Next Version of Netscape to be Based on Mozilla 1.4Wednesday May 14th, 2003T_Moz wrote in to tell us that the next Netscape browser release will be based on a branch of Mozilla 1.4. The news was confirmed by Netscape DevEdge in a story announcing the availability of Mozilla 1.4 Beta. Netscape's decision to base their next version on 1.4 has been widely anticipated, particularly since the new Mozilla Development Roadmap was unveiled last month. MozillaNews uncovered this back in January. http://www.mozillanews.org/index.php3?article=ee36b2404cfa65b733ae1190a7f6405b "MozillaNews uncovered this back in January. http://www.mozillanews.org/index.php3?article=ee36b2404cfa65b733ae1190a7f6405b " While Netscape's plans have been known forever, this is the first official confirmation from Netscape. Alex OMG! I don't believe it. Netscape was one of the 'major vendors' planning a release on 1.4. What else were they going to do? Release from 1.3? (I'm sure we'd know about that by now) Wait for 1.5 to become stable again? No. Sorry to be sarcastic, but it isn't really news. When I saw the article I thought for a second that I was on theregister.co.uk (which I read at the same time) and thought to myself 'it took them a while to pick up on that'. Then I noticed the mozine design. Netscape had previously stated that there would be no more versions of Netscape Communicator released, only updates to the existing programs. So yes, this is news. Mike No, they never said that publicly. My article uncovered that fact, but it also explictly stated that this release was coming. You've misunderstood. You may be right about "publicly" stated. I also work with someone who used to work in the NS DevEdge group and who has friends at Netscape, and he told me the same thing. Basically, they are throwing in the towel after getting decimated in the browser war. Unless they change their mind, it looks like Mozilla will need to officially become an "end-user product" as well, since it doesn't look like anyone else is planning on doing it anymore (at least after Mozilla 1.4)... Mike Netscapes 6 and 7 are not "Netscape Communicator". Netscape Communicator is Netscape 4. Gerv The "browser suite" then. You know what I mean... Mike What will it be? Netscape 7.1? 7.5? 8.0? my guess is they will call it 7.5 It will be Netscape 7.1 . . . (codenamed "Buffy" - no vampire slayers included!) It will be defenetly called 7.5, since it's a big step from 7.0x. The next big Netscape release will be version 7.1 . . . See here . . . snews://secnews.netscape.com:563/b7q1vi$10712@ripley.netscape.com . . . and here . . . http://sillydog.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1993 . . . You assume that Jay Garcia has any clue as to what's going on inside Netscape... not necessarily a good assumption. Yes. In fact I'd say Jay Garcia knows quite a lot about what's going on inside Netscape at the moment . . . And why would this be the case, pray tell me? Just to clarify, I doubt that being a "Netscape Champion" gives him any useful information that Netscape developers working on Mozilla don't already have.... Notice his email says @netscape.jaygarcia.com . Not @netscape.com . I don't know this guy from adam, but anyone who puts a company's domain name as the node name in his email address, I don't trust. That's done for sorting reasons. All his mail related to Netscape stuff goes to that address, so then he can easily sort it and keep it separate from family mail and other stuff. (I don't know the person in question, but it's standard practice to construct email addresses this way if you have your own mailserver.) If I had my own mailserver, I'd be doing that. For example, on bugzilla my email address would be bugzilla.mozilla.org@jonadab.net, whereas on slashdot it would be slashdot.org@jonadab.net. If you don't understand how this would make sorting your mail easier, then you don't get a lot of mail. It's a little weird that the netscape is in the domain portion rather than the username portion, but that's probably an implementation detail related to his mailserver setup. (In particular, he may be using a mailserver that doesn't provide the other type of alias.) Probably should be 7.5, but Netscape marketing will probably make it 8.0 since it will likely be another year before a new major release on a post 1.4 milestone. Yeah. The way I figure it, Firebird won't be up (feature-wise) to the standard of Navigator until circa 1.7. Maybe 1.6 if we're lucky -- but for it to be worthy as the base of a new major release, it will also need a couple of significant new features. The customizeable toolbars can be one, but something else is needed. So Firebird can be ready around 1.8 or 1.9 timeframe. At 4 releases per quarter, that's... at least a year. Then there's Thunderbird, which currently is nothing like usable. It's a year behind Firebird -- and that's if you give Messenger credit for being up to the same standard as Navigator, which it isn't. I predict that when Firebird is ready for a new release they'll do a new release, and mail/news will just suck until (at least) the next major version after. Then there's calendar. It's unfortunate to see that in limbo. What then? It seems obvious that Netscape would want to keep the integrated application suite. They're going to keep working the XPFE version, sever a branch and ne'er the twain shall meet? Aren't most of you developer types Netscape employees? Remember that they've used the 1.0 branch for more than a year, so assuming they do the same with the 1.4 branch, you're asking what they're going to do in late 2004. I'm not sure they even know what they're going to do that far ahead... I guess it rather depends what happens with Mozilla, what happens with Netscape 7.5 or 8 or whatever, and what happens with the rest of AOL stuff. My guess is that Netscape will use the 1.4 branch until the Firebird/Thunderbird migration is complete. Since it is a significant change, Netscape would want to make sure all the new applications are working together as