Weekend Discussion

Friday March 3rd, 2000

This weekend's discussion: What keeps you interested in Mozilla, and what expectations do you have?

Just click the responses link below to enter the forum. Let us know what you think!

#1 Web designing (made less complex)

by gerbilpower

Friday March 3rd, 2000 9:15 PM

Well what keeps me here is my impatience: I want a standards compliant web browser now so I can do all kinds of neat shit with HTML, CSS, XML, etc.

Okay that has only been part of the reason. I just like download Mozilla and run it until it crashes and start it up again. It's fun, especially since Mozilla is much more faster and usable than it was when I first started testing builds.

<:3)~~

#2 all the amazing possibilities

by petejc

Friday March 3rd, 2000 9:15 PM

all the amazing possibilities

#3 Mozilla

by Pyro

Friday March 3rd, 2000 9:40 PM

The ability it has to take back the Internet from Microsoft if the government can't. And the fact that its good - a full featured browser at 5MB!!! Now if only they could get the mail bugs fixed....

#4 Hmm...

by Tanyel

Friday March 3rd, 2000 10:32 PM

The main things I like about Mozilla are the fact that it can be used to build custom Web browsers, and the Interface can be customized to match a particular company, brand, or theme.

I also like the features, such as the ability to save passwords and form information. It is about time Netscape caught up to Internet Explorer, and based on what I have seen so far, I think Mozilla will surpass the current Internet Explorer.

Also, I am a former "Netscape loyalist". I only switched to Internet Explorer because Netscape was so pathetic that it was insulting. Because of my distrust of Microsoft, I am looking forward to a practical alternative. Mozilla and Opera seem like the only serious alternatives and Mozilla is free. I think I will get both.

My expectations are that it will run on my 32 megabyte computer, even better than Internet Explorer and the old Netscape are running. There should be more but this is all I expect.

#20 Interesting...

by mozineAdmin

Saturday March 4th, 2000 4:35 AM

I can't switch to IE, because I find practically everything about it insulting -- from its interface to its error messages. I have to have it on my machine (I run Win98), but I refuse to run it (except when testing site designs).

I hate that they lump together plugins and activex controls under the same security designation (Run ActiveX controls and Plugins) -- resulting in a dialog box every time a page with a plugin comes up (because I refuse to give ActiveX controls free reign over my machine).

The UI is inane (what the hell is up with that little e-over-a-page icon that's in the URL bar (where it performs one action) and in the IE equivalent of the personal toolbar (where it does nothing, but is there for looks), and in the status bar (where it does absolutely nothing, and has no reason to be there). And the gray toolbar icons which becomes colored _upon rollover_? Jeez...

From months of seeing security bugs found in their mail system -- partially due to IE's tight OS integration -- I refuse to use their default mail reader (can you say Melissa?).

I don't find its supposed CSS and other standards superiority to be of sufficient benefit to warrant a switch, because as any simple testing shows, 5.5 doesn't even live up to Mozilla's standards support at this time (try it on David Baron's CSS test suite), or on one of the DOM test suites out there. And partial implementation, as I have stated in the past, is still a hindrance to standardization.

#22 Re: Interesting...

by danielhill

Saturday March 4th, 2000 6:47 AM

I'm referring to IE5 here, although most things apply equally to IE4, since IE5 was just a bug fix and spit-and-polish job.

"I can't switch to IE, because I find practically everything about it insulting -- from its interface to its error messages. I have to have it on my machine (I run Win98), but I refuse to run it (except when testing site designs)."

I do find IE insulting. The status messages are useless. The error messages are terrible, you can't tell what failed with connecting to a site (DNS or connection timed out).

"I hate that they lump together plugins and activex controls under the same security designation (Run ActiveX controls and Plugins) -- resulting in a dialog box every time a page with a plugin comes up (because I refuse to give ActiveX controls free reign over my machine)."

Add Java applets to that group as well. I let ActiveX controls run, I just don't allow them to automatically download. ActiveX controls are similar to plugins from a security standpoint - they are both native code, and both can be automatically downloaded (with NS SmartInstall, which was rarely used :( ). That dialog box is an absolute pain, and totally useless.

"The UI is inane (what the hell is up with that little e-over-a-page icon that's in the URL bar (where it performs one action) and in the IE equivalent of the personal toolbar (where it does nothing, but is there for looks), and in the status bar (where it does absolutely nothing, and has no reason to be there). And the gray toolbar icons which becomes colored _upon rollover_? Jeez..."

I disagree with the points in this paragraph. The 'e' icon in the URL bar is similar to the bit of paper next to the NS4 one, it's just inside the text field, not next to it. You can drag that into your Favourites, on the desktop, into another window, or onto the Home button to set your homepage.

The links bar is exactly the same as the Netscape one, but can be 'minimised' to provide a drop-down bar. Drag it right up against the Address bar on the far right hand side. There will be a drop down arrow you can click, and that will drop your list of links in that bar.

As for your point about the toolbar rollover, NS4 does something similar, it's made brighter. Personally I like the rollover effect.

"From months of seeing security bugs found in their mail system -- partially due to IE's tight OS integration -- I refuse to use their default mail reader (can you say Melissa?)."

This is a difficult one, it's partially true. But it's not Outlook Express that causes the problems, it's Word. Clueless newbies open Word documents from unknown sources and ignore the macro warning. Melissa was just a fabricated, overblown story by the media.

The same thing could conceivably happen with Netscape. By the way, neither OE nor O2000 are any more integrated into Win98 than Netscape Messenger resetting my MAPI preferences.

"I don't find its supposed CSS and other standards superiority to be of sufficient benefit to warrant a switch, because as any simple testing shows, 5.5 doesn't even live up to Mozilla's standards support at this time (try it on David Baron's CSS test suite), or on one of the DOM test suites out there. And partial implementation, as I have stated in the past, is still a hindrance to standardization."

Netscape 4 is disgusting in this regard. You can't do simple rollover tricks with table cells. That's one of my favourite effects, but NS4 won't have a bar of that. NS4's renderer is slow, outdated and need of a revamp.

Which is exactly what Mozilla is. That's why it's important.

Just like the world needs a second superpower to keep America in check (you can tell I'm not American), the browser world needs another superpower. As I see it, Netscape is akin to Russia - has potential, but massively outgunned by America (Internet Explorer).

#24 Re: Re: Interesting...

by mozineAdmin

Saturday March 4th, 2000 7:54 AM

You said,

"I disagree with the points in this paragraph. The 'e' icon in the URL bar is similar to the bit of paper next to the NS4 one, it's just inside the text field, not next to it. You can drag that into your Favourites, on the desktop, into another window, or onto the Home button to set your homepage. "

That's the one action I described in my post. However, the other instances of that icon have no actions associated with them. That was my point. It's a poor design to use the same icon in three different ways on the page and make it useless in two of those instances.

"As for your point about the toolbar rollover, NS4 does something similar, it's made brighter. Personally I like the rollover effect."

The rollover effect wasn't the issue. The issue is that the bar is all grey, *until* you mouseover. Because of this, you can't use color cues to draw you to the proper button -- and once the color actually appears, it's too late to be useful. Netscape could be better in this regard, I'll admit, but IE's solution is really poor.

#67 Re: Re: Interesting...

by Kovu

Sunday March 5th, 2000 10:03 AM

"The links bar is exactly the same as the Netscape one,"

No, it's not the same. Show me where you can edit the names of these links? The reason I can fit so many on my Netscape toolbar is because I can make "Mozillazine, etc, etc., etc." into a simple "MZ" button. Show me where you can switch the folder that the toolbar sees, or add folders to your toolbar? Or even put applications up there (like AIM -- yes I use it). The NS personal toolbar is one of its coolest features. IE's version is a pathetic, weak excuse for it. It's there because it had to be, just like OE and Frontpage Express were slapped up there so that IE could claim to compete with Communicator (Composer/Messenger).

"but can be 'minimised'"

Netscape's can be collapsed as well.

"As for your point about the toolbar rollover, NS4 does something similar, it's made brighter. Personally I like the rollover effect."

I agree with Chris. Gray buttons result in a gray, ugly UI.

IE's UI bites because Microsoft simply doesn't CARE that it bites. The purpose of the program was to make sure Netscape didn't become an Internet standard thereby drawing people away from non-Windows APIs, it was not to build a decent program. If you ask me, all they've managed to do is create Mozilla and ruin Windows. I'm going to really enjoy watching IE become irrelevant.

#76 Re: Interesting...

by Shalom

Sunday March 5th, 2000 1:26 PM

1. To rename the link, right click and use "Rename" or go to Organize Favorites and do the same thing to the icons.

2. To add a folder, bring it up in the browser and then drag the little "e" in the URL bar up to the toolbar.

3. To add an executable, bring up the folder it's in, and drag it onto the toolbar.

I like Mozilla better than IE, but don't spread misinformation about IE ... that's just using their tactics.

--John

#31 Re: Interesting...

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 9:47 AM

It seems nearly impossible to answer these questions without defending Internet Explorer. Well, I guess I will try the interlaced reply thing.

I find that quite understandable, dear.

I guess this could be a problem. Have you tried clicking "no" when it asks if you want to install the ActiveX control?

"what the hell is up with that little e-over-a-page icon that's in the URL bar (where it performs one action)"

Well the "one action" is a good one, I think. It provides something for people to click on when they "drag and drop" bookmarks.

"and in the IE equivalent of the personal toolbar (where it does nothing, but is there for looks)"

The little icons, in the "Links" bar, tell what type of file is being linked to. It is a little E over a page when the link is a Webpage, but if the bookmark links to a Jpeg file, the little picture will be a JPG icon. On my computer, the MozillaZine bookmark has a little red monster beside it, which is crushing buildings.

"and in the status bar (where it does absolutely nothing, and has no reason to be there)."

The little E on the page, in the status bar, changes when the Web browser loads a "secure document". It changes back when the Browser loads an "insecure" document. So, I think its only purpose is to indicate the type of document. It also changes to indicate a "broken" Webpage. We will see more of that if the W3C gets its way.

"And the gray toolbar icons which becomes colored _upon rollover_? Jeez..."

I think this is awful too. I would think greyscale icons would be used to indicate "disabled features" (like the faded menu items), not to indicate usable "buttons". They could have done it better.

"From months of seeing security bugs found in their mail system -- partially due to IE's tight OS integration -- I refuse to use their default mail reader (can you say Melissa?)."

I refuse to use Outlook Express because it seems to require as much memory as a Web browser, just to compose a message. I do not have to wait nearly as long when clicking on a "mailto link" in Netscape. I suspect the reason they built Internet Explorer into the mail software is so they could strengthen their argument that Internet Explorer is necessary for an operating system to exist, as if there were no operating systems before Internet Explorer.

That does not bother me at this time but I still do not like Microsoft. Die, Microsoft.

#34 Re: Re: Interesting...

by mozineAdmin

Saturday March 4th, 2000 10:03 AM

"I guess this could be a problem. Have you tried clicking 'no' when it asks if you want to install the ActiveX control?"

Of course - I don't run them on my system. The point is that the running of activex controls and plugins are under the same security option (see my previous post) and I get a warning even when displaying simple plugin content (because I won't turn off warnings in that pref). This is obviously intentional on Microsoft's part - to make ActiveX controls seem as secure as plugin content - which they certainly aren't.

"Well the 'one action' is a good one, I think. It provides something for people to click on when they 'drag and drop' bookmarks."

Never said it was a bad action, or that doing only one action was somehow bad. I meant "one action" as opposed to something else -- in this case, "no action". As in, "I do one thing while you do another".

"The little E on the page, in the status bar, changes when the Web browser loads a 'secure document'."

Doesn't in IE5.5 - I checked. It doesn't change at all - a separate lock image appears. But that's beside the point - they use the same icon for three different purposes (the one is still a mystery to me), and none of these uses are the same. That's just bad design.

#35 Big Sigh

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 11:46 AM

"The point is that the running of activex controls and plugins are under the same security option (see my previous post) and I get a warning even when displaying simple plugin content (because I won't turn off warnings in that pref). This is obviously intentional on Microsoft's part - to make ActiveX controls seem as secure as plugin content - which they certainly aren't."

