While Mr. Zawinksi liked the early days of Netscape and the way they "changed the world", I find those early days among the most repugnant in the software industry. Netscape took a university developed browser - Mosaic - and applied a Microsoft embrace and extend philosophy to marketing it. I won't even go into the origins of Netscape. I've read a lot of stuff about how Marc Andreesen supposedly hijacked the Mosaic project and stuff. I don't know if it's true, and I don't care. What matters is that Netscape attempted to make the web proprietary with their Netscape only tags. In effect, they tried to do for browsers what Microsoft has done for so many other ways. And they succeeded at first, with 80+% of the browser market. Had they not underestimated Microsoft, I wonder what the web would be today? Might we all be paying the "Netscape toll" on the internet? Who knows. In a way, the relentless drive by Micrsoft to defeat Netscape brought about a lot of good things for net, most importantly open standards. (Where we go from here in a Microsoft dominated web is a different story).
While Netscape did do a good thing by releasing their browser source code as free software, I still don't think the company changed much. I do hear from people inside Netscape that they where genuinely exicited about the source code release and weren't just doing it as a cynical last desperate ploy to stave off extinction. I'll take them at their word. Nevertheless, at the same time Netscape was releasing its browser source code, it was also attempting to (in the opinion of many people) hijack the DNS standard with their "smart browsing" feature that redirected certain keywords to sites of Netscape's choice, not necessarily the DNS name holder. I guess not much has changed for them.
So I'm thankful that Netscape released their browser code as free software, I'm sufficiently unhappy with their behavior as a company that I am not sorry to see them pass into oblivion.
Just wanted to comment on some of your comments.;)
When Andreesen left to form (what became) Netscape, I believe he paid $100,000 for the code he took with him. So, who's more to blame, the school for selling the code, or him for buying it? I don't know. I suppose it depends on your personal viewpoint. Note that I"m not aware if he only licensed the code (leaving it still available for others to use) or bought it outright.
And while you are correct that about the Netscape only tags, there is another side to that story as well (one I have heard many times from my wife, who does web development). The tags they put in defined capabilities that at the time didn't exist. So a case could be made that Netscape didn't want to wait for the traditional standards process to define that functionality; they wanted to give it to their customers right away. Also, AFAIK, all of their tags were well documented and all other browser makers were free to implement them (as Microsoft did in IE). It wasn't quite 'embrace and extend' in the way that Microsoft practices it.
This isn't to say anything you said is wrong, but I do think that there is another side to the story and the reality of the situation was not quite as bleak as you made it out to be.
Feel free to correct any factual errors I may have made, though.;)
Jamie was great. Bright guy, very honest, very forthright. It was refreshing to have somebody like that to talk to about Mozilla.org and Netscape. It'll be a shame to see him go.
I've noticed a trend lately. Eric Raymond wants his life back. Jamie is leaving Mozilla. Linus will certainly be focusing more and more on Transmeta (read his Linux Magazine interview). That leaves Richard Stallman debating whether Linux needs a GNU tacked on in front of it.
It would be nice if somebody could step up and assume some of these leadership roles. ESR is right -- you need some advocacy. Somebody has to translate the Open Source ideals into English so that the masses can grok it and get on board. Hell, you might not even need a true code hacker for it -- someone like CmdrTaco is great at expressing the Open Source ideas to the public.
But more than that, every single person who believes in Open Source needs to stand up and support it in any way they can. Can you hack code? Then surf over to Mozilla, download some code, and contribute. Go to a Linux kernel ftp site and download that. Hell, start your own damn Open Source project! But get involved...that's the key.
And those of us who can't hack code (like myself), but still really like this whole crazy Open Source thing, can contribute by talking with others, evangelizing, and getting the rest of the world excited about it.
These defections aren't good. It's up to the community to make sure enough people can step up and carry on the good fight.
Again, this is just my opinion. I could be wrong.
Open source no panacea
by
Chris+Blaise
·
· Score: 2
Those are characteristics of server-side attributes, not the client-side which is what the whole Mozilla project is geared toward.
I think it's illustrative of the battle that projects based in Open Source need to fight in order to play ball in the client market. Here we have a perfect example of an end-user project that has accomplished nearly nothing since it's inception.
Server platforms and apps are run by technically competent people who can comprehend and perhaps even enjoy command-lines and no GUI (I'll certainly raise my hand). And hell, if leaving out the fluff results in a more robust product, that's what you want in a server anyay. However, you're not going to find that kind of attraction from the unwashed masses who want to read e-mail and browse the web and perhaps write the occasional letter. It's a ball-busting exercise to write those kind of applications and if it ain't "right" few will use it. And if nobody is going to use it, what's the point?
I don't think the problem is unsolvable but it will be difficult. I feel it's a point that most Open Source advocates seem to miss or choose to ignore when it comes to considering the client market.
I'm a little surprised by JWZ's conclusions
by
aheitner
·
· Score: 2
Granted I am not familiar with Mozilla, but the impression I had was it was going decently well. Certainly when you combine the state of the Gecko engine and the features (eg. "What's Related, etc) that NetscapeComm proper has been adding in the 4.5x navigator series, it's debatable whether IE is really ahead (they're on an unstable beta of ver5 as well). As b'sides which, IE always pisses the hell out of me -- never can tell what it's doing or what progress it's made.
But the issues Mozilla.org has had seem to be core ones to software projects, especially commercial ones, and issues i've thought about a bit. The mistake was releasing the previous Navigator4 codebase at all. It was too crufty. A million lines they tell me. Gee whiz, that's amazing. No wonder it sucks.
Let me tell you something -- Microsoft doesn't write bad software 'cos they don't have good programmers, or intentionally. They do it for beaurocratic reasons. It's pretty much impossible to manage something that big in that environment, where individual teams write small chunks without considering the rest of the project. The result is slow, impenetrable cruft.
Projects like GNOME and KDE avoid this -- people work on individual modules _based_ around a core design, and with that Invisible Hand of massive public testing and fixes that keeps things more-or-less in line.
Mozilla was reaching that point.
