Mozilla Celebrates Its 10th Birthday

I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "Mozilla has turned 10 today. It's been a long, strange trip from being the once-dominant browser, going down to almost nothing, and returning to something like 25% of the browser market. 'With a sliding market share, Netscape decided to focus on its enterprise oriented products and gave away the browser but most importantly allow volunteers to work on the product. Mozilla was nothing but Netscape's user agent (the name a browser uses to contact the web server), a reminder of the first Netscape code name. Over time, Mozilla would become the name of the open source project, AOL would buy Netscape and Internet Explorer would get up to 90%+ of market share leading to the worst period in web browsers' history where innovation was a niche for Opera and IE remixes users.'"

Comments

Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[colmore]

There's an apropos Joel on Software article from a few years back

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[heffrey]

And bad software takes 10 years to un-write too!

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[BuR4N]

Favorite quote:

"Now the trouble comes when you can't think of any new features, so you put in the paperclip, and then you take out the paperclip, and you try to charge people both times"

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Anonymous Coward]

Mistake number 7: reading anything that self-absorbed cocksucking blowhard has to say. Time and time again he's proven himself to be an idiot, not to mention a turd burglar. But if "wear a vibrating butt plug during meetings" and "castration is much more enjoyable than it sounds" (actual quotes from him) is your kind of advice, then knock yourself out.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Anonymous Coward]

Irony: citing what Mozilla has done as an example of the wisdom of an article written a while ago that cited Mozilla as an example of what not to do.

Mistake number 5. The "We'll Ship It When It's Ready" syndrome. Which reminds me. What the hell is going on with Mozilla? I made fun of them more than a year ago because three years had passed and the damn thing was still not out the door.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[moosesocks]

Mozilla only gained mainstream acceptance once a developer independent of the Mozilla organization took the codebase, and discarded a large portion of the code to create Phoenix (later FireBird, now FireFox).

Prior to that, it was a slow, ugly bloated mess.

Ironically, now that the old Mozilla devs are managing the project, it's once again becoming a slow, bloated mess.

Had the project been properly managed, I don't think it would have taken 10 years.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[McLovin]

The MS Office buying cycle

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Eddi3]

Somebody clearly hasn't tried/heard about Firefox 3. Slow? Bloated? Not at all. I'd say it's faster then any other browser at this point.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[kv9]

I'd say it's faster then any other browser at this point. it ain't faster than Opera.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Anonymous Coward]

Not really. Blake Ross and Dave Hyatt were already related to Mozllla by the time the mozilla/browser (pre-Phoenix) project started. They did start the project separately from the main Mozilla work, but they could hardly be called independent from the Mozilla organization. Blake Ross was an intern; Dave Hyatt was a Netscape employee.

The project started mainly because the monolithic Mozilla suite was heavily influenced by America Online. Ross and Hyatt pretty much discarded the old chrome and started with a fresh one. Rendering engine wise it was pretty much the same thing.

The project would have taken 10 years regardless. Since Netscape released the source code, the engine code was pretty much rewritten. Then, the old chrome was pretty much discarded.

The modern Firefox could hardly be called a 'slow, bloated mess' if you consider the pre-mozilla/browser standards. Mozilla 2 is not perfect, but the Firefox 3 beta shows that the features can be there with a 1.5 era responsiveness.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Cal Paterson]

No, good software does not take any predetermined amount of time to write. The time taken for a good release is proportional to the complexity of the task being attempted. Which means, shockingly, that harder programs take longer to write.

Spolsky, in the linked article, cites Windows NT and Lotus Notes as examples of "good software". Further more, his definition of good software extends only to the kind of release-late-release-rarely, bloated codebase, big company proprietary works that are not representative of the majority of FOSS development.

Here are a few of the holes in his logic; pieces of software where development never ceases (linux kernel), pieces of software which are small and small and fill a predefined need (many quickly thrown together programs), ALL pieces of software for which the aim is not to please a customer directly and a whole host of other situations.
Joel Spolsky, in this article, as in many others, fools himself and many others who lack critical thinking.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Anonymous Coward]

I worked as an intern a couple years ago for FogCreek. I heard rumors, and from what I saw there, I'm inclined to agree with them. I turned down a job offer for that very reason.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[pizzach]

It was odd with Mozilla. The developers had a fixation with making Mozilla look exactly like Netscape Communicator. No one was allowed to try to improve the interface at all in the classic theme. It was one of the most extreme cases of shortsightedness I had ever seen...at the time, most users were verbal about wanting a more native looking theme. Modern did not fit that bill either.

Firefox is what had finally delivered what people had wanted.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[zlogic]

A little correction: Netscape discarded their codebase and wrote Netscape 6 from scratch, which shares its codebase with Mozilla Seamonkey. XUL and user extensions appeared at that time. And Firefox it not a complete code rewrite, but rather a cleanup of the bloated Seamonkey.
I've used Netscape 6 when it was first released (on a middle-end PC) and it was horribly slow, Netscape 7 was a bit better but still not usable.
And Netscape did do a lot for Mozilla, in fact Netscape 6 and 7 were released before Mozilla went out of beta. And Gecko was actively developed by Netscape.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[zlogic]

It depends. I've used both Opera and Firefox and opening a lot of tabs (especially pages with embedded Flash and video, on sites like Youtube) often results in Opera becoming locked up for 5-10 seconds, OTOH Firefox slows down but I can still scroll pages and switch tabs.
I've also checked memory usage and it is actually about the same around 90-140 Mb for Firefox and 80-130 Mb for Opera, but Firefox had 15 addons installed while Opera didn't have any.
However sometimes Firefox can stop responding after running some badly done Javascript when Opera detects that and asks to terminate all scripts on the page.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[hairyfeet]

Or Kmeleon.