Of course, it is intentional. That is the way of the troll. But why not disable the prompt so the plugins run without it? If you click no every time is asks to install an ActiveX control, you should not have to worry about them running and, therefore, should not need prompts to tell you when they are running.

"Never said it was a bad action, or that doing only one action was somehow bad. I meant "one action" as opposed to something else -- in this case, "no action". As in, "I do one thing while you do another"."

If it is not bad and not useless then why complain about it?

"Doesn't in IE5.5 - I checked. It doesn't change at all - a separate lock image appears."

To me, adding to an image is changing it. I understand your statement though.

"they use the same icon for three different purposes (the one is still a mystery to me), and none of these uses are the same. That's just bad design."

Well, maybe the purpose of that Icon is to indicate that a Webpage exists. In this case, the icon in the address bar indicates the address of a Webpage, and the icons in the "Links" bar indicate links to. Following the same pattern, the icon in the status bar represents the status of the current document, which is a Webpage. Among other things, locks represent security. So, adding a lock to the Webpage icon could represent a "secure" "webpage". I suppose it is also possible that they just like plastering that E on everything, but it seems to have been used with a purpose. Also, the icon in the address bar does not change if the address points to a file other than a Webpage. Maybe they did not think about that.

#42 Re: Big Sigh

by mozineAdmin

Saturday March 4th, 2000 4:07 PM

"If it is not bad and not useless then why complain about it?"

I wasn't. Again, I was complaining about the fact that the icon is used in three different places in the UI, with entirely different purposes and uses for each (with the status bar one being essentially useless). That's all. I don't think I can explain it any better.

"To me, adding to an image is changing it. I understand your statement though."

The image isn't even added to. The lock doesn't appear anywhere near the little icon (unless the other side of the status bar is considered near).

"Following the same pattern, the icon in the status bar represents the status of the current document, which is a Webpage."

Maybe. Yet it doesn't change to the site's icon like the URL bar icon does. And it doesn't change for FTP sites (neither does the URL bar icon for that matter). I really think that it's just superfluous. If it did have a usefulness at one point, it seems to have lost it in 5.5

#37 Re: Interesting...

by wolfseyn

Saturday March 4th, 2000 1:40 PM

Here are some more valid arguments against IE5... First, there is no e-mail notification feature to my knowledge, and also an overall lack of mail/news integration. I dislike IE's bookmarks: A bookmark (filename) cannot contain: /\:*?"<>| It's hard to organize the bookmarks; you can't drag a link to a specific place in the "Links" folder. Also, I'd really like to be able to view a picture by itself (for printing, maybe) and if I right-click on an Image in Netscape it tells me the name of the image (really usefull when designing web pages) I would like to change the toolbar's size without it changing the toolbar settings in "My Computer"/ Explorer

Thank you for your time...

#61 Re: Re: Interesting...

by danielhill

Sunday March 5th, 2000 3:08 AM

"First, there is no e-mail notification feature to my knowledge,"

You have to have Outlook Express loaded for it to appear. It is a bit stupid, they sould either integrate it into the OS or make a separate program that can be loaded at all times.

"and also an overall lack of mail/news integration"

That's probably because you can use any mail program you want. With NS4, you can use what you like as long as it's Netscape Messenger.

"I dislike IE's bookmarks: A bookmark (filename) cannot contain: /\:*?"<>|"

That's because they are files on the disk. Personally, I don't care whether bookmarks are lots of little files or one big file. Lots of little files use up more disk space, but you can copy individual bookmarks more easily.

"Also, I'd really like to be able to view a picture by itself (for printing, maybe)"

One of MSFT's Web Accessories lets you do this.

"and if I right-click on an Image in Netscape it tells me the name of the image (really usefull when designing web pages)"

Agree with this. Very useful feature. Saves having to copy image location and fire up Clipboard Viewer.

Hey, I want to make it clear that I am not flaming anyone by countering your posts, just balancing the argument. (Don't ask me what that means :)

#71 My opinion on integration and UI

by Quelish

Sunday March 5th, 2000 11:10 AM

Personally, I like that IE and Outlook express are two different programs (or at least two different executables). I have always hated how Netscape deals with mail. I have to load the browser if I want to view my mail. And we ALL know how long NS 4.x takes to load. It's a pain in the a$$!!

Outlook Express has Netscape mail beat hands down right now, I'll give Microsoft that much. I love how you can access multiple accounts and news all from the same folder list. I also love that I can customize the interface out the wazzoo and decide what buttons appear and where they appear. Oh yeah, the fact that it supports multiple POP3 accounts puts it ahead of NS 4.x right away. The only downside to OE is the lack of security. But despite that, it loads fast (MUCH faster than NS mail) and is extremely usable.

Another big beef of mine with NS is how it does not correctly handle mailto: links in Windows. Clicking any mailto: link in NS launches their own mail client, not the MAPI registered client. Man I really hope Moz fixes this problem.

The way I see it, if I want to browse the web, I use a web browser. If I want to read Email, I use an Email reader. I don't want to load the browser to read my Email and vice-versa. The key is that the two work together properly: If I get an Email with HTML, it uses the browser's engine to show the message. If I click a mailto: link in the browser, it launches my registered Email client. This gives me a choice of which Email client I want to use and which browser I want to use, and not worry about having to load one all the time if I want to use the other. Yes, that takes away from the immediate ability to have your browser check your Email for you, but that's a minor feature if you ask me. How hard is it to leave your Email program running anyways? Besides, it goes back to the issue that I don't want to load my browser to find out that I have new mail -- I'd rather just load my mail program.

A quite note on the issue of bookmarks: I hate how IE deals with favorites. What a terrible implementation!! I LOVE that I can drag links into my bookmark list and organize it on the fly. As long as Moz keeps this feature in then boomarks will always be better than favorites.

#74 outlook express

by damian

Sunday March 5th, 2000 11:53 AM

Also got to love all those Outlook Express security holes we're always hearing about. Makes me wish I ran windows, just so I could get macro viruses by viewing my email.

#82 Re: outlook express

by Quelish

Sunday March 5th, 2000 6:33 PM

Yes, security is a big downfall to OE. I personally get around that by prescanning all my mail using Norton 2000...but I know that not everyone out there is enlightened enough to know to prescan things. So I'll give you that much.

So what's the answer? Take the UI features from OE, combine them with the browser rendering features of Mozilla, and make it a separate executable from the browser. Then you'd have a secure, kick-a$$ mail client!!

#85 Seperate executable?

by damian

Sunday March 5th, 2000 7:10 PM

Well I think the idea with mozilla mail is that it is written almost entirely in XUL, using mozilla's rendering engine to do almost everything that a mail client needs to do. Making it a seperate exucutable would mean having two executables with mostly the same code. The resulting Mozilla stand-alone would not be significantly smaller than the one with the mail client included. I usually don't like programs that attempt to do everything, but i think in this case it works because it adds very little bloat to the code. A good idea would be an option to use an external mail program of your choice. I'm sure this has been suggested already.

Also, the best thing about Mozilla is that, when it's finished, there will no longer be any excuse to use windoze.

#79 Re: My opinion on integration and UI

by RvR

Sunday March 5th, 2000 3:13 PM

You wrote : << Personally, I like that IE and Outlook express are two different programs (or at least two different executables). I have always hated how Netscape deals with mail. I have to load the browser if I want to view my mail. >>

maybe on windows, but not on Unix : you can invoke netscape -mail (but ok, it's slow to load...)

<< And we ALL know how long NS 4.x takes to load. >>

but as the rumour tells : IE is partly loaded at Windows boot. hmmm Microsoft... cheaters !)

#81 Re: Re: My opinion on integration and UI

by Quelish

Sunday March 5th, 2000 6:28 PM

Actually, I do believe that on Windows you can do the same thing, but it is essentially loading the same executable and the same set of libraries. It just starts out with the Mail client instead of the browser.

OE is a separate executable from IE and the common bond between the two is the browser engine. Nothing about OE is loaded on boot except the engine, and if you never get any HTML related mail the engine is never used...so I don't think that you can use the "loads on bootup" as an argument for why OE is faster than Netscape mail.

So speaking of loading on bootup, why not make a loader for Moz that will load essential parts of it into memory on startup similar to the way that IE works? Except make it an executable so that you have the choice to stop it from loading if you want by simply removing it from your startup proggies that get launched. I know Moz loads fast now, but it could be even <I>faster</I> if it steals a trick from Micro$oft.

#80 Why I hate Netscape Mail

by bink

Sunday March 5th, 2000 5:15 PM

I don't like OE or Netscape Mail (I use Eudora), but I've ALWAYS hated Netscape Mail because if the browser crashes, the mail client crashes too. That's got to be the single best argument for seperating the mail client from the browser. If I've got half an email composed and I went to the browser to grab an url for someone, and the damn thing crahses (which never happens in Netscape 4.x, right?), I start the email over again. I REALLY hope this won't be the case over time in Mozilla.

#118 Re: Why I hate Netscape Mail

by gerbilpower

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 10:24 AM

That's why when Mozilla is finally a shipping product it's never gonna crash, right :)

I would use Eudora, but there are two things preventing me: (1) I cannot import all my mail still in Netscape Messenger over to Eudora and I have WAAAYYY to many to forward or save individually, and (2) Eudora is just a mail program, no news :(

<:3)~~

#68 Also, no "Open Frame in New Window" opti

by Kovu

Sunday March 5th, 2000 10:14 AM

This drives me absolutely nuts. There is an "Open Link in New Window" option, but not one for frames. The ONLY thing IE has better is the Fullscreen button, and that's not even a default button anymore.

#5 open source!

by damian

Friday March 3rd, 2000 10:35 PM

Free software, and all the good things that come with it. Even though I'll probably never delve into the source code, I like the principle of the whole thing. I like helping with the bug reports and knowing that in some small way I'm contributing. Also got to like the openness of forums like this one.

#6 What I like...

by Waldo

Friday March 3rd, 2000 10:52 PM

I LOVE the idea of mozilla as a multi-platform internet toolkit. I can't wait to see the cool apps that are developed using mozilla components.

And jeeze, it's open source. How cool is that?!

#7 It's the best we have...for Linux

by rkaa

Friday March 3rd, 2000 10:57 PM

1: It's the closest there is to a WYSIWYG html editor for Linux.

2: The upcoming ability to handle multiple mail-accounts.

As far as my expectations go I think it'll take another year before the Linux version is very usable - it lags severely behind compared to the Win. version, features as well as speed - but I can wait.

#64 Re: It's the best we have...for Linux

by shim

Sunday March 5th, 2000 7:31 AM

If they can extend it to multiple ISP and multiple mail-accounts even better.

#75 A year ?!?

by damian

Sunday March 5th, 2000 11:59 AM

You can wait a year, I can't. Hopefully we won't have to. The linux version is sadly neglected compared to the windoze version, but at the rate things are improving, and with some of mozilla's most talented programmers working on the linux problems, I would be surprised if it doesn't do everything we expect and more by this summer.

#130 It's the best we have...for Linux

by rkaa

Wednesday March 8th, 2000 2:13 AM

I searched bugzilla for anything on composer - all OS'es - and it came up with zarro boogs. I was intending to report a few, but i don't even know where to start. Have you browsed the code it makes? Do that before you place any bets hehe.

#8 Internationalization and direct text inputing

by shim

Friday March 3rd, 2000 11:10 PM

I like the idea of open source and sharing. More so the support for other languages beside English. Kind of making this world closer to each other, don't you think so?

However, I wish I can input Chinese character diretly from Mozilla mail and news. Then I can forget about IE and outlook express for good.

Cheers!

#9 jabber + mozilla == pthptpbpthptb

by megaloB

Friday March 3rd, 2000 11:15 PM

I got mozilla because I heard jabber could be used with it and jabber is, from what I've seen, going to kick the crap out of ICQ in terms of filesize and ease of use. As a space junkie (I love the free disk space), having a browser at 5mb and a little IM client at hopefully < 1mb and you have everything you need at <= 6mb of downloadage.

