I’ve just changed some text on our download page relating to Mac OS 9 users. The old text recommended Mozilla 1.2.1; the new text says:
Due to the lack of developer interest, build machines, compilers and
testing resources, the last mozilla.org software built for Mac OS 9
was Mozilla 1.2.1, released in December 2002.
However, versions of our software that old are not recommended for
security reasons. Therefore, for Mac OS 9 users, mozilla.org
recommends iCab – which is, as far as we
know, the only graphical browser currently maintained for Mac OS 9.
After a quick discussion, the security group concluded that this was the best thing to do for Mac OS 9 users. My suggestion to them was prompted by a newsgroup message or forum post somewhere, although I’ve forgotten where it was. So if it was you who came up with the idea, thanks :-)
It is a shame that no-one has picked up the baton and continued development of Mozilla for OS9. There are unofficial builds of 1.3.1, but as you say, these have security vulnerabilities that haven’t been fixed, and it’s only fair that you recommend a more secure alternative.
The one thing I really like about iCab is that you can make sure that web sites cannot move the browser window or resize it. I wish this functionality was in Firefox 1.5.0.0. (Or possibly is it and I could not find it?)
Deacon:
/options/content/advanced… (next to enable javascript)
Deacon Nikolai: Edit | Preferences (or Tools | Options) | Content tab | Advanced… button next to “Enable JavaScript | uncheck “Move or resize existing windows”.
I think it was me that suggested it. :) Someone had emailed staff back on the 5th asking why the first page they got when they ran 1.2.1 on Mac OS 9 thanked them for becoming a tester when they were just an end-user, and I recommended not using it at all in favor of iCab in my reply, which is probably what you remember seeing.
My recommendation was based on the info I found at http://darrel.knutson.com/mac/www/browsers.html
That was it!
So, the security of the proprietary iCab program (which is unknowable) is recommendable above recommending that a team of interested programmers port a more recent Firefox to MacOS 9? Didn’t the recent discovery of spyware in iTunes teach MacOS users that proprietary software is untrustworthy by default? What else is iTunes doing behind your back? What about the other proprietary programs used to run iTunes; what are they doing that users might not want done without their explicit consent? You’ll either never know or you’ll learn too late to have stopped it from doing those things. You’ll also not be able to legally (perhaps technically as well, regardless of how expert you are) change the program to make it stop doing those things in the future.
With the exception of your columns, for which I am grateful, I know that the Mozilla Foundation is not interested in talking about software freedom. They make this clear when they talk about “browser choice” (an argument I’ve laid out before) and side with the Open Source movement—a movement which was designed to not bring up software freedom, but instead talk about issues of interest chiefly to business—that software developed in the Open Source methodology can be developed faster, for less money, and be less buggy than other software. Both the browser choice argument and the argument framed on development price, development speed, and lack of bugs are untrue. “Open Source” software has its share of bugs, some programs are developed remarkably slower, and some proprietary programs cost no money and therefore offer no price disadvantage to their “Open Source” counterparts.
This recommendation reminds me of why I stick with Free Software—it respects my freedom to run, inspect, share, and modify software (or get someone I can trust to do work for me).
J.B.: Do you have any idea what a mammoth task it would be to port Firefox back to OS 9? We didn’t abandon Mozilla on that platform for no reason, you know. It was taking significant resources of a dedicated team at Netscape to keep the port going, and also holding everyone else back because we had to maintain yet another build system. At this stage, you’d also need to port a significant number of build tools, and make a heck of a lot of code changes to cope with the architectural differences of OS 9 (on which I am not an expert, but I know they exist).
Over the past three years, no-one has stepped forward to do this work. What makes you think things will be different now? Recommending iCab is clearly the right thing to do for users who want an actively-maintained browser for their OS.
If you want to look at things from a Free Software perspective, why are you not recommending that these Mac OS 9 users upgrade to a free operating system as a first step? Then, they could have all the free software they wanted. It is said, rightly, that over time the value of all non-free software approaches zero. That’s happening to Mac OS 9, and there’s nothing the Mozilla Foundation can do about it.
Oh ho ho ho. Blake very specifically laughed at this one when it was suggested in 2002. As an extension it would be nice, but I’m sure Web Developer or whatever already includes this.
– Chris
Html Validator [1] [2] displays a green checkmark in the status bar if the page is good, a yellow warning if there were errors that it (Tidy) could fix or a red X if there were errors it couldn’t fix.
I had to uninstall it because it was causing crashes on some pages, though. That was version 0.7.6, I have yet to try 0.7.7.
