Question:

Sorry, I know I asked this before, but I haven't been paying attention. I hear there have been some new releases of Mozilla for OS/2. What's the news?

Answer:

There's been quite a bit of browser activity. The list of current releases of most interest to OS/2 User's is:

• Mozilla Release Candidate 1.2a
• Mozilla Release 1.1
• Latest Trunk Daily Builds
• Latest 1.0 Builds
• IBM Web Browser 1.2

Mozilla Release Candidate 1.2a

Mozilla is approaching a 1.2 release. See Mozilla Home for the details of what this really means. The Mozilla Roadmap is handy for those that like pictures.

The 1.x code base is intended to provide a stable environment for those developing add-ins and for those doing specialized builds. This is already starting to occur. For example, in the past I mentioned we might see a lightweight, browser only build of Mozilla sometime soon after the v1.0 GA release. Well, v1.2 will have this.

The Mozilla 1.2a Release Candidate reports itself as:

Response to this release has been pretty good. Those that have been asking for an installer, now have one. There was a problem with the initial drop of the installer, but a refresh drop corrected this.

One notable missing item is support for the Feature Installer plug-in. According to Mike Kaply, this is unlikely to occur, so don't get rid of Netscape 4.61 just yet.

Mozilla Release 1.1

There is not much to be said about the Mozilla 1.1 Release. It was the last major branch release.

It may be a useful fallback for those that are having problems with 1.2a, but need features that are not in 1.0.

Latest Trunk Daily Builds

For the adventurous, there are the ever changing and somewhat misnamed Daily Builds. These are built continually throughout the day even though the directory tree is named nightly.

Daily Builds are lightly tested, beta code. Be prepared to restore to a previous version, just in case.

That said, a Latest Trunk Build has all the latest fixes, features and bugs. It seems like every build adds a previously missing feature or tweaks the User Interface to be even more functional. For example, the cookies dialog just got a Detail/Summary button. This allows you to see the content of the cookie before deciding if it should be written.

As of today, this build identifies itself as:

Latest-1.0 Daily Builds

Another useful Daily Build is the Latest 1.0 Daily Build. This is a bug-fixed version of the 1.0 Release. You won't find any features that are not in the 1.0 Release, but you should find increased stability and, perhaps, better performance. As of today, this build reports itself as:

Those that have been paying attention might ask why there is no Latest 1.1 Daily Build. This is because the v1.1 Release and all the subsequent v1.x Releases are final releases. Once released, there is no subsequent development on the branch by the core developers.

IBM Web Browser v1.2

As always, IBM is slow to produce updates to the IBM branded version of Mozilla. The Web Browser 1.2 release has been available for several months. It's available to eCS customers at eComStation and to Software Choice customers at Software Choice

The version is based on the Mozilla 0.9.4 milestone so it is missing many features of the current Release Candidate. The 1.2 version number has no relationship to Mozilla release numbers. However, the IBM Browser does have the benefit of additional IBM testing and is available in several NLS versions.

What Else?

One of the better sites for keeping up with what's new with Mozilla is Steven Wendt's Tips for Warpzilla - Mozilla for OS/2 . The site contains a wealth of tips and techniques on tuning Mozilla.

So that's the state of Mozilla today. Come back in a few weeks and I'm sure much will have changed.

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SCOUG, Warp Expo West, and Warpfest are trademarks of the Southern California OS/2 User Group. OS/2, Workplace Shell, and IBM are registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation. All other trademarks remain the property of their respective owners.