advertised. Although it wouldn't be even close to being as bad as Netscape 6, Netscape would hate to take unnecessary risks. Better to use Mozilla as it was intented for, a testing ground, instead of going blindly into new territory without properly planning. My hope is that Netscape will hearken back to Navigator, releasing Firebird as Navigator and then offering Mail/News etc. as an extra add-on. Navigator hasn't seen a real standalone release since 4.08, IIRC. It's about time for it to return. I wish there was a way to convince Netscape to do at least one bug-fix release of 7.0 for Mac OS 9. They should fix the worst crashers, anyway. Then at least those users would have a product they could use until they get around to migrating to OS X. Well, those Netscapers have already done it! ftp://ftp.netscape.com/pub/netscape7/english/7.02/mac/macos8 How's that for service? No, no, I mean beyond 7.0.2. Know any 7.0.2 users? It still crashes aplenty. I seriously thought Netscape was dead.... they rarely update the browser... it almost seems like a joke. I would consider using netscape if they got their act together, stopped dwelling on trying to be everything to everyone, and just release a browser. I just surfed over to netscape.com on my mac and am only presented with an apple themed homepage- Its so ambigious... what is netscape nowadays? Heres an idea: get a blank HTML page. at the top put a giant graphic "Netscape Software" then below that "Netscape Navigtor". In the middle of the page have three options 'about' - 'download' - 'support'. with some fancy graphics. And thats it- thats all they need. Perhaps on the download page offer a beta link that connects over to a mozilla beta or nightly, with a very short explination of mozilla, codenames, purpose whatever. Could it be more simple? I think the other option would be to combine the mozilla efforts and the remaining Netscape employees at AOL and make Mozilla the "one and only" browser, bundle it with AOL, and in a sense legitimize it- instead of being just an open source browser it would become a product. Mozilla is already standing on two legs, so why keep Netscape kicking around? "I seriously thought Netscape was dead.... they rarely update the browser... it almost seems like a joke." Last major release of Netscape was in August 2002. When was the last major release of IE? "Heres an idea: get a blank HTML page. at the top put a giant graphic "Netscape Software" then below that 'Netscape Navigtor'. In the middle of the page have three options 'about' - 'download' - 'support'. with some fancy graphics. And thats it- thats all they need." You mean something a little like this? http://channels.netscape.com/ns/browsers/default.jsp Alex Well I wouldn't use IE these days for ethical and personal reasons. I wasn't actually comparing Netscape to IE, but to Mozilla. Netscape does not seem to be very agressive at staying up-to-date with Moz. Next that link you gave is the perfect example of what not to do! It's an absolute mess! It's marked with ADs- text everywhere... if this was in paper form it would clearly be a junk flyer. This is much simpler: http://www.apple.com/safari/ But still I don't think it's simple enough, just a blank page take all that text you see and throw it in an 'about' html file, have a download link, and a support link. Don't clutter the page with ads, don't clutter the page with text. And throw that on Netscape.com ... no complicated string of links to find the 'downloads' page. Yeah both approaches get the job done, but one is simple, the other is not as simple. Perhaps I just think there elegance to simplicity- and Netscape.com has more in common with a wal-mart flyer. "Well I wouldn't use IE these days for ethical and personal reasons. I wasn't actually comparing Netscape to IE, but to Mozilla. Netscape does not seem to be very agressive at staying up-to-date with Moz." You can get builds of Mozilla every day. But I'm sure you wouldn't let your proverbial grandmother use a Mozilla nightly build. Netscape will never be updated as often as Mozilla, it will always be behind. However, their releases will be stable, highly tested, well documented and not have incomplete features. Alex I believe netscape.com makes money (although I might be wrong). The browser on the other hand is free. How hard is it to look at the top of the page for the huge DOWNLOAD link (the same place it has always been)? Netscape.com has been a portal since the days of Internet yore (i.e. Netcenter) and I think it's a much better portal now than it was given all the Time Warner content integrated with it. Netscape.com is actually my main news source now. I wouldn't want to change it for anything; luckily, neither does Netscape. You're just going to have to get over it, I'm afraid. Who wants to keep updating their software? The older stuff works, so why replace it with something that's unknown? I use Mozilla, but I don't feel the urge to keep up any more. On some machines I use, I have 1.3.1, but I no longer use the alpha or beta releases. It doesn't offer me anything other than grief. With NTLM support, I doubt I will upgrade again for a long time - everything else is stable and all the features I use are okay. I might consider switching to Firebird though. Once Thuderbird settles, I might even be convinced to use that for mail instead of the ultra-reliable Netscape 4.8. Personally I find constantly updating a pain in the arse. I used to download the Linux 0.9 kernels everyday or two. But now I get annoyed by short life-cycles of the major distros - thank goodness for Debian. Microsoft get this right: we won't need to replace Windows 2000 for several years yet. Change, especially in a business environment is expense. Mistakes can ruin a reputation for years, a la Netscape 6. Yep. Unless you'd doing actual active testing, there is little reason to run the nightlies or alpha releases... But I suspect that 1.5-1.6 will see enough good changes to the back end to make it worth updating (quite apart from the Firebird changes). |