~terry
Mon, Jul 15, 1996 (12:46)
seed
NCSA Mosaic -- Mosaic was the first and once greatest web
browser, but lately it's been relegated to the role of playing catch-up
to Netscape. Thankfully, though, Mosaic plays this game very well.
The newest releases contain many of Netscape's best features,
including document caching, improved FTP support, internal
support for gifs and jpegs, built-in newsreader (with a recently
added toolbar), new HTML tags (including centering, tables, and
background images), and low cost (it's free!). Mosaic has a nice
spawning feature that allows users to access multiple pages at the
same time. Another useful option is Mosaic's full-screen
presentation mode. Mosaic has also caught up to Netscape in terms
of speed, and some claim that it's even faster than Netscape now.
Mosaic is a 32-bit client that can only be run on Windows 95/NT
platforms or on Windows 3.x platforms that are using the latest
version of Win32s.
The official release of Mosaic 2.0 includes several interesting and
unprecedented new features. In addition to an option that allows
Mosaic to automatically check and track links from various web
pages (AutoSurf) and a new advanced hotlist manager (much like
Netscape's SmartMarks) that is seamlessly integrated into Mosaic,
there is one cool new feature that is bound to please the socialite in
all of us. Mosaic now offers the opportunity to collaborate with
other users -- by joining a collaboration session, you can chat with
others, send and receive files, and partake in web cruising with your
friends, all from within Mosaic. This is the first web browser to
allow you to do these three functions without having to resort to
using an external application.
Unfortunately, Mosaic does still lack some of Netscape's
proprietary features, including font sizes, advanced support for
tables (the width tag and nested tables), and client side image
mapping. Also, Mosaic's integrated newsreader and internal FTP
client currently aren't quite as solid (in terms of ease of use and
appearance) as those offered by Netscape, but they are getting
better with each new release. With the final release of Mosaic 2.0,
the competition has once again heated up between Netscape and
Mosaic, but in the end, I still have to give the overall edge to
Netscape...for now.
Pros: Great features, AutoSurfing, collaboration feature, on par
with Netscape in terms of speed
Cons: Support for tables, news, and FTP isn't quite as solid as in
Netscape
New for Win: Client side image mapping, Kodak Photo CD
support, bug fixes, more new for Mac: PNG, frames, CSIM, and
advanced tables support, progressive image decoding, more
Version Reviewed: Windows - 2.1.1 Official Release. Macintosh -
3.0 Beta 2
Date of Review: 5/3/96 Reviewer: Forrest Stroud
Location: ftp://ftp.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Web/Mosaic/Windows/Win31x/mosaic21.exe
Information: http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SDG/Software/WinMosaic/HomePage.html
Company: http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/General/NCSAHome.html
~Critter
Tue, Oct 1, 1996 (09:38)
#1
I have just received word that version 3.x beta should be out soon for windows
platforms. It is already available for Mac systems. Of course, it does catch up quite a bit with the big two but still falls just a little short. It does help raise the baseline HTML level so programmers can code to about the same level and reach most people on the Internet. If anyone has further information please post.
~joedoe
Tue, Jan 21, 1997 (16:53)
#2
Version 3.0 is out for win95/NT, as of several weeks ago, I think. It is available for download, through a revised web page, linked to the old page. I am downloading it now, so I haven't actually seen it yet, but it would be great if you could review it, or at least link to it.
~sprin5
Tue, Jan 9, 2001 (09:43)
#3
Good ol Mosaic, the U of I browser that started it all!