I think it's really a shame JWZ gave up.
It may be a lesson on the wisdom of releasing commercial products as OS projects: don't bother if they suck.
I work for a 6 person company on a 40-50k line project, which is rewritten piece by piece relatively frequently. I didn't realize how lucky I am.
These notices about JWZ's resignation come with too much of a note of sadness. Yes, it is a sad day for Netscape. But Netscape has had many sad days, long before AOL acquired it or Mozilla was released as an open source product.
This is, however, a decidedly Good Thing for JWZ himself. The two articles about his resignation are him at his best. JWZ is a person very in-touch with reality. He knows the company structure, but is still very much aware of human dignity and the Right Things (which tend to get lost in such a structure as a company).
This is an incredibly talented person. If his talents are wasted at Netscape (and there's no reason to believe they aren't), then we should be short of thrilled to see him leave. Goodness only knows what such a man could do for the Internet, computers, or the world.
The revolution never dies -- it lives in the hearts of those that seek greater.
In the print version of _Triumph_of_The_Nerds_, Robert Cringely posits the following metaphor that often echoes my experience; a company's growth is like an invasion.
The first wave of people are commandoes, doing whatever they can to acquire a beach-head, with very little beaurocratic (sp?) overhead, running fast and loose to do whatever is needed to establish themselves.
In the next step, the workers are more like soldiers, still working to expand market share and maintain what they have, but less chaotically than before, and it's vital to maintain what territory you already have.
At some point (if the previous stages succeeded), the potential for growth is curtailed, so the company is more like a police force, just maintaining order and making sure that no problems develop.
Commandoes, soldiers, and cops are very different kinds of jobs, and almost no one doesn't have a preference as to the kind of work they prefer. I also expect that the preference changes over time. When you're young and don't have mortgage payments or a spouse who'd like you around, being a commando is very fun, very exciting. Get a family and other responsibilities, and the long work hours and worries about where the next sale will come from lose their charm.
It may seem sad to some (particularly when you're young) that both companies and people change their ways over time, but they're both really acting according to what's appropriate for them at that point in their lives. I'm recently married and working at a startup (http://www.perspecta.com/), and as one of my married co-workers said to me, "When you have two major responsibilities, you feel like you aren't doing either well." That's exactly how i feel some days, but i love what we're doing here too much to give it up just yet. But i'm also working hard not to blow my marriage; no amount of stock options or killer code would make up for doing that.
So it's not surprising that company founders leave when the company gets big; commandos aren't happy in a squad car, pulling people over for busted tailights. But it's also unrealistic to think that this is a failing of Netscape; it's VERY hard to maintain that startup fever (though sometimes possible, with skunkworks and small spun-off companies.)
mahlen
We don't need no indirection We don't need no flow control No data typing or declarations Did you leave the lists alone? Hey! Hacker! Leave those lists alone! Chorus: All in all, it's just a pure-LISP function call. (Repeat) --"Another Glitch in the Call" (to the tune of a Pink Floyd song)
You raise some good points. The best open source apps are usually the servers. Rarely do the GUI end-user OSS products come close to commercial products. The only conspicuous exception I have seen is GIMP.
However, this does not mean that Open and closed source cannot co-exist. Software which everyone requires ( such as an operating system ) makes a very good candidate for an open source project. Software that is only used by a small niche market ( eg video editing software ) is a much less viable candidate for an OSS project.
In conclusion, I think that the core parts of the linux OS already prove that open source is very good for some things. In other areas ( eg desktop environments ) , the jury is still out... And in some areas, such as those involving fairly specialised products, it seems less plausible that OSS will knock closed source from its position. Indeed, the only decent word processors today that run on linux are closed source.
If you read Cowpland's ( Corel's CEO's ) comments, he discusses these issues. And his arguments are pretty solid. A system based on open source, suplemented by closed source apps is viable. But I don't believe in this vision of an open source "utopia"
Hey, Mozilla, what you gonna do?
by
kzinti
·
· Score: 2
JWZ laid down a kind of challenge to you, didn't he, Mozilla? He said you had failed. Your own leader, and he said you failed. What are you gonna do now?
I see two choices.
One, you can ignore him. Maybe Jamie was impatient; maybe, as he said, his own goals were unrealistic. Do you believe in the course you're on? Are you mature enough, collectively, not to get impatient -- to stay the course and see your product through to the end? Do you have confidence in your vision, and in the plan you've chosen to realize that vision? If so, then you won't let Jamie's departure distract you too much from the task at hand.
Two, you can listen to Jamie. You can reexamine your goals and your plan. Was your vision the right one? Was Jamie's vision the right one? Or maybe the vision was right, but the plan has led you astray... or bogged you down. Perhaps you need to focus on different goals: more frequent smaller releases instead of less frequent larger ones. Maybe you need to look at what can be removed (for now) from the project rather than what can be added.
Either way, I urge you to make your choice, make it now, and get on with things. I for one believe in the Mozilla project and its vision; I'd be working on it myself if not for other commitments. I want you to succeed, and I hope you succeed soon before AOL pulls the plug.
Don't let the loss of your evangelist distract you unnecessarily. Get on without one if you can, or promote a new one if someone steps up. But above all, please focus like the proverbial laser beam on your goals. Mozilla still has a chance to Win Big, and many of us are counting on you. Go get 'em!
IE 5 has been released, and it's heckava lot faster and more stable than Netscape 4.5 on Windows32.
If you've got your nose in Linux or another Unix all day, you may well think "Oh, Netscape 4.5 isn't *that* bad", but it really is a big stinky dog compared to what you can get on Windows, esp. with IE.
As far as Netscape not being that far behind, maybe that's true for lowest-common-denominator Internet browsing, but for the really interactive CSS/DHTML stuff that you can get away with on an Intranet (where you can develop for one client), IE is way ahead.
Std Disclaimer: Sure IE has proprietary features, but so is any feature of Netscape/Moziila that no other browser has. At one time frames and tables were a proprietary Netscape feature.
