On Netscape 4.x and the Stylesheets of LJ's S2 Layout Engine:

[acroyear]

Now I don't want to get into a rant here, but neither IE NOR Netscape follow the standards correctly. I support the standards, and also respect that one must move forwards in capabilities or be left behind by those that do. The browser wars were supposed to be about standards. Tragically, Netscape 1) lost the war and 2) didn't have a stable-enough code base to be fixed via open source methods (particularly when required 3rd party stuff was removed, leaving a lot of gaping functionality holes).

Thus, Mozilla had to basically start over w/ the new layout engine, Gecko. Newer *IS* better in this case, both in the Mac world and in the standards-based browsing world.

The style sheets are NOT poorly formated. They are perfectly legit to the standard; i ran 'em through a validator. That Netscape for doesn't (and will never) support the standard is neither our fault, nor LJs. That Netscape freezes or crashes as a result is certainly not our fault.

One can always try to go into the netscape configuration options dialog and turn off stylesheets. Netscape 4 allowed that, at least for windows/linux, though the resultant look was often horid and even more unreadable. The other option, seeing if the right-mouse-button menu had a "copy link location" (which it does in IE and Mozilla) isn't an option for OS 9 since Macs don't have that right mouse button to start with (and thus, most mac apps don't have those menus even for the macs with 2-button mice).

Mozilla as "newest and greatest" it most certainly isn't. Html 4.0 and CSS 2.0 are *3 years old*. Netscape 4.x is technically now 5 years old and 5 years abandoned. No bug fixes or functionality fixes have been done in ANY Netscape 4 release since 4.6. The only reason ANY release after 4.6 happened is to fix security issues to keep the feds (who'd committed to Netscape for a solution back in the 3.x days) from complaining. That's it. No other bugs like the multitude of CSS problems have ever been fixed in a Netscape 4 release since 4.6 over 5 years ago.

So no, I have no intention any more of crippling my stuff to work with a product that has been abandoned by its owners for half a decade.

The world moves on.

Comments

[dglenn.livejournal.com]

'Then there are statements like [I] don't like having internet exploder on a Mac. I don't like supporting M$ in that fashion. which definitely came across to me as a statement of pride.'

Is every boycott an example of the sin of pride then? (I don't remember having spoken to Eowyn about Microsoft in this regard, so I'm not sure where her attitude falls on the pride/principle thing.) I can see how such a statement could be a pride thing (and not recognized as such by the speaker); I can also see how it might not be.

(Oh, about Links and Lynx -- I use each of those on occasion (there are some things Lynx seems better at), and that's my other gripe about pages that rely on Javascript for stuff that doesn't require Javascript.)

'yes, one tool that does all (correctly and with a nice interface) is nice, but also impossible; i accepted that years ago. i personally think we're still a decade away from "comfortable" computing.'

Heh. Tell that to one of those Emacs-using heretics. (Flamebait: vi rules!)

I'm not sure what you mean by "one tool that does it all" here. I never expect my computing to use a single tool any more than I expect a Swiss Army Socket-Wrench With Soldering Iron, Waffle Iron, Web Browser, And Trouser Press to be manageable.

I do expect one web browser to be a reasonable all-around web browser and do all the web-browser stuff correctly and comfortably. In fact I expect several to do so, so that people with a different idea of "comfortable" than mine can pick a different browser. I expect to switch tools when I go from web browsing to news to email to image editing to music composition; I do not expect to switch tools when going from one web site to a different web site.

' i don't want to add browser-detection code to every page when the only thing it may do is turn on/off one little feature like the stylesheet.'

Oh those are annoying from both ends and often work incorrectly anyhow. Especially when they reject a browser for not being on the list of browser the author knew about even though that browser would work correctly with the page. No, my approach (which I present here only as an alternative way of thinking about things) is to make things less complicated instead of more: I just dismiss all the extra-fancy layout tricks that only work in some browsers and not in others, as being unimportant to getting my content across. I've got a different set of priorities; I'm not trying to show how cool a layout I can make, I just want to present my words, images, and music in a reasonably attractive form. So, I am definitely note advocating adding browser-detection code.

In general, if I make it display correctly and attractively under Lynx, it'll display correctly in pretty much every other browser except perhaps Mosaic (and even Mosaic stands a chance). So I don't have a lot of testing to do except where I do something fancy ... well, what passes for "fancy" for me, that is.

Am I artificially limiting myself and disregarding a lot of what HTML can do? Unfortunately yes. But it doesn't particularly bother me. It bugs me in principle that not all of the power can be used portably, but it doesn't bother me personally because, despite what some people may think, I do not feel I need to use every available feature of a tool. I only need to use the parts that pertain to what I'm trying to do. For me, the "safe" parts of HTML suffice.

[blueeowyn.livejournal.com]

It might interest Joe to know that I happen to prefer MS Word to Word Perfect, AppleWorks, ClarisWorks and several other word processors that I have had access to over the years. MS Word and MS Excel are my friends. I use PowerPoint but think that it in general is over-used (not an attack against MS, but an attack against the put it into bullets and don't bother explaining anything method of presentation). I haven't used Access but I hear that it is a PIA and lacks a few protections against erroneously deleting the entire DB due to a slip of the finger.

Left to my own preferences my default apps are:
Netscape, MS Word, MS Excel, Filemaker, Telnet to unix for unix mail & newsgroups, Eudora for work email, SPSS, MeetingMaker, Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Photoshop, BBEdit Lite, Goliath, Fetch, and Stuffit.

I dislike a lot of what Bill Gates is doing. I find the newer version of Word a pain to use and a huge memory hog (so I usually use the older one). I find the whole "IE is necessary to the OS" saga extremely annoying (and unfortunately effective). I have heard so much about the security flaws in IE and the lack of stability of it (to say nothing of the stupid left toolbar that takes my small screen and makes it smaller) to NOT want it on my computer (esp. since with very few exceptions, it doesn't fix things, it just shows different problems).

That said, it will probably stay since Hotmail won't work anymore with Netscape (though I can't say I am at all surprised).a