Web Browsers - timeline

The timeline of web browsers shown here seems to be very useful. I can think about the following ways, the information can be utilized.

1. Details of all the existing / non-existing web browsers and their version release periods
   
2. The ways in which different web browsers have evolved and their ancestors
3. Maturity levels of the browsers
4. etc. (there may be more)
   

I couldn't find the famous text based 'lynx' browser (found in Linux OS) in the timeline. May be it was not considered as a web browser?

Opera Mini - mobile browser

While I was in Sweden, I met Ms. Malin Rundberg, Project Manager of Opera Mini software, at Graziela's (our Development Manager) birthday party. We had a good chat about various things for some time. One of the topics was about the Opera Mini, the free mobile browser.

I use Nokia 6230 and I had been using its default browser to access the internet over GPRS. At the party Malin recommended me to use the Opera Mini, not just because she is the Project Manager of it, but it has got some nice features. When she was telling the features of the software, I was thinking like, 'how did I miss this nice piece of software?'. I decided to try this when I'm back home.

I downloaded the software and I have been using it for a while. It's amazing! If I say the truth, now I don't like to open my phone's default browser at all. I recommend this software for everybody around and I should thank Malin for introducing me to this application.
This is how you install the product (phone should support java applications):

1. Open the default mobile browser and connect to the internet
2. Access the site www.operamini.com
3. Download the software by clicking the appropriate link
4. Allow the phone to install the java application
5. Exit your phone browser, now the application has been installed.

Opening the browser is as easy as running a java application in the phone. Just select the 'Opera Mini' from the phone's applications collection and let it to connect to the internet (you will be prompted to allow network access). Now you can play with it.

Firefox themes

Today I came accross this nice blog entry, which has listed almost all the currently available firefox themes with the screen shots and the download links.

I have been using Noia 2.0 (eXtreme) and its one of my favourites. A clean yet cool interface. Changes are very important in human lives, and they must be there in my firefox browser which I use more than any other apps. So, Today I plan to make a switch to the 'Metal Lion (vista)' theme.

May be, I would feel like I have had installed a new browser :-)

Firefox Themes in an overview

End of the Internet - from Google

To check the new items in Google Reader, I use the bookmark ('Next>>'), provided by the site. Today, when I clicked my bookmark, I saw the bookmark was redirected to this URL; http://www.google.com/reader/next?go=noitems. Obviously it has the meaning that I don't have any new items to read. But a funny page was displayed with a link to an interesting page.

And this is the page to what the 'End of the Internet' link is pointing to.

By curiosity, I checked the registration information for the domain SHIBUMI.ORG (where the page is hosted) and its not registered to Google. Google, points to an external link as the end point of it service... isn't it interesting?

Backtrack the history of websites

How long have you been on the internet? How long you have been accessing a famous web site like Yahoo or Google? Can you tell how those popular web sites have developed over the time (last 10 years or so)?

I'm using the internet since late 99, but now I couldn't backtrack my memory to get a clear picture of their look and feel at that time. I think this would be case for everybody out there. It is difficult because the internet is intangible and people rarely save even the screen shots of these sites.

Don't you feel excited to see how the famous Yahoo! web site looked like in 1996, 2000, 2004 and today (2007).






How about the Google home page in 98? Thats when Google first appeared as a search engine on internet.









A wonderful web site Wayback Machine, powered by Internet Archive, is the magic behind all these screen captures. It provides browsable archive of the web sites since 1996. The archive consists of multiple versions of the web site arranged in yearly basis and whenever the web site is updated a new version is created.

If a web site is missing there, its possible to submit manually too. They claim that it will be available within next 6 months.