Slashdot Mirror

Or if you want to get them from the source, netscape is available back to 2.0x at http://wp.netscape.com/download/archive.html

pop-ups? what are these pop-ups you speak of?

People don't know what/who to believe in on slashdot anymore.. So here is a link to CNet:

http://hwreviews.netscape.com/hardware/0-1095-405- 20192504-2.html?tag=rating

By far, the Yamaha's most interesting feature is its DiscT@2 (or Disc Tattoo) Laser Labeling System, which lets you burn graphics and text, such as signatures, logos, or pictures, directly onto the unused portion of CD-Rs. For example, you could burn the words 2001 Holiday Season all the way around the edge of a CD-R containing family photos. You can use any CD-R media with DiscT@2, regardless of brand name or speed, but we found the text to be more visible on CD-Rs with a dark-blue dye. On the downside, the DiscT@2 software can be difficult to master, and the included manual provides little instruction.

Yes, too bad there aren't bigger names doing something with open source.

You're so right. No one writes software for the Mac.

-T

Info from Sillydog.org:
The release notes for Navigator 2.0 are here. You can see the mention of Frames as a new way to present documents. Unfortunately, the link to the demo is broken -- perhaps Netscape kept an archival copy.
Version 2.0 of Netscape Navigator came out in March of 1996.

Info from Sillydog.org:
The release notes for Navigator 2.0 are here. You can see the mention of Frames as a new way to present documents. Unfortunately, the link to the demo is broken -- perhaps Netscape kept an archival copy.
Version 2.0 of Netscape Navigator came out in March of 1996.

http://enterprise.netscape.com/products/aimsvcs/ai mgateway_ds.html

The reviewer is correct, Perl is a good tool for slamming and jammin' text, including XML. What I'm not so sure of is the quote "It's therefore surprising that using Perl for XML processing hasn't received much attention until recently."

I mean one need only scroll down the extensive list of CPAN Modules to see well over 50, as well as many sites/authors devoting time, energy and resource.

Similarly, I would point out some press modules supporting web services via XML, such as SOAP::Lite as far back as 02/26/01 and XML-RPC also in '01 -- or O'Reilly's own XML.com with articles such as "Processing XML with Perl" written shortly after the turn of the millenium.

Point is, though I personally love Perl, blatant plugs such as "... it's just that the world outside of the Perl community doesn't seem to have taken much notice of this work. This is all set to change with the publication of this book and O'Reilly's Perl and XML." " don't inspire confidence in the reviewer's objectivity.

Check out Netscape 2.02's Navigator Handbook, which was created in 1995! (look at the bottom of the page)

AOL was doing this shit back in the 1980's FOR GOD'S SAKE! Everything they had was dynamic content accessed via static buttons, including documents.

How about every single HyperCard stack ever made? A stack is a document. Did these idiots ever try clicking on any of the buttons in a stack?

FROM WHERE THE FUCK DO WE GET THESE GODDAMNED RETARDS?!?!?

I sent this email to museumtour.com 2 days ago. Hopefully, this helps them out.

I have seen the ridiculous claims by SBC concerning your website and their patents. So, I thought i might attempt to be a little help in this situation and do a little online searching for previous art. http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-html/1995S ep/0034.html As you can see, that email is from September of 1995, almost a full YEAR before that patent was filed. It appears that the patent SBC filed was on the very reason for the invention of frames in the first place!

In particular I would like to refer to the following in that September 1995 email: NAME="window_name" The NAME attribute is used to assign a name to a frame so it can be targeted by links in other documents (These are usually from other frames in the same document.) The NAME attribute is optional; by default all windows are unnamed. Therefore, a frame could remain static while referencing other frames with each click in the original frame.

Also, you might check out this url: http://www.focazio.com/web95/images/cnn.gif

This is a screenshot of cnn.com in 1995. I'm sure you'll notice the navigation icons at the top.

