Post #17,544
11/9/01 3:32:30 PM
|
Actually, I disagree in part
Obviously that letter is never going to see the light of day on the letters page. :=)
But actually, I found Internet Explorer 4.0 beat Netscape Crashigator 4.x. IE 4 was, I found, more reliable than Navigator 4. (And, for added insult to injury, it had JDK 1.1 support for months, maybe as much as a year, before Netscape managed to get it into Navigator.)
Make no mistake, I'm not saying Microsoft's inclusion of Internet Explorer in later versions of Windows wouldn't have ultimately had its effect. But Netscape had problems entirely unrelated to Microsoft monopoly power.
"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it."
-- Donald Knuth
|
Post #17,547
11/9/01 3:52:16 PM
|
Maybe i mixed up timelines
Wasn't this after ie was included witt windows and free? I mean, NN4 came out after they had already lost the browser wars, no?
How to mangle the truth;
Have it reported by any major U.S. media outlet.
|
Post #17,610
11/9/01 6:46:57 PM
|
I think IE 3 was the first bundled version
Remember, Microsoft originally distributed IE in their Plus! pack, and only made it available free later. OSR2 (late 1996) was the first release that actually included it, and that was of course the still-cruddy version 3. At any rate, there was a period of time when most users would still be downloading something.
According to [link|http://www.cgonline.com/features/010625-f1-f1.html|this history], Windows 98 was the first IE4 bundle - between the time IE4 was released (October 1997) and the bundled version, you'd have still had to download it.
Netscape 4 first came out in July 1997. And guess what? The period of time where Netscape really crumbled was in late 1997 to mid-1998. (That's when IE really started eating Netscape's lunch, taking them from 60-70% market share to 40%.) Microsoft's deal with AOL probably had a lot to do with it, but I really think Netscape quality and other bad moves - maybe even sheer overconfidence - had some part of that. With Netscape quality poor and lagging on the Java front, a lot of people (including myself) who thought IE3 sucked took the opportunity to give IE4 a whirl.
Netscape executives didn't help by [link|http://news.cnet.com/news/0,10000,0-1005-200-333656,00.html|statements] like "It's not the browser wars anymore, it's the portal wars," said Dave Rothschild, vice president of client products at Netscape. "We are getting huge growth in Netcenter users, and that's what counts--driving people to your portal."
Of course, the portal frenzy has faded. You've got Yahoo, and maybe a couple others that are grimly trying to make a go of it. And we know where Netscape went.
"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it."
-- Donald Knuth
|
Post #17,732
11/11/01 1:45:12 AM
|
Version info.
When I worked for Microsoft Money 2000, I did a medium-sized matrix for what browsers came with which OSes, and therefore, what scenarios were possible.
Win95original - none
Win95b - IE 3.0
Win95c - IE 4.0 (Yeah, there was an "integrated" version that was released... It was horrible. Trust me.)
Win98 - IE 4.0
Win98SE - IE 5.0
WinME - IE 5.01 (? Don't know - it was not even in full testing until after I left the group.)
WinNT 4.0 - IE 2.0
Win2k - IE 5.0
WinXP - IE 6.0
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
|
Post #17,740
11/11/01 5:39:16 AM
|
Yeah, and about that NT 4.0 with I-Exploder 2.0 . .
Whenever I do an NT 4.0 install I make sure I have my IE 4.0 for NT CD-ROM. Microsoft's site won't let 2.0 on, not even to download an upgrade.
[link|http://www.aaxnet.com|AAx]
|
Post #17,897
11/12/01 12:26:42 PM
|
*Shrug*
Yeah? Well, that's what you get for not using the latest OS version.
Juuuuust kidding. ^_^ I agree, it's a crock, but apparently there's no plan to fix that.
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
|
Post #17,551
11/9/01 3:57:39 PM
|
AFAIK...
Part of the reason that Netscape started to suck so badly is that the free release of IE basically dried up the funds that they had to continue development of Netscape. Thus the subsequent releases blew chunks because they no longer had the money to continue substantial development.
"He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." - Friedrich Nietzsche
|
Post #17,562
11/9/01 4:23:20 PM
|
My perspective
Netscape 4 / IE 4 was the period when it was a matter of taste which one was better. In a lot of cases it came down to which one worked better on your computer. My overall impression was the Netscape was better when it worked but IE was more stable.
IE 5 was the version where MS pulled ahead on quality, because Netscape afford could no longer keep up. IE was already pulling ahead in overall usage because MS had begun using licensing to push Netscape out of the market. Still, I know few people, including myself, that preferred Netscape 4.07 to IE 5. IE 5.5 was pretty much the final push to IE, at this point only those that went with non-MS software on principle used Netscape over IE.
Prior to IE 4 there was no question that Netscape was better. IE 3 was the first version that was usable and that version sucked huge blazing chunks. It didn't render a lot of perfectly legal pages correctly, and crashed as soon as you hit anything complex.
Jay
|
Post #17,657
11/10/01 1:20:40 AM
|
And some of us think IE still blows chunks..e.g vs Opera
|