I expect a finished product that will not only oust Netscape 4.72 and IE 5, but that will also continually update past final by implementing future w3 features or even propietary ones. I want to see mozilla be used in BeIA, I think that would be cool, even though I have no idea what a 'Net Applaince' is, if Mozilla can jump on that and have Mozilla toasters or whatever, that would be uhhh...super

#18 Hey yeah...

by Waldo

Saturday March 4th, 2000 1:58 AM

I can't wait for jabber. It is going to be so great! Jabber+Mozilla will be really cool.

But I have some thoughts that are totally offtopic.

* What's going to stop jabber users from IM Spamming each other?

* How long from mozilla's release until a cross-platform Napster client is written entirely in XUL?

#21 Re: Hey yeah...

by danielhill

Saturday March 4th, 2000 6:24 AM

"How long from mozilla's release until a cross-platform Napster client is written entirely in XUL?"

I put $50 on 3 days after Mozilla's release. Look through SourceForge and they already have a dedicated category there for Napster clients. If someone hasn't started working on one, well smack me over the head with a big smelly fish.

#25 Re: Hey yeah...

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 8:51 AM

If the people at Napster have any significant foresight, they might consider working with Mozilla to make an "official" Napster client before some "unofficial" client steals their users the way Microsoft tried to steal AOL's users.

#62 Re: Re: Hey yeah...

by danielhill

Sunday March 5th, 2000 3:11 AM

I don't think Napster really care. They don't seem to mind, they kind of encourage it.

I'll ignore your MS / AOL comment so as not to start a big irrelevant flame war.

#26 Update on Jabber/Mozilla

by ERICmurphy

Saturday March 4th, 2000 8:55 AM

Jeremie and I are the two main guys that are planning on working on the project.

The problem has been the fact that Mozilla has been too rough to develop the client on. However, I plan on working on it over Spring break here soon, and I am sure Jeremie will be ready soon too.

Once we get going, something should spring up pretty quick.

Have a good one,

Eric

#10 My opinion

by markpeak

Friday March 3rd, 2000 11:19 PM

my opinion, - I hate M$. - I'm Netscape loyalist too. - Mozilla is opensource, performance browser, Web Standard Compliant, small

but there're somethings that Mozilla can't give me - no separate download (browser or mail only) - there are not Intelligent Feature yet as IE

#11 Netscape's return to glory ;)

by Kovu

Friday March 3rd, 2000 11:33 PM

I like Mozilla because it's the antithesis of the original proprietary browser concept. The standards compliance and customizability make it nothing less than the next level in Web browsing. The XP nature ensures that we can have the same browsing experience on Amiga, Linux, and Windows. Once Mozilla starts hitting like a stone, IE is going to be considered a broken piece of crap in comparison to every other browser on the market -- that's the beautiful part, it won't be just Netscape taking over, it'll be CNN browsers, Disney browsers, Lord of the Rings browsers. All of this customizability, standards compliance, and efficiency, who's going to give one rat's ass about IE except Windows desktop users who either have no choice or are just too lazy to get a real browser?

Anyway, I guess that covers both the "why" and "my expectations."

#12 "Ground Zero"

by Caspian

Saturday March 4th, 2000 12:21 AM

Wow, great topic. Hmmm, I guess its the chance to exercise my creativity and problem solving abilities. Though its also exciting to be at "ground zero" of what is to be a phenomenon, something no one has ever done or seen before.

Expectations? MS will not be overthrone immediately from its IE throne. But there is a looming giant in the distance known as Mozilla. Attacking from every direction on every platform. Unparalleled excellence, price and portability that is irresistible to developers and businesses. What has begun cannot be stopped.

#13 "Ground Zero"

by Caspian

Saturday March 4th, 2000 12:28 AM

#14 Standard Browser for Internet Apliances...

by hleal

Saturday March 4th, 2000 12:45 AM

I think that mozilla will be the standard browser for internet appliances. Is fast, portable, well designed, open source, componentized, feature rich, and more stable day by day.

So, will buy an internet appliance ONLY if it uses Mozilla as their web browser.

Keep Up the good work!

#15 Business perspective

by dunegoon

Saturday March 4th, 2000 12:59 AM

As IT Director of a manufacturing company, I need a cross platform browser so that I can specify the best technology for our company's needs. If IE becomes "the only browser", it will be more difficult for us to use opther innovative technology such as network computers, Linux, wireless terminals, MacIntosh, and so forth. This is more important than just Internet web browsing by the employee's because we use the same technology for our internal business needs. Our users love this browser based interface to our data. What we don't like are the "channels", and "favorites" (advertising crap, AOL IM, etc.) that come with either of the commercial packages. We also need a fairly complete suite- browser, mail, news, composer, calendar- with a consistant look. We have actually had very good luck using and supporting Netscape 4.5 on nearly 1,000 machines across 20 locations nation-wide. We run the whole thing from our headquarters where we have SuiteSpot, Messenger, Collarbra(news), LDAP, and Calendar on two HP-UX servers. The server side has been very reliable.

It is getting ever more difficult to support the client side Netscape, however, because of the many packages that now require IE.

I am fearful that the Mozilla project may be too home-oriented, leaving us "Keep It Simple" business users out of the thinking. Hopefully, whatever results will be highly configurable, modular in design, stable, support Java, and wildly popular.

Thanks for listening, Allen

#28 Re: Business perspective

by WillyWonka

Saturday March 4th, 2000 9:06 AM

"It is getting ever more difficult to support the client side Netscape, however, because of the many packages that now require IE."

When mozilla is released the companies which embed the IE control will now have an alternative (Yeah no more monopoly on the embedding front) thanks to Adam Lock. He is the one who programmed the ActiveX control for mozilla.

Sadly the last working version of it was M12 because of the Web Shell redesign. (Hurry up and get it fixed Web Shell guys!)

#43 Simple Browsing...

by Silverthorn

Saturday March 4th, 2000 4:38 PM

One thing that is kind of nice about all of the open source is that Netscape does not have total control on everything, especially the interface type things...

To me, the most important part of Mozilla is still Gecko. If I am thinking right, Gecko is what interprets all the html and shows it...

All of the interface on top of that, including all the skins and e-mail and newsgroups, panel, etc. is just added on.

While all that stuff is nice to have, I have an e-mail program. I have newsgroups. I don't really NEED skins, etc.

What I'm hoping is that eventually things will branch out more, with someone perhaps making a very barebones browser, more like the origional gecko viewer, and just referencing updates in Gecko for things.

That would make it more like Linux, where you have all these different distributions, but they general incorporate the latest official Kernal into them.

So that's what I'd like anyway... Shawn =)

P.S. Since I am always talking about key commands and such it seems. It'd be nice to have an interface that had customizable keybindings that were really easy to access. Like how you can customize everything in EMACS.

#55 Re: Simple Browsing...

by jesusX

Sunday March 5th, 2000 1:06 AM

Agreed about the EASY user configurable key assignment, but at least you can change the source. As for the "need" for skins, this is not just for hobbyists. This is the idea behind the "NeoPlanet" thing and the logo branding of IE. This will make Mozilla very attractive to companies wanting to push their brands (Like EVERY ISP in the world), or in a corporate environment, etc. I found how to change some of the things in Netscape Communicator, but it's a clumsy prefs.js editing method. A nice skinning ability will make this much more attractive.

#16 Business perspective

by dunegoon

Saturday March 4th, 2000 12:59 AM

It is getting ever more difficult to support the client side Netscape, however, because of the many packages that now require IE.

Thanks for listening, Allen

#17 Well ...

by danielhill

Saturday March 4th, 2000 1:30 AM

... Netscape 4 sucks, I don't like MSFT, and I need an alternative :)

Seriously, NSCP4 is slow, buggy and out of date. No wonder people laugh at it. MSIE is much better, but it's a Microsoft product. I'm scared of being locked into a proprietary, one-vendor system. I already use Windows98, Office 2000, and IIS for some web servers.

I think the world needs a sane alternative. I count Netscape out. becuase I hate America Online. I don't hate MS, but I hate AOL.

So that leaves Mozilla. As slow as development may be, and I admit these delays are frustrating, I'm willing to wait for Mozilla if it lives up to expectations.

Which are ... a small, fast, reliable and up-to-date DHTML capable browser. I loved the first Netscape developer release of the Gecko engine. No XUL crud, no mail or news or page composer. Just a blisteringly fast browser that fits on a floppy disk.

THAT's what I want to see.

#19 New Technologies

by jonde

Saturday March 4th, 2000 4:01 AM

In Mozilla I like the new technologies. And standards support is very important also.

#23 Netscape Loyalist

by onyo

Saturday March 4th, 2000 7:30 AM

I'm a Netscape loyalist, I use only Netcape browser. Hate IE and MS. I want Mozilla to succed.

#27 I like the cross-platform support

by ERICmurphy

Saturday March 4th, 2000 9:03 AM

The fact that Mozilla is going to be on so many platforms is going to be great.

Personally, I will be thrilled to have Mozilla/BeOS.

Not to mention all the other great things...

#29 I'm Interested because...

by WillyWonka

Saturday March 4th, 2000 9:13 AM

What keeps me interested is seeing how fast the programmers add new features.

They are moving a hell of a lot faster than the guys at my work programming wise. (Well to be fair there are a lot more programmers working on mozilla)

I only wish that some of the features which are constantly requested in the .wishlist news group would be added. I know there is a 90% chance that they wont, but I can always hope for a miracle :)

<cross fingers>download manager, seperate threads, PNG Alpha</cross fingers> hehe

#32 Re: I'm Interested because...

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 9:58 AM

I doubt they will include a download manager any time soon. Instead, I suspect they will try to get people to use the Netscape "SmartDownload" software so they can shove advertisements down our throats. That seems to be the Way Netscape has been going lately.

#44 Download helper...

by Silverthorn

Saturday March 4th, 2000 5:00 PM

Of course this is where the open source comes in handy. I suspect someone will be able to easily create a download manager that integrates into Mozilla, as they have access to the code...

If Netscape tries putting in something weird with ads everywhere, they'll only be shooting themselves in the foot, because people will ignore it and grab a version that has what they want...

And I would guess that is what is happening even now. I can't see many people using SmartDownload when Go!zilla and Get Right are so popular...

Shawn =)

#63 Re: Re: I'm Interested because...

by danielhill

Sunday March 5th, 2000 4:53 AM

Need I mention Shop@Netscape?

#77 Re: Re: Re: I'm Interested because...

by Tanyel

Sunday March 5th, 2000 2:05 PM

Yes. Also, the mail client automatically displays advertisements. This will not work as long as there are alternative browsers, download managers, and mail clients. I think it will all change though. Did somebody mention being able to select which page the mail client automatically displays?

#87 Re: Re: Re: Re: I'm Interested because...

by asa

Sunday March 5th, 2000 9:02 PM

"Did somebody mention being able to select which page the mail client automatically displays?"

If they didn't, I will. Yes you can specify the mail start up page to be whatever you want (not trying to start anything but you could do this in 4.x as well). In mozilla it can easily be set in the preferences. You can do it as easily as setting the browser start page. Go to mail and news settings and you'll see "Messenger Start Page" type in a URL or a file and you're ready to go.

#89 Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: I'm Interested because...

by danielhill

Monday March 6th, 2000 12:30 AM

"Yes you can specify the mail start up page to be whatever you want (not trying to start anything but you could do this in 4.x as well)"

It's by manually editing the prefs.js file isn't it? What is the pref name I have to change?

#95 Yes and No

by asa

Monday March 6th, 2000 8:02 AM

In 4.x you must manually open the prefs.js file and insert a line of text. In Mozilla you have to manually click on the Edit menu, manually selec the Preferences... menu item, manually select the Mail and Newsgroups settings and manually enter a URL or file (or manually click on the 'use current page' button) and then manually click on the OK button.

#111 Re: I'm Interested because...

by schmidt

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 2:30 AM

> What keeps me interested is seeing how fast the programmers add new features.

I guess this is the reason that we have to wait for so long for a final release.

