[arachne] Re: Arachne for Windows

Arachne at FreeLists---The Arachne Fan Club!


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> On Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:39:22 +0000, Udo Kuhnt wrote:
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>> As we all know, MP considered DOS to be an OS for the poor, and Arachne
>> a web browser for the poor, and the only reason why it does not support
>> some advanced features of web browsers for other Operating Systems is
>> that he thought that the old machines of those he considered his target
>> group would not be able to make use of those, anyway.


MP started work on Arachne because as a poor student in Prague he
had only a 386 with 8 megs. More advanced computers than that were
then quite expensive, especially in Eastern Europe. He has said that
if he had had better hardware he never would have bothered with DOS.
He thought Arachne would be useful to people like himself.

>> He also thought of Arachne as a vehicle of introducing the Wonderful
>> World Of Linux to those who did not know anything apart from DOS, and
>> was very disappointed when the Linux version did not become as
>> successful as he had expected.


The Linux version was abandoned almost at the very beginning of it's
development. I think MP saw that Arachne needed to be completely
rewritten if it was to be really successful as a Linux program. He
talked for awhile about his ideas for "Arachne 2.0" but the need to
earn a living took his attention elsewhere.

He stopped using DOS and often said that he "no longer had a DOS
computer". His business became networking and the internet and being
able to afford better computers he migrated to Linux exclusively. I
think he saw no way to make a buck with Arachne, either in DOS or in
Linux.

It's hard to imagine that Linux needs another browser. And Arachne's
developer thought there was no widespread future for DOS or he
certainly would not have abandoned both DOS and Arachne. We're
lucky that Glenn and others were able to convince MP to release
Arachne GPL.

I still use Arachne on my old 386, but I realize it's just a hobby
for me, like playing Bach on a vintage harpsichord.




                  Arachne at FreeLists                  
-- Arachne, The Premier GPL Web Browser/Suite for DOS --

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