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Safari is released to the world

donmelton.com

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Re: Safari is released to the world

#71

Post by kanamekun »

Danieru wrote: post #29
donmelton wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither, really. It's mostly because I retired.

So I'm curious. As a young programmer with 1.5 years before entering the workforce I have to wonder what you plan to do. From my super young and inexperienced perspective retirement will just mean having more control over my programming. Is programming still super fun and adicting? So; what do you plan to do? A relaxed retirement? Occasional contracting? A startup? Open source? Quiting programming forever and travell…

From his website: "Hello, I'm Don Melton, probably best known as the guy who started the Safari and WebKit projects at Apple. These days I'm just an aspiring writer and a recovering programmer."

http://donmelton.com/about/

Re: Safari is released to the world

#74

Post by podperson »

frozenport wrote: post #51

Why did Apple feel the need to make a web browser?

Apple had been dependent on Microsoft and Netscape for good browser options. Microsoft released IE5.5 for Mac which was neither IE5 nor IE6 compatible, and then nothing. Netscape gradually turned into a gigantic steaming pile of crap.

I might add that Chimera -> Camino was the beacon of hope before Safari came out, and once it got going on Mac OS X, other folks got so excited they demanded a cross-platform version which eventually became Firefox.

In general, the need for a non-sucky non-bloated web browser alternative to IE reached a critical mass at that time, not just on Mac OS X.

Re: Safari is released to the world

#75

Post by podperson »

ConstantineXVI wrote: post #65
Yaggo wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must be kidding.

WebKit core gets commits from nearly every major hardware manufacturer and OS vendor that isn't Microsoft. Unless Apple's stripping all those commits out of spite, iOS WebKit contains code from Nokia, RIM, Samsung, HPalm, Google, and many others that might be seen as competitors otherwise.

You notably left out Adobe who use it for Adobe AIR.

Re: Safari is released to the world

#76

Post by sazary »

brown9-2 wrote: post #66

The mention of needing to keep the project a secret makes me wonder what would have been so different about things had the news leaked. Let's say the browser user agent leaked or some enterprising reporter figured out what Apple was up to. What would have gone differently in that alternate universe?

maybe nothing other than an angry steve and a not-that-fascinating-presentation.

Re: Safari is released to the world

#77

Post by SG- »

brown9-2 wrote: post #66

The mention of needing to keep the project a secret makes me wonder what would have been so different about things had the news leaked. Let's say the browser user agent leaked or some enterprising reporter figured out what Apple was up to. What would have gone differently in that alternate universe?

Probably some bad things, over the years certain project details have leaked right before the keynote (such as ATI pre-announcing a hardware release) and finding Apple switching to NVIDIA for the next few years.

Re: Safari is released to the world

#80

Post by SG- »

chiph wrote: post #64

Don - you had several plugins available from launch - Flash, etc. How'd you do that without tipping your hand?

They were simply using the standard OSX browser plugins (the same Mozilla, Camino and IE used at the time).
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