Ilya Kozhevnikov

Browser Newsletter #9

February 24, 2008

Netscape Navigator 9.0.0.6

These security fixes included in Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.12 have been included in Netscape Navigator 9.0.0.6.

Netscape Navigator 9.0.0.6 is based on Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.12

Changelog for Opera 9.26 for Windows

Opera 9.26 for Windows is available for download.

This release is a recommended security and stability upgrade. See the Security section for additional information.

Read more…
© Opera Software ASA, 20/02/08

The Internet Explorer 8 User-Agent String

As Dean announced, a beta version of Internet Explorer 8 will be released in the first half of 2008.

During internal testing, we have encountered a small number of sites which fail to recognize IE8 because they are performing exact string matches to look for specific IE version strings. Those checks will need to be removed or updated to accommodate IE8. The article Best Practices for detecting the Internet Explorer version provides suggestions and code samples.

As noted in the Best Practices article, it is not recommended that you block access to content based on the user-agent string of the browser. If you do have to offer different content to different versions of the browser due to improved capabilities, you should ensure that future versions of the browser are not blocked. Serving content based solely on the user-agent string is often an unreliable way to detect the full capabilities of the browser, because the user might have adjusted some settings, such as disabling script or extensions.

Open APIs May Help Microsoft Repair Reputation

By being more open, the company could also be more successful in areas where it has struggled, like the Internet, analysts said.For example, when Microsoft created a new version of its Internet Explorer browser, IE 7, to keep up with the latest Internet standards — and to compete with Mozilla’s Firefox browser — many people who’d built sites to work with previous versions of IE found they no longer worked because they had been designed to support Microsoft’s proprietary technologies. In trying to do the right thing and support more open and generally supported technologies, Microsoft found that its own proprietary software got in the way of its best intentions.In fact, the changing business models on the Internet that have made Google so successful are another example of where Microsoft could have benefited if it had embraced open standards and more technological transparency sooner, Selby said.

Read more…
© The Washington Post, 21/02/08

500 million Firefox downloads: complete; 500 million grains: in progress

Firefox just reached 500,000,000 downloads. This is an absolutely phenomenal milestone for Firefox. It is sort of hard to imagine what that number means. For some perspective, that’s roughly the audience size of 10,000 Rome Colosseums combined. It would be the weight, in kilograms, of 8,500 Boeing 747 airplanes. In dollars, for $500 million you and 15 of your friends can fly to the International Space Station.

Read more…
© The Mozilla Blog, 21/02/08

Firefox reaches 500 million downloads milestone

This milestone also reveals an accelerated all-time download rate of about 415,000 per day on average. For recent months the rate is closer to 600,000 downloads per day though.

November 9, 2004: Firefox 1.0 release, 1200 days ago.

100 million reached on October 19, 2005, 344 days later.

200 million reached on August 2, 2006, 287 days later.

300 million reached on February 12, 2007, 193 days later

400 million reached on September 7, 2007, 207 days later.

500 million reached today February 22, 2008, 168 days later:

Note: this is the number of downloads through Mozilla servers only. Downloads are not the same as users: a user can install a Firefox download in more than one computer (likely) or download it more than once in the course of several years (even more likely). Firefox users is currently estimated somewhere between 125 and 150 million based on the number of daily update requests.

Netscape Finally Really Dead

AOL will officially pull the plug on the Netscape Web browser next week, which raises the question: Netscape is still alive?

The rise and fall of Netscape is a reminder of just how quickly technology changes – and a warning to approach battles against Microsoft cautiously. Netscape was founded in 1994, and quickly won customers by providing software that made it easy for people to navigate the Internet. Netscape went public a year later and saw its stock price nearly triple on its first day of trading. At one point, the company had an $8 billion market cap and 90% of the Web browser market.

Firefox: On Its Way to Web Domination?

I like to do periodic reports of usage of Firefox on PCWorld.com, and these numbers too show Firefox getting more and more popular. The trend for Firefox usage is still trending upwards over time. In fact, January 2008 was the first month during which a third of site visitors–34.36 percent, to be overly exact–used Firefox. Here’s a graph of its growth over the past three years[...]

Internet Explorer remains the most-used broser at PCWorld.com, but total usage for IE 7, IE 6, and the dregs of previous versions has fallen below sixty percent. (Back in September 2004, when Firefox was still an obscure beta, just one percent of visitors used it–and around 90 percent of visitors used IE.)

AOL Makes Good on Pledge to Drop Netscape

As of March 1st, AOL is finally pulling the plug on Netscape support.

Come next month, no bugs will be fixed, nor holes patched, in the latest version of the Netscape browser. For those seeking up-to-date software beyond the most recent iteration of Netscape, AOL shall point people to Firefox, which comes with an extension that makes it look like a Netscape browser.

New mozilla.com to feature an organic design

As with previous main Firefox releases, Mozilla is working on a new version of mozilla.com for Firefox 3 launch later this year.

The redesign, commissioned to The Royal Order, a Chicago-based design agency, with illustrations by Delicious Design League, is currently in draft status but the mockup below, posted by Mozilla’s Creative Director, John Slater, is close to what we will see for Firefox 3.

Netscape finally put to the sword

AOL has released its last ever update for Netscape Navigator and is encouraging its remaining users to switch to Flock or Firefox.

“Users will see the following major upgrade notice, released as Netscape 9.0.0.6,” said Tom Drapeau, director of AOL’s Netscape brand, in a company blog.

Nearly 14 years after the once mighty browser made its first desktop appearance as Mosaic Netscape 0.9, its disappearance comes as little surprise.

Although Netscape accounted for more than 80 per cent of the browser market in 1995, the arrival of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer in the same year brought stiff competition and surpassed Netscape within three years.

This entry was posted on Sunday, February 24th, 2008 at 11:39 pm and is filed under Browser Newsletter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.