Netscape 6 Preview

America Online has released the preview version of its updated Netscape browser, Netscape 6. This even as Netscape’s share of the browser market has declined from 33 percent in 1999 to 14 percent. In comparison, Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has gone up to 86 percent from 65 percent a year ago. As both Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Netscape browsers are free, there's no financial gain for either company. According to analysts, most users don’t know the difference or care.“

The question is will this latest version of Netscape be able to reclaim lost market share. Its 5 MB footprint is a huge improvement over the 16 MB of its predecessors. This decline is in part due to the rewritten browser's engine, which uses XML (eXtensible Markup Language) and displays XML data. XML apart from the data also changes the feel and functionality of the browser. The real advantage will be for developers and OEMs who want to build browser functionality into a product. With all this, there is speculation that XML is going to spur another war, for compatibility and ease of use."

New Features
New in Netscape 6 is a slimmed-down profile which makes the download less than half the size of Communicator 4.7 (18 MB). The user interface has been slicked-up, and the browser now includes the first third-party America Online e-mail client. There’s also an intriguing combination of Web search tools and instant messaging.
The full download of Netscape 6 tops out at 8.5 MB, compared to 18 MB for the Communicator 4.7 and 29.4 MB for the IE5. Netscape 6 has abandoned Communicator's HTML rendering engine in favour of the newer and nimbler Gecko browser technology, which makes it smaller and faster.

The interface now offers more customisation options than its competitors like My Sidebar, a collection of small, tabbed windows (Netscape calls them tabs) and some other user-friendly applications. Netscape 6 comes with customised mini-pages like the Web clipping service provided for Web-enabled mobile phones. Netscape says more than 400 tabs will be available at launch. It claims being user-friendly and if one doesn’t want to see My Sidebar; it collapses with a simple mouse click.

Netscape 6 is the first major update to Netscape's browser since AOL acquired the company in 1998. More importantly, however AOL could use the Netscape 6.0 technology in the client for its online service. Some features indicate AOL’s influence on Netscape. There’s My Sidebar tab that contains the Buddy List. This lets you send instant messages to other AOL/Netscape Instant Messenger subscribers from within the browser--and not just the browser on your computer. Buddy Lists are now stored on Netscape's servers, so you can access them from any IM-equipped PC.

Also when you send messages in Netscape Mail, the software checks for recipients on your Buddy List and if they're online, you can send an instant e-mail message and start a chat session. Netscape Mail can also send and receive your AOL e-mail—“The first third-party e-mail client ever to offer that service”. You can now manage multiple AOL and POP3 e-mail accounts, with separate in-boxes and folders for each one

Another popular feature is that when you read a message, Netscape automatically stores the sender's address so you can send them mail later by simply typing the name in the To: field when you start composing. Hence Netscape Mail works as a very usable basic e-mail client.

Netscape has tried to make searching as easy as possible, using keywords by getting results from AOL’s shopping search engine by using the URL bar. One can also hit a button to get additional results, which start with a list of sites reviewed in Netscape's Open Directory project- Those results also appear in the Search tab of My Sidebar, where they remain until you search on new keywords.

Another feature is that one can refine his search by category using Google, an effective search engine. You can also configure Netscape to search several sites at once, like MapQuest and Netscape Jobs. However, you can't choose a different search engine as the default one; you can only bookmark it. Also, Netscape 6 does not come with a large selection of preloaded bookmarks or even major search engines.

Netscape 6's security options are an improvement over Communicator 4.7's and that of IE5. You can automate site log-ins via a master password and set cookie controls on a site-by-site, cookie-by-cookie basis. Other features include Composer, a serviceable Web-page authoring tool, Net2Phone software for Internet phone calls; and a translation command for conjuring up computer-generated versions of Web pages in foreign languages.

Sadly enough, the preview release 1 does have the usual beta bugs, and other irritants. It lacks tool tips, which help to learn. So Netscape 6 may prove to be no exception in its difficulty to facing up to expectations of a new software

Netscape 6 is launching simultaneously for the Windows, Macintosh and Linux platforms, and the Gecko engine has no serious competition yet from Microsoft's Windows CE in the Web appliance universe, where Linux is rapidly gaining popularity. Actually two years ago Netscape started the Mozilla initiative, opening the browser's source code up to the public for input hoping a helping hand from programmers, the way they had given for Linux.

So even if Netscape 6 isn't your desktop browser choice, don't be surprised to see it on a TV set or mall kiosk in the next couple of years.