Re:Good Software Takes Ten Years to Write

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but it doesn't suck as much as Opera.

Congrats

[MacarooMac]

Still can't drink, drive, vote or fuck tho'

Re:Congrats

[Amorymeltzer]

Still can't drink, drive, vote or fuck tho' Yeah well, that 10 year old's done more to Microsoft than you ever will.

Re:Congrats

[kemushi88]

But it can view porn.

Re:Congrats

[MacarooMac]

Yeah well, that 10 year old's done more to Microsoft than you ever will

I guess I'd better go buy one of those jumbo strap-ons then

Re:Congrats

[Runefox]

I didn't know you could strap a 747 to your crotch. Wow, you've got skills.

Re:Congrats

[MacarooMac]

Strapping it on is not a probem but you firstly need to install the Firefox 'UnPlug' extension to make the device reusable.

And what a great ride it's been

[spectre_be]

but the road ahead is long! (isn't it everywhere?)

What was that 'hidden' page again with the quote from the 'book of mozilla'? Ahh memories :)

Live long and prosper mozilla.

Re:And what a great ride it's been

[gEvil (beta)]

What was that 'hidden' page again with the quote from the 'book of mozilla'? Ahh memories :)

That'd be this guy.

Re:And what a great ride it's been

[Anti_Climax]

about:mozilla

Re:And what a great ride it's been

[morgan_greywolf]

And so at last the beast fell and the unbelievers rejoiced.
But all was not lost, for from the ash rose a great bird.
The bird gazed down upon the unbelievers and cast fire
and thunder upon them. For the beast had been
reborn with its strength renewed, and the
followers of Mammon cowered in horror.

from The Book of Mozilla, 7:15

Re:And what a great ride it's been

[BeeBeard]

Thanks for the link. I was drawing an about:blank there, too. ;)

Re:And what a great ride it's been

[Ilgaz]

about:mozilla I wonder if IE still shows a blue page when you write it/click on IE.

That was a evil joke from MS but they have also hit themselves since blue screen means BSOD of Windows for many.

Re:And what a great ride it's been

[MacarooMac]

And I just didn't get the *in joke* here, either from the original reference or the link, until I realized I'm browsing on my sister's PC with IE. Donut.

Once dominant browser?

[eln]

Mozilla as spun off in 1998 was never the dominant browser. By the time Mozilla was open sourced 10 years ago, IE was the dominant browser by a significant margin. If the browser was still dominant, I doubt Netscape would have ever open sourced it.

Re:Once dominant browser?

[stefanlasiewski]

The summary doesn't make this clear, but the actual article is referring to Netscape as the the dominant browser from Early 1990s to 1998.

Thems was the REAL browser wars. Do you have your Windows 95 Plus Pack yet?

Re:Once dominant browser?

[shellbeach]

Thems was the REAL browser wars. Do you have your Windows 95 Plus Pack yet? Ah, the Windows 95 Plus pack, that gave everyone who bought it smoothed fonts (and themes, too, IIRC). I remember it well! Not as exciting as the gradient titlebars in the early Memphis betas, though ...

'course, before the IE vs. Netscape war there was the Netscape vs. NCSA Mosaic war. And before that, there was the Mosaic vs. gopher war. Like fire across the galaxy, the browser wars spread ...

Re:Once dominant browser?

[bckrispi]

And then there was AOL buying out Netscape, but keeping all of their trillion users on IE.

Re:Once dominant browser?

[Ilgaz]

Mozilla as spun off in 1998 was never the dominant browser. By the time Mozilla was open sourced 10 years ago, IE was the dominant browser by a significant margin. If the browser was still dominant, I doubt Netscape would have ever open sourced it. Can you imagine current Firefox if it was opensourced back in Netscape 3 days when first signs of MS monster waking up and Netscape was still shipping a very good browser showing IE from MS a joke? I remember just like we laughed as Silverlight/Zune today, we laughed at IE 2.0. We saw it as a spoiled rich kids "If you don't play with me, I am going to buy a better toy from store" kind of thing.

Also here is one of the first people suggesting Netscape should go open source _immediately_ by taking the risk of being laughed at. It will surprise you if you didn't see it:
http://web.archive.org/web/19980113192359/slashdot.org/slashdot.cgi?mode=article&artnum=425

I think CmdrTaco also deserves a mention for this anniversary.

"Add the final piece of data to the mix:Netscape is losing money as well as browser market share. What's a company to do? Maybe the solution is simple:GPL Netscape's Source Code.

So now that you've stopped laughing, let's talk about this seriously for a moment."

In fairness....

[Otter]

Internet Explorer would get up to 90%+ of market share leading to the worst period in web browsers' history where innovation was a niche for Opera and IE remixes users.

Putting aside the fact that users who were sufficiently upset by this "worst period in web browsers' history" could always go back to Lynx and Viola...

This seems a bit unfair to kfm and Konqueror, which made web browsing on Unix tolerable while Mozilla was still in shambles, Galeon, which put the first decent browser around the Mozilla engine, and whatever that Mac browser was called ... OmniWeb? Plus CyberDog!

