The timestamp on the downloads provided on the install page are March 5 1999, and March 6 2000 which may give an indication as to this articles age.
Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
11–20 of 285 posts
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#12Quoted post unavailable.
There is a current front page article on the same blog, I suspect someone browsed from that and shared what they found.
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#13Considering all the discussions about JavaScript and sites with primarily text requiring it, this looks like the more things change, the more they remain the same :-P. Also see Wirth's Plea for Lean Software[0] from 1995 for another "timeless" issue.
I did find this bit interesting too...
> Apart from this practical reason, there's a principal one: The first time I invoked Netscape, it said that it is obsolete and refuses to work. I don't use software that thinks it knows better than I when I should stop using it.
...considering the modern trend for autoupdating software. The author (after this paragraph) also considers availability, but another issue is if the software is something one would like to use even if it is available - for instance, personally i never liked using a version of Paint Shop Pro after version 7 since i found all of them a degradation. I can use PSP7 just fine though (even on Linux via Wine) - imagine if the software decided by itself that it is too old to run or to replace itself with a new version against my wishes (this is something a lot of software does nowadays).
From a user's perspective this also has implications on preserving backwards compatibility for foundational functionality programs rely on.
[0] https://people.inf.ethz.ch/wirth/Articles/LeanSoftware.pdf
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#14I was at a startup from 2000-2003 where the chief scientist was a security wonk and demanded that our product worked with and without JavaScript enabled.
No wonder the startup failed. Imagine trying to make a useful product with one hand tied behind your back!
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#15The timestamp on the downloads provided on the install page are March 5 1999, and March 6 2000 which may give an indication as to this articles age.
HTTP headers tell
Last-Modified: Sun, 07 Mar 1999 17:07:32 GMT
[1] http://web.archive.org/web/19970106091058/http://www.complan...
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#16My modern version of this is browsing with JavaScript disabled. Most of the sites that don’t work weren’t worth my time anyway.
I disagree. Using AJAX to hit internal APIs to load or update content improves performance of the site, and can make it easier to maintain.
I can't say i've seen a single site where in practice that worked as advertised. Also some times it introduces UX annoyances (e.g. back button not working as expected).
It is one of those things where in theory if absolutely everything was done right and no other stuff was done differently it can work. E.g. if the only difference between a JS-enabled and a JS-disabled version of the site was the content change and nothing else (no additional JS frameworks, functionality or whatever) then yes it most likely can be faster (though for the difference to be noticeable the site needs to be rather heavy in the first place).
Problem being that in practice this comes with a bunch of other baggage that not only throws the benefit out of the window but introduces a bunch of other issues as well.
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#17My modern version of this is browsing with JavaScript disabled. Most of the sites that don’t work weren’t worth my time anyway.
I disagree. Using AJAX to hit internal APIs to load or update content improves performance of the site, and can make it easier to maintain.
I disagree. Using AJAX to hit internal APIs to load or update content improves performance of the site, and can make it easier to maintain.
The reality is, with node junk, the average site uses 10mb of js, taking 5s to render, to show 1kb of text.
Get rid of that 10mb of js, all those fonts, and you don't need to update only part of a page.
It will load and render in 10ms.
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#18[deleted]
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#19Considering all the discussions about JavaScript and sites with primarily text requiring it, this looks like the more things change, the more they remain the same :-P. Also see Wirth's Plea for Lean Software[0] from 1995 for another "timeless" issue. I did find this bit interesting too... > Apart from this practical reason, there's a principal one: The first time I invoked Netscape, it said that it is obsolete and re…
Firefox on Ubuntu (which I'm not using anymore for these and other reasons) and presumably on other OSs does exactly that: refuse to open new tabs/sites once every two weeks or so, telling me "one more thing we need to do" ie self-update. So you're loosing all your browsing context, though FF does a better job restoring it after restart than it used to, but still that's user-hostile and self-important as fuck. And there's also a "principal" reason why I can't stand this: that the Web is now 30 years old, past its peak, so if browsers still need to update bi-weekly for new features and experiments, this in combination with lack of browser diversity proves without any shade of doubt there's something very wrong with the incentives for browser development, the Google/Mozilla browser cartel, and the evolution of "web standards".
Re: Why I Don't Use Netscape (1999)
#20So the "movement" against modern browser features is not a movement and has nothing to do with these features but its simply a version of "kids these days lost their ways" thinking. A version of conservatism, I guess. "Everything was better in the good old days" and "The new generation is horrible, the humanity is doomed" kind of thoughts are probably a manifestation of fading youth.