Also, there is this link: http://www.ac603.dial.pipex.com/webinov.htm#Intro

As you see, it's from December 1995 and SPECIFICALLY talks about using frames for navigation.

Fred Sotherland of C|Net gave an overview of how the C|Net television network is using the web to integrate TV with the Internet. He also gave some rules which they apply to make sure that pages are usable.

* *No page with more than 20k graphics * *All pages have 256 colour graphics * *Making use of Netscape 2.0 frames to put content and navigation side by side. * *Your only limitation is your Imagination (an the available bandwidth)

Again, this link is from November 1995: http://www.i-m.com/November-1-7-1995/0018.html

If you read that, you see the following: - If you have an image (a button bar for example) that is 80 pixels high and 400 pixels wide, DON'T make a Frame 80 x 400. As with everything else, allow a buffer. The scroll bars (or the blank space that makes them up) runs 20-25 pixels. In addition to that Netscape does appear to add a little more in the gutter area. An 80 x 400 image should be in a 110-120 x 430 frame at the least. - More of a good thing, isn't better. Having a fixed portion of the interface for the navigation bar is a good thing. However, having 4 frames isn't.

As you can see from that, not only does it mention a navigation bar, but it also mentions a BUTTON BAR..like what you have on your webpage. That is from the year BEFORE SBC's patent.

If there is any doubt to that, check this link: http://english.ttu.edu/kairos/1.1/guide.html The pictures are from Spring 1996 when the patent was filed, but they're using the features from Netscape 2.0.

http://semanticstudios.com/publications/web_archit ect/frames.html This is a PERFECT PERFECT PERFECT example of prior art. It is published 2 months before the patent application and describes websites with the EXACT features the patent was filed on.

One more, from netscape itself discussing netscape 2.0: http://wp.netscape.com/navigator/v2.0/frames.html

Netscape 2.0 was released in February of 1996, as you can see from this link: http://scout.wisc.edu/addserv/NH/96-02/96-02-05/00 31.html

That is all I have time for right now, I hope you fight this and don't give in. There is clearly prior art and it seems SBC just filed a patent on something that was already in heavy use at the time of the filing. Now, they want to harass small companies almost 7 years later. They don't go after the big companies because they know their claims are fraudulent. But, I think if you can show them YOU know beyond the shadow of a doubt that their claims are ridiculous, they might look elsewhere for a sitting duck.

Hare Krishna!

Here is the text of the e-mail I sent to museumtour.com after uncovering what I think may be prior art, in only a few minutes poking around on the web:

Sir,

I have been appalled by the acceptance of over-broad patents by the USPTO for some time, and was similarly appalled to see the abuse of a patent on Frames-based browsing used to threaten legal action against your site. Although I am not a lawyer, I believe that I may have found some invalidating prior art. [Please insert standard not-a-lawyer disclaimers here.]

As far as I can tell, the patent covers the existence of links in one frame that affect the display of information in another. This technique was described and published in the original documentation on frames, which you can see on the Netscape website here:

http://home.netscape.com/assist/net_sites/frames.h tml

This includes the text:

These properties offer new possibilities:

1. Elements that the user should always see, such as control bars, copyright notices, and title graphics can be placed in a static, individual frame. As the user navigates the site in "live" frames, the static frame's contents remain fixed, even though adjoining frames redraw.

2. Table of contents are more functional. One frame can contain TOC links that, when clicked, display results in an adjoining frame.

3. Frames side-by-side design allows queries to be posed and answered on the same page, with one frame holding the query form, and the other presenting the results.

Point 2 appears to describe the technique patented, and therefore constitutes prior art if published before 17 May 1996.

This documentation does not itself have a date, and has not been archived by the Wayback Machine (http://www.archive.org), but appears to have been in existence for some time prior to the patent application date. The evidence for this comes in a reference from a post to the HTML mailing list in January 1996:

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-html/1996J an/0110.html

It should be possible to check with Netscape to determine the date of publication of this web page.

I hope that this is of some use.

