[aclug-L] Re: The Future

[John Goerzen <jgoerzen@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Tom Hull <thull@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> > features to speed web browsing by 30%. Developers have ported
> > Mozilla to a huge number of different types and architectures of
> > computers even though Mozilla has yet to be released as a finished
> > product. There are already many people that can use the Web that
> > could not before. 
> 
> Wow. Is that really true?

Yes, or at least was :-)  This, I believe, was before the big
rewrite.  But there was talk of something -- Gecko, if I remember
correctly -- that was only a few hundred K and was the rendering
engine.

> My impression had been that mozilla.org has pretty much been a bust.
> According to a July 7 1999 "state of the lizard" report, 80% of the

Keep in mind that the paper was written in December 1998 when the
feeling was much different.

There is still somewhat of a conflict of opinion on that.  However, I
do maintain that the NPL choice has had the effect of stifiling
contributions, and the AOL buyout was none too helpful either.

> development was still being done by Netscape/AOL engineers. The
> latest schedule is aiming for function complete in 12/99, with
> alpha and beta testing after that. The page on Binaries is still
> more ominous. It says:

[chop]

These are just to scare off the users that are trying to try something 
new without knowing what they're stepping in to.  I compile all my own 
binaries of it, and can assure you that they do not have an expiration 
date like that.

Even though it is not yet released, there are several platforms on
which people are using Mozilla where Netscape has never gone before.
AlphaLinux, in my own case, is one such example.