Once apon a time (circa the intro of Windows 95), my web tools were Netscape and Eudora. I actually paid for Netscape even though it could be had for free, as I wanted to support the authors. Still have the T-shirt and cap.
But there were problems, mostly involving email. Eudora was single-tasking, so you couldn't read mail and download more at the same time. It seemed more a legacy Windows 3.1 program than Windows 95. Netscape couldn't deal with more than one email account at a time -- you had to close it and run a front-end account switcher to access a second account. Worse, Netscape did not use the Windows registry; it had no idea how to open a Word file unless you told it, even though Windows knew. This was probably due to the Netscape goal of replacing the Windows desktop, but it was a rather madding policy. Causal Netscape users were forever saying they couldn't open attachments, when the problem was that Netscape was intentionally broken.
Near the end of 1995, Bill Gates told his people to transform Windows into a full-fledged Internet OS to compete with Netscape. The next year, Microsoft totally revamped Windows 95, adding Internet Explorer 3.0, and shortly later the watershed 4.0 suite, including the new Outlook Express. These were stunning improvements for Microsoft. Outlook Express not only multi-tasked, but could natively handle multiple email addresses. It also seamlessly integrated into Explorer and the Windows Registry. Internet Explorer, a ground-up rewrite, solved all the many problems of the former Spyglass-based Internet Explorer 2, which was, well, a slow pig compared to Netscape.
Within 3 weeks of the Internet Explorer 4.0 release, I removed both Netscape and Eudora from all my machines and have never looked back. For some reason Netscape never responded with anything more than a few tweaks and gloss -- as late as 1999, you still had to close and repoen Netscape mail in order to download from a second account, and the suite still couldn't open a Word document until you told it how.
Suddenly, things have changed
I've been experimenting with Mozilla Firefox since the 0.8 beta and have been fairly happy with the 1.0PR preview. Now that 1.0 is officially released, I'm removing Internet Explorer from my desktop. I'll keep the program around for a while (it's hard to actually remove and there are still sites that Firefox won't open gladly), but I don't use it much anymore.
I'm still using Outlook Express, however -- it works fine and until Mozilla at least gets to 1.0 with their email program and convinces me that they are willing to use the Windows Registry for opening attachments, I'll not yet trust my email to something new. But give it time.
Microsoft's monopoly on browsers (which was Netscape's own damn fault) is breaking. Email may follow soon. You owe it to yourself to check out Firefox, as just the tabbed bowsing concept makes it a superior product.
Then again, never misunderestimate Microsoft's ability to meet the competition.
More here.
You might want to give Eudora another shot too. I've used it continously since 1995, but it has always been mutli-threaded on the Mac. No virii (that I know of -- of course, like I said, I am on the Mac side) and it is much, much easier to handle the massive amounts of email that everyone has now.
A lot of people use Mail (bundled with the system on the Mac side, hooks into the base Unix mail architecture) but I still stay with Eudora because it seems faster and the controls and filtering are better.
Posted by: Phelps at November 12, 2004 01:27 PM