Mozila violated a Prime Directive of Open Source
by
PedXing
·
· Score: 2
Jamie hit the nail on the head with his second reason for Mozilla's problems: It violated one of the most important requirements of Open-Source projects by not releasing a usable product.
Remember how much Linux.98 sucked? I do. But it was able to suck because it existed. Mozilla didn't suck. It didn't even exist. It was unusable from the start and the few pathetic "releases" that did appear were hardly usable at all.
Why are so many people willing to contribute to open source projects? To get work done! They need a certain tool, so they pick one. When they find a problem or a missing feature, they correct it. The important thing is to have Open-Source projects be useful from the start.
Release early and often. This is what has made Linux so successful. It may not have have been great from the start, but the people using it improved this or that and their improvements were given back to the community regularly. This created a truly superior product.
It is sad, too, for the Mozilla project that Jamie has gone. However, as someone said, it is better for all in the long term. Jamie can get working on something better and Mozilla will either get a shot in the arm or a kick in the head (which it gets doesn't really matter at this point). Mozilla probably triggered much of the Open-Source publicity of the last year, but without a usable product, it's worth nothing.
I applaud Jamie for all he's done in the past (I still use that PostScript tape label thing), for trying to make Mozilla what it could have been, and wish him the best in the future. I hope he doesn't wait long to give his next gift to our community.
For as long as I remember, I have wanted a small, fast and reliable browser. No bloatware, e-mail, instant messenger or anything. Just a small browser that would get the work done and still leave plenty of free memory. I had and still have high hopes for Mozilla.
A web browser doesn't need an e-mail client. And it definitely doesn't need an operating system like Win98. It's just an application. So just focus on getting a stable browser the size of Opera done and everybody will be happy.
What is important in Mozilla is: - small size - fast - standards compliant
Even if it takes two years to get there, it's something worth making. IE fails in each and every of those and won't ever make it.
What we have to remember is that Open Source should not compete against Microsoft. We are serving different customers. I'm using Linux because it's so stable, fast and runs on virtually anything. I also love the freedom and the values of Open Source.
What will happen during the next few years? Windows 2000 will ship requiring a horrible amount of memory and having way too many bugs. It's a huge code base and made in a lot of hurry. If you think that Netscape had problems, then consider the chore to port that stuff to Merced. Not to mention that they also have to port Win98.
OTOH Linux will get easier to use, more applications and Wine will be able to run Win32 apps. There will be a small and fast Mozilla, office apps from several vendors and great e-mail clients. Add to that speed and reliability.
What is the difference between Mozilla and IE? It's exactly the same as between Linux and Windows. One is made to be as good as possible and the other one is made to gain power and money. Making decisions based on money works only for a while but you mostly create problems. You never create anything that will last. Keep believing in good quality and you'll always beat the opponents.
It sounds like he was a little burned out, it happens to the best of us. A change of scenery is the best fix for him.
I'm also not so sure what all the depression is over with mozilla. I keep hearing that it is a failure and I don't think that is the case. When Netscape released the source code I know more than a few of us had these delusions about integrating a browser in to our various projects or changing a few lines of code to make mozilla better but they didn't give us a good workable code base and it wasn't modular in that way. Mozilla has come a long way since then. I still think that it is kind of difficult to work with mozilla right now, the nspr libs didn't install correctly on my machine and the configure script didn't work right... Just little things like that can be discouraging.
Now that mozilla is taking a more component oriented approach and we've got more wide usage of CORBA I think things are pretty exciting, as soon as mozilla can view and create HTML (xml) without crashing and can install easily I think interest will start to increase.
-- This is my signature. There are many signatures like it but this one is mine..
Hey, Mozilla, what you gonna do?
by
gavinhall
·
· Score: 3
Posted by shaver@netscape.com:
I guess I'm the person to respond to this, because reporters keep calling me to ask if I'm the Jamie replacement. I guess I am, as much as anyone is; I've been with mozilla.org since pretty much day one, and I was the ``virtual jwz'' when he was on sabbatical. So just pretend it's a really, really long sabbatical or something.
First, I'll do the eulogy thing: we will certainly miss Jamie -- I think any organization except the Vatican would mourn his departure from their ranks. He did some great work here at Netscape and mozilla.org, and he was (usually) a pleasure to work with. Thanks for all the fish.
As for the issues at hand, I think I agree mostly with Jamie on the facts of the case, but my conclusions sometimes differ meaningfully: I, too wish we'd shipped a browser already, and a great one at that. But I think that the switch to the NGLayout/Gecko engine is a great example of how the mozilla.org project is a success: it was the best way to get a browser that matched the demands of our users, and I'm not sure that Netscape would have done The Right Thing before the advent of mozilla.org. Also, as Jamie himself points out, it did help us recruit more developers, which is always a win.
The balance of Netscape vs. non-Netscape developers doesn't bother me as much as it seems to bother Jamie. When we started, there were zero external developers in any form, and there are now many (34 non-netscape.com people have commit privileges on the mozilla.org CVS tree, and many more contribute patches for others to commit), and I think that matters more than the comparison to the large number of developers that Netscape pays.
What does the future hold? Well, our work towards 5.0 continues apace, so we'll still be trying to help our existing developers and recruit new ones. We'll be finishing up our efforts to make some of the Mozilla code available under the GPL as well (the JavaScript engine, in this case), to broaden our ``technology reach''.
People have asked if we have a plan for attracting more developers, and I think that the best answer is ``ship a beta''. When we get onto hackers' desktops, we have a much better shot at getting into their hearts and minds, too. In the nearer term, we just need to weather the storm of reporters and pundits, and concentrate on getting our jobs done. We'll make Jamie proud yet.
Since it's the 2nd of April, I'm assuming that this is not yet another april fool's day slashdot news item
I've participated in a few opensource projects and helped code a few functional utlities that still helps a lot of people all around the world. When Netscape announced the release of Mozilla code, I was one of many to logon to their site and download the tar ball, but alas, it was too hard to decypher. I went through the code for 1 week (a lot longer than most people did). I couldnt figure out 75% of the things in there. So I gave up. (And I guess that is what happend to all the others out there)
Initially when netscape announced the release of mozilla, there were dozens of web sites, hundreds of mailing lists, just devoated to the discussion of what should be in mozilla. Over the past year, these web sites and lists just died away one by one. I guess what most people did not release was, that what mozilla needed was not new functionally, but... stablility, at a good speed. It did not need be a front end to your kitchen skin (should see some of the suggestions made on wishlists) it just needed to fetch a web page and display complying with most statndard as possible.
