for Netscape, it's free (as in beer) software. I think the saying is "you get what you pay for."

Free (as in speech) software carries with it the ability for such conglomerates to come along and use it for pretty much whatever they want to. You can't be mad at them for doing this, because they are explicitly *allowed* to by the software creators.

I would be suprised if Netscape/AOL/Time Warning/Mirabilis/Nullsoft/Winamp/whatever *didn't* do something like this, but I'm not suprised that they did, nor do I think it's wrong, nor do I blame them for doing so.

Mike

"I would kill everyone in this room for a drop of sweet beer."

The commercial side

[Ektanoor]

Ok, ok, ok. Stop a moment and think. Netscape 6.0. It was supposed that Netscape would make a commercial version of its browser. Right? Right. Now they are the authors/proprietors/owners of this thing. On the net, to have a commercial value you should advertise. And Netscape's value, today is on all these AOL & Netscape Netcenter stuff. The browser is, in any case given for free. So how od you think Netscape will atract customers? - "Oh, hey! We are such a good guys, get our browser for free... and by the way, don't forget we do something else..." That is the way they do money today.

So it would be quite natural to see Netscape providing adds on its browser. Maybe they are too much for such a product, But that's the only way for them to keep afloat. Anyway they give the right to choose. They also gave ground to Mozilla's project, and this one is much less ad-loaded than Netscape.

Why it looks so ad-ictive in relation to IE? Well IE is a system embedded into a OS called Windows, upon which Microsoft gets some envious fees. Even from people who don't use it. And, besides, Microsoft has a much larger market in control. So it does not need to rape your brains with a menu carrying 40 ads right-tight into your eyes and calling you to "buy... Buy... BUY!!!!" having its logo in every corner. Microsoft can be more stealth and more promiscuous then Netscape/AOL because its interest is even on the stock value of many companies and not on the direct sell of the product.

Any way, if this bores you, which is understandable, don't forget that there is Mozilla, Konqueror, Lynx, Links, and a few others that have nothing to do with selling you snake oil. However most of the breath only on the *NIX. That is the cost of freedom.

Re:It wouldn't bug me if

[SamHill]

Haven't tried the 6.0 flavor yet, but the 4.7x bunch just absolutely will not let you take the preformated sections out of your bookmark file.

Really? I'm running Communicator 4.73 (latest version for PPC Linux), and I have no Netscape- or AOL-related crap in my bookmarks.html. Unless you're counting the ``Personal Toolbar Folder'', which contains the links that appear in my toolbar, or the ``New Bookmarks'' folder, where new bookmarks go. If I wanted, I could select any folder to store new bookmarks, to store toolbar bookmarks, or to appear as the bookmarks menu. I'd be surprised if that had changed.

bookmarks.html is just a text file. If you don't like the stuff that's in it, and you can't delete things from within the bookmark editor, just quit Netscape, make a backup copy of bookmarks.html, and hack on it in a text editor. When you're happy with it, restart Netscape and see how it works -- you may need to reset some or all of the ``special'' folders. The worst that can happen is that you'll break something and have to go back to your original (and try deleting unwanted stuff again).

NullSoft Can Fix it

[skywalker107]

Have Justin Farkel over at WinAmp write us up a Plug-in to overlay all the banner ads with Winamp Graphic EQ's. Then he can piss of the parent company and a fellow subsidiary all in the same shot