Re:In fairness....

[webmaster404]

Before Firefox started getting popular in the middle-late age of IE6 the web was stagnant, very little innovation that people could see was being done with MS finally killing off Netscape, yes there was progress but in the grand area of things most code had to be checked on like 3-4 browsers to make sure it could render (IE5, IE6, Opera and Netscape/Firefox) correctly. Now, with Firefox/Safari/Konqueror/Opera all being mostly standards-compliant very little testing needs to be done except with IE5-7. I would call it the worst age of the internet from a developers standpoint, with non-standards following browsers being the norm.

Re:In fairness....

[The One and Only]

and whatever that Mac browser was called ... OmniWeb? Plus CyberDog!

I was there so let me elucidate. Mozilla began in 1998, so let's say Netscape died by 1998. On the Mac, the main available browsers were IE and Netscape at that point. Some people still used Netscape despite it not being supported, some used IE, some used minor players such as iCab and Opera. OmniWeb was a NeXTStep browser, not a Mac browser, at that point. CyberDog was a demonstration of Apple's OpenDoc technology, which died in 1997. CyberDog itself was only supported from 96 to 97, and never really caught on.

In 1997, Apple buys NeXT and Steve Jobs takes over. Jobs makes a deal with Microsoft to settle remaining patent disputes (the residue from the "look and feel" lawsuits of the late 80's). That deal includes such provisions as MS investing $150 million into Apple, MS promising to develop just as many Mac versions of Office as Windows versions for the next five years, and IE becoming the default browser on the Mac, although not being built in the way it was built into Windows 98. Until 2003, Apple is contractually obligated to bundle IE and set it as the default browser.

By 2000, the user base is fractured between just using IE, trying to get old Netscape to work, trying to get Mozilla or new Netscape to work, and trying out fringe browsers. (AOL made a few customized releases of Mozilla under the Netscape branding at the time.) In 2001, Mac OS X comes out. A new version of IE is bundled and set as the default browser. Mozilla eventually gets ported over. iCab and Opera get ported over. OmniWeb gets ported from NeXTStep (which is closer to Mac OS X than Mac OS 9 was).

In 2002, some people, including Dave Hyatt, separate out the browser parts of Mozilla from all the other cruft, put it in a Cocoa wrapper, and release it on Mac OS X as Chimera. Chimera gains a significant userbase. It is now known as Camino for the same types of reasons that Mozilla Phoenix became Mozilla Firefox. Despite having similar goals to Firefox, Chimera's initial release was actually months before the first release of Phoenix (as Firefox was then known). At this point there is competition between IE, Chimera, and OmniWeb. Eventually, Firefox becomes available on Mac OS X as well.

In 2003, Apple releases Safari, some months after hiring Dave Hyatt to make them a browser. Safari is built around WebKit, which is a fork of KHTML, the rendering engine of Konquerer. Later in 2003, Microsoft discontinues IE for Mac, and ever since then the main browsers on the Mac are Safari, Camino, Firefox, and to a smaller extent, OmniWeb and other fringe players.

Honest Question

[FiveLights]

You'll want to mod me down so as not to attract attention to this issue, but I'd honestly like to know... I usually browse at a level of 4 or higher but sometimes, when there are still few comments to a story, I'll drop down to -1. My question is, does every story have all of this racism and homophobia nonsense attached to it, or is this something new? If it's a long standing thing, are there any theories as to why people bother with stuff like that on a site like Slashdot? They just get modded down and aren't even seen by most people (I, of course, assume most people are like me), so why do they bother? Hope someone answers before I get modded into oblivion with the trolls :)

Re:Honest Question

[Pojut]

It's always been around, but it's usually been kept to one or two postings per story. Lately (the past few weeks) I have watched this steadily increase...I'm not sure what caused it, and I'm not sure why it's happening...but it has definitely become more frequent.

Re:Honest Question

[JamesRose]

It really does vary alot- you'll get one or two comments in almost every story, but this story seems to be very popular for trolls. If you want to judge how much trolling goes on, this would not be representative of the norm. Generally though, it's the same sentiments (exactly the same words often) and no doubt coming from the same places.

Re:Honest Question

[4D6963]

My question is, does every story have all of this racism and homophobia nonsense attached to it, or is this something new?

It's always like this. Usually it makes up the half of the first dozen of comments. As for why they do that, my guess is they're both bored and frustrated, so they come here to anonymously say The Forbidden Word (the "N word") and such as often as they can as they feel they can't do that in real life. I don't think they actually care what people think or say, they probably are just comforted by the idea that a handful of people will read the things they anonymously wrote which they wouldn't actually dare say.

Re:Honest Question

[heinousjay]

Assuming most people are like you is dangerous, foolish, and typically invalid. You have no reason for making such an assumption.

Also, is there a way to block submitters? This imaginary property zealot is starting to get on my nerves with the editorializing. I don't like my stories assuming I'm a dipshit hippie.

Re:Honest Question

[Anonymous Coward]

It wasn't so long ago...

This was invented precisely because of the many anon trash-posts. That way people would browse at, say, 4 and not see junk.

It happens, though, that some anons are respectable and were caught in the middle of the bombing. So, now, yes, most don't see anonimous posts. It came to a point where is seldom worthy for me to post, as I really want to remain as I am.

