> I read the article at http://www.techweb.com/wire/story/TWB19980402S0013
> where Dreessen apparently remarks that he envisions Netscape (Mozilla)
> and Linux fused for life. He suggests that Mozilla could become the
> "GUI that runs on top of Linux," as the article says.
I was there :)
At any rate, I have a difficulty envisioning Netscape as a "GUI that
runs on top of Linux". Even if this happens, there are plenty of
different GUI's that one can run on top of Linux to choose from. I can't
really envision a situation like 95 or NT where booting the OS means
semantically the same thing as booting the GUI (Netscape).
Surely, parts of Netscape (now that the source is out) might be used for
parts of a GUI interface running on top of X, since parts of Netscape to
do various desktop functions already exist.
Also, I wanted to ask this at the SVLUG meeting where Marc Andreesen spoke,
but there wasn't time -- we had to get on the buses to SF to make it for
the party. Anyway, I'm wondering how well Netscape can coexist with the
trend (as I see it) of embedding browser technology in other GUIs (K
Desktop, for instance). KDE has facilities like seamless automatic HTTP
and FTP built right into the filemanager. Being network-aware -- surely
this seems to be the future of the desktop. So, where does that leave
Netscape, since much of the browser functionality will be in the desktop
to begin with?
Perhaps the functionality will be taken _from_ netscape and put into the
existing desktop environments (improving them) rather than netscape evolving
into a fully fledged GUI.
> Is it just me, or does this sound like Windows 98 and MS Explorer? Is
> Netscape trying to gain a controlling arm in the Freeware world?
I don't see that. In fact, I really don't have a problem with MS bundling
their browser. You do need something to do http right out of the box if you
go Windows, and you'd end up downloading IE or Netscape (or perhaps something
else) to do that. Personally, perhaps MS ought to be bundling more stuff with
their OS, not less. After installing something like Red Hat and seeing just
what stuff is _missing_ from an install of Windows vs. a full install of
Red Hat is amazing, to say the least. And, the Windows user will end up
having to get all that stuff (or get whatever subset of stuff they have
interest in).
> Independence
> of each individual Free software product from other products, so that
I'm not really sure if this is an issue. There are a lot of free software
products that depend on other free software products. Perhaps I'm misunder-
standing your point though.
> lane
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David E. Fox Tax Thanks for letting me
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