#30 Well simple...

by pepper

Saturday March 4th, 2000 9:27 AM

- It's Open Source. I can see why things fails and do something about it. - It's multiplatform. I can use Mozilla both in Linux and Windows. - Mozilla follows WEB standards instead of inventing new ones. - And yes, I use Mozilla (or Communicator 4) 90% of the time I sit in front of the computer (If I remove the time I develop software). I couldn't care less about spreadsheet applications, Word processors or other boring software. Except Quake and Unreal of course ;)

#33 Re: Well simple...

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 10:01 AM

This is concerning the statement, "Mozilla follows WEB standards instead of inventing new ones". I think the W3C is inventing new "standards". In the process, they are causing Mozilla to create a browser that will fail on Webpages that have nothing wrong with them.

#39 Re: Re: Well simple...

by Ugg

Saturday March 4th, 2000 2:52 PM

"I think the W3C is inventing new 'standards'. In the process, they are causing Mozilla to create a browser that will fail on Webpages that have nothing wrong with them."

Standards are there for a reason. If pages are rendering incorrectly in a standards-compliant browser, and the reason isn't bugs in the browser, then the pages have something wrong with them. End of story.

If you don't like the W3 standards, invent your own markup language, give it a new file extension, and code a viewer.. just like EVERY OTHER PERSON who has ever made a new document format in the history of computing. If you're the genius you think you are and the W3 is so terrible, then I hope your format finds all the success and glory it would be entitled to. Until then, do everyone a favor and shut the hell up.

What the hell are you, anyway? Some kind of troll? All I ever see you doing is referring to engineers as "flunkies" and acting like everyone is accountable to you for everything you perceive as wrong with the world (which is to say, nearly everything). Get a life already, dude.

By way of staying on topic.. it's about bloody time that I get to use the technologies I read about years ago. What am I looking for in Mozilla? The first browser that's actually modern for its time since Mosaic 1.

#49 Please keep your comments friendly!

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 8:25 PM

First, call the rancid whore that gave birth to you and ask her to teach you about civility.

"Standards are there for a reason. If pages are rendering incorrectly in a standards-compliant browser, and the reason isn't bugs in the browser, then the pages have something wrong with them. End of story."

The pages do render correctly. The only browser that does not render them correctly is Mozilla. I was saying that, when the W3C was making "recommendations", it should have made them in a way that would not invalidate Webpages that were just fine before the W3C came along. You said "if pages are rendering incorrectly in a standards-compliant browser, and the reason isn't bugs in the browser, then the pages have something wrong with them". There was nothing wrong with them before the W3C recommendation. That is like pouring water on a dry towel and blaming the towel for the wetness. This not the end of the story. You think the only possibility is problems with the Webpage. The other possibility is problems with the "standards".

I am currently pro-Mozilla. The things I type are meant to be constructive and helpful in making Mozilla a success. What happens if somebody has 1000 Webpages that work fine on every browser except Mozilla? Do you think they are going to change all 1000 pages, or are they going to put a "Best viewed with Internet Explorer" banner on their main page?

"If you don't like the W3 standards, invent your own markup language, give it a new file extension, and code a viewer.."

I am doing this.

"If you're the genius you think you are"

I am.

"do everyone a favor and shut the hell up."

While you are on the phone, ask the bitch about the proper way to express disagreement.

"What the hell are you, anyway? Some kind of troll?"

Read the profile, idiot. If you cannot understand the words, I suggest you look at this: http://www.hookedonphonics.com/

"All I ever see you doing is referring to engineers as "flunkies" and acting like everyone is accountable to you for everything you perceive as wrong with the world (which is to say, nearly everything)."

You are either blind or stupid. I type meaningful opinions and suggestions. You seem to think I am accountable to you. Yes, I called Ben Goodgar a lame Netscape flunkie, and I may have called a <understatement>few</understatement> people trolls. You are a lame W3C flunkie. I called him a flunkie because he called my suggestion absurd instead of just explaining why he did not think it was practical. That is all you need to know about that. I called people trolls because I thought they were unfairly criticizing Mozilla and not giving it a chance. That is all you need to know about that. I called your mother a rancid whore because you told me to "shut the hell up" and suggested that I am a troll. That is all you need to know about that.

"it's about bloody time that I get to use the technologies I read about years ago. What am I looking for in Mozilla? The first browser that's actually modern for its time since Mosaic 1."

This is the only thing you typed that was not stupid. Also, I hope you do not think I care what you think. I care more about whether I spelled "Goodgar" right than your feelings. I like Kovu and gerbilpower. I think it has something to do with the lion and the gerbil. Do you have a cute animal? No! Cute animals run from trolls.

Scroll up and look at my exchange of words with mozineAdmin. I explained that I switched from Netscape to Internet Explorer due to problems with the old Netscape, and I was expecting Mozilla to be good enough for me to switch back. He explained to me why he made a different decision and chose not to use Internet Explorer. I answered some of his questions to the best of my ability at that time, and he responded to that. There was no part in which he said "shut the hell up" or "get a life already". There was no part in which he said "your thoughts are absurd". In turn, there was no part in which I called him a flunkie or a troll, or called his mother a rancid bitch. Learn, flunkie. Be respectful to me and I will be respectful to you.

#69 Not true

by Kovu

Sunday March 5th, 2000 10:25 AM

"when the W3C was making recommendations", it should have made them in a way that would not invalidate Webpages that were just fine before the W3C came along."

That's just silly. These pages that were "just fine" were made using ridiculous work-arounds. That's Microsoft's argument exactly "we don't want to make current developers mad by breaking their pages." So by this argument, Web developers should keep with the ridiculously extensive workarounds forever and continue using broken "standards" just so that a few pages display "properly." If W3C had done what you say they'd be proposing broken standards and what's the point in that?

Rather, I say let them fix their pages once to work with the new, non-broken standards. Most of them won't even have to. Very, very few pages look that horrible in Mozilla to where they'll need to be completely rewritten, and the benefits of being standards compliant far, far outweigh the few broken standards that bite it.

#91 Re: Not true

by danielhill

Monday March 6th, 2000 12:39 AM

I agree with this. Even MSN and the god-awful nineMSN looks fine in Mozilla :)

Speaking of which, it's time to get a new nightly. The one I got a few days ago was a corrupted download :(

#114 Re: Not true

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 7:21 AM

"So by this argument, Web developers should keep with the ridiculously extensive workarounds forever and continue using broken "standards" just so that a few pages display "properly.""

See my reply to damian. It contains an example in which W3C compliance causes Mozilla to fail on a Webpage that works properly on all other Web browsers. It required absolutely no "workarounds" until Mozilla came along.

"If W3C had done what you say they'd be proposing broken standards and what's the point in that?"

As I said before, the standards were not "broken" until the W3C said they were broken. This is not all about scripting languages. The W3C has wrecked even more fundamental things.

#86 Re: Please keep your comments friendly!

by Ben_Goodger

Sunday March 5th, 2000 7:39 PM

Ma'am, if you have something to contribute (other than whining), please feel free to do so. If you have something to say to me, send me mail at ben@netscape.com.

Oh, and you didn't spell my last name right.

#115 Re: Re: Please keep your comments friendly!

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 7:24 AM

FLUNKIEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA :)

#134 Re: Re: Re: Please keep your comments friendly!

by Ugg

Thursday March 9th, 2000 1:41 AM

*cough*TROLL!*cough*

#106 oh the irony (n/t) <:3)~~

by gerbilpower

Monday March 6th, 2000 3:02 PM

<:3)~~

#54 On standards and html...

by damian

Saturday March 4th, 2000 11:11 PM

The whole idea of web standards is that you write the html once, and you can expect it to look the same on any browser. This would be great, but in reality it didn't work that way. Microsoft and Netscape pushed their own ways of doing things, with their own html tags which only work for their browser.

Mozilla is going to be a standards complient browser. So if you use only the standard html tags, it should display properly in Mozilla, hopefully in other browsers too. The question is what happens if Mozilla comes to a page that has non-standard html on it? Well a standards complient browser should display the page as best it can, just ignoring the unidentified tags, whether they are Netscape or M$ specific, or my own imaginary <foo> tag. It should NOT fail to display the page, no matter how much it has wrong with it, as long as it has some valid html in it somewhere.

Anyways, following the current standard should not mean that the old standards no longer work, and even very poorly written pages should be displayed as best they can. Can you give any examples of pages where Mozilla's standards complience causes it to fail?

B.T.W. Keep speaking your mind, and ignore jerks that can't carry on an intelligent conversation without resorting to insulting people they don't agree with.

#112 Re: On standards and html...

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 7:03 AM

"Can you give any examples of pages where Mozilla's standards compliance causes it to fail?"

Yes dear, I can. Here is the simplest example I have:

I used an image map similar to the above one. It worked fine with Netscape and Internet Explorer. I think it also worked with Opera, and even WebTV, for goodness sake. I did not have to create any "workarounds" as Kovu suggested. However, a W3C recommendation requires "user agents" to ignore the img tag if it is between a <map> and a </map>. Maybe there is a good reason for this, but it seems to me that the only thing this rule does is cause Mozilla to fail to display an image Map that works fine on every other Web browser. It does not fail because of missing tags. It fails because of W3C compliance.

This example was easy to fix, but what happens if I have thousands of image maps like that? And what happens if there is a compliance issue too complex to be solved by just moving an img tag?

#127 Re: Re: On standards and html...

by damian

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 6:38 PM

I see what you mean, and I don't see a simple solution. I can't see any good reason for the situation you described to not work, other than "W3C says so". But I think it would go against the principles that Mozilla stands for to break it's standards complience at this point. The solution, if their is any, would have to be up to the W3C. If there is no way to make the consortium more open and still come to agreement on standards, then we can can only hope that they get their heads out of their proverbial arses, and make their recomendations a little less strict on issues like this one. Of course this would cause major headaches for mozilla programmers, but I think that the only way Mozilla will survive is if it can evolve with changing standards.

#129 Thank Goodness...

by Tanyel

Wednesday March 8th, 2000 12:04 AM

Concerning "backward compatibility", I think Mozilla and the W3C are at a "point of no return". Also, if the members of the organizations are anything like the flunkies that attacked me, they are more concerned with personal glory than the success of the Internet or Mozilla.

It is refreshing to see a response to one of my posts that is not part of an inquisition.

#88 Re: Re: Well simple...

by sacolcor

Sunday March 5th, 2000 9:55 PM

I already made a large reply to this argument in the M14 thread, which I won't waste bandwidth repeating here. In brief, however, there has to be /one/ correct way to write HTML/CSS/DOM. Having multiple ways to do it causes a /ton/ of repeated effort and compatibility problems.

Since Tanyel has emphasized a dislike for W3C standards on several different occasions, let me ask what solution you would suggest for the current problem of incompatibility? I've spoken with a lot of web developers, and the status quo is costing an /incredible/ amount of effort, and holding back the advancement of the field. You have said that you want the process to be more 'open'...what does this mean? There is a public comment period for all W3C recommendations during which anyone can submit their opinions, so everyone who cares to at least has the chance to be heard. Have you ever submitted a comment on one of the recommendations?

Sure, the membership in the working groups is limited, but that's by necessity...the larger a group gets, the longer it takes to come to an agreement. How would you suggest that the process work?

#113 Re: Re: Re: Well simple...

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 7:12 AM

"Since Tanyel has emphasized a dislike for W3C standards on several different occasions, let me ask what solution you would suggest for the current problem of incompatibility?"

I think any Webpage with a "valid" document type definition should be handled as a W3C compliant Webpage and all others should be handled as a non-W3C compliant Webpage. That is my proposed solution. Please tell me what is wrong with it. If you cannot find anything wrong with it then I want to find that person who stated that it would be difficult to detect which version of HTML a person was using.

"You have said that you want the process to be more 'open'...what does this mean?" It means, if they want to make "standards" that will satisfy everybody, they should not exclude everybody who does not have an excessive amount of money to spend on their organization. They seem like American politicians who cater to lobbyists.

"Have you ever submitted a comment on one of the recommendations?" No. If they have something like MozillaZine, I do not think they made it very obvious. I am certain they see my comments in MozillaZine, since Mozilla is the only group I know of who seems to be listening to them.

How would you suggest that the process work? I suggest it work in a way similar to that of Mozilla, where new recommendations and corrections are "suggested" through something like Bugzilla.

