July 06, 2003
Software Free Dome
There's free software and then there's f-r-e-e software. The past week has seen oodles of new, updates. So here's my top 3 with a possible serious contender for crown of best IE-addon browser.
Mail for Free: Ultrafunk Popcorn 1.45B
Let's begin with a new Popcorn build, V1.45b. Besides the usual bug fixes and other code-level enhancements. It also supports APOP authentication used for secure login using MD5 digital signatures. Also improved is the "Mailbox info for all Profiles" dialog. This now lists just the mailbox, the mail and their total size instead of a the previous (v 1.35) complex calculation between previously polled mail and current mail box size. You can use a supplied Reg patch to make Popcorn the default mail editor; although I advise against it. The latest version adds an option for a user-definable spell check to the included mail editor. Popcorn's audio alerts too have been improved (wasted on this tester who's audio is more disabled than the opposite) available. Also new are options to poll accounts on startup and minimize on close (as well as minimise to system tray). My test run shows remarkable improvements in speed. You are now able to download mail headers, process them, read marked messages and delete mail much faster. System resource use is still very low -- under 4 MB -- for the features supported. And I found double-clicking a mail profile in the poll accounts dialog is a quick shortcut to the mailbox. Popcorn's also a neat apps to have when dealing with attachment-riddled email. Especially it reads all main as plain text. Which means that HTML is rendered in its pure code form. And attachments are read in pure MIME format as well. Frankly, using Popcorn (126 kB, Windows, freeware) before downloading my mail to OE means I can remove the fluff and chaff. And I'm far more intelligent and able to make snappier decisions that spam-control tools like SpamPal. Super-speedy Browser: Opera 7.20 Beta 1
The second significant software upgrade is that of Opera 7.20 that I have waited for with bated breath. This is available in both Windows and Linux versions. But having downloaded an early v7.20 Build 2981 copy (3 MB non-Java / 13.2 MB with Sun JRE; Windows, shareware), I'm disappointed. Barring a substantially improved M2 (mail and news client), I experienced lots of other small, but annoying problems. Opera 7.20 Beta 1's rendering engine is more intolerant than before of poor bandwidth or slow DNS resolution. Behaviour that's connected as well to CSS issues. Even Opera's own page was not immune to browser vagaries. It took me 3 refreshes just to get the page displaying as it should! The problem appears related to the Synchronous DNS setting and worked differently at different instances. I also experienced several Javascript-related errors. On the positive side, the M2 email and news client has certainly improved. It had fewer problems with IMAP mail accounts. Or with retrieving POP mail from one on my notoriously slow ISP accounts. And also managed to render HTML-format mail correctly; even in print. In-page image rendering too has really improved. I tested Opera 7.20 with cached sites in Google, as well as the actual URL. And didn't have long white-out periods on-screen. In one quick test, 28 images were rendered in under 48 seconds with an average throughput of 1.2 kbps. And an irritating Hot list bug that created new folders as branches of an existing folder has been resolved. As has bookmark import from pre-Opera 6.x versions. But I did experience several worrying Opera-induced system restarts. As well as 100% CPU utilization. And this Beta caused my Windows 2000 PC to crash not once, but 3 of the 7 times I used it prior to writing this column! I recommend a clean install instead of upgrading an existing version. If you upgrade you have to physically move the contents of ..\Programs\Plugins to ..\Plugins to get multimedia plug-ins like Flash and Java to work. Cool Zipper: PowerArchiver 2003
Winzip and WinRAR make way, this week too sees release of PowerArchiver 2003 v8.5; the ultimate archiving tool. This shareware (2.5 MB, Windows, Shareware) is the best compression client available. And has supported the Deflate64 standard far long than WinZip (whose v9 Beta supports the format). PowerArchiver also has other resource- and time-optimization features like a direct-to-zip option. And internal file viewer that supports many images and text formats. The new version is also much faster with a smoother interface that supports Windows XP ClearType. Competition for MyIE2?
There are several multi-document (tabbed view) browsers based in part on NetCaptor and on the latter's open-source clone: MyIE. The one most common to readers in my personal favorite: MyIE2. Others like AvantBrowser I find while feature rich have serious resource management that often causes Windows crashes. And then there's the recently released GreenBrowser. The closest MyIE clone that matches many of MyIE2 features. I'm still evaluating GreenBrowser to see if its really such a great tool. It seems frozen in development time on several fronts. Support for skins is poor; all you can change is the background. And the user-interface is not as evolved as MyIE2 today. The browser also trips on certain security flaws that MyIE2 traps and recovers from. But GreenBrowser (390 kB, Windows, freeware) is pretty good for the average surfer. There's a search box very much like Opera's; complete with a drop-down list of search engines. And like Opera (and Mozilla), a searched term appears in the current window. GreenBrowser also scores on resource use. And even with 8 windows open, the minimized footprint was a mere 1.6 MB. Compared to MyIE2's 4 MB and Opera 7.20's 8.5 MB. The app shoots to the system tray even when you close it. And supports IE extensions by default. Click to Mail Me Now!