This is the best comment I've seen so far, but it doesn't really prove prior art. The page you refer to is dated 1999. As with many innovations, the presence of an enabling mechanism does not necessarily indicate prior art.

Can you prove that frames were intended for use as contemplated by the patent, i.e. a consistent user interface across a document or site? Not from that article. Remember too that not only frames are at issue here -- a navigation bar using tables or divisions would appear to be covered by the patent as well.

While it is blatently obvious with hindsight that frames can be used in this manner, some Googling around will show that a huge amount of web design material at the time references a document called "Ameritech Web Page User Interface Standards and Design Guidelines" by Detweiler, M.C. and Omanson, R.C. (1996), on the matter of creating a consistent user interface by using frames. If that doesn't ring a bell, Ameritech was the original holder of the patent, and recently acquired by SBC.

Reading the patent provides some more insight too: they contemplate a document with embedded codes indicating document sections, that conforms to a predefined structure. Read this way, the patent does not partain to HMTL frames, because HTML is a hypertext linked collection of documents, not a single document. A navbar or frame moving the view to named references within a single document, however, would clearly violate the patent.

So is the patent valid? Well, that involves proving prior art; not just that frames existed, but that they were used for the purpose of navigation, both in a single document and between documents. Any evidence of tables to do the same thing would also be useful. Also crutial is having an incontestible source -- printed information is best, a reputable online news source or journal is the next best thing.

w3.org records Edelstein's Sep 1995 proposal to include frames in the HTML specification, but the example page he sites is no longer available.

The Netscape Navigator 2.0 announcement contains "Frames, a new page presentation capability that enables the display of multiple, independently scrollable panels on a single screen, each with its own distinct Internet address. They also enable a region of the screen to be frozen in place as the user scrolls through information on a page". Tantalising, but it doesn't mention using the frozen region for navigation.

Most promising are the Mozilla 2.0 release notes. Two of the example links are broken, while third doesn't work in my browser, although the pages appear to be there. It clearly demonstrates the use of a navigation frame to select different pages in a site, and view them in a "dynamic" frame. That said, the navigation frame itself is not entirely static (it scrolls, but does not change), and there is no navigation inside a single document from the frame.

There is a lot of effort required to find proper evidence of prior art that will hold up in court. The Wayback Machine would provide great evidence, if only we can find it.

This is the best comment I've seen so far, but it doesn't really prove prior art. The page you refer to is dated 1999. As with many innovations, the presence of an enabling mechanism does not necessarily indicate prior art.

Can you prove that frames were intended for use as contemplated by the patent, i.e. a consistent user interface across a document or site? Not from that article. Remember too that not only frames are at issue here -- a navigation bar using tables or divisions would appear to be covered by the patent as well.

While it is blatently obvious with hindsight that frames can be used in this manner, some Googling around will show that a huge amount of web design material at the time references a document called "Ameritech Web Page User Interface Standards and Design Guidelines" by Detweiler, M.C. and Omanson, R.C. (1996), on the matter of creating a consistent user interface by using frames. If that doesn't ring a bell, Ameritech was the original holder of the patent, and recently acquired by SBC.

Reading the patent provides some more insight too: they contemplate a document with embedded codes indicating document sections, that conforms to a predefined structure. Read this way, the patent does not partain to HMTL frames, because HTML is a hypertext linked collection of documents, not a single document. A navbar or frame moving the view to named references within a single document, however, would clearly violate the patent.

So is the patent valid? Well, that involves proving prior art; not just that frames existed, but that they were used for the purpose of navigation, both in a single document and between documents. Any evidence of tables to do the same thing would also be useful. Also crutial is having an incontestible source -- printed information is best, a reputable online news source or journal is the next best thing.

w3.org records Edelstein's Sep 1995 proposal to include frames in the HTML specification, but the example page he sites is no longer available.