#117 Not as simple as it seems...

by sacolcor

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 8:53 AM

"I think any Webpage with a "valid" document type definition should be handled as a W3C compliant Webpage and all others should be handled as a non-W3C compliant Webpage."

That sentence makes it sound easy, but doing it is anything but. A "non-W3C compliant Webpage" isn't following any particular syntactical rules, but rather a hodge-podge of ill-defined (and sometimes contradictory) behaviors that have evolved through divergent browser development over the last five years. How is the browser to know whether to interpret a tag the way IE has done it or the way NS has done it? Even worse, what happens when a new web developer learns HTML/CSS/DOM by looking at a mix of web pages? They would end up mixing concepts from both camps and trying to use them in the same document.

Without a precise definition of the language, you'd have to build in an AI engine to try to make an intelligent guess on how to render the page, and even then I'd be skeptical of success.

I've decided to copy the post I made in the other thread, since it's germane to this topic: ---------------------------------------- I don't think many people understand the problems created by trying to support both the old way and the standard way. Let me mention a few of them: 1) Time. Would it be worth delaying the release of Mozilla by (I would guess) 2-3 months? Much of the old NS4.X code simply won't work in Mozilla...it would all need to be rewritten.

2) Size. Adding the code to handle multiple rendering methods will bloat Mozilla...it will be a bigger download, take up more memory, and run slower. Nokia's using this layout engine in their portable devices; this decision was undoubtably based in part on the fact that the code was relatively compact.

3) Ambiguity. There would be two (or more) possible ways to render many of the elements and calls. How does Mozilla know which one the designer intended? Some of the old ways of doing things conflict with what the standard ways, or with each other, and there will often be no way to tell.

4) Complexity. Adding this extra code, and especially trying to make decisions of which method to use, is going to make the code more complicated. This would incur a maintenance cost; trying to coordinate the two methods would require some pretty 'clever' code, which will undoubtedly create a number of 'clever' bugs that will need to be worked out.

All of this trouble, just to support techniques that there are generally new and better ways of doing anyway...it just doesn't seem like a worthwhile thing to work on. I doubt that many web designers have been coding their sites for /only/ Naviagtor, in any case...they probably also coded for IE, and /most/ of the IE code I've seen looks pretty decent on Mozilla, since IE5 has something like 95% HTML4 and 85% CSS1. The ones I've talked to have generally been /eager/ to ditch their old NS4.X code ASAP, because it was filled with kludgy workarounds that were put in because of NS4.X's poor CSS support. ---------------------------------------- Including everyone in the W3C decision making process sounds good in theory, but breaks down in practice. Language design is one of those things that's not hard to do, but is very hard to do /well/. Making the decision making process open to the general public would result in slowing the process down to a snail's pace, as well-meaning people try to add a lot of features that sound nice, but really aren't a good idea. In this situation, a small, highly-skilled group of PhDs and industry experts can do the job better than a community consensus. And this process /is/ fairly open. Take XSL, for example. Discussion for it goes on the XSL mailing list, which you could subscribe to at majordomo@mulberrytech.com. You can also comment on the working draft, by writing to xsl-editors@w3.org. In all, the W3C is far more open than groups such as ANSI and ISO, where you can't even see a copy of their finished standards without forking over hundreds of dollars.

#119 Re: Not as simple as it seems...

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 10:44 AM

"That sentence makes it sound easy, but doing it is anything but."

It was my understanding that you did not ask me if it was easy. You asked me how it could be done.

"How is the browser to know whether to interpret a tag [in non-W3C-compliant webpages] the way IE has done it or the way NS has done it?"

New versions of Internet Explorer could handle the pages the way the old versions of IE handled them. New versions of Netscape can handle the pages the way Netscape 4.72 handles them. Other browsers could handle them in a way chosen by their makers.

"Even worse, what happens when a new web developer learns HTML/CSS/DOM by looking at a mix of web pages?"

Probably the same thing that would happen if the developer learned only from W3C compliant Webpages. The developer would end up with scripts that do not work with most browsers.

"Would it be worth delaying the release of Mozilla by (I would guess) 2-3 months?"

I do not think so. Netscape has been delayed too long. I think it should have been programmed to handle old Webpages from the beginning and this is another mistake Netscape will have to live with.

"Adding the code to handle multiple rendering methods will bloat Mozilla...it will be a bigger download, take up more memory, and run slower."

I think this is partially due to faulty recommendations by the W3C that force unnecessary incompatibilities with old "standards". More importantly, I think a slightly bigger file size would be worth the extra compatibility. I do not think it would take up more memory if it was done right. I do not think it would run slower unless it was transitioning from a "compliant" page to a "noncompliant" page. Of course, this is all dependant on the browser being programmed a certain way.

"There would be two (or more) possible ways to render many of the elements and calls. How does Mozilla know which one the designer intended?"

If the DTD is not there then it can handle the elements and calls the way Netscape 4.7 would. If Netscape 4.7 is too terrible, it can handle the elements and calls the way Internet Explorer would.

"Adding this extra code, and especially trying to make decisions of which method to use, is going to make the code more complicated."

It is not difficult or complicated to check for whether a document type definition exists or not.

"Making the decision making process open to the general public would result in slowing the process down to a snail's pace"

The extremely delayed release of Netscape is "justified" by the determination to make it right. Why should things be different for a Web "standard"?

"...as well-meaning people try to add a lot of features that sound nice, but really aren't a good idea."

Maybe people in the W3C are not all good. Maybe people outside of the W3C are not all bad.

"In this situation, a small, highly-skilled group of PhDs and industry experts can do the job better than a community consensus."

That sounds like about what Microsoft and AOL are. I doubt a small group of people can account for the needs of most people on the Internet. I also know some idiots with graduate degrees and some very competent people who have not graduated from high school yet. Further, letting a bunch of rich people control the Internet is a mistake.

#123 Re: Not as simple as it seems...

by sacolcor

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 12:42 PM

From your post, I think I can narrow our points of disagreement down to three:

1) You feel that the current situation in web design, where authors need to code seperate implementations for every browser, isn't a problem, or at least is preferable to accepting a single standard for the language unless that standard is developed by internet-wide consensus.

2) You feel that coding a browser to accept multiple interpretations of an HTML document is not unreasonably difficult, and should have been done by Mozilla.

3) You feel that the only acceptable standard is one reached by consensus across the entire internet. Because the W3C does not seek this consensus, it should not be listened to.

If I've misunderstood your position, please correct me. Now, as to my response:

1) You may feel this way, but every professional web developer I've spoken with disagrees. Web designers are wasting vast amounts of time dealing with this problem...it /has/ to go away. Do you do much cross-browser web design? How have you been coding your web sites, so as not to be affected by this issue?

2) If you think you can do it, by all means gather others who feel similarly and implement it...I'm sure the team would be interested in a NS4.7 (and/or an IE) compatibility module, if it seemed to be a solid piece of 3rd party code. I've decided it isn't something I'd want to spend time on, and Netscape seems to have made the same call. If you're not a programmer, please don't try to assert that it isn't excessively complex, or won't impose serious costs in terms of resource use.

3) In my last post, I listed ways that you could have your voice heard in the W3C design process. You neither reposted nor responded to these ways. This makes your position on the W3C begin to sound dogmatic, rather than reasoned. Your response:

"The extremely delayed release of Netscape is "justified" by the determination to make it right. Why should things be different for a Web "standard"?"

would have the W3C putting out a new standard so infrequently as to effectively not exist. The standards should be published /prior/ to the browser makers doing an implementation; otherwise you create incompatibilities that are nobody's friend. This requires a faster pace than a pure consensus approach would allow.

#124 Re: Re: Not as simple as it seems...

by Anon

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 1:19 PM

Couldn't have said it better myself. We're all rooting for you, anyway ;)

#126 Here here! N/T <:3)~~

by gerbilpower

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 1:48 PM

N/T

<:3)~~

#128 The Tanyel Trilogy

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 11:51 PM

A NEW HOPE "1) You feel that the current situation in web design, where authors need to code seperate implementations for every browser, isn't a problem, or at least is preferable to accepting a single standard for the language unless that standard is developed by internet-wide consensus."

No, that is not what I was saying at all. I think the "current situation" is a problem. I think the W3C is adding to that problem by creating yet another variation. I realize this is done supposedly to make things easier when the W3C dominates the Internet, but I think it might kill Mozilla before that happens.

"2) You feel that coding a browser to accept multiple interpretations of an HTML document is not unreasonably difficult, and should have been done by Mozilla."

I do not think making a Web browser is unreasonably difficult for people whose primary job is to make a Web browser. I believe that making a Web browser support two sets of rules is not significantly more difficult than making it support a single set of rules. I think Mozilla should have been "backward compatible", which means it should have been made to handle two interpretations.

"3) You feel that the only acceptable standard is one reached by consensus across the entire internet. Because the W3C does not seek this consensus, it should not be listened to."

I think everybody should be listened to. I think the W3C made some mistakes and Mozilla is going to suffer for adhering to those mistakes without being "backward compatible". This is not about silencing the W3C.

TANYEL STRIKES BACK "1) You may feel this way, but every professional web developer I've spoken with disagrees. Web designers are wasting vast amounts of time dealing with this problem...it /has/ to go away."

...or I may not feel that way. See episode IV.

"2) If you think you can do it, by all means gather others who feel similarly and implement it..."

This is not a question, complaint, or disagreement so I normally would not have responded to it. I reposted it to acknowledge that I read your suggestion, so you will not think I ignored it. You seem to think I ignored your post about the XSL mailing list.

"If you're not a programmer, please don't try to assert that it isn't excessively complex, or won't impose serious costs in terms of resource use."

I have read your sentence and determined that you have not asked me any questions in that sentence, but I am acknowledging that I read it. My assertions are the same.

"3) In my last post, I listed ways that you could have your voice heard in the W3C design process. You neither reposted nor responded to these ways."

I did not know you wanted me to repost that suggestion. I responded to it but did not make a clear association between my response and your post. I typed "Further, letting a bunch of rich people control the Internet is a mistake". It is my understanding that posting to such a mailing list would be offering a suggestion, but would not be a vote, which means the power still lies in the hands of the members who paid excessive amounts of money for more power than being able to send e-mail. In an earlier post, I typed "I am certain they see my comments in MozillaZine, since Mozilla is the only group I know of who seems to be listening to them". I believe members of the W3C already know of my opinions, but if you think they do not, tell me and I will consider sending comments to their mailing list.

"This makes your position on the W3C begin to sound dogmatic, rather than reasoned."

Does it still seem dogmatic? Where is my death star? I believe I have shown the foundation for every claim I have made about Mozilla or the W3C, and every claim has reason. The only claim, that I wish I could retract, is the one in which I told Ugg that I do not care about Ugg’s feelings. I think the truly "dogmatic" people are the ones who issue polemic posts about how I must be wrong just because I do not agree with all of the decisions of Mozilla and the W3C.

RETURN OF TANYEL "[Your claims that delaying the release of W3C recommendations until they are optimal] would have the W3C putting out a new standard so infrequently as to effectively not exist."

Releasing the recommendations without properly and completely designing them leads to shortsighted decisions. These shortsighted decisions lead to incompatible standards, which adds to the complexity of "code forks" and browser "sniffers". This may lead to standards being released faster but the standards will increase the amount of work necessary for pages to be compatible with existing browsers. They are also likely to cause more trouble in the future as the shortsightedness leads to new W3C recommendations, which invalidate old recommendations. I believe they call it deprecation, but I am not certain. This problem exists in the W3C, regardless of its labels.

"The standards should be published /prior/ to the browser makers doing an implementation; otherwise you create incompatibilities that are nobody's friend."

The standards have caused Mozilla to create a new browser that must be detected separately from other versions of Netscape, and cannot even handle Webpages designed for its predecessors. Also, see my reply to damian. I see the good in having common rules for Web browsers, but the rules should not render existing pages useless.

My original post was only three sentences and I never intended for it to lead to so much typing. Hopefully everything has been clarified. If you wish to ask me more questions, go ahead, and we will go on to Episode I.

