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Mozilla 1.6 Beta Released
Sick Boy writes "As reported on Mozillazine, the Mozilla Foundation today released Mozilla 1.6 Beta. This latest milestone adds support for NTLM authentication on all platforms and improves the implementation on Windows. The automatic page translation feature has been restored (now powered by Google Language Tools) and a new version of ChatZilla, 0.9.48, is now included. In addition, several security and crash bugs have been fixed during the beta release cycle. Builds can be downloaded from the Mozilla Releases page or directly from the mozilla1.6b directory on ftp.mozilla.org. The Mozilla 1.6 Beta Release Notes have more detailed information about what's new and known issues to watch out for."
Not that I doubt they can take the load, but why make 'em?
"[A] high IQ is like a Jeep; you will still get stuck, just farther from help!" --Just d' FAQs, c.g.a
From http://www.mozillazine.org/talkback.html?article=3 990
Microsoft's NTLM authentication protocol, popular on Windows-based corporate networks, is now supported by Mozilla on all platforms. Previously, NTLM authentication was only available to Windows Mozilla users, requiring the presence of the Windows SSPI API. Now, the SSPI code has been discarded and a cross-platform implementation has been checked in.
This makes me wonder if Microsoft will peruse legal action to block Mozilla from using a cross-platform, non MS implementation of an MS technology. Because NTLM is undocumented, I wonder what the legal ramifications of implementing it are? Do you own a copyright to an undocumented technology?
FB is hardly that much faster - it uses exactly the same rendering engine and set of libraries under the hood, so there is just a tiny speedup from the GUI that is unnoticable on modern fast computers. It does NOT support W3 better or worse, since it uses exactly the same Gecko engine. And it lacks many features of Mozilla that need to be brought back through extensions. And inflationary extensions can eventually cause severe security problems.
Because IE is insecure, does not have popup blocking, lacks many other features Mozilla does have and supports W3C standards better. Plus, it comes with a mail client that is more secure than outlook and has a well working spam filter built in.
;)
So apart from what's not in bold text above, you're saying that IE is a better browser?
Work on that syntax, son.
I often get customers coming up to me and asking what they can do to reduce or stop those annoying pop-up's. Sometimes I'll have to stop and think for a few seconds to understand/remember what they're talking about since Mozilla has spoiled me.
The first thing I always do is recommend that they download Mozilla and give that a try while explaining to them that I haven't seen a pop-up in over a year.
Unfortunately, though, most folks (~ 95%) will just tell me that they like/are happy with Internet Explorer, despite its bugs and holes. After another attempt at explaining to them the benefits of switching, I'll just tell them about products such as pop-up stopper and popup defender. It's sad, really, as they have no idea what they're missing out on.
But why not concentrate on implementing IE's version of DHTML?
Because the Mozilla developers will always be playing catchup. Once MicroSoft cottons onto the fact that the Moz people are expending considerable effort in matching IE's DHTML features, they'll most likely start releasing new extensions. As it is, there is a good compromise already in Mozilla. Web pages that don't appear to be standards conforming are rendered in "sloppy" mode, which generally works for IE targeted stuff.
At the end of the day, I cannot think of a single website that uses IE specific DHTML in a way that makes me yearn for support for it in Moz. The last IE only website I encountered was the Egg online bank one. Their insistence that I hadn't got a recognised browser simply means I got a credit card from somewhere else (Sainsburys as it happens).
Chris
Am I the only one in here that do not type out my web pages in a text editor? I happen to prefer the WYSIWYG web editing of Mozilla, which is missing from the Firebird releases. I, for one will be very unhappy to see the main branch of Mozilla discontinued just because of this.
Time flies like an arrow, Fruit flies like a banana.
Once you've gotten used to 20+ tabs and flipping between them instaneously, watch out. Mozilla is like the crack of the Internet. Highly addictive.
I'll give you one reason: the average (window$) users will give up if the installation is not better than smooth and will never see all the great things mozilla has to offer. Sadly, the average user is used to bearing with slow stuff more than he is to thinking.
Remember: perception is more important than reality.
Well, if you need to know how far away, you could check out http://www.squarefree.com/burningedge/ for a nice summary of the 'nightly' activity. If you want to see 'who changed what in what file and when' in any release, just check http://bonsai.mozilla.org/. Not as easy to summarize that yourself, but when I was into the nightlies, I loved watching that. The rate of progress is phenomenal.
--- March, milde, march!
I think a proper installer is a very high priority. I'm a linux user and use and I am quite happy using tar, but I've got a lot of friends who use windows and don't have the skills to install software that doesn't have an installer.
With an installer these people can download and install it themselves and then they can tell their friends, who can do the same. Mozilla usage can increase at an exponential rate. Without the installer mozilla would only be available to the technically savvy and their close friends.
(don't know about Opera)
:)
Here is Opera's rendering mode "strategy."
Having recently made an excursion into the world of XHTML 1.1 web design, I have to say, it demands so much of your code, you'll never look at tag soup the same way again. But it's worth it. It took a while, I adjusted, and will never give an (X)HTML document that doesn't validate* to the browsing public again. I strongly urge all of you to put forth the effort to check your pages and read up about web standards (here) as well.
If only there were some way to get the same from the 8,419,528,073 animated GIF-loaded, Frontpage Express, Geocities-hosted messes elsewhere on the web.
*: Don't forget to check your CSS for validity as well.
the "non-open Flash format" argument is so old is not funny anymore.
/. is an anti-Flash crowd, but as a technology Flash is no more evil than animated gifs. Both are abused by advertisers but both have legitimate uses.
The Flash IDE is proprietary. The Flash file format is open and documented. You can write your own program to create or read flash files like so many have.
SVG may be nice but with 98% market penetration I don't see Flash disappearing anytime soon. Also, considering its graphics+animation+sound+video (sorenson based) capabilities, coupled with a pretty good language (based on ECMAScript 4), Flash is a very powerful tool.
I realize that