The Netscape Navigator 2.0 announcement contains "Frames, a new page presentation capability that enables the display of multiple, independently scrollable panels on a single screen, each with its own distinct Internet address. They also enable a region of the screen to be frozen in place as the user scrolls through information on a page". Tantalising, but it doesn't mention using the frozen region for navigation.

Most promising are the Mozilla 2.0 release notes. Two of the example links are broken, while third doesn't work in my browser, although the pages appear to be there. It clearly demonstrates the use of a navigation frame to select different pages in a site, and view them in a "dynamic" frame. That said, the navigation frame itself is not entirely static (it scrolls, but does not change), and there is no navigation inside a single document from the frame.

There is a lot of effort required to find proper evidence of prior art that will hold up in court. The Wayback Machine would provide great evidence, if only we can find it.

This is the best comment I've seen so far, but it doesn't really prove prior art. The page you refer to is dated 1999. As with many innovations, the presence of an enabling mechanism does not necessarily indicate prior art.

Can you prove that frames were intended for use as contemplated by the patent, i.e. a consistent user interface across a document or site? Not from that article. Remember too that not only frames are at issue here -- a navigation bar using tables or divisions would appear to be covered by the patent as well.

While it is blatently obvious with hindsight that frames can be used in this manner, some Googling around will show that a huge amount of web design material at the time references a document called "Ameritech Web Page User Interface Standards and Design Guidelines" by Detweiler, M.C. and Omanson, R.C. (1996), on the matter of creating a consistent user interface by using frames. If that doesn't ring a bell, Ameritech was the original holder of the patent, and recently acquired by SBC.

Reading the patent provides some more insight too: they contemplate a document with embedded codes indicating document sections, that conforms to a predefined structure. Read this way, the patent does not partain to HMTL frames, because HTML is a hypertext linked collection of documents, not a single document. A navbar or frame moving the view to named references within a single document, however, would clearly violate the patent.

So is the patent valid? Well, that involves proving prior art; not just that frames existed, but that they were used for the purpose of navigation, both in a single document and between documents. Any evidence of tables to do the same thing would also be useful. Also crutial is having an incontestible source -- printed information is best, a reputable online news source or journal is the next best thing.

w3.org records Edelstein's Sep 1995 proposal to include frames in the HTML specification, but the example page he sites is no longer available.

The Netscape Navigator 2.0 announcement contains "Frames, a new page presentation capability that enables the display of multiple, independently scrollable panels on a single screen, each with its own distinct Internet address. They also enable a region of the screen to be frozen in place as the user scrolls through information on a page". Tantalising, but it doesn't mention using the frozen region for navigation.

Most promising are the Mozilla 2.0 release notes. Two of the example links are broken, while third doesn't work in my browser, although the pages appear to be there. It clearly demonstrates the use of a navigation frame to select different pages in a site, and view them in a "dynamic" frame. That said, the navigation frame itself is not entirely static (it scrolls, but does not change), and there is no navigation inside a single document from the frame.

There is a lot of effort required to find proper evidence of prior art that will hold up in court. The Wayback Machine would provide great evidence, if only we can find it.

The Mozilla browser showed us something else.

More than anything else, Mozilla's well thought architecture managed to build a WORA platform with a strategy different from Java's -- with better quality for desktop apps, I dare say.

http://developer.netscape.com/viewsource/index_fra me.html?cp=dev01mmgz&content=archive/archivelist.h tml#humaninterface

So if your technology can't win on price and performance, break out the lawyers and sue everyone

or your browser for that matter

if exist "%USERPROFILE%\Application Data\Phoenix\Profiles\Default\*.slt" goto setprefs

rem If we get here, then no profile for Phoenix exists, so lets create one

"%PROGRAMFILES%\Phoenix\phoenix.exe" -CreateProfile default

:setprefs

rem Now we need to create (or recreate) the prefs file.

c:
cd "%USERPROFILE%\Application Data\Phoenix\Profiles\default\*.slt"

rem Configure Toolbars
copy "%PROGRAMFILES%\Phoenix\default.rdf" .\localstore.rdf /y >NUL

rem Configure everything else
copy "%PROGRAMFILES%\Phoenix\default.js" .\prefs.js /y >NUL

rem All Done.