But I used to read anonimous posts... that was made very hard with the last modification: the comment folding system. Someone at /. really likes digg a lot... :-/

Re:Honest Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Google for "GNAA" .. they are a troll group the entrance requirements for which is (was?) to get a "first post" on slashdot ..

Re:Honest Question

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, is there a way to block submitters?

Short answer: no.
Long answer: You can block stories related to a fixed list of topics and authors. Unfortunately, 'authors' here refers to the handles of the /. admin listed with the words "Posted by", such as Zonk, CmdrTaco, kdawson. You can't block stories based off of the submitter's handle.

One approach we could request would be to utilize the Fans/Foes lists in promoting/demoting homepage stories. However, this wouldn't help your current problem in that "I+Don't+Believe+in+Imaginary+Property" is not a /. handle.
I don't know why /. posts attributed stories submitted by non-members.

Re:Honest Question

[nuzak]

I just set anonymous postings to -1 and move the rightmost bar to the left one notch. Gets rid of pretty much all of 'em. There's worse things in the world to get riled up about than a bunch of giggling simpletons.

Re:Honest Question

[Anonymous Coward]

...are there any theories as to why people bother with stuff like that on a site like Slashdot?

Why, yes, there are: John Gabriel's Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory

Re:Honest Question

[Ilgaz]

You'll want to mod me down so as not to attract attention to this issue, but I'd honestly like to know... I usually browse at a level of 4 or higher but sometimes, when there are still few comments to a story, I'll drop down to -1. My question is, does every story have all of this racism and homophobia nonsense attached to it, or is this something new? If it's a long standing thing, are there any theories as to why people bother with stuff like that on a site like Slashdot? They just get modded down and aren't even seen by most people (I, of course, assume most people are like me), so why do they bother?

Hope someone answers before I get modded into oblivion with the trolls :) Organized trolling, either by already known entities (g***) or some wannabe copycats. Cure is the same exact thing: Ignore the trolls.

Re:Honest Question

[sveinungkv]

I have a theory on what caused it. The republicans are to elect who get to run as a republican presidential candidate soon. One candidate, Ron Paul, gets mutch of his support from tech people. Many tech people read Slashdot. About the same time as the racist comments started to multiply a campaign to label him racist started. The racist comments often mention this candidate. It could of course be a coincidence, but if not: Slashdot, meet politics. Politics, meet Slashdot!

Open Source ...

[apathy maybe]

Should mention that this was the project that began the "Open Source" concept (as compared to Free Software), when a certain gun nut took the Debian guidelines for "free" and worked with Netscape and eventually created the Open Source Initiative.

Personally, I prefer the term Free Software... :P

Anyway, I'm using Firefox now, have done for a while. But my mother is still on Mozilla (a version that is getting on now, I can't remember which one though). One thing I've taught her, Firewall, no MSIE and much less problems (she also has a virus checker that does some small good, not sure if it outweighs the bad though...).

I remember something nasty happening to IE years ago and having to download Netscape, and then slowly learning about this Free Software idea and eventually installing Mozilla.

Ah, the memories.

Re:Open Source ...

[morgan_greywolf]

I remember something nasty happening to IE years ago and having to download Netscape, and then slowly learning about this Free Software idea and eventually installing Mozilla. My introduction to the 'Free Software' idea and GNU GPL was in 1989, when I first encountered Russ Nelson's Freemacs editor. I was kinda blown I find out a few years later that some Finnish college student had managed to create an entire complete operating system kernel and released it under those very same terms.

Re:Open Source ...

[apathy maybe]

Meh, but I'm younger then you are. I can't remember 1989...

I really got into GNOME/X/GNU/Linux around 2001/2002. I always did like GNOME more then KDE...

Anyway, I'm starting to feel old myself... (and I know I'm not), this reminiscing has to stop! (Goes and codes some PHP.)

Re:Open Source ...

[STrinity]

My introduction to free software was in 1986 when my father bought a Commodore 64 and one of his friends came over with an extra disk drive so we could copy all his games.

Re:Open Source ...

[pat mcguire]

Yes, but was that pirated disk full of beer or speech? That tends to make all the difference.

Re:Open Source ...

[Luyseyal]

I'm pretty sure that was the joke...

-l

Re:Open Source ...

[STrinity]

Well, I had Space Taxi and Impossible Mission, so the games were definitely speech.

Re:Open Source ...

[shellbeach]

But my mother is still on Mozilla Oh, that's just cruel. Nobody should hate their mother that much ...

In the immortal words of the great Clippy....

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

Over time, Mozilla would become the name of the open source project, AOL would buy Netscape and Internet Explorer would get up to 90%+ of market share leading to the worst period in web browsers' history where innovation was a niche for Opera and IE remixes users.

In the immortal words of the great Clippy: "English, MF-er, speak it?" I haven't seen a jumbled run-on like this since Stallman was last in town.

SeaMonkey is Netscape

[foxalopex]

Personally I consider SeaMonkey to be the modern relative of Netscape. FireFox is sort of the light-weight relative. Being a big fan of Netscape, I use SeaMonkey today. :) I remember seeing Netscape turn into a mess after version 3.0 and basically die from the market sadly. Fortunately Netscape communications was generous enough to give away their source which makes it possible for it to have survived today as opensource.

Re:SeaMonkey is Netscape

[omnipresentbob]

If Firefox is the light-weight relative, then SeaMonkey must be a 2 ton obese gorilla...

