NetScape standards, 2.0 features, and purple pages

[William Shipley]

OmniWeb 2.0 doesn't highlight destination anchors (same as NetScape), so  
you won't see pages of underlined purple text.

Phew!

On NetScape compatibility: you could rewrite the HTML parsing in OmniWeb  
and load it in as a bundle, but to be honest it'd be a huge pile of  
work.  HTML parsing is a lot harder than you might expect.  Imagine  
writing an app where data files not only might be corrupt, but you are  
expected to handle any level of corruption by figuring out what the  
author really intended.  Consider this link:  
http://www.netscape.com/comprod/products/navigator/version_2.0/index.html.  
 This is at NetScape, and they have a <DT> outside of a <DL> about  
halfway down the page.  THESE GUYS WRITE BROWSERS FOR A LIVING.  Imagine  
the other stuff we have to accept.

I digress.  Our intended mode of extending HTML is for the user to  
categorize our parser in order to add new tags.  With respect to  
selecting between strict HTML and NetScape extensions, for the most part  
the interpreting the NetScape extensions doesn't hurt the way we  
interpret normal pages, so there's no point in turning them off.  One  
exception to this is tables, and the guy who's writing that says he  
accepts all three standards (NetScape, HTML3, and I don't know the third)  
and draws them all correctly.

With regards to our understanding NetScape extensions: our bug-tester  
has two machines on her desk, and is running OmniWeb 2.0 in one and  
NetScape 2.0 in the other.  Any time she sees a difference she logs a  
bug.  (Yes, we do frames.  They rule.)

Sad, but true.  Hey, 1.4 billion dollars can't be wrong, can it?

In other news, on  
http://www.omnigroup.com/Software/OmniWeb/features2.html you'll find the  
list (so far) of new features in 2.0.  I may have forgotten some stuff.   
If you have something you particularly loved that didn't make it in, go  
ahead and write me; I may have done it and forgotten about it, and I may  
get it in for 2.1 (which should be in Marchish).

On the beta that I promised today: we're close, but not quite.  I'll  
post an announcement as soon as it comes to pass.  Note that the beta  
will be an expiring demo (check the license panel for how long you have),  
although 2.0 final will ship with a free non-expiring single-user  
license, just like 1.0.

-Wil