How about the mozilla.org CCK? Or if it isn't sufficiently advanced, use Netscape's CCK instead.

The CCKs exist to do exactly what you want - customize the browser. Why reinvent the wheel?

This is where some basic research could have helped you before posting yet another lame Ask Slashdot question. I find Google works well for that sort of thing. Perhaps you could also start at Mozilla.org's project pages. RTFM, etc, etc, etc. /mike

Yup! But some people still don't get it

Here's a good place to start for things XUL. Luxor borrows a bit from XUL and show some of the XML advantages over the API approach we all have been using.

Note how easy it is to develop a web site. XUL and other XML technologies will do the same for the interface.

COM refers to .com.us domains.

www.netscape.com.us could not be found. Please check the name and try again.

vs.

Netscape Network

It seems we have different definitions for "push" technology. Netscape beat you to this business model 5 years ago with Netcaster. I believe this is what the parent post was referring to. "Subscription based email delivery services" (A mailing list I have to pay to get on?) seem to be a lower tech version of Netcaster.

In fact video games may well be one of only a few new art forms to come out of the nineties. (Yes I know there were video games before then, but they were amateurish compared to the games that started coming out in the mid-nineties.)

But they are 'art' in the same way that cinema is 'art'. In other words they are 'collaborationist' art, requiring the efforts of many people to create. Because of this fact it requires a great deal of money to complete a decent video game, and no-one will put up that money without expecting a return. So video games must be commercial. You must make, or at least attempt to make, video games (and films) that will return a profit.

This results in many comprimises. One of these is the fact that sex and violence sell. Don't believe me? Count the number of R and PG-13 rated films and compare them to those PG and below. Or just go see 'Adaptation' (in theaters now) and try to catch what Charlie Kaufman was really trying to say with that script...

The danger is that the governement will find excuses like this to use in an attempt to control the video game market -- and will be able to get such controls past the courts because of public opinion. For this reason one of two things must happen; either the video game market implements its own system akin to the movie rating system, (which it has done) and puts out an equivalent effort to enforce it (which it is not doing). Or, my preference, someone produces tools that allow people to create video games on their own quite easily.

This last is coming to pass, we have all seen the recent /. articles on the various FPS vendors making sure their game engines are easily available to modders. But we need the other types of game engines to do the same thing. And we need some way for modded games to get into the console market. This will put many of the big gaming houses out of business though, the surviving vendors will be those that produce the best game engines and do the most to encourage third-party development.

I suspect the game vendors will prefer the first scenario. But I think the second will result in things that few people would argue are 'art'. They may not be games as we now know them though...

Youre not understanding the Playboy article: its promoting Mozillas qualities as a porn browser, not as a general use browser; just notice the features they highlight in the article and consider what kind of audience Playboy has. I guess we can assume you wont ever read in a general living, or style, magazine about how great Mozilla is when you want to jerk off to pictures of scantily dressed girls.

Oh, and heres a link to the Pornzilla project -- theyre the ones whove been putting pressure on the developers (and contributing some code too) to make Mozilla a wonderful browser for all the perverts out there.

REALLY BIG ADVERTISEMENTS POP UP/UNDER/SIDEWAYS/THROUGH/OVER/AROUND... ADS

There's no need for a remote server. The scheme will work with public key cryptography. Panasonic can distribute their machines with the public key stored in the security chip. Sony will use the corresponding private key to sign their compiled kernel. When the machine boots, it will load the kernel into memory, and check the signature. If the signature doesn't authenticate with the public key, the machine simply refuses to boot.

Once the machine boots, it is running a trusted kernel which can refuse to execute code until it authenticates the signature.

If you make any change to any code, the machine will not execute your code until Sony signs it with their private key.