Re:SeaMonkey is Netscape

[Ilgaz]

If Firefox is the light-weight relative, then SeaMonkey must be a 2 ton obese gorilla... Believe or not, Seamonkey uses less RAM and CPU than Firefox.

Re:Latin for Slashfags

[Anonymous Coward]

Rident stolidi verba Latina. (Ovid)

IE Dominance wasn't always bad....

[Jason Levine]

I was a Netscape user back in the 3.x and 4.x days. I was also a web developer. NS 3.x beat IE 3.x hands down when it came to web development. The 4.x models showed IE pretty much even with Netscape. Then Netscape did something monumentally stupid. They stopped releasing browsers. Sure, they claimed that they were working on something big in the back room, but that didn't help use users and developers. Meanwhile, Microsoft came out with IE 5.x which blew NS 4.x out of the water when it came to development ease and usage. Of course, IE6 was even further ahead of Netscape 4.x. Meanwhile, the back room development was still progressing, or so they said.

Up until this point, IE's dominance was a good thing. It proved that sitting on your laurels won't win you the browser wars. Even if you've got a grand plan, you've got to get regular releases out there or people will just forget about you.

It's just too bad that Microsoft didn't learn this lesson. With their browser safely at 90%+ market share and no real competitors in sight, they stopped development (except for bug fixes, of course). Over time, the wonderful, easy to use browser started showing its age. Alternatives like FireFox started popping up, showing people that a more standards-compliant browser could make development a lot more fun. FireFox started to take off and wonder of wonders, Microsoft decided that maybe they should update cranky old IE6. The IE6 languishing years were the really bad time to be a web developer. Now I'm hoping that IE6 dies off rapidly (though not as much as I kept hoping that Netscape 4.x would die off).

Re:IE Dominance wasn't always bad....

[filbranden]

Actually, I remember that I never really liked Netscape 4. Netscape 3 was really great! Light, fast, simple. Then Netscape 4 they renamed it from "Navigator" to "Communicator", you had e-mail and news and whatnot, it was really bloated and slow.

I remember that I kept a copy of Navigator 3 that I always used. But then websites with CSS started to appear, and they were only supported under 4.

IE3 was the worst of all. Their support for CSS was the biggest pile of bugs ever. Just to give you an idea, it's been 2 times better on each version after 3, and even now in IE7 it's far from good. Imagine 2^(7-3)=16 times worse than that!

I even remember using IE2 on NT 3.51 IIRC. It was simple and not bloated, more in the lines of Netscape 3. However, at that time no one would consider anything other than Netscape. It's sad how the history turned out after that, but it's good to see the way it's going nowadays!

Re:IE Dominance wasn't always bad....

[decipher_saint]

Given that Netscape made their source code public in March '98 and had a final release in November of that year and IE 5.x wasn't released until March '99 I don't see how they were in direct competition with each other.

By late 1998 the "browser war" was over (really). Having IE pre-installed on Windows had finally done the trick that Microsoft was hoping for, dominance through apathy.

There is no doubt that "Communicator 4" stank, but to say that Microsoft saved the day for users and developers alike with IE 5 is pure fantasy.

To this day I miss the view source / HTML validator that was built into Netscape, not to mention the Javascript console.

Re:IE Dominance wasn't always bad....

[IntlHarvester]

It wasn't that simple. In 1998, Netscape still had a dominant marketshare (60-70%). It wasn't until they canned Netscape 5 in favor of the complete vaporware of Mozilla that they started to plummet, and even then it wasn't for 3-4 years before they dropped into the single digit range.

Re:IE Dominance wasn't always bad....

[sonamchauhan]

> Then Netscape 4 they renamed it from "Navigator" to "Communicator",
> you had e-mail and news and whatnot, it was really bloated and slow. ... And buggy. I still remember the strange "Bus Error" message on the console when it would crash... It used a _bus_?

Hey...

[Anonymous Coward]

cmd.exe and ftp.exe haven't been updated in years.. what *dark* times these are!! Updates are nice, but why exaggerate it to epic proportions..?

Re:Hey...

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

cmd.exe has been updated, see www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/technologies/management/powershell/default.mspx
ftp has sort of been updated in that they integrated it into explorer.

Mozilla's dead

[monopole]

Just read the Suck.com article

Re:Mozilla's dead

[bunratty]

That reminds me of 2001 when it seems nearly everyone on Slashdot claimed that Mozilla 1.0 would never ship, and nothing I said would convince them it was just around the corner. In seven years I'll probably remember how everyone kept complaining about the memory leak so many of us could never see.

Re:Mozilla's dead

[Kelson]

Didn't Netcraft confirm it, too? Or am I getting it mixed up with something else?

Re:Mozilla's dead

[Anonymous Coward]

The parts that work -- nearly everybody agrees that the Gecko layout engine is wonderful; the project management tools are nice -- should be harvested for use by the living, and the rest tied up in a biohazard bag and burned. It's a little sad, yes, but it's also the only reasonable option left. Galeon will take over the world, eh? Yea, that seems likely. Well, more likely than Lynx at least.