Let's begin with a new Popcorn build, V1.45b. Besides the usual bug fixes and other code-level enhancements. It also supports APOP authentication used for secure login using MD5 digital signatures. Also improved is the "Mailbox info for all Profiles" dialog. This now lists just the mailbox, the mail and their total size instead of a the previous (v 1.35) complex calculation between previously polled mail and current mail box size. You can use a supplied Reg patch to make Popcorn the default mail editor; although I advise against it. The latest version adds an option for a user-definable spell check to the included mail editor. Popcorn's audio alerts too have been improved (wasted on this tester who's audio is more disabled than the opposite) available. Also new are options to poll accounts on startup and minimize on close (as well as minimise to system tray). My test run shows remarkable improvements in speed. You are now able to download mail headers, process them, read marked messages and delete mail much faster. System resource use is still very low -- under 4 MB -- for the features supported. And I found double-clicking a mail profile in the poll accounts dialog is a quick shortcut to the mailbox. Popcorn's also a neat apps to have when dealing with attachment-riddled email. Especially it reads all main as plain text. Which means that HTML is rendered in its pure code form. And attachments are read in pure MIME format as well. Frankly, using Popcorn (126 kB, Windows, freeware) before downloading my mail to OE means I can remove the fluff and chaff. And I'm far more intelligent and able to make snappier decisions that spam-control tools like SpamPal. Super-speedy Browser: Opera 7.20 Beta 1
The second significant software upgrade is that of Opera 7.20 that I have waited for with bated breath. This is available in both Windows and Linux versions. But having downloaded an early v7.20 Build 2981 copy (3 MB non-Java / 13.2 MB with Sun JRE; Windows, shareware), I'm disappointed. Barring a substantially improved M2 (mail and news client), I experienced lots of other small, but annoying problems. Opera 7.20 Beta 1's rendering engine is more intolerant than before of poor bandwidth or slow DNS resolution. Behaviour that's connected as well to CSS issues. Even Opera's own page was not immune to browser vagaries. It took me 3 refreshes just to get the page displaying as it should! The problem appears related to the Synchronous DNS setting and worked differently at different instances. I also experienced several Javascript-related errors. On the positive side, the M2 email and news client has certainly improved. It had fewer problems with IMAP mail accounts. Or with retrieving POP mail from one on my notoriously slow ISP accounts. And also managed to render HTML-format mail correctly; even in print. In-page image rendering too has really improved. I tested Opera 7.20 with cached sites in Google, as well as the actual URL. And didn't have long white-out periods on-screen. In one quick test, 28 images were rendered in under 48 seconds with an average throughput of 1.2 kbps. And an irritating Hot list bug that created new folders as branches of an existing folder has been resolved. As has bookmark import from pre-Opera 6.x versions. But I did experience several worrying Opera-induced system restarts. As well as 100% CPU utilization. And this Beta caused my Windows 2000 PC to crash not once, but 3 of the 7 times I used it prior to writing this column! I recommend a clean install instead of upgrading an existing version. If you upgrade you have to physically move the contents of ..\Programs\Plugins to ..\Plugins to get multimedia plug-ins like Flash and Java to work. Cool Zipper: PowerArchiver 2003
Winzip and WinRAR make way, this week too sees release of PowerArchiver 2003 v8.5; the ultimate archiving tool. This shareware (2.5 MB, Windows, Shareware) is the best compression client available. And has supported the Deflate64 standard far long than WinZip (whose v9 Beta supports the format). PowerArchiver also has other resource- and time-optimization features like a direct-to-zip option. And internal file viewer that supports many images and text formats. The new version is also much faster with a smoother interface that supports Windows XP ClearType. Competition for MyIE2?
There are several multi-document (tabbed view) browsers based in part on NetCaptor and on the latter's open-source clone: MyIE. The one most common to readers in my personal favorite: MyIE2. Others like AvantBrowser I find while feature rich have serious resource management that often causes Windows crashes. And then there's the recently released GreenBrowser. The closest MyIE clone that matches many of MyIE2 features. I'm still evaluating GreenBrowser to see if its really such a great tool. It seems frozen in development time on several fronts. Support for skins is poor; all you can change is the background. And the user-interface is not as evolved as MyIE2 today. The browser also trips on certain security flaws that MyIE2 traps and recovers from. But GreenBrowser (390 kB, Windows, freeware) is pretty good for the average surfer. There's a search box very much like Opera's; complete with a drop-down list of search engines. And like Opera (and Mozilla), a searched term appears in the current window. GreenBrowser also scores on resource use. And even with 8 windows open, the minimized footprint was a mere 1.6 MB. Compared to MyIE2's 4 MB and Opera 7.20's 8.5 MB. The app shoots to the system tray even when you close it. And supports IE extensions by default. Click to Mail Me Now!
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