AOL Releases Client for Mac OS X with Gecko Browser

DietFluffy writes "America Online released an update to their Mac OS X client. The built-in browser is powered by Gecko! However, America Online plans to stick with Internet Explorer for their Windows client. Will this make web designers think twice about tailoring their web pages to Internet Explorer? Or will they ignore this, given that the Windows client will still have Internet Explorer as the default browser?" And if this goes well, will the Windows version eventually use a Gecko-based browser, too?

Curious, this choice...

[ites]

Trying something new for a niche platform
makes sense when looking at the market.
AOL does not need browser wars...
but it needs to regain control of its user base.
If AOL is smart it will test the waters
before jumping in.
Consider Gecko on Mac to be a prototype for
a new AOL version for Windows.

pop-ups

[NASAKnight]

Does this mean AOLers can finally get rid of those stupid pop-up adds that AOL spews out at startup?

Been aol free for 3 years, and I'd never go back

Re:Mozilla.

[sjgman9]

It is a great deal faster than Mozilla on OSX. I tried it on a G3 iMac yesterday. AOL doesnt use the chrome interface, so that helps. Lets hope this can be done for Windows as well.

The browser wars would still be going on if this happened 3 or so years ago. Now better than never

Re:8.0 Uses Gecko

[jmu1]

Based on what information? Do you have a URL? As I've heard it on NPR several times that they won't be switching.

if AOL knows what's good for it

[Ender Ryan]

If AOL wants to remain in existence, AOL needs to help topple the MS monopoly, first in browsers and then the desktop OS would help.

The DOJ isn't going to do anything to MS, MS will be allowed to continue doing business how they please. Pretty soon, MS is going to start pushing MSN even harder. People will buy their PC and it will come with an MSN subscription and will come preconfigured to connect to the Internet via MSN. It will most likely use completely proprietary windows only connection and communication protocols. All software that people need will come on their PC, and they'll pay per use or rent monthly, and pay via their MSN bill.

Whether that really happens that way or not is yet to be seen, but the danger to AOL from MS/MSN is very obvious, and if AOL wants to stay in business they had better start pushing to bring MS down off it's pedestal.

AOL could start by spending less money giving me coasters, and use standard connection protocols, etc.

Most people who use AOL continue to use AOL because that's what they've been using for a long time... AOL needs to start worrying about it's future.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Web Developers will stick with IE

[squaretorus]

The reason being that its easy. Most clients of web companies use PCs with the latest version of XP and IE installed - why?

Because its easy. IE has its flaws, but its pretty much universal and good enough. With .NET you can actually SMELL the IE bias as soon as you start building a page. This keep development costs down and delivery schedules easy to estimate.

By building for IE and offering to 'do a mac version if you get complaints / lose customers' most web houses cover their arse while keeping it simple. And the carrot? 'Its cheap as chips to do in IE, but a bitch to do cross browser - so it'll costs lots more - it'll be cheaper in the long run to do two versions, and you probably wont need the second version anyway!'

IE is here to stay.

Re:8.0 Uses Gecko

[prwood]

http://webmaster.info.aol.com/index.cfm?article=6& expand=0&sitenum=2

This is in AOL's webmaster info area.

Look in the fourth row of the table, marked "CompuServe Versions Possible" - and in the last column. You can see that in CompuServe 7.0, they are using Netscape 6.x, which is Mozilla, which is Gecko.

Still can't find my agent url, but that table is proof from AOL's mouth that at least one of their products incorporates Gecko.

Re:Do we hate AOL today?

[psicE]

Well, do we hate Apple?

I have good reason for predicting that, within a year, Apple will buy AOL from AOLTW.

Right now, "convergence" is out. Convergence-based companies, like Vivendi, Time Warner, Disney, Viacom, and more are looking extremely bad. Many of them are on the verge of breaking up.

So let's say Time Warner breaks up. They put publishing and print-based materials in one company (Time), and multimedia/interactive materials in another company (Warner). That leaves America Online; the service that Apple went to special lengths to enable on Mac; the service that powers Apple's new iChat; and the service that now offers the Gecko browser by default on Mac.

Why wouldn't Apple jump to buy America Online, integrating it with OS X, and morphing the Mac AOL client into both a new, fully standards-compliant Galeon-style browser, and a new, fully standards-compliant MSN Explorer-style browser? They've got the money, after all, being one of two profitable computer companies. I think it'll happen.

Aren't they already ignored?

[Lethyos]

As far as I recall, web designers/builders/maintainers/whatevers have traditionally ignored AOL, passing them off as irrelevant (for a variety of reasons from the custom browser they used to use, to the fact that AOL users are stupid by stereotype). To answer the question posted in the story, yes, I think the trends towards developing for Internet Explorer will (sadly) continue, for two reasons. First, the irrelevance AOL is considered to embody (read up), and second, because web design doesn't pay what it used to. As a result, those who want web sites built want them built as quickly as possible. Making cross-platform web sites is more expensive than IE-only.

It's still good to see yet another large company "support" open source software... Even if they do nothing other than lend credibility to a particular project.

I wish my competitors ignored AOL...

[alexhmit01]

AOL is the SINGLE most important demographic for anyone in the B2C space. They are followed closely by people that use MSN's search engine. People that use Yahoo's search engine are a distant third.

People that run NS6/Mozilla are meaningless. Google searchers with any browser are kinda worthless.

NS4 users are important, you get people at work at low-tech companies.

I mean, it depends what you are doing. If you are building crazy flash sites with loud annoying noises, ignore AOL. My sites try to make money, like hell I'll ignore the largest contingent of shoppers, just because people think that they are stupid.

I'll take an semi-illiterate user running AOL 5.0 on an 800x600 monitor visiting my site over a "1337 Linux Hacker" running a Mozilla beta shopping me and 12 competitors to save 50 cents...

Alex

Re:8.0 Uses Gecko

[jmccay]

Compuserve and AOL are two different things. AOL has more freedom to change things on Compuserve. AOL is obligated to keep IE in the AOL code in order to keep there icon on the desktop with windows installs. Microsoft & AOL went to blows about it a year or so ago. Now that Mozilla 1.0 has been released though, AOL has a lot more power when it comes to bargaining because they can switch to mature open source code if they get removed from the desktop on windows installs. If I remember correctly, I think it was a four year agreement.

Re:pop-ups

[Jay L]

I doubt it, as I understand it the popup killing code is part of Netscape/Mozilla not Gecko the rendering engine.

Wouldn't matter anyway, as those popups are rendered by the AOL client, not the browser. (Even if they're HTML windows now, they're still launched by the client, not other browser windows.)

However, that doesn't matter, because since 1996 you have been able to disable all popups at keyword MARKETING PREFS.