Under the above system, Sony acts as the grand gatekeeper. You must get Sony's approval to create working code (and quite possibly movies, music, and other content) for this machine. This is exactly the kind of thing the constitution sought to avoid when it separated patents and copyrights.

If a site displays well on IE but poorly on Mozilla, it is often the case that the designers of the site focused on developing for IE and gave much less thought to being a standards-compliant site.

I'm really not trying to troll here, and even though he makes some interesting points, it's very difficult to trust the business opinions of a man that has one major dropped ball in his experience and is now trying to push his automation software as the Next Big Thing in IT. I don't honestly think he has any clue what the NBT is, but neither does anybody else.

Yes I know this. Theres an article on devedge which explains the issues pretty well. The 'obtainment' issue the devedge writer describes is interesting, I have to assume that W3C felt that pages should link to the download page for the plugin if the plugin was unavailable, while MS felt plugins should download and auto-install.

Sun's description shows you the nitty gritty, but explains less of the 'why'.

The worst of this is the jsp:plugin tag, which generates code for the 1.3 plugin. Saves a lot of typing, but won't it get out of date pretty fast?

-Baz

The last time I checked, netscape.com had pop up ads. Interesting that their browser is now going to block them. I think somebody needs to make up their mind.

Wired has introduced a new layout, which is xhtml compliant (and looks quite sophisticated too). See this interview for more info.

No need to do that - a quick poke around on Netscape's site will find it - took me about a minute - have a look at this page. (From front page, go to Browser Central, then Product Archive).

Granted, I knew it would probably be there, because I know Netscape are pretty cool about keeping old versions available for download. You probably just assumed it wouldn't be on Netscape's site, which isn't surprising.

Hope this helps. The links seem to actually work, too - I just downloaded 3.04 for Linux, just to check the links weren't dead.

Tim

JavaScript was horribly named by inept marketers at Netscape back in 1995. Its real name was "LiveScript" but they changed it at the last minute so they could coast on Java hype. It has nothing to do with Java

There is an excellent browser toolbar for mozilla which emulates the googlebar at;

http://googlebar.mozdev.org/

This seems to be having problems with the Linux build at present but two other projects linked from this page are Mycroft which has plug ins to allow you to search over 170 different search engines (check it out) and Easysearch which allows you to search google and others.

While exploring the mozdev site, check out Mouse Gestures, Pie Menus (both under Optimoz) and the Multizilla toolbar. These, for me, have made browsing fun and efficient once again.

If you are keen, there is an easy to follow tutorial on building your own toolbars at;
Building a toolbar for Netscape 7 (applies to Mozilla too). I used this to write a toolbar to search our Corporate Directory, Intranet and Google, It took me three days to write from scratch but is now quite widely used.

This seems really dumb.

What's next?
Gecko electronics shuts down Netscape's Gecko?

> Sure you have spellchecker problem...

There are two solutions to this:

1.) Download the SpellChecker for Moz.

2.) Download the Netscape spellchecker.

This could actually be a good thing. Pay a premium for advertising-free premium content. It's not all that different from paying for premium television channels (HBO, Cinemax, etc.) on your cable or satellite system.

If they're smart, they'll also make this available to non-AOL users through the Netscape Network as well, so all you need is their "Screen Name Service" and a browser to sign on. Price this fairly -- say, $4.95 a month -- and they might garner a good number of users. It's actually working pretty well so far for Real Networks; why not expand things a bit?

With ad revenues for web sites dwindling rapidly, this is probably inevitable. And I think it's ok.

Maybe the Canadian Air Force could replace their antiquated fleet of Sea Kings with these choppers.

Beos has fewer applications, sure, but it also has a consistent interface...

Those two things are related. As soon as you get a real rush of programmers and popularity, you can kiss your consitency goodbye. You're always at the mercy of some idiot who thinks that his "revolutionary new idea" (bitmapped buttons / custom window frame / dark grey on black text) is worth throwing own consitency and ease of use. You just can't win, they outnumber you. Enjoy it while you can.