#131 Refining the positions

by sacolcor

Wednesday March 8th, 2000 10:20 AM

Thank you for clarifying your position, Tanyel; I've updated the issue points to better reflect them.

1) "I think the W3C is adding to the [browser incompatibility] problem by creating yet another variation."

2) "I do not think making a Web browser [that can handle multiple HTML interpretations] is unreasonably difficult for people whose primary job is to make a Web browser. I believe that making a Web browser support two sets of rules is not significantly more difficult than making it support a single set of rules."

3) "I think everybody [who has something to say] should be listened to [and given a vote in the standards design process]."

And my responses:

1) This position needs to provide a viable alternative in order to be taken seriously; otherwise it is a pointless gripe. As I understand it, your alternative is as follows:

a) Browser makers should maintain backward compatibility with their previous implementations, and also support the standard once it gets approved. b) The W3C should take an open vote on each feature of the standard before finalizing it.

These subitems are addressed in the other two points.

Again, if I've misunderstood you, please correct me.

2) The people whose primary job is making web browsers don't seem to agree with you. If you have a reason that we should trust your judgement on the matter rather than theirs, please provide it. Otherwise, assertions like these come across as naive, as though a consumer was telling an auto engineer that he wants a car that gets 250 mpg, while the auto engineer keeps telling him that he could build the car, but it would take ten years, cost $2,000,000 and couldn't carry anything larger than a small child. [Disclaimer: I'm a Software Engineer, not an Automotive Engineer; those numbers are only illustrative]. But like Automotive Engineering, Software Engineering is not magic; everything has its trade-offs, and there's no such thing as a free lunch.

3) This statement, and others in your post, imply that the best way to design a standard is to give everyone a vote. I contend that this is not true, because the number of people who truly understand the design issues will be vastly exceeded by the number of people who have only a superficial grasp of the problems involved. You would probably add a few hundred insightful views, and several thousand well-meaning but ill-conceived ideas that would then be voted into the standard by people who don't know enough to recognize the problems they will cause. Your primary objection seems to be the membership fees, and perhaps there does exist a better way (based on merit) to keep the quality of the standards groups high. But opening the process to everyone would be a big mistake. There /are/ ways to provide your input, using the mailing lists and public comment periods. If you show yourself to be extremely insightful, you could also be invited into a W3C group as an outside expert, and then you'd have a vote. But you'd first need to prove yourself through public discourse and build up a reputation for being one of the top people in the field under review. Also, don't begrudge the W3C the money it collects; I'm sure it takes a lot of money to keep the w3c.org website running.

#136 Episode I

by Tanyel

Friday March 10th, 2000 6:41 PM

"I think the W3C is adding to the [browser incompatibility] problem by creating yet another variation."

More specifically, they are adding to the problem by creating a variation that is absolutely incompatible with previous versions, even when the incompatibilities are not necessary.

"I think everybody [who has something to say] should be listened to [and given a vote in the standards design process]."

I said the "standards body" should have a system similar to Bugzilla.

"This position needs to provide a viable alternative in order to be taken seriously; otherwise it is a pointless gripe."

The "viable alternative" would be "standards" that do not unnecessarily invalidate older conventions.

"Browser makers should maintain backward compatibility with their previous implementations"

I happen to think a good way for Netscape to lose the five developers, who still make pages for Navigator, is to create a situation in which all of their work is rendered useless, and then label the situation as an effort that is supposed to make their work easier.

"and also support the standard once it gets approved"

Yes, but I do not think the W3C recommendation should be the "standard". This means I think that either the W3C should have produced different recommendations or Mozilla should have followed a different organization.

"The W3C should take an open vote on each feature of the standard before finalizing it."

I think a process should have been used similar to the one Bugzilla uses.

"The people whose primary job is making web browsers don't seem to agree with you."

That does not mean I am wrong.

"If you have a reason that we should trust your judgement on the matter rather than theirs, please provide it."

This is a "borderline" personal attack, possibly one of those "pointless gripes" you mentioned. If you want me to consider proving myself then I need more information. For instance, who are the people you suggest have superior judgement to me? What reason is there to trust these people’s judgement? What have they accomplished? What makes you think this question is relevant?

"Otherwise, assertions like these come across as naïve"

I think assuming a person's beliefs are wrong while she has, thus far, provided competent reasons for her beliefs, is a "naïve" and blind action.

"as though a consumer was telling an auto engineer that he wants a car that gets 250 mpg, while the auto engineer keeps telling him that he could build the car, but it would take ten years, cost $2,000,000 and couldn't carry anything larger than a small child"

I could have some fun with this. Tell me what each element of this analogy symbolizes. If this analogy assumes I am only a consumer, it is not fair. However, I do not expect fairness.

"the number of people who truly understand the design issues will be vastly exceeded by the number of people who have only a superficial grasp of the problems involved"

If the people, who produced the "standard", produced a faulty "standard", then maybe they do not truly understand the design issues. Maybe they promote themselves as experts and lead "naïve" followers into traps that will ruin them.

"You would probably add a few hundred insightful views, and several thousand well-meaning but ill-conceived ideas that would then be voted into the standard by people who don't know enough to recognize the problems they will cause."

I said the process should be like Bugzilla. Have people in Bugzilla voted many problems into Mozilla that are going to lead significant problems? Did Mozilla’s compatibility problems come from the general public, or the group of "experts" at the W3C?

I read the entire message you typed.

"don't begrudge the W3C the money it collects; I'm sure it takes a lot of money to keep the w3c.org website running"

I suspect I could maintain a similar site for $30 per month plus the cost of registering a domain name. I shall further examine this issue.

#137 Still more on standards and accusations.

by sacolcor

Saturday March 11th, 2000 1:30 PM

> I happen to think a good way for Netscape to lose the five developers, who still make pages for Navigator, is to create a situation in which all of their work is rendered useless, and then label the situation as an effort that is supposed to make their work easier.

The people at Netscape made the decision that their interests would be better served by concentrating on making a standards-compliant browser than by making a backwards compatible one. I rather doubt that this decision was made lightly or quickly. Since the people at Netscape have written a rather successful browser in the past, and certainly know their interests better than you or I, I'm inclined to take their word on it. In any case, since they are the ones putting in the work, they get to decide what they do and how they do it. Of course, since this /is/ open source development, you are welcome to take the code and create a product that serves your own interests or preferences. Doing this would be a positive, productive way of both promoting your interests, and building a professional reputation for yourself. Pointing out flaws is useful. Filing Bugzilla reports on them is even more useful. Writing a patch or seperate module to deal with them would be better yet. Repeatedly complaining in a public forum about them is not useful at all.

>>> I do not think making a Web browser [that can handle multiple HTML interpretations] is unreasonably difficult for people whose primary job is to make a Web browser. I believe that making a Web browser support two sets of rules is not significantly more difficult than making it support a single set of rules. >> The people whose primary job is making web browsers don't seem to agree with you. > That does not mean I am wrong.

No, but it means that the rest of us have to decide whether to believe a group of people who have been in the browser business for years, or a person who, although quite articulate, has not given me any evidence of browser design experience. Given those options, I'll go with the Netscape team. My own experience as a software engineer also leads me to believe that they made the right call.

>> If you have a reason that we should trust your judgement on the matter rather than theirs, please provide it. > This is a "borderline" personal attack, possibly one of those "pointless gripes" you mentioned.

It isn't an attack at all. Rather, it is a request for you to provide some credentials or evidence to lend strength to your position. If you've written a rendering or parsing engine before, I'll take your opinions on browser design much more seriously than I will if you've never worked on a professional software project before.

> If you want me to consider proving myself then I need more information. For instance, who are the people you suggest have superior judgement to me? What reason is there to trust these people's judgement? What have they accomplished?

They wrote one of the two main browsers in use in the world today?

With regard to writing web standards, how about Tim Berners-Lee, the W3C director? He's the one who invented HTML, HTTP, and URLs. He also wrote the first web browser and the first web server. These accomplishments (and others...see http://www.w3.org/People/Berners-Lee/Longer.html) are sufficient for me to trust his abilities in that field. As the director, he's the one who gives each web standard the final blessing. If you want to consider him an incompetant, you're going to need to provide me with some evidence as to why you can design web technologies better than he can.

>> Otherwise, assertions like these come across as naïve > I think assuming a person's beliefs are wrong while she has, thus far, provided competent reasons for her beliefs, is a "naïve" and blind action.

The issue isn't one of your beliefs; it's a free country and you can believe what you want. But when you repeatedly deride an organization in a public forum, you need to back it up. When you initiate a dispute of professional opinion with people who have established reputations, you need to either have a solid professional reputation of your own (by publishing quality research papers or leading quality software design efforts), or have solid factual evidence of incompetance. So far, the essence of your argument seems to be "The W3C standards/Mozilla aren't backward compatible, so their designers must be idiots".

In reading the standard, I've seen a number of areas where there /was/ attention paid to backward compatibility. There are also areas where they felt that a backward compatible approach would over-complicate the standard. If I'd been on the right mailing list at the right time, I probably could have seen (and even participated in) the debate over those issues as they came up. But I wasn't, so I'm willing to accept the results unless I see evidence that they did a bad job.

> I said the "standards body" should have a system similar to Bugzilla.

Then I may have misinterpreted your previous statements; it seemed like you wanted the standard to be directly designed by vote. That wouldn't work, for the reasons described in my last post. Having a public issue/suggestion board similar to Bugzilla could certainly be of utility in the process. However, keep in mind that (just as in Mozilla) there would still be a relatively small group of people authorized to decide whether any particular suggestion or issue is incorporated into the main work.

>> The number of people who truly understand the design issues will be vastly exceeded by the number of people who have only a superficial grasp of the problems involved. >If the people, who produced the "standard", produced a faulty "standard", then maybe they do not truly understand the design issues. Maybe they promote themselves as experts and lead "naïve" followers into traps that will ruin them.

You haven't yet offered any evidence that the standard is faulty. Obviously, it isn't perfect; that's why CSS-2 followed CSS-1, and why work is ongoing on CSS-3. But the fact that it fails to perpetuate the mistakes of the past is hardly a flaw...I would consider it a feature. You're throwing around a lot of accusations painting the W3C as an evil, self-serving, greedy organization, but you haven't provided any facts to back up those accusations other than "They made a standard that requires changing existing code" and "They have a membership fee to join". These facts are insufficient to support your accusations.

> Did Mozilla's compatibility problems come from the general public, or the group of "experts" at the W3C?"

Neither. The compatibility problems were caused by the browser makers implementing features without agreeing on a standard way to do it first.

>> Don't begrudge the W3C the money it collects; I'm sure it takes a lot of money to keep the w3c.org website running > I suspect I could maintain a similar site for $30 per month plus the cost of registering a domain name. I shall further examine this issue.

Make sure to spec it out to handle a comparable traffic load. Also, add in the cost of maintaining offices in nine different countries, each with their own mirror of the site, to make sure that people around the world are able to participate.

#138 Bad formatting

by sacolcor

Saturday March 11th, 2000 1:33 PM

I apologize for the formatting in that last post; the entry form removed several of the line feeds when I pasted it in. The '>', '>>', and '>>>' /should/ make it clear who was saying what.

#140 More?

by Tanyel

Friday March 17th, 2000 4:12 PM

I will respond to you in e-mail.

#141 Re: More?

by sacolcor

Wednesday March 22nd, 2000 10:01 PM

Good enough...this thread has fallen so far off the front page that I doubt anyone else would read anything we wrote, anyway. :-)

#36 Simply a better browser

by archen

Saturday March 4th, 2000 12:13 PM

Basically, I hate all browsers at the moment. I remember how I practically fell in love with Netscape 3. But since then I've become dependent on style sheets, so I have to switch to newer browsers which I don't even like. MSIE is just a complete security disaster (not to mention that Active X does not have a place as an Internet technology). Netscape 4 is approaching a peace of junk (but I like the e-mail client, so that's still a plus.) Opera is good, but I still find it's lack of support for many things to be a major drawback.

Mozilla offers hope in how many features it has, and supporting standards. It's also important that it will hold the door open for everyone else. I remember what a relief it was when I started getting into Linux to see a program I was familiar with. If MS gets total control of the browser market, you can bet that they'll immediately start leveraging things against every other operating system.

