Here is a strange site…if anyone else can figure out exactly what the hell the point of it is, please let me know.
My only comment is that a DHTML scramble is probably not the most user-friendly way to display news headlines. Oh yeah, and also, usually a news “headline” is associated with some kind of “story” that can then be linked to and read…I couldn’t find that feature here. I don’t think MSNBC is sweating these guys.
Okay. So Hotline provided me with Internet Explorer 5b1 long before it was released to the general Mac-using webpublic. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t surprised with the final release. From what I can tell so far this MS product is actually a worthwhile download. Just a few of its high and low points:
Good:
1. At only around 8MB is size, it’s even possible for the average 56k modem user to download within a reasonable time.
2. It seems that that pesky memory leak in the beta versions has mercifully vanished.
3. The fact that the Address Autocomplete is finally up to par with what Windows users have had for ages (and it’s even translucent! Wow! Just like Windows 2000 menus! Where do you suppose they got that idea?
4. That page holder is nifty for the intranet I use every day but don’t want as my start page.
5. The interface is all Aquafied and lined like an iMac. It’s actually a pretty good looking browser. You can even change the color. I don’t know why you would, though, because….
6. It autoselects its color to reflect the color of the computer it’s installed on… (I’ve only seen it automatically be blue on a blue and white G3 and graphite on a G4… If it can select the interface color to match the iMac it’s installed on, that would be interesting).
7. Again something Windows users have had: you can now have folders of links on your toolbar now, not just links. This is actually really handy… assuming you spend your time organizing your bookmarks.. which would, let’s face it, be more than a little pathetic.
8. For all you Flash developers out there, it seems that IE5 now FINALLY understands Javascript passed from within a .swf file. You have no idea how long I spent trying (and failing) to get standard popup windows to work in IE4.5.
Bad:
1. While it has a tighter rendering engine than any other Mac browser, I have had some problems with it selectively ignoring top and left margin=0 commands in my body tag. You hit reload, and it obeys, reload again, and it’s back to faulty code rendering.. not something I’m too happy about.
2. It has a fondness for ignoring the bold tag… That’s not too cool either.
That’s about it. Only a couple problems.. (although it’s taken my system down a couple of times… might be an extension thing.. I’m still figuring that out. And I’ve had a few suspicious Error Type 11 failures with not IE, but other applications that NEVEr crash. Like SimpleText.). Those problem are pretty annoying, though. We’ll see if MS can get a patch out relatively quickly (ha!).
Hey kev…here’s that $300 PC you were looking for…eMachines eTower – Cyrix M-2 366, $299.00 at PCMall.
Okay. Anyone who’s ever needed something to inspire them ( a broad statement, I know) in the realm of either programming or design, check this out:
http://www.soda.co.uk/soda/constructor/index.htm
Seriously. EVERYONE NEEDS TO SEE THIS.
SO I am a lone MAC user in a 100+ co. that runs all windows & NT. After completing a multimedia project for a trade show using powerpoint (which sucks) with embedded quicktime movies and animations running millions of colors and 30fps, there was a request to use a wintel machine for the show. The project was created on a G4 400, and with 50 megs RAM dedicated to powerpoint, the presentation ran smooth and seamless. Well, I tried running a few of the animations (which I DOWNSAMPLED) on a few pc’s, and this P3 650Mhz with a 16Meg graphic accelerator just choked. So I tried about four other systems and got even worse results. So in the end I had my mac at the trade show and have ammo to lob at the engineering kooks. Feel free to Send your support
Well… the experiments have been completed, and the verdict is in:
The BeOS runs on a G3/4 based Mac running VirtualPC.
Only there’s one problem: It sucks. The speed is hardly what you’d expect from Be (even running on an emulated processor; Win98 is faster) and the graphics cards aren’t supported (at least natively). So you end up with a slow OS in black and white at only 640×480. That about wraps it up for me and my Be fantasy. Maybe I can find a $300 PC to run it on….
Another brilliant advancement in law enforcement. Apparently in England they are going to start scanning people’s airplane tickets for cocaine and heroin.
What exactly are they going to do when they find some? Arrest you because you let some coke fiend handle your boarding pass? The next time I go to England I hope I remember to roll my ticket up in a tube shape and dip one end in powdered sugar.
For those of you who care… Be, Inc announced FreeBeOS 5 today. In case the name isn’t enough clue: It’s BeOS 5. And it’s free. To download. http://free.be.com. If you can get in, that is. I keep having problems connecting to the site.
Now, because the new BeOS is strictly software based (no disks used to install) I’m willing to bet it can be run on a G3 or G4. Here’s how:
1. Seeing as how all BeOS releases from here on out are going to be x86 based, install Connectix VirtualPC on your machine
2. Using your newly installed Win98, download BeOS from the aforementioned URL.
3. Because BeOS runs solely within Windows (but not really… it’s complicated) I bet you can fool it into thinking you’ve got a POS Intel processor.
I will post my results when I can get a socket connections to be.com. If anyone tries this and fails/succeeds, please let us know. You can post to your heart’s content in the Alternate forum.
I’ve been using the beta version of the new Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 for Macintosh over the last few months and I have been extremely satisfied with its performance and stability. I think for once it might be possible that the folks over at Microsoft are actually thinking straight… or maybe they are just scared of the competition and its keeping them on their toes. Anyhow, I think the things people want in a browser are a decent looking customizable interface, fast rendering times, a small file size, a free download, and fairly standard HTML rendering. I think it might just be available for download right here a day before its actual announced release.
[ tell me how wrong I am in the forum ]