Then there are those who bitched about mozilla, from the start to the end (i guess when jwz leaves, it might as well be the end). I don't think bitching about the code would have helped making it more stable and fast. Helping the coders, coding it your self and replacing those netscape coders should have been the first thing we should have done. As jwz stated, most people thought netscape still owned mozilla and had full control over mozilla (this was inforced by the inital netscape/mozilla licence,) on that.. i belive mozilla would have been better accepted if it was released as BSD or GPL/LGPL.. most coders were weary of this and stayed away from mozilla just cause of that fact alone... and then there were those who, like me, waited for others to go ahead and do something to the code, test it, pinch it.. see if it bites.. (would a dead beast bite?)
Best jwz quote : I must say, though, that it feels good to be resigning from AOL instead of resigning from Netscape
PS: oops posted it in the wrong place:) --
-- ...free your source and the rest would follow...
jwz is one of the few latter-day saints to become known by their initials. i mean, you know GLS, RMS, ESR, ETC., but it's pretty kewl when someone your age is an undeniable net.god. (also, he's much less insane than the *other* TLA that worked on (l)emacs). so, it's undeniably sad to see him go.
it's also ironic to see this happen at a time when mozilla.org was finally producing a product that was starting to look like an early version of a real contender, rather than a cobbled-together POS.
however, maybe it's a good thing:
a) maybe jwz can get out there and do something he really enjoys now, which might be good for all of us:), and
b) maybe this will act as a wakeup call. with jwz gone, mozilla can go one of two ways: either somebody's gonna do *something*, or it's gonna die.
c) maybe all of us losers with delusions of grandeur will go download the tarball again...
This is indeed a tragedy, but frankly it does not surprise me.
I've been lurking around the mozilla mailing lists (mirrored in the mozilla newsgroups) and the mozilla.org website basically since they were created. Watching the dynamic of the mozilla communication mechanism over the period of a year, a number of things became unsettling. (I've only ever lurked, primarily because I'm not a sophisticated programmer, and I would have little to offer either the mozilla or linux kernel mailing lists. The development processes in both fascinate me, however.)
First, it amazes me that anyone in the Mozilla project was able to communicate with another at all. From the moment the mozilla mailing lists were created and mirrored, it was apparent that 80-90% of the mail/posts were, and would -always- be, irrelevant fluff. The primary reason for this is that while the Netscape 4.5 support newsgroups were not public - available only through nsnews.netscape.com, the mozilla newsgroups were public, and contained those compelling words "netscape", "misc" and "mail-news". From the perspective of a user with little knowledge of the significance of the word "mozilla", there was no reason to think that the most obvious place to ask Communicator questions.
The result was/is that despite the good efforts of Dan Mosedale and Jim Cape (each of whom made valiant strides to keep the mailing list topical), the vast majority of discussion was/is about 3.0, 4.0x and 4.5 problems. Combined with another 10% of posts of the "I want my 5.0 and I want it NOW!" variety, and a further 5% of the "Now that I can order you, I demand the following 50 stupid features that I have no idea how to program myself" variety, the mozilla mailing list, to the best of my observation, became a completely inhospitable place to have useful techinical discussions such as are seen almost exclusively - by contrast - in the Linux kernel mailing list. The latter, despite the fact that its content is usually way beyond this law student, is a pleasure to read. The Mozilla list is not.
I will leave remarks about the daunting complexity of the source as a major factor to jwz and other programmers/contributors. I'm simply not qualified. But another result is that because most of the contributors (as pointed out by jwz) were still Netscape employees, communication via the mailing list for the purposes of solving localized problems was (I assume) unnecessary.
I must, therefore, put a caveat on jwz's "fishbowl" analogy. These are two huge disincentives to communicating publicly about the source tree, and the lack of consistent communication on the nitty-gritty details of development may have played its part in the failure of the mozilla project to capture the imagination - and effort - of the programming community.
Aside from that caveat, though, jwz commented that such outside observation, combined with mozilla's independence, motivated the project to redesign the layout engine, and thus the UI, from scratch. It is unfortunate that the choice to rebuild a project thoughtfully and correctly, at the obvious cost of time, is considered a 'failure', or even a bad thing. Yes, some idiots have complained and threatened that if "Netscape doesn't come up with my browser now, I swear I'll move to IE5", not understanding that (a) the development regime has changed radically, (b) the project was rebuilt, (c) it's better to ship the right thing "late" - inasmuch as there is any such thing as 'late' in an open source project - than the wrong thing when users demand it.
For someone who has lurked and gained some familiarity with the dynamics of the project and the cast of characters, none of these conditions indicate 'failure' to me. It is unfortunate that jwz does, but he'd probably know better than I.
Before we go digging Mozilla's grave...
by
Frank+Hecker
·
· Score: 5
It might be a good idea to review things as they stand today, as well as a little bit of history. Some points to remember:
First, the Mozilla effort goes on: AOL is still funding development, non-AOL developers are active as well, the project is continuing to release "milestone" releases which you can try out, and this will culminate later this year in beta releases of Communicator 5.0 and then a final release, all based on the open Mozilla source code. This has been the case all along, and remains the case.
Next, in the Mozilla project there was a fundamental trade-off: build and release a product based on the existing in-progress 5.0 code base ("Mozilla Classic") or rearchitect the product to make it more standards compliant (i.e., use the new layout code being developed), more extensible, more open (e.g., use something other than Motif), and so on. In particular, many people complained vociferously that Mozilla/5.0 needed to have 100% standards compliance for HTML 4.0, CSS1, etc. Thus the decision was made (way back in October 1998) to rearchitect the product, use the new layout engine, use GTK+ instead of Motif, etc.