Re:Mozilla's dead

[Ilgaz]

That reminds me of 2001 when it seems nearly everyone on Slashdot claimed that Mozilla 1.0 would never ship, and nothing I said would convince them it was just around the corner. In seven years I'll probably remember how everyone kept complaining about the memory leak so many of us could never see. Mozilla could take off when they finally figured not everyone on Earth is interested in some college students geek fantasy implementations. Everyone seem to know about Firefox these days, ask them if they have ever seen/used Mozilla pre 1.0. Did we forget the Netscape 6.0 scandal release from AOL? Did they break the code? No, they hurried with release and packaged a horrible product abusing the still known brand Netscape and few remaining die hard supporters.

Mozilla could achieve success when they finally admitted there is an issue with their product. Memory leaks will be really fixed when majority of Mozilla developers/supporters figure that people doesn't buy RAM to cover their programming mistakes and stop posting spoiled rich college kid message replies like "Buy more RAM" without figuring the "cheap chip" they mention could be someone's weekly income.

You will also figure most of people saying "memory leak" will say (or won't care to say) "it is fixed" when Firefox 3 uses native OS'es technologies to display data.

BTW while writing this message, Safari from OS X Leopard 10.5.1 uses 400 MB of RAM ;)

Re:Mozilla's dead

[bunratty]

Mozilla was achieving success from the very start. The usage of Mozilla doubled every year from 2000 to 2005 (and probably before 2000 also but the stats sites just don't have any data on that time period). Since 2005, Mozilla use has doubled yet again. Because Firefox came out in 2004, of course most people who use Firefox today didn't use Mozilla products before Firefox. That's the nature of exponential growth.

Memory leaks have been fixed for years now. Just look at the ones that were fixed this week alone. If you think there are still some unfixed, just let us know how to reproduce the leak and we'll file a bug report so it can be fixed. I would never tell you to buy more RAM to work around a memory leak. That would be incredibly stupid.

If you didn't see the incredible success of Mozilla long before Firefox came out, and if you don't see that memory leaks are getting fixed, you're simply not paying any attention.

Happy birthday

[Teflon_Jeff]

I remember using Netscape Communicator, and the early Mozilla browsers. heck, thanks to most admin's MS-centric thoughts, you could use Mozilla to go wherever you wanted on a restricted network. It's how I avoid Smart filter at work. I 3 U Firefox.

Netscape really had a soul

[Misanthrope]

Back when I first started browsing with Netscape 1.0, it really appealed to me because of the obvious fun the developers were having.
Take for example the Amazing Netscape Fish Cam
http://wp.netscape.com/fishcam/
You used to be able to hit ctrl-alt-f and it would load up a webcam with their office aquarium.

Re:Netscape really had a soul

[Yer Mum]

You still can in SeaMonkey...(!)

Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[eepok]

I remember when Firefox was covered by Slashdot about 7 years ago. It was described as some itty bitty beta based vaguely on Netscape (which I personally hated), but it was mentioned that it was only some 5MB download. I thought, "Hey, it's free (my favorite price), it's small (I seriously needed better hardware), and it's cutting edge (geek factor)."

I downloaded it, installed it, learned I could move the buttons around and fell in love. Since then, I would always install Firefox on every computer I fixed. I require all friends to use it. I carry around FireFox portable (and thunderbird) on a thumbdrive so I can use it wherever and however I wish.

While in beta, it worked. The release candidates worked. The final versions worked. Tabs and middle click CHANGED what the internet was to me. Java control, add-ons, everything -- Thank you Firefox!

Actually, the birthday was yesterday...

[Anonymous Coward]

I actually submitted this yesterday, just so everyone knows that when I wrote "today" I meant the 22nd. Not a big deal, but :-)

Oh, and does anyone think they'll eat a cake shaped like the internet? I know that's what I'd bake...

Bug fixes

[Kelson]

It's just too bad that Microsoft didn't learn this lesson. With their browser safely at 90%+ market share and no real competitors in sight, they stopped development (except for bug fixes, of course).

And only bug fixes that they considered critical -- security, crashers, etc. Nothing that would have fixed rendering bugs. And I don't just mean spec violations, I mean outright bugs that would make content disappear. When they did IE7, they combed the net looking for descriptions of known rendering bugs so they could fix them.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[Maltheus]

While in beta, it worked. The release candidates worked. The final versions worked.

Unfortunately, I don't find that the case anymore. I still use Firefox, but it seems to get buggier and buggier as time goes on. I now routinely "reboot" Firefox like I remember having to do with Windows 95. Granted, it could be due to a number of factors, but I still consider it the most unstable app I use by far.

Ah, memories

[Ed Avis]

The true significance of Netscape's decision to make its browser free software was that it was the first story I ever read on Slashdot. I've read the site almost daily since then and dagnammit, it's made me the man I am today. I kinda miss the old style of articles, even the endless Linux 2.1.x point releases.

Taco - what happened to all the comments on the old articles? I can't believe none were posted for this story.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[eepok]

Wow! That's some strong words. "Most unstable app I use by far"?

I by no means intend the following to be insulting, but I have to ask:

1) What are you doing that causes Firefox issues?
2) What "more stable" apps are you using?

We all submit that Firefox can grow to be bloated in RAM if it's not restarted every so often. (I'm at 85MB right now having not closed it since 8am this morning and having surfed/goofed quite a bit today.)But if a site ever causes Firefox to crash, I probably don't want to be going to that site anyway, or when I restart Firefox, it opens up all my tabs to the pre-crash site and I'm still logged in.