After reading the proof-of-concept script at http://online.securityfocus.com/archive/1/298748, I now know at least to avoid blind links.

Also, I've come up with this possible solution:

In IE, bring the potentially malicious page to the front, then press Ctrl-O to get the Open prompt. Enter this:

javascript:void(location.replace=null)

then click OK. Now anytime that a javascript on that page tries to do a location.replace command will now instead issue a null command (no command at all). (Assuming the script hasn't already been activated, under an onLoad event or something)

This works with annoying exit pop-up ads too:
javascript:void(window.onunload=null);

You can do this with all sorts of javascript commands that get abused. Find some offensive pages, look at their source, and disable the commands you see used often. (onunload is probably the worst and most often used).

Major inspiration from this cnet builder page.

Pornzilla Modifications - stealth profiles, image zoom, view (but don't download) all linked images, go to next/previous thumbnail gallery or image.

Leech - download all links from a page that have an extension in your list of extensions to download. The author didn't figure out how to send referrers with the requests, which is annoying because many porn sites require a correct referrer header, but there are several workarounds included with Leech.

Pornzilla Modifications - stealth profiles, image zoom, view (but don't download) all linked images, go to next/previous thumbnail gallery or image.

Leech - download all links from a page that have an extension in your list of extensions to download. The author didn't figure out how to send referrers with the requests, which is annoying because many porn sites require a correct referrer header, but there are several workarounds included with Leech.

He also complained about Mozilla's vaunted "standards compliance." His exact words: "Mozilla invents its own standards, and it's the only one to comply to them."

For the most part, this is only true if your friend believes that the W3 is a subsidiary of AOL. Needless to say, it isn't, and in fact many of the standards which Mozilla follows (While IE only sorta follows) were written by groups that included representatives from Microsoft. A partial list of the (real, non-Mozilla invented) standards that Mozilla enforces can be found here.

Isn't javascript "write once, run anyware" kinda stuff?

It'd be nice, wouldn't it.

JavaScript is a Netscape invention, always has been. As such, Netscape did write its own standard and is the only one to comply with it. However, there IS a real standard known as ECMAScript that Moz and IE both do a reasonably good job of supporting. Unfortunately, this does not cover everything. ECMAScript can be thought of as defining the 'core' of what scripting on browsers is often used for.

Beyond the core are the areas of scripting that make up the buzzword-compliant DHTML (Dynamic HTML, a fancy way of saying JS, CSS, and HTML)

This is where cross-browser scripting gets hairy. The standards used for manipulating documents dynamically are collectively defined by the W3 as the DOM, or Document Object Model, which has many uses outside of HTML, but we'll stick to its HTML uses for now. Unfortunately, some of the more advanced elements of the DOM are still in a drafting phase, and as such are not ready to be used as standards. Meanwhile, browsers implement support in their own ways, lacking any sort of rules to adhere to. It's my hope that as these drafts are finalized into W3 Recommendations, that MS will include support for them as I know Mozilla will. Until then, browser detection will continue being a way of life for advanced client side scripting.

512MB req'd for Windows, but 2GB req'd for Linux?

Can someone please explain that (bottom of page) to clueless me?

Phoenix: Not sufficiently faster to make up for the fact that I can't search google straight out of the address bar.

But you can! Quick Search bookmarks let you search any site you want from the address bar.

Netscape.
Stopped evolving in a mass-market way at 4.79 ... and that version is buggy as hell.

because the "Mainstream press is the cable companies

So, is there any documentation describing what each and every preference setting in these files is supposed to do? Alas, at the present, no. However, a good reference (for the time being, at least), would be the Netscape developer docs at DevEdge Online. They might not all be exactly identical to the settings used in Mozilla or Netscape 6, since they're primarily written for Communicator 4.x, but it's somewhere to start.

Oh, just to add to the info on the Wired redesign, there's an excellent article over at Netscape's DevEdge:

An Interview With Douglas Bowman of Wired News