Mac

Windows

Note: requires MS Internet Explorer 5 or later.

IE Booster is a collection of accessories for Internet Explorer. It extends the context menu and adds a number of handy features that designers and developers will appreciate. By right-clicking on a page you can select from nine functions. There's a browser resizer, which lets you select from most standard screen sizes, a command to open frames in new or current windows, a title tag copier, a links lister and source code viewer.

Most useful of all are the commands that show forms and applets, stylesheets and images. The images feature lists all the current page's images together with source paths, dimensions, file size and overall size of the page itself. Other useful information is displayed with each tool including HTTP headers, cookies, session variables, last modified date and referring page.

Web link: www.paessler.com

Netscape 6.x has various enhancements to offer. The suite includes: Netscape Navigator, Netscape Mail, Netscape InstantMessenger, Netscape Composer, and Netscape Address Book; you also get add-on applications such as Java for running Web applets, Winamp for audio playback, RealPlayer8 for streaming media, and Macromedia Flash Player for high impact Web content.

This latest 'maintenance' release includes some enhancements and bug fixes.

You are advised to backup any important files such as address books and email folders before updating to this new version. Netscape also recommends that you install into a new directory – installing on top of released product builds may cause problems. Your computer system should have a minimum of a Pentium 233Mhz processor and 64Mb of RAM.

Web link: www.netscape.com

HTTrack is an offline browser utility that allows you to download a Web site from the Internet to a local directory, building recursively all directories, getting html, images and other files from the server to your computer. Then simply open a page of the 'mirrored' site in your browser, and you can browse as if viewing online. HTTrack can also update an existing mirrored site and resume interrupted downloads.

This update includes various enhancements and bug fixes.

Web link: www.httrack.com

Shareware

BlackWidow is a site scanner, site mapping tool, site ripper, site mirroring tool and offline browser. The tabbed interface features an integrated browser, site structure explorer and email, link, and thread reports. By specifying the file types you want to scan, BlackWidow maps the site for you. Once it's finished, you can select the files you want to download for later viewing or just see information on them. The program is good for checking for bad links, retrieving email addresses and verifying external links. The program will scan HTTP sites, SSL sites (HTTPS) and FTP sites.

Web link: www.softbytelabs.com

Free

ThemeWrap (© 2000-2001 German Bauer) is a tool that automates the creation of Netscape 6/6.1 Theme .jar files. To customise the look and feel of your browser, you can choose a built-in theme as a working theme directory, and browse your local disks for new graphical elements to introduce and work into a new design, which ThemeWrap can then export as a distributable JAR file (Netscape's Theme format) and HTML install page.

Official Netscape themes are a good place to start adaptations, because these tend to have clearly set subdirectories for each browser component. ThemeWrap simplifies the editing of all the CSS and image resources that define that component by allowing you to drag and drop new image resources and dynamically altering the underlying rules.

Web link: www.design4use.net

Note: this version displays banner-ads, which will be romoved if you purchase a licence.

There are numerous bugfixes and enhancements in this updated version, including: support for Internet keyboards and mice as well as other shortcuts; smooth scrolling; improved handling of bookmarks; and better support for certain printer drivers.

This 'Java' version includes the Sun Java plug-in.

Web link: www.opera.com

Free

This version of Microsoft's mighty Web browser includes improved support for DHTML behaviours, as well as additional support for vertical text and existing standards such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS 1). Also features additional support for the Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL). A print preview feature has been added, as well as improvements in printing performance and several Internet enhancements that will be included in the upcoming Windows Millennium Edition. This build introduces new language features in JScript and VBScript, and a frames re-architecture.

Web link: www.microsoft.com

Mac OS

NOTE: The Mac programs are mostly in archived 'HQX' (BinHex) files – they can be extracted with several applications, including Stuffit Expander (which is on the CD...). Clicking on the links below should set the process in motion. You may receive a message that the file cannot be loaded into Simple Text — if so, start Stuffit and then open the HQX file you want from within Stuffit.

Free

Here's an opportunity for you to take a different path from the big-name browsers. As an alternative Web browser OmniWeb will give you most of what you need. It is a native Cocoa application, which means that it is multi-threaded and takes full advantage of the new features of OS X. The program has an Aqua user interface, bookmarks with drag-and-drop functionality that can automatically check themselves for new content, forms that automatically remember their values when they are bookmarked, keyboard shortcuts for navigation and other tasks, shrink-to-fit window zooming, and more.

OmniWeb supports JavaScript, Flash, layers, QuickTime, SSL, CSS and Java applets, amongst others. OmniWeb is free to use, but registration is encouraged to facilitate the further development of the program.

Web link: www.omnigroup.com

Free

ThemeWrap (© 2000-2001 German Bauer) is a tool that automates the creation of Netscape 6/6.1 Theme .jar files. To customise the look and feel of your browser, you can choose a built-in theme as a working theme directory, and browse your local disks for new graphical elements to introduce and work into a new design, which ThemeWrap can then export as a distributable JAR file (Netscape's Theme format) and HTML install page.

Official Netscape themes are a good place to start adaptations, because these tend to have clearly set subdirectories for each browser component. ThemeWrap simplifies the editing of all the CSS and image resources that define that component by allowing you to drag and drop new image resources and dynamically altering the underlying rules.

Web link: www.design4use.net

'Adware'

Note: this version displays banner-ads, which will be romoved if you purchase a licence. There is an initial 30-day banner-free trial period.

Web link: www.opera.com

Free

Having dropped the 'Communicator' part of its name, the Netscape suite reaches version 6 with a major overhaul. New features include: an email client that lets you check a wide range of accounts, from AOL to Netscape Webmail; handy privacy tools, such as the Cookie Manager and Password Manager; builder tools that almost fully support the standards for HTML 4.0, XML 1.0, CSS1, key parts of CSS2, ECMA-262, and the Level 1 DOM; a customisable interface that offers built-in support for multiple skins or themes. Netscape 6 now incorporates AOL Instant Messenger directly into the interface.

The browser's engine has been fundamentally rebuilt, so version 6 is smaller and you may find it running faster than its predecessors.

You are advised to backup any important files such as address books and email folders before updating to this new version.

Another update to Microsoft's Web browser and Outlook Express. This final release version has a new look and includes various fixes making it more stable.