Most people on/. and elsewhere seemed to agree with that decision at the time, and would presumably still agree with it. However from Jamie's point of view it presumably would have been a better plan to go ahead and ship as early as possible even given the downsides. (Also, Jamie saw no reason to ditch Motif for GTK.) That's something about which reasonable people can disagree, but I don't buy the assertion that by taking the extra time to make a better product the Mozilla project has therefore "failed".
Slashdot Mirror
While Mr. Zawinksi liked the early days of Netscape and the way they "changed the world", I find those early days among the most repugnant in the software industry. Netscape took a university developed browser - Mosaic - and applied a Microsoft embrace and extend philosophy to marketing it. I won't even go into the origins of Netscape. I've read a lot of stuff about how Marc Andreesen supposedly hijacked the Mosaic project and stuff. I don't know if it's true, and I don't care. What matters is that Netscape attempted to make the web proprietary with their Netscape only tags. In effect, they tried to do for browsers what Microsoft has done for so many other ways. And they succeeded at first, with 80+% of the browser market. Had they not underestimated Microsoft, I wonder what the web would be today? Might we all be paying the "Netscape toll" on the internet? Who knows. In a way, the relentless drive by Micrsoft to defeat Netscape brought about a lot of good things for net, most importantly open standards. (Where we go from here in a Microsoft dominated web is a different story).
While Netscape did do a good thing by releasing their browser source code as free software, I still don't think the company changed much. I do hear from people inside Netscape that they where genuinely exicited about the source code release and weren't just doing it as a cynical last desperate ploy to stave off extinction. I'll take them at their word. Nevertheless, at the same time Netscape was releasing its browser source code, it was also attempting to (in the opinion of many people) hijack the DNS standard with their "smart browsing" feature that redirected certain keywords to sites of Netscape's choice, not necessarily the DNS name holder. I guess not much has changed for them.
So I'm thankful that Netscape released their browser code as free software, I'm sufficiently unhappy with their behavior as a company that I am not sorry to see them pass into oblivion.
When Andreesen left to form (what became) Netscape, I believe he paid $100,000 for the code he took with him. So, who's more to blame, the school for selling the code, or him for buying it? I don't know. I suppose it depends on your personal viewpoint. Note that I"m not aware if he only licensed the code (leaving it still available for others to use) or bought it outright.
And while you are correct that about the Netscape only tags, there is another side to that story as well (one I have heard many times from my wife, who does web development). The tags they put in defined capabilities that at the time didn't exist. So a case could be made that Netscape didn't want to wait for the traditional standards process to define that functionality; they wanted to give it to their customers right away. Also, AFAIK, all of their tags were well documented and all other browser makers were free to implement them (as Microsoft did in IE). It wasn't quite 'embrace and extend' in the way that Microsoft practices it.
This isn't to say anything you said is wrong, but I do think that there is another side to the story and the reality of the situation was not quite as bleak as you made it out to be.
Feel free to correct any factual errors I may have made, though. ;)
Posted by Mike@ABC:
Jamie was great. Bright guy, very honest, very forthright. It was refreshing to have somebody like that to talk to about Mozilla.org and Netscape. It'll be a shame to see him go.
I've noticed a trend lately. Eric Raymond wants his life back. Jamie is leaving Mozilla. Linus will certainly be focusing more and more on Transmeta (read his Linux Magazine interview). That leaves Richard Stallman debating whether Linux needs a GNU tacked on in front of it.
It would be nice if somebody could step up and assume some of these leadership roles. ESR is right -- you need some advocacy. Somebody has to translate the Open Source ideals into English so that the masses can grok it and get on board. Hell, you might not even need a true code hacker for it -- someone like CmdrTaco is great at expressing the Open Source ideas to the public.
But more than that, every single person who believes in Open Source needs to stand up and support it in any way they can. Can you hack code? Then surf over to Mozilla, download some code, and contribute. Go to a Linux kernel ftp site and download that. Hell, start your own damn Open Source project! But get involved...that's the key.
And those of us who can't hack code (like myself), but still really like this whole crazy Open Source thing, can contribute by talking with others, evangelizing, and getting the rest of the world excited about it.
These defections aren't good. It's up to the community to make sure enough people can step up and carry on the good fight.
Again, this is just my opinion. I could be wrong.
Those are characteristics of server-side attributes, not the client-side which is what the whole Mozilla project is geared toward.
I think it's illustrative of the battle that projects based in Open Source need to fight in order to play ball in the client market. Here we have a perfect example of an end-user project that has accomplished nearly nothing since it's inception.
Server platforms and apps are run by technically competent people who can comprehend and perhaps even enjoy command-lines and no GUI (I'll certainly raise my hand). And hell, if leaving out the fluff results in a more robust product, that's what you want in a server anyay. However, you're not going to find that kind of attraction from the unwashed masses who want to read e-mail and browse the web and perhaps write the occasional letter. It's a ball-busting exercise to write those kind of applications and if it ain't "right" few will use it. And if nobody is going to use it, what's the point?
I don't think the problem is unsolvable but it will be difficult. I feel it's a point that most Open Source advocates seem to miss or choose to ignore when it comes to considering the client market.
Granted I am not familiar with Mozilla, but the impression I had was it was going decently well. Certainly when you combine the state of the Gecko engine and the features (eg. "What's Related, etc) that NetscapeComm proper has been adding in the 4.5x navigator series, it's debatable whether IE is really ahead (they're on an unstable beta of ver5 as well). As b'sides which, IE always pisses the hell out of me -- never can tell what it's doing or what progress it's made.
But the issues Mozilla.org has had seem to be core ones to software projects, especially commercial ones, and issues i've thought about a bit. The mistake was releasing the previous Navigator4 codebase at all. It was too crufty. A million lines they tell me. Gee whiz, that's amazing. No wonder it sucks.
Let me tell you something -- Microsoft doesn't write bad software 'cos they don't have good programmers, or intentionally. They do it for beaurocratic reasons. It's pretty much impossible to manage something that big in that environment, where individual teams write small chunks without considering the rest of the project. The result is slow, impenetrable cruft.