[1] http://users.skynet.be/mgueury/mozilla/
[2] https://addons.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?application=firefox&category=Developer%20Tools&id=249
I like iCab, it’s a good browser. Which is more than I can say on either count for ANY of the alternatives. Though Omniweb does try. No offense but, Firefox is an absurdly distant second place in terms of UI and overall features, love the marklets though. Lucky you have Safari and Opera for OS X to keep you out of last place.
I’m serious, Mosaic’s been dead for about a decade didn’t you guys get the memo?
You know what’d be cool? iCab’s UI and features on top of gecko or webkit.
Gervase Markham: I’m not blaming you personally or the Mozilla Foundation for stopping development on MacOS 9. I don’t blame anyone for that decision. What’s important is to continue to distribute a Free Software browser so that if anyone wants to put in the work of porting the software elsewhere, they can (or they can hire someone to do this work for them). The Mozilla Foundation and you personally are distributing Free Software and that’s the chief reason I recommend Firefox to everyone I know for their web browsing. While I don’t agree with the Mozilla Foundation’s choice of movement to side with, the recommendation of iCab is interesting with respect to what that means for pursuing software freedom and running more secure software.
I appreciate the size of the job to port Firefox to MacOS 9; it is as you say a big job. Further disincentivizing people from the task, it would probably go unappreciated by most MacOS users because most users of that OS have moved to MacOS X. But how much work it would take the Mozilla Foundation to do this job isn’t important because they’re not doing that work. No matter how big the job is (and it can’t be as big of a job as writing an entire OS was a little over 20 years ago when GNU started) this burden will be borne by others, so perhaps the Mozilla Foundation could offer sincere thanks and an offer of hosting or something relatively low-maintenance to any individual or group that shows the initiative of doing the job.
This discussion was initially framed along the line of security (Mozilla 1.2.1 is not recommended for security reasons). So, the recommendation that one pick an uninspectable, unmodifiable, unsharable program to do this job does stick out both in itself and in light of what is acceptable in the Open Source movement.
J.B.: when we dropped Mac OS 9, we offered the sincere thanks and hosting (and other support) to anyone who wanted to take up the baton and continue development. But there was no-one then and there is no-one now.
Updating 1.2.1 to fix all the known security issues might be a lesser task than porting Firefox, and the same offer would be open to anyone who wanted to try that.
The choice is between a browser with known security problems (Mozilla 1.2.1), and one with no known security problems (iCab). Are there security holes in iCab? Almost certainly. Is a user safer using iCab than the currently-available builds of Mozilla 1.2.1? Definitely.
As you know, I believe free software is important. But I believe it’s important because of what it empowers people to do, and the abilities it gives them. Free software is a means, not an end. I would recommend free software over non-free software if it was less functional. But I will not recommend free software over non-free software to a non-programmer if using the free software exposes them to a significantly higher risk of having their machine turned into a zombie. That’s not the sort of empowerment I want free software to permit!
The recommendation, of course, is being made in the context of an already bad situation – the person is using a proprietary OS. Given that they have chosen to do that, there’s less one can do to help them than otherwise. RMS, for example, would not have to make this decision because his advice would be to obtain a better, free OS, and perhaps even a better computer to run it on (are there free software OSes maintained for the 68k? Debian?). And that would be good advice. If I rule out those options, I’m left with the decision above.
Z80, go! There�s Uzix, for MSX :).
Gervase Markham: I’m not blaming you personally or the Mozilla Foundation for stopping development on MacOS 9. I don’t blame anyone for that decision. What’s important is to continue to distribute a Free Software browser so that if anyone wants to put in the work of porting the software elsewhere, they can (or they can hire someone to do this work for them). The Mozilla Foundation and you personally are distributing Free Software and that’s the chief reason I recommend Firefox to everyone I know for their web browsing. While I don’t agree with the Mozilla Foundation’s choice of movement to side with, the recommendation of iCab is interesting with respect to what that means for pursuing software freedom and running more secure software.
I appreciate the size of the job to port Firefox to MacOS 9; it is as you say a big job. Further disincentivizing people from the task, it would probably go unappreciated by most MacOS users because most users of that OS have moved to MacOS X. But how much work it would take the Mozilla Foundation to do this job isn’t important because they’re not doing that work. No matter how big the job is (and it can’t be as big of a job as writing an entire OS was a little over 20 years ago when GNU started) this burden will be borne by others, so perhaps the Mozilla Foundation could offer sincere thanks and an offer of hosting or something relatively low-maintenance to any individual or group that shows the initiative of doing the job.