I don't think Mozilla will be a total success, much in part because of the way it looks. Personally I love it, but I think it's a bit to radical for many people. Especially to those who will cling to their MSIE widgets. I think that basically, some people are just in love with IE no matter what is wrong with it (just like Netscape in a way). But I'm hoping that Netscape will get its market share back up to 50%. Of course once Linux takes over the world, MS will still not have an IE port, and Netscape will go through the roof (again).

A thought for Netscape 5.1 -- spell checker for forms...

#38 Spell Checker for forms...

by wolfseyn

Saturday March 4th, 2000 2:00 PM

See bug 16406 http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=16409

#40 Re: Linux has already taken over the world

by damian

Saturday March 4th, 2000 2:56 PM

the world just doesn't know it yet.

#41 Yet another reason Mozilla is cool

by damian

Saturday March 4th, 2000 3:02 PM

They're having a party! http://www.mozilla.org/party/2000/faq.html And on a completely unrelated note, check out the new tabs in the sidebar in today's builds. :)

#45 Re: Yet another reason Mozilla is cool

by gerbilpower

Saturday March 4th, 2000 5:56 PM

They look nifty and more clickable (althought they are bulkier and appear out of place with the rest of the UI), but I liked the format where the tabs always remained on top and don't go to the bottom if it is below the tab that you're currently viewing.

But that lasted a good few months, what happened? I've always thought that it was more intuitive that they always remained the same place.

#47 Re: Re: Yet another reason Mozilla is cool

by Tanyel

Saturday March 4th, 2000 7:09 PM

I like the tabs too. I noticed the change but I did not know they were just added today. This is the first time I have looked at the sidebar in a while. Having them move up and down does not bother me as long as their order does not change.

#48 Ugh, tabs are bulky and out of place!

by Quelish

Saturday March 4th, 2000 8:15 PM

I can't stand the tabs personally. I took one look at them and had to ask myself how the hell they made it into Moz. I liked the way they were before -- they were simple and functional. The news tabs take up too much space and look kludgy and out of place.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE keep the old tabs!!

#52 Re: Ugh, tabs are bulky and out of place!

by damian

Saturday March 4th, 2000 10:47 PM

Well they do look somewhat kludgy. I think they could use some polishing up and maybe shrinking. However they do look like tabs, it kind of hints at their purpose, unlike the old ones which looked like nothing at all.

#46 yee haw

by jdube

Saturday March 4th, 2000 7:01 PM

It is a very nice browser, the best for linux IMHO. Two things that could be fixed though: <br> 1) The download applet automatically thinks you want to download to the directory you have mozilla in, which isn't too cool because when you specify somewhere else you must type the filename in again, and if you need the specific filename which happens to be three miles long, its quite a bitch.<br> 2) Hrm... no, I lied. There is no 2. That's the only problem I've had with mozilla a-s of the 3-1-2000 nightly build.

#50 Why Moz is important to me

by Quelish

Saturday March 4th, 2000 8:28 PM

I've been a Netscape fanatic since the days of the throbbing blue and grey "N". Microsoft has a better browser in terms of rendering speed over 4.x, but it's so unsecure and the UI leaves a lot to be desired. Not to mention that I detest Microsoft's business practices. Oh, and there's also the matter of a 17 meg minimum download to get new versions of IE. Oh but wait, I also forgot about the propietary web extensions that lock out anyone who isn't using Windows. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

And then we have Mozilla. I am looking forward to a small footprint...to super fast rendering...to complete standards compliance...to a 100% customizable interface...to cross platform code and ports to devices ranging from handhelds to settops to PC's...to a true secure means of surfing the web...and to the return to being the leader in the browser market.

Moz can't do it alone though, even if the browser is better than anything else anyone can produce. Moz needs help from AOL to put it on all those coasters they send out, and help from all of us to spread the word to our family, friends, and co-workers. Moz CAN and WILL do it!!

#53 Oh yeah, if it ran on Win98...

by Quelish

Saturday March 4th, 2000 10:51 PM

Almost forgot, I'm looking forward to it actually running on Win98. None of the nightlies for the last week or so have been running at all. The splash screen shows up, but after 10 seconds it disappears and nothing else happens.

#65 Works fine here. Did you clear out old files?

by mozineAdmin

Sunday March 5th, 2000 8:08 AM

like mozregistry.dat, etc?

#72 Yep, tried it on a clean Win98 Install

by Quelish

Sunday March 5th, 2000 11:22 AM

I recently reinstalled Win98 and the build from Saturday was the first I tried on it. Splash screen shows, then dissapears and nothing else happens.

#73 Was the reinstall on a formatted drive?

by mozineAdmin

Sunday March 5th, 2000 11:48 AM

Or overtop of an existing install? And did you report the bug?

#83 Reformatted Drive

by Quelish

Sunday March 5th, 2000 6:38 PM

It was on a totally reformatted drive. No, I have not reported the bug yet...But I will right after this post!!

#94 Bug #? (n/t)

by mozineAdmin

Monday March 6th, 2000 6:20 AM

#101 Bug #30598

by Quelish

Monday March 6th, 2000 11:46 AM

http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=30598

#116 Re: Bug #30598

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 7:34 AM

I do not think the "UNCONFIRMED" state should have been added to Bugzilla. They might as well have added a "TEMPORARILY IGNORED" state.

#51 Java Support

by cknoll

Saturday March 4th, 2000 10:27 PM

I like the idea of a fully implemented OJI spec and I hope more JVM vendors support the interface.

I was kinda disappointed that a few Moz developers said 'Java sucks.' when asked about the status of the Java support for beta. I can say that one of the main reasons that I would use Moz is that it can support any number of JVMs out there that support the standards the best.

-Chris

#56 Because IE doesn't do cool stuff.

by jesusX

Sunday March 5th, 2000 1:26 AM

I love Mozilla because IE doesn't support the single biggest innovation to the Internet since HTTP, the almighty BLINK tag. Oh yes, <blink> baby, that's where it's at. </blink>

=-]

#57 Crazy Features

by skeurto

Sunday March 5th, 2000 2:18 AM

All these crazy features got me thinking. Will it be possible to make the default background transparent (ala ETerm with shading and tinting)? That would be cool beyond words.

#96 No.

by leafdigital

Monday March 6th, 2000 9:27 AM

I think you're asking to make the default window background transparent so that you can see through to other applications behind?

If so, that isn't possible, because Windows (prior to Windows 2000) and Mac (prior to MacOS X) and Linux/X (except certain systems) don't support alpha blending for windows.

(Well, it is probably possible, but it would be a horrible hack and would not work very well.)

Also, given that Mozilla can't even alpha-blend a PNG graphic yet - http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=3013 - frankly the chances of it blending its actual windows are fairly slim. :)

Oh, while I'm posting; I'm interested in Mozilla because of my web design interests (every designer on the planet who uses CSS wants Netscape 4.x to DIE. Now. If we could only rely on IE5 as the "minimum working CSS" then life would be much much nicer), because I'd like to have a browser that (potentially) I may be able to tweak to my liking, and because I still use Netscape 4.x most of the time so...

--sam

#139 Re: Open source, great technology

by rkaa

Tuesday March 14th, 2000 10:46 AM

hehe well it's a bug, not a feature, but if you use linux moz check out http://www.netdot.com Transparency rules!

#58 trolling

by megaloB

Sunday March 5th, 2000 2:24 AM

Trolling. It's fun and easy. it's far too easy to call people a bitch when you can't punch them in the face in person. Please note I am not arguing for the troll. If I could I would bold the word 'the'.

Coincidentally, I love mozilla. The jabber thing really owns me at the moment, just thinking about how much smaller jabber is than ICQ, AND that if it could be part of mozilla, it would be huge.

That way, we could listen to self-proclaimed geniuses do the bloody rag dance all over everyone else. I am not the only person who says 'stfu' over useless posts. I'm telling myself stfu right now.

In many languages, over many Operating Systems, all over the world, which, I think, is the real power of mozilla. It's modular, so I could make nifty skins or some weird thing with XUL that is so new my brain can't process it.

http://www.hookedonphonics.com/

#59 uhhh

by megaloB

Sunday March 5th, 2000 2:30 AM

I just realized I made just about as much sense as the rancid whore that birthed me. What I meant was that mozilla's great features will lie in jabber and other such programs, which allow communication on a much braoder base. ICQ has four billion members, but half of them tell me about great porn I could be seeing. With jabber, I could get a message about great porn from a BeOS box in japanese.

#60 <BLINK>

by jesusX

Sunday March 5th, 2000 2:37 AM

I bet that the fact that I'm posting this again is going to piss some people off. But that's what M&Ms are for, making friends.

Mozilla does BLINK. Netscape does BLINK. IE doesn't. Therefore Mozilla is good.

That, and it's faster than a fat man running for th ejohn after downing a bag of WOW! chips, it has great CSS support (nee 4.x), and it does BLINK!

Silly posts, silly posts... BLINKing all the way...

PS: Anyone wanna write an ActiveX component that is self propagating and makes everything viewed in IE BLINK? =-]

#66 Netscape Webmail integration

by Anon

Sunday March 5th, 2000 9:44 AM

I love my @netscape.net address, but it's really lagging behind the other free email providers. No POP3 support (this used to be a premium service, they discontinued it), while Yahoo! does this for free. If Mozilla Mail provided support for Netscape Webmail, that would be Insanely Great.

#90 Re: Netscape Webmail integration

by danielhill

Monday March 6th, 2000 12:34 AM

Yahoo!Mail can be read from a POP reader? Can you please post how?

#93 Re: Re: Netscape Webmail integration

by Anon

Monday March 6th, 2000 5:14 AM

To use Yahoo! Mail with a POP reader, log into their webmail service, click on Options, and then subscribe to Yahoo! Delivers. There's an option to have them send you their newsletter once a week or a few times each week. However, I've never gotten a message from them. After that, go back to Options and click "POP Access And Forwarding" to turn it on. I've never gotten Yahoo!'s SMTP server to work, though. At least I can check it with Netscape every minute.

#70 Equal support to Mac

by mrschmitt

Sunday March 5th, 2000 10:51 AM

It seems like forever now that the Windows version of Communicator has been ahead of the mac version. Especially in terms of java support. It also seems that MSFT is taking IE for Mac more seriously than Netscape has been taking it Mac department(Still hate MSFT). I know that Netscape has been trying to keep the Mac version similar in features and performance to the Windows version, but my hope is that Mozilla will make a product that runs equally on all platforms.

#78 XP + open source + standards compliant

by RvR

Sunday March 5th, 2000 2:44 PM

First, with Mozilla I feel "at home" on both Unix, Mac and Windows ! It's the ONLY true cross-plateform internet suite, right ?

Then, it's XP + open source / open development + standards compliant... it's the "Perfect Project" ! (just like Linux !)

My expectations are that Bugzilla will still be used to track bugs after the first "final Release" (and that MozillaZine will continue to be the community site it has been since its beginning), that 8-bit alpha transparency will be supported in PNG images, that a lot of themes are created and that a site will be dedicated to them, say mozilla.themes.org ( if you don't know what i mean, check http://themes.org/ ). Also i would like the IRC client ChatZilla to be back in the Tasks menu because I think this could be the "killer" component of the suite. Why isn't it included in M14 ?

#84 What keeps me coming?

by basic

Sunday March 5th, 2000 6:44 PM

Initially, it was the fustration with NS and IE. Then as I learned more about web-standards and what not, it was standards that kept me coming. after a while, learning about the XP tools that mozilla.org is creating, I began to realize that this could be the next big thing! Like Java was, except better! That was before I saw XUL. When I saw XUL, I thought that that was it! But then came XBL! Now I just want to learn XUL/XBL/Javascript and write my own XPDE (Cross-Platform Desktop Environment)!!!!

Besides that, anyone up for OfficeZilla!?

Just musing...

Basic

#92 Open source, great technology

by uksi

Monday March 6th, 2000 4:49 AM

Mozilla has great promises and so far it's been making a whole load of things come true. Ok, maybe not as fast, maybe not as lightning fast (I won't insert my opinion about JWZ here), but pretty fast anyway. A whole damn friggin' browser from ground up in two years!