Projects like GNOME and KDE avoid this -- people work on individual modules _based_ around a core design, and with that Invisible Hand of massive public testing and fixes that keeps things more-or-less in line.
Mozilla was reaching that point.
I think it's really a shame JWZ gave up.
It may be a lesson on the wisdom of releasing commercial products as OS projects: don't bother if they suck.
I work for a 6 person company on a 40-50k line project, which is rewritten piece by piece relatively frequently. I didn't realize how lucky I am.
These notices about JWZ's resignation come with too much of a note of sadness. Yes, it is a sad day for Netscape. But Netscape has had many sad days, long before AOL acquired it or Mozilla was released as an open source product.
This is, however, a decidedly Good Thing for JWZ himself. The two articles about his resignation are him at his best. JWZ is a person very in-touch with reality. He knows the company structure, but is still very much aware of human dignity and the Right Things (which tend to get lost in such a structure as a company).
This is an incredibly talented person. If his talents are wasted at Netscape (and there's no reason to believe they aren't), then we should be short of thrilled to see him leave. Goodness only knows what such a man could do for the Internet, computers, or the world.
The revolution never dies -- it lives in the hearts of those that seek greater.
-- Stargazer
In the print version of _Triumph_of_The_Nerds_, Robert Cringely posits the following metaphor that often echoes my experience; a company's growth is like an invasion.
The first wave of people are commandoes, doing whatever they can to acquire a beach-head, with very little beaurocratic (sp?) overhead, running fast and loose to do whatever is needed to establish themselves.
In the next step, the workers are more like soldiers, still working to expand market share and maintain what they have, but less chaotically than before, and it's vital to maintain what territory you already have.
At some point (if the previous stages succeeded), the potential for growth is curtailed, so the company is more like a police force, just maintaining order and making sure that no problems develop.
Commandoes, soldiers, and cops are very different kinds of jobs, and almost no one doesn't have a preference as to the kind of work they prefer. I also expect that the preference changes over time. When you're young and don't have mortgage payments or a spouse who'd like you around, being a commando is very fun, very exciting. Get a family and other responsibilities, and the long work hours and worries about where the next sale will come from lose their charm.
It may seem sad to some (particularly when you're young) that both companies and people change their ways over time, but they're both really acting according to what's appropriate for them at that point in their lives. I'm recently married and working at a startup (http://www.perspecta.com/), and as one of my married co-workers said to me, "When you have two major responsibilities, you feel like you aren't doing either well." That's exactly how i feel some days, but i love what we're doing here too much to give it up just yet. But i'm also working hard not to blow my marriage; no amount of stock options or killer code would make up for doing that.
So it's not surprising that company founders leave when the company gets big; commandos aren't happy in a squad car, pulling people over for busted tailights. But it's also unrealistic to think that this is a failing of Netscape; it's VERY hard to maintain that startup fever (though sometimes possible, with skunkworks and small spun-off companies.)
mahlen
We don't need no indirection
We don't need no flow control
No data typing or declarations
Did you leave the lists alone?
Hey! Hacker! Leave those lists alone!
Chorus: All in all, it's just a pure-LISP function call. (Repeat)
--"Another Glitch in the Call" (to the tune of a Pink Floyd song)
However, this does not mean that Open and closed source cannot co-exist. Software which everyone requires ( such as an operating system ) makes a very good candidate for an open source project. Software that is only used by a small niche market ( eg video editing software ) is a much less viable candidate for an OSS project.
In conclusion, I think that the core parts of the linux OS already prove that open source is very good for some things. In other areas ( eg desktop environments ) , the jury is still out ... And in some areas, such as those involving fairly specialised products, it seems less plausible that OSS will knock closed source from its position. Indeed, the only decent word processors today that run on linux are closed source.
If you read Cowpland's ( Corel's CEO's ) comments, he discusses these issues. And his arguments are pretty solid. A system based on open source, suplemented by closed source apps is viable. But I don't believe in this vision of an open source "utopia"
JWZ laid down a kind of challenge to you, didn't he, Mozilla? He said you had failed. Your own leader, and he said you failed. What are you gonna do now?
I see two choices.
One, you can ignore him. Maybe Jamie was impatient; maybe, as he said, his own goals were unrealistic. Do you believe in the course you're on? Are you mature enough, collectively, not to get impatient -- to stay the course and see your product through to the end? Do you have confidence in your vision, and in the plan you've chosen to realize that vision? If so, then you won't let Jamie's departure distract you too much from the task at hand.
Two, you can listen to Jamie. You can reexamine your goals and your plan. Was your vision the right one? Was Jamie's vision the right one? Or maybe the vision was right, but the plan has led you astray... or bogged you down. Perhaps you need to focus on different goals: more frequent smaller releases instead of less frequent larger ones. Maybe you need to look at what can be removed (for now) from the project rather than what can be added.
Either way, I urge you to make your choice, make it now, and get on with things. I for one believe in the Mozilla project and its vision; I'd be working on it myself if not for other commitments. I want you to succeed, and I hope you succeed soon before AOL pulls the plug.
Don't let the loss of your evangelist distract you unnecessarily. Get on without one if you can, or promote a new one if someone steps up. But above all, please focus like the proverbial laser beam on your goals. Mozilla still has a chance to Win Big, and many of us are counting on you. Go get 'em!
--JT
IE 5 has been released, and it's heckava lot faster and more stable than Netscape 4.5 on Windows32.
If you've got your nose in Linux or another Unix all day, you may well think "Oh, Netscape 4.5 isn't *that* bad", but it really is a big stinky dog compared to what you can get on Windows, esp. with IE.
As far as Netscape not being that far behind, maybe that's true for lowest-common-denominator Internet browsing, but for the really interactive CSS/DHTML stuff that you can get away with on an Intranet (where you can develop for one client), IE is way ahead.
Std Disclaimer: Sure IE has proprietary features, but so is any feature of Netscape/Moziila that no other browser has. At one time frames and tables were a proprietary Netscape feature.