Could you imagine cars working like that?
1) Crashed into by some A-hole.
2) Crash data sent to manufacturer for preventative measures, fix will be out in all models in a couple weeks
3) You get pulled out of your car and, if you want to continue driving that day, are presented with a clone of your car, pre-crash, to do so.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[bunratty]

I still use Firefox, but it seems to get buggier and buggier as time goes on.

I don't think Firefox is getting buggier. Try the new official Firefox support for your woes.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[shellbeach]

I remember when Firefox was covered by Slashdot about 7 years ago I think you meant Phoenix, not firefox :) With the dodgy yellow and black buttons.

Funny that the Phoenix project aimed to strip out all the bloat from Mozilla ... and now, five years later, Firefox is becoming just as bloated as Mozilla used to be. Somebody needs to re-phoenix Firefox ...

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[bckrispi]

I've found that it's not the browser that causes frequent crashes, but the plugins (or themes). My home install uses the default theme, and only about 1/2 dozen "must have" plugins. My browser seldom, if ever crashes. However, there was a certain theme I installed some time ago that apparently caused a crash at least twice a day. Once I deleted the theme, I was stable again.

Hi, I'm I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property.

[Anonymous Coward]

> Assuming most people are like you is dangerous, foolish, and typically invalid. You have no reason for making such an assumption.

That assumption is right often enough to be useful, but fails often enough to be dangerous.

> Also, is there a way to block submitters? This imaginary property zealot is starting to get on my nerves with the editorializing.

You picked a strange story to complain about editorializing in.

Most of this story was quoted from the article by the Slashdot editor as you can verify using the firehose link (the unedited submission is considered a "related story"). The part I actually wrote said little more than happy birthday, mused about whether the developers would have a cake shaped like the internet, and was posted yesterday on the actual Mozilla birthday (i.e. when I wrote "today" it actually was the correct day).

If you're saying that you don't like my name, well, that just makes us even. As far as I know, you can't block me, but you can filter out YRO stories if you want to. Alas, I'm a geek, so I submit lots of other stories to other sections and that still won't filter them all. The only reason you probably haven't noticed me until recently is because I've used so many names. If the submitter name combined with the story gave someone a laugh, it was probably me. I'm also responsible for a fair number of +5 posts as AC, but that's another matter.

> I don't like my stories assuming I'm a dipshit hippie.

That's only half right.

I've never assumed that you were a hippie :-)

Re:Hi, I'm I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property.

[Anonymous Coward]

Aww, you're so cute when you think you're being clever. Congratulations on being one of Slashdot's best, I'm sure your mother is proud.

I always hated the name 'Mozilla'

[vic-traill]

I wasn't there, but I've always understood 'Mozilla' to be a funky portmanteau of 'Mosaic Killer', stemming from Marc Anderson's dream of Netscape reigning supreme over Mosaic, the ground-breaking NCSA-developed graphical browser. Anyone out there who was close to the action?

As a result, I never shed a tear for Netscape when IE wiped the floor with them, as it seemed to me that Netscape got exactly what they had set out to do to Mosaic.

I remember quite vividly the first time I saw Mosaic fired up, watching the 'world' icon spin. I was so focused on the software - 'fucking cool!' - that I don't even remember what page we were loading.

Re:I always hated the name 'Mozilla'

[InvisiBill]

I wasn't there, but I've always understood 'Mozilla' to be a funky portmanteau of 'Mosaic Killer', stemming from Marc Anderson's dream of Netscape reigning supreme over Mosaic, the ground-breaking NCSA-developed graphical browser. Anyone out there who was close to the action?

As a result, I never shed a tear for Netscape when IE wiped the floor with them, as it seemed to me that Netscape got exactly what they had set out to do to Mosaic.

It's a bit more complicated than that, as Netscape really was Mosaic in a way.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser)

Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina originally designed and programmed NCSA Mosaic for Unix's X Window System at NCSA.

...

Marc Andreessen, the leader of the team that developed Mosaic, left NCSA and, with Jim Clark, one of the founders of Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI), and four other former students and staff of the University of Illinois, started Mosaic Communications Corporation. Mosaic Communications eventually became Netscape Communications Corporation, producing Netscape Navigator.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netscape_Navigator

After his graduation from Illinois in 1993, Andreessen moved to California to work at Enterprise Integration Technologies. Andreessen then met with Jim Clark, the recently-departed founder of Silicon Graphics. Clark believed that the Mosaic browser had great commercial possibilities and provided the seed money. Soon Mosaic Communications Corporation was in business in Mountain View, California, with Andreessen appointed as a vice-president. The University of Illinois was unhappy with the company's use of the Mosaic name, so "Mosaic Communications Corporation" changed its name to Netscape Communications (thought up by sales representative Greg Sands) and its flagship web browser was the Netscape Navigator.

In other Mosaic/IE news...

Spyglass licensed the technology and trademarks from NCSA for producing their own web browser but never used any of the NCSA Mosaic source code. Microsoft licensed Spyglass Mosaic in 1995 for US$2 million, modified it, and renamed it Internet Explorer.

In other words, you're happy that Mosaic killed Mosaic because they wanted to kill Mosaic.

Re:I always hated the name 'Mozilla'

[vic-traill]

It's a bit more complicated than that, as Netscape really was Mosaic in a way.