Anyway, I love the technology. Mozilla is the only browser that renders my new homepage (not yet up) completely (IE doesn't render certain parts). It's the browser that's making me say "don't bother making sites look good under NS 4.7, just make them useable with the browser." And I hope that when Mozilla is out, it will replace NS4.7 for most people so that I can design web pages and not go bald.

It's also open source. Although I have little time, I have contributed some code to Mozilla and assisted with one or two bugs. Ok, it's not much, but it's something, and once a decent beta is released, I hope that a lot more people will contribute to the project.

#132 Re: Open source, great technology

by rkaa

Wednesday March 8th, 2000 2:40 PM

Mozilla is the only browser that does NOT render MY homepage correct :) http://home.c2i.net/dark/linux.html

#133 Sarcastic Social Statement

by Tanyel

Wednesday March 8th, 2000 3:08 PM

You are not allowed to say that. It makes you seem "dogmatic" and "naive", and you are now required to make an entire Web browser yourself or be forever silenced. Everybody call rkaa incompetent now.

#97 My 10 wishes for Mozilla...

by Rick_g

Monday March 6th, 2000 10:05 AM

Sorry to interrupt the "Netscape vs. Explorer" discussion, but i think that wasn't the topic.

Why i'm still interested in Mozilla:

a) I h8 the microsoft way of programming. (I still remember the "This program requires the VBRUNX00.DLL" message)

b) I don't like Netscape 4.x's speed of browsing.

c) Mozilla promises speed, small disk space, and is free! (And open source if that wasn't enough. Hail Gecko! :o)

MY EXPECTATIONS.

I would like a browswer:

a) Doesn't crash or crawls (or growls with my harddrive) when i open some complex page in my 16 MB machine. The last milestone i tested (M13 i think) did that on ALL pages!

b) That is tolerant with incomplete pages , this is, closes open tags.

So far when Netscape 4.x loads a 200K table page (where 100K are advertisements - ugh), suddenly i have to reload because the transfer got stalled. Since i don't get ANY text (the /TABLE tag wasn't received yet), i press reload. Guess what? I get a "Transfer interrupted!" message in the middle of a hyperlink, making a whole paragraph being treated as a link. UGH. :[

c) That loads and unloads faster (or at least as fast) than explorer.

d) That doesn't have 1,000 files of 100 bytes each on many directories, consuming 1,000*8192 = 8MB instead of 100K or 200K. I like Netscape 4.x because it has HUGE but FEW files, optimizing my disk space. Actually i was dissapointed with Mozilla, because expanded it used 20MB. But oh well, why i complain, Microsoft was so ashamed of its 80MB that it replaced the full program for an active installer - only 500K - wow! :P

e) That has the little green dragon as the logo :o) I liked a lot the cartoon in "Netscape's New [L]ayout" in Mozilla.org .

f) That can be customized ANYTIME about MAPI (make current mail reader as default for windows, use last reader found)

g) That can import and/or export bookmarks and mail (call it internet mail, exchange, outlook, outlook express - i won't tell my personal experiences but you can imagine ;)

h) That can switch between pages with a TAB. if you've seen Tabsurf WebBrowswer(http://www.tabsurf.com) i think you'll understand me. It was a great idea! It would even better if i could right-click on a link and choose "open in a new tab" option.

i) That doesn't treat ".ps.gz" Gzipped Postscript files as ".ps.ps" (Netscape 4.x does that :T but oh well, that's a minor bug. It's tolerable :) Hey, you could add some options to have a default downloader program (i.e. Go!Zilla) for your own custom file extensions!

j) That doesn't load the whole mail program when you write a mail in a "mailto:" link.

Well, my 10 wishes for Mozilla. Will it pass the Test? Drum rolls please....

#98 11th Wish!

by Rick_g

Monday March 6th, 2000 10:17 AM

I liked the "Auto-load images" Menu easily available in Netscape 3.x. I don't like netscape when it tries to load ALL the images at the same time. It's much better if you can choose WHICH images load in the webpage. Unfortunately, if i disable images i don't see Rollovers when i press the [Images] button. I would also like to have a double statusbar. i.e.

gecko.gif [******.................] 40% (click here for ALL files statistics) www.mozilla.org [***....................] 20% done.

I also dislike that i have to click on ALL frames on a window to load images, there could be a "load images on all frames" or so.

12th wish! Does Mozilla render .BMP files? I mean, Netscape 4.7x does great with .PNG files, but runs MS Paint because it can't load standard windows bitmaps? come on...

Thanks for listening guys! I'm so glad you have this feedback form. It really feels great that i can talk to (AND be answered!) by the development team.

Cya!

#99 Re: BMP's on the web

by WillyWonka

Monday March 6th, 2000 10:47 AM

BMP's should NEVER be used on the web. 90% of the time they are uncompressed which means that they will take forever to download. Gif/Jpg/Png (To replace gif) is all you should ever need. When you put images on the web they should be as small as you can possibly make them. It takes on avg. 1 minute to download 100k on my 33.6.

[For people who say but most people are on cable/dsl now... I am on ADSL and I still want it as fast as possible. Just because I have more bandwidth, doesn't mean I want it to take the same amount of time to download.]

#122 Re: Re: BMP's on the web

by Rick_g

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 12:12 PM

I know that. I would NEVER put a BMP on the web (unless it's zipped).

But the problem is this: when i try to open a BMP file locally, Netscape launches MS paint. I have collections of BMP files in my machine - i'm working on an image compression algorithm and i need uncompressed files available.

At least they could add a plugin for BMP. Some people out there use Netscape not just for web browsing - Netscape (or any browser for that matter) is so versatile that i use it to maintain my directories and files.

#104 Re: 11th Wish!

by archen

Monday March 6th, 2000 2:16 PM

I agree with the above poster, bitmaps should never be used on the Internet. PNG can offer millions of colors with a no-loss compression algorithm... so basically there is nothing a bitmap can do that a PNG can't do also. I've actually seen people (who obviously didn't know any better) who used bitmaps on their pages. Loading a 100k jpeg is bad enough, but render the equivalent bitmap at 10x the size? I can hardly find an advantage in this. It's better to not even allow bitmaps to render, otherwise you can be assured someone out there will start actually using the things.

#105 Re: My 10 wishes for Mozilla...

by pepper

Monday March 6th, 2000 2:45 PM

I think I need some clarifications here.

a) What do you mean with this? Could you elaborate.

c) You are aware of that IE is integrated with Windows. This means that most of the IE dll's are already loaded. And why do you start and close your browser, stop doing that and leave it open all the time. ;)

d) I actually like that Mozilla is separated into many components. This will give a lesser memory print since less unnecessary dll-code is loaded. Not to mention that it is easier to use the Mozilla code from other applications. I can recommend to switch to reiserfs if/when you sit in Linux, which is a filesystem that is very efficient with many small files.

g) Importing bookmarks and mail is already there for Outlook Express. I really don't hope that any Netscape employee wastes the time with exporting stuff to Outlook Express. I think that OE is pretty good att importing stuff from N4 at least. Maybe a project for an independent developer.

#107 Re: My 10 wishes for Mozilla...

by basic

Monday March 6th, 2000 7:13 PM

a) Well, Moz on Linux do have similar problems, it needs GTK... But that doesn't make it a bad product.

b) Moz should be better... I hope!!

c) It better be. MY EXPECTATIONS.

I would like a browswer:

a) 16MB is pushing it quite a bit, Which OS are you running? Any other apps running at the same time? I would say that moz isn't ready for low-end right now, with more leak cleanups, low memory handling codes and some special memory saving modes, that might do the trick.

b) I'm not sure what you are saying here. Do you mean displaying malform *ML or incremetal reflow? If the former, I'd say that is a bad, bad idea, as it only results in more code and possibly causes more bugs. If the latter, moz already has this. Few more tweaks, and it should be fine

c) Known bug, I heard they were going to cut down the number of xpt files and what not. That should do part of the trick. If it really needs to be speeded up further, after the post beta multi-skin capability is in, could they implement a XUL cache dump or something to cut down parsing (if that helps on really really slow machines like and old 486 running win95 with 16MB and slow HD).

d) same as c) I think they are going to combine some of the xpt files. And there are currently many "test.exe" files that can be rid off.

e) Hear! Hear! For a real Moz skin!!!

f) Sounds good, why not report this to bugzilla http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/ if someone has not beat you to it? ;-)

g) Sounds cool! But I have a feeling this would have to be on a platform by platform basis (someone correct me if I'm wrong). Right now I think they should aim for stability and platform parity first ( I knwo they are almost there, but not quite...)

h) XUL & XBL, that is all I can say. ( and of course a good skin switching system)

i) I don't get this one, your first point, have you tested it? if it has that problem, all I can say is bugzilla. As for the second, do you mean a special download manager interface? I thought we had that already ( the application section in the NS4 needs improvement and it is currently missing from moz, if it is not in bugzilla)

j) Nice idea, I'm not sure if Moz already does this, but if it doesn't I think it would be a nice after 1st release feature.

k) Would love that too... could someone throw in a simple image/photo editor too? While you are at it why not make ender (composer) the ultimate webdev tool (heck why not make it the ultimate UIdev tool or even the ultimate XPdev tool)!

pardon me thinking out loud!

Basic

#100 Expectations, high and low...

by sacolcor

Monday March 6th, 2000 11:32 AM

My expectations are high, but I just noticed this PC Computing article by Jennifer Powell that has Mozilla already pronounced dead:

http://www.zdnet.com/pccomp/stories/all/0,6605,2429467,00.html

Actually, it really doesn't look like she did much research into the current state of Mozilla, and I unfortunately didn't see any way to respond or comment on the article.

#110 That's why it is called ZZZZZ...DNET!

by basic

Monday March 6th, 2000 7:27 PM

They have been sleeping for the last 3 years!

#102 Will it won't it

by mtrump

Monday March 6th, 2000 12:28 PM

Dear All,

I am really enjoying watching the Mozilla project (I have M13 and will download M14 shortly).

The main reason that I am interested in the Mozilla project is that I do not believe that there will ever be release of Mozilla which can rival IE5. In fact I will stick my neck out and wonder whether there will ever be a useable release.

I am waiting to be proved wrong, but in the mean time, every corporate user that I know is standardising on IE.....

Cheers, --m--

#109 Re: Will it won't it

by basic

Monday March 6th, 2000 7:24 PM

All I can say is..."wait for beta"

#103 Some reasons why I like Mozilla

by Netvigator

Monday March 6th, 2000 1:27 PM

1. Compact - more effective, easier 2 download

2. Doesn't mess about with the operating system (yes still Windows unfortunately)

3. Open source - not only the fact if you have the skills you can modify the code, but all those extra enhancements and feedback we can give. I am very impressed with bugzilla esp.

4. Greater privacy enhacement (better cookie managment) And a few more resons which I can't remember now

#108 MNG

by basic

Monday March 6th, 2000 7:23 PM

Anybody know of any MNG dev (or rumors of MNG dev) in Moz? One of the reasons I'm following Moz so that I can use GIMP to create images without footing a lump sum to unisys. And PNG/MNG (and the up coming new jpeg) should do the job.

basic

#120 Re: MNG

by WillyWonka

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 10:57 AM

We'll be lucky to get png alpha in mozilla. Right now there are 101 votes (At one vote per person) on the PNG bug, but no one seems to be working on it.

#121 What is the problem?

by Tanyel

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 11:31 AM

Do they not know how to do it, or is there just no interest?

#125 Re: What is the problem?

by WillyWonka

Tuesday March 7th, 2000 1:23 PM

Its a complicated problem because if something moves underneath (A layer or something) all the colours have to be recalculated. Its coding both at the high level (Dealing with layers and other images) and at the low level where you do the actual colour calculations.

#135 ...and another piece of bad ZDNet journalism.

by sacolcor

Thursday March 9th, 2000 8:04 AM

Take a look at this piece, "The Rise and Fall of Netscape", published on ZDNet by an MSNBC columnist:

http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,2458154,00.html