--
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
Jamie hit the nail on the head with his second
.98 sucked? I do. But
reason for Mozilla's problems: It violated one
of the most important requirements of Open-Source
projects by not releasing a usable product.
Remember how much Linux
it was able to suck because it existed. Mozilla
didn't suck. It didn't even exist. It was
unusable from the start and the few pathetic
"releases" that did appear were hardly usable at
all.
Why are so many people willing to contribute to
open source projects? To get work done! They
need a certain tool, so they pick one. When they
find a problem or a missing feature, they correct
it. The important thing is to have Open-Source
projects be useful from the start.
Release early and often. This is what has made
Linux so successful. It may not have have been
great from the start, but the people using it
improved this or that and their improvements were
given back to the community regularly. This
created a truly superior product.
It is sad, too, for the Mozilla project that
Jamie has gone. However, as someone said, it is
better for all in the long term. Jamie can get
working on something better and Mozilla will
either get a shot in the arm or a kick in the
head (which it gets doesn't really matter at this
point). Mozilla probably triggered much of the
Open-Source publicity of the last year, but
without a usable product, it's worth nothing.
I applaud Jamie for all he's done in the past (I
still use that PostScript tape label thing), for
trying to make Mozilla what it could have been,
and wish him the best in the future. I hope he
doesn't wait long to give his next gift to our
community.
A web browser doesn't need an e-mail client. And it definitely doesn't need an operating system like Win98. It's just an application. So just focus on getting a stable browser the size of Opera done and everybody will be happy.
What is important in Mozilla is:
- small size
- fast
- standards compliant
Even if it takes two years to get there, it's something worth making. IE fails in each and every of those and won't ever make it.
What we have to remember is that Open Source should not compete against Microsoft. We are serving different customers. I'm using Linux because it's so stable, fast and runs on virtually anything. I also love the freedom and the values of Open Source.
What will happen during the next few years? Windows 2000 will ship requiring a horrible amount of memory and having way too many bugs. It's a huge code base and made in a lot of hurry. If you think that Netscape had problems, then consider the chore to port that stuff to Merced. Not to mention that they also have to port Win98.
OTOH Linux will get easier to use, more applications and Wine will be able to run Win32 apps. There will be a small and fast Mozilla, office apps from several vendors and great e-mail clients. Add to that speed and reliability.
What is the difference between Mozilla and IE? It's exactly the same as between Linux and Windows. One is made to be as good as possible and the other one is made to gain power and money. Making decisions based on money works only for a while but you mostly create problems. You never create anything that will last. Keep believing in good quality and you'll always beat the opponents.
I'm also not so sure what all the depression is over with mozilla. I keep hearing that it is a failure and I don't think that is the case. When Netscape released the source code I know more than a few of us had these delusions about integrating a browser in to our various projects or changing a few lines of code to make mozilla better but they didn't give us a good workable code base and it wasn't modular in that way. Mozilla has come a long way since then. I still think that it is kind of difficult to work with mozilla right now, the nspr libs didn't install correctly on my machine and the configure script didn't work right... Just little things like that can be discouraging.
Now that mozilla is taking a more component oriented approach and we've got more wide usage of CORBA I think things are pretty exciting, as soon as mozilla can view and create HTML (xml) without crashing and can install easily I think interest will start to increase.
This is my signature. There are many signatures like it but this one is mine..
I guess I'm the person to respond to this, because reporters keep calling me to ask if I'm the Jamie replacement. I guess I am, as much as anyone is; I've been with mozilla.org since pretty much day one, and I was the ``virtual jwz'' when he was on sabbatical. So just pretend it's a really, really long sabbatical or something.
First, I'll do the eulogy thing: we will certainly miss Jamie -- I think any organization except the Vatican would mourn his departure from their ranks. He did some great work here at Netscape and mozilla.org, and he was (usually) a pleasure to work with. Thanks for all the fish.
As for the issues at hand, I think I agree mostly with Jamie on the facts of the case, but my conclusions sometimes differ meaningfully: I, too wish we'd shipped a browser already, and a great one at that. But I think that the switch to the NGLayout/Gecko engine is a great example of how the mozilla.org project is a success: it was the best way to get a browser that matched the demands of our users, and I'm not sure that Netscape would have done The Right Thing before the advent of mozilla.org. Also, as Jamie himself points out, it did help us recruit more developers, which is always a win.
The balance of Netscape vs. non-Netscape developers doesn't bother me as much as it seems to bother Jamie. When we started, there were zero external developers in any form, and there are now many (34 non-netscape.com people have commit privileges on the mozilla.org CVS tree, and many more contribute patches for others to commit), and I think that matters more than the comparison to the large number of developers that Netscape pays.
What does the future hold? Well, our work towards 5.0 continues apace, so we'll still be trying to help our existing developers and recruit new ones. We'll be finishing up our efforts to make some of the Mozilla code available under the GPL as well (the JavaScript engine, in this case), to broaden our ``technology reach''.
People have asked if we have a plan for attracting more developers, and I think that the best answer is ``ship a beta''. When we get onto hackers' desktops, we have a much better shot at getting into their hearts and minds, too. In the nearer term, we just need to weather the storm of reporters and pundits, and concentrate on getting our jobs done. We'll make Jamie proud yet.
Since it's the 2nd of April, I'm assuming that this is not yet another april fool's day slashdot news item
:)
I've participated in a few opensource projects and helped code a few functional utlities that still helps a lot of people all around the world. When Netscape announced the release of Mozilla code, I was one of many to logon to their site and download the tar ball, but alas, it was too hard to decypher. I went through the code for 1 week (a lot longer than most people did). I couldnt figure out 75% of the things in there. So I gave up. (And I guess that is what happend to all the others out there)
Initially when netscape announced the release of mozilla, there were dozens of web sites, hundreds of mailing lists, just devoated to the discussion of what should be in mozilla. Over the past year, these web sites and lists just died away one by one. I guess what most people did not release was, that what mozilla needed was not new functionally, but... stablility, at a good speed. It did not need be a front end to your kitchen skin (should see some of the suggestions made on wishlists) it just needed to fetch a web page and display complying with most statndard as possible.