I do appreciate the overlap between the development teams, and that Netscape was originally named 'Mosaic Communications Corporation'. But NCSA Mosaic the browser still existed in spite of Clark/Anderson's attempt to appropriate the name. As far as I can tell, there was no overlap in the software, just in the name. Netscape the browser was in no way Mosaic the browser.

jwz claims outright that the browser they were developing was spoken of as 'crushing NCSA Mosaic', which is when he says he came up with 'Mozilla' http://www.jwz.org/gruntle/nscpdorm.html (search on Mozilla in the page).

In other words, you're happy that Mosaic killed Mosaic because they wanted to kill Mosaic.

Now that's a damned funny line. While I knew that Mosaic had beget Spyglass, I had *no* idea that Spyglass beget IE. I plead circular ignorance. Thanks for the laugh.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[bunratty]

That's why creating a new profile is the most recommended fix for Firefox problems: "With a new profile the application will run without any extensions, themes, or customized settings that may be causing problems." Updating your plugins and drivers can help also. For more information, you can look at the MozillaZine Knowledge Base or the new official Firefox support site.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[cyphercell]

1) What are you doing that causes Firefox issues?

I often have about 10-15 tabs open at a time, there's three things that cause fairly consistent crashes for me. Java, Flash, and or a shitty myspace profile. Of course I could use some more RAM, hobbling along at 512MB.

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[Emberpyro]

While in beta, it worked. The release candidates worked. The final versions worked. Tabs and middle click CHANGED what the internet was to me. Java control, add-ons, everything -- Thank you Firefox! Sorry, but I feel the need to point out that Opera included tabs in the early/mid-90s, almost a decade before Firefox was released finally, and most features that FF users point out as being brilliant are ones which I've taken for granted since about 2000 when I started regularly using Opera. Yes, back then I had to deal with adverts, which after about an hour of use I managed to completely blank out (so much so that when they finally got *rid* of the adverts, it seemed very odd not having a block of what I considered blank space above the page...), but it's got all the features I need in a web browser (without me having to install several dozen extensions to make it do what I want...) and doesn't use up all my ram with only a few pages open for a couple of hours. Right now I have about 90 tabs open. Yes, I suck, and I tend to use tabs rather than bookmarking pages, but that's fine because Opera copes with my abuse. I have 1gb of ram, and I can quite happily run Opera with all these tabs open, alongside WoW, gtalk (which really *does* eat up ram and I wish I knew why...), ventrilo, foobar2k or vlc, etc etc etc... I use FF to check webpages in, and after a couple of tabs it just slows down to a halt, even without half the stuff I mentioned running.

innovation was a niche for Opera and IE remixes? !

[ZoCool]

Hardly, dear Zonk. Segue over to a Mac user, ask them to download a (free public release) copy of iCab (www.icab.de) and have a look at what ONE man (Alexander Clauss) is capable of. Mac only (it was your choice, folks)(or was it? Bill?) iCab was the first freely available public release browser to pass the Acid-2 test. Now, in his v4 series, having given in and gone over to webkit for his engine, iCab may perhaps not fly through Acid-3 when they finally resolve it as a test, but in the meantime Alexander is still 6-12 months ahead of anyone else for general innovation in the interface stakes. Opera is a follower, and often a fail-er. Netscape 8 on WinBox is possibly the nearest competitor. SeaMonkey on Mac a close third, and my main browser when Alex went through a sticky patch. iCab is simply the best browser interface you will use, in my considered opinion. Use it and be productive as no other browser allows. To be notified of constantly updated beta bleeding edge versions it will cost you a one-off US$29 - Max value. Am I biased? Blood oath! Jen of Brisbane

Read old slashdot articles about this

[Luyseyal]

Here's a good start if you want to read old slashdot articles about Mozilla in 1998.

-l

Re:Thank you, /., for showing me Firefox

[Maltheus]

It seems to mostly be related to having a lot of tabs open (even with enough memory). It could also be flash as well.

As for more stable apps, I'd say every app I use in Linux is more stable. Even cinelerra, which they warn I will have to save often with. Granted, I'm probably not using any other app as hard as my browser, I'm just saying that firefox is the only app I use that crashes regularly these days. And I will only execute financial orders on a fresh browser anymore.

It is really dead

[Ilgaz]

Just read the Suck.com article

You are saying like the author says "there will be 5 computers on this planet". :)

Back in 2000, Mozilla was a horrible, lost its focus complete slow/bloated thing. It has changed when Mozilla people sit down and think what is wrong and that thinking ended up in Firefox, browser today and its companion Thunderbird.

Go back in time thanks to Wayback machine to the time that flame was written:

http://web.archive.org/web/20001218010700/http://www.mozilla.org/

"Mozilla 0.6 Released
Mozilla 0.6 is a milestone release based on the same branch as Netscape 6."

With such low UID I assume you have seen that disaster named Netscape 6. You haven't seen it totally if you were using a modern OS like Linux that time. You should be running Windows 98 to experience it totally :) Also remember, this is few months later. For the Netscape/Mozilla community that time, 0.6 was a great milestone. You can now imagine how was Mozilla while author is writing that article.

That is the "Mozilla" author speaks about and it is (thank God) dead.

Riding slowly, no?

[wild_berry]

FireFox 3 has:

Mammon slept. And the beast reborn spread over the earth and its numbers
grew legion. And they proclaimed the times and sacrificed crops unto the
fire, with the cunning of foxes. And they built a new world in their own
image as promised by the sacred words, and spoke of the beast with their
children. Mammon awoke, and lo! it was naught but a follower.

from The Book of Mozilla, 11:9
(10th Edition)