Then there are those who bitched about mozilla, from the start to the end (i guess when jwz leaves, it might as well be the end). I don't think bitching about the code would have helped making it more stable and fast. Helping the coders, coding it your self and replacing those netscape coders should have been the first thing we should have done. As jwz stated, most people thought netscape still owned mozilla and had full control over mozilla (this was inforced by the inital netscape/mozilla licence,) on that.. i belive mozilla would have been better accepted if it was released as BSD or GPL/LGPL.. most coders were weary of this and stayed away from mozilla just cause of that fact alone... and then there were those who, like me, waited for others to go ahead and do something to the code, test it, pinch it.. see if it bites.. (would a dead beast bite?)
Best jwz quote : I must say, though, that it feels good to be resigning from AOL instead of resigning from Netscape
PS: oops posted it in the wrong place
--
jwz is one of the few latter-day saints to become known by their initials. i mean, you know GLS, RMS, ESR, ETC., but it's pretty kewl when someone your age is an undeniable net.god. (also, he's much less insane than the *other* TLA that worked on (l)emacs). so, it's undeniably sad to see him go.
:), and
it's also ironic to see this happen at a time when mozilla.org was finally producing a product that was starting to look like an early version of a real contender, rather than a cobbled-together POS.
however, maybe it's a good thing:
a) maybe jwz can get out there and do something he really enjoys now, which might be good for all of us
b) maybe this will act as a wakeup call. with jwz gone, mozilla can go one of two ways: either somebody's gonna do *something*, or it's gonna die.
c) maybe all of us losers with delusions of grandeur will go download the tarball again...
so, i personally wanna wish jwz good luck.
-k. ^-^
-k. ^-^ ^D
This is indeed a tragedy, but frankly it does not surprise me.
I've been lurking around the mozilla mailing lists (mirrored in the mozilla newsgroups) and the mozilla.org website basically since they were created. Watching the dynamic of the mozilla communication mechanism over the period of a year, a number of things became unsettling. (I've only ever lurked, primarily because I'm not a sophisticated programmer, and I would have little to offer either the mozilla or linux kernel mailing lists. The development processes in both fascinate me, however.)
First, it amazes me that anyone in the Mozilla project was able to communicate with another at all. From the moment the mozilla mailing lists were created and mirrored, it was apparent that 80-90% of the mail/posts were, and would -always- be, irrelevant fluff. The primary reason for this is that while the Netscape 4.5 support newsgroups were not public - available only through nsnews.netscape.com, the mozilla newsgroups were public, and contained those compelling words "netscape", "misc" and "mail-news". From the perspective of a user with little knowledge of the significance of the word "mozilla", there was no reason to think that the most obvious place to ask Communicator questions.
The result was/is that despite the good efforts of Dan Mosedale and Jim Cape (each of whom made valiant strides to keep the mailing list topical), the vast majority of discussion was/is about 3.0, 4.0x and 4.5 problems. Combined with another 10% of posts of the "I want my 5.0 and I want it NOW!" variety, and a further 5% of the "Now that I can order you, I demand the following 50 stupid features that I have no idea how to program myself" variety, the mozilla mailing list, to the best of my observation, became a completely inhospitable place to have useful techinical discussions such as are seen almost exclusively - by contrast - in the Linux kernel mailing list. The latter, despite the fact that its content is usually way beyond this law student, is a pleasure to read. The Mozilla list is not.
I will leave remarks about the daunting complexity of the source as a major factor to jwz and other programmers/contributors. I'm simply not qualified. But another result is that because most of the contributors (as pointed out by jwz) were still Netscape employees, communication via the mailing list for the purposes of solving localized problems was (I assume) unnecessary.
I must, therefore, put a caveat on jwz's "fishbowl" analogy. These are two huge disincentives to communicating publicly about the source tree, and the lack of consistent communication on the nitty-gritty details of development may have played its part in the failure of the mozilla project to capture the imagination - and effort - of the programming community.
Aside from that caveat, though, jwz commented that such outside observation, combined with mozilla's independence, motivated the project to redesign the layout engine, and thus the UI, from scratch. It is unfortunate that the choice to rebuild a project thoughtfully and correctly, at the obvious cost of time, is considered a 'failure', or even a bad thing. Yes, some idiots have complained and threatened that if "Netscape doesn't come up with my browser now, I swear I'll move to IE5", not understanding that (a) the development regime has changed radically, (b) the project was rebuilt, (c) it's better to ship the right thing "late" - inasmuch as there is any such thing as 'late' in an open source project - than the wrong thing when users demand it.
For someone who has lurked and gained some familiarity with the dynamics of the project and the cast of characters, none of these conditions indicate 'failure' to me. It is unfortunate that jwz does, but he'd probably know better than I.
First, the Mozilla effort goes on: AOL is still funding development, non-AOL developers are active as well, the project is continuing to release "milestone" releases which you can try out, and this will culminate later this year in beta releases of Communicator 5.0 and then a final release, all based on the open Mozilla source code. This has been the case all along, and remains the case.
Next, in the Mozilla project there was a fundamental trade-off: build and release a product based on the existing in-progress 5.0 code base ("Mozilla Classic") or rearchitect the product to make it more standards compliant (i.e., use the new layout code being developed), more extensible, more open (e.g., use something other than Motif), and so on. In particular, many people complained vociferously that Mozilla/5.0 needed to have 100% standards compliance for HTML 4.0, CSS1, etc. Thus the decision was made (way back in October 1998) to rearchitect the product, use the new layout engine, use GTK+ instead of Motif, etc.
Most people on /. and elsewhere seemed to agree with that decision at the time, and would presumably still agree with it. However from Jamie's point of view it presumably would have been a better plan to go ahead and ship as early as possible even given the downsides. (Also, Jamie saw no reason to ditch Motif for GTK.) That's something about which reasonable people can disagree, but I don't buy the assertion that by taking the extra time to make a better product the Mozilla project has therefore "failed".