[arachne] Re: User-friendliness or lack thereof in Arachne

Arachne at FreeLists---The Arachne Fan Club!

Hi Udo,
                  I just want you to know that there are some users
of Arachne who are glad or who don't really want Arachne
to do some of those functions that you mentioned.  I don't
have any love for a "mouse" and my DOS machine does
not install the mouse connected to it. I am looking at that
mouse right now and it is covered with dust. So, all those
clicky things you want, I don't want because they will make
the Arachne core bigger.
   I do wish that I could do secure transactions with Arachne,
and if it could do Javascript then life would be easier.        

Eric

On Fri, 27 Jan 2006 17:41:50 +0000 "Udo Kuhnt"
<048321887-0001@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
> Arachne at FreeLists---The Arachne Fan Club!
> 
> > Udo ...
> 
> > Tell me something, please, because you have me very curious.
> 
> > Why did you switch from a Windows browser to a DOS one?
> 
> > It would seem that there must have been *some* special reason, 
> since you
> > obviously prefer what Netscape will do for you.
> 
> One of the reasons was that Netscape used to shut down every now and
> then while downloading a file. This was even more annoying because 
> its
> download speed was unusually slow with my 56 Kbit modem. Of course, 
> that
> is something that is only related to the browser, not to Windows.
> 
> Now, Arachne is definetely slower, but that was not the only reason 
> for
> my decision - see below.
> 
> > Arachne is designed for people who know, and/or are willing to 
> learn, DOS and
> > taking responsibility for what one does on a computer.
> 
> No problem for me, since I have many years of DOS experience. 
> However,
> that should not be confused with the necessity to do everything from 
> the
> command prompt. I like GUIs if they are well-designed, and prefer the
> interface of Arachne to the one of Lynx, for example.
> 
> > I was unaware that Arachne would overwrite an existing file of the 
> same name;
> > I thought that the DOS requirement to answer "Overwrite Existing 
> File y/n?"
> > either made overwriting impossible because the message wasn't 
> passed through
> > Arachne, or that the message *was* passed through. I know that 
> this was a long
> > topic of discussion a few years back, so to see you suddenly 
> complain about
> > that was a surprise.
> 
> Actually, the create_file function in DOS does not care about an
> existing file of the same same unless it is marked as read-only. You
> want a new file, you get a new file.
> 
> > As to where you want to save a file, or what you want to call it, 
> that's
> > hardly difficult. In fact, it is easier to type in than to play 
> the click
> > click click mouse game to get to where you want to go. But then, 
> of course,
> > that is strictly IMNSHO.
> 
> That depends. If I have to download many files that should go into
> different sub directories, I prefer to just click them with the 
> mouse.
> 
> > Please don't forget to tell us, please: Why did you drop windows 
> and opt for
> > DOS?
> 
> Well, to make a long story short: At first, I did not use Windows at
> all, only DOS. Later, I used it for things like watching AVI videos,
> etc. I did not really depend on Windows until I got Internet access.
> 
> After about five years of Windows usage, numerous crashes and 
> countless
> hours of wasted time spent on Windows maintenance, I was thoroughly
> annoyed and fed up with Windows, so I started to look for DOS 
> software
> that could serve to replace the Windows programs I was using. The 
> only
> thing I sticked with was the Netscape Navigator. I read about web
> browsers for DOS, and gave DR-WebSpyder a try, but did not manage to
> make it work.
> 
> Then, in 1998, I decided to upgrade my PC again. I bought a new
> motherboard, and also a new graphics card. Everything was working 
> fine,
> until I tried to connect to the Internet and realised that I did not
> have a suitable graphics driver. No problem, since it was available 
> on
> the 'net, but I needed Windows to get Netscape working, and the 
> driver
> for Windows.
> 
> So even though my PC was working perfectly, I was cut off from the
> Internet because my browser relied on Windows, and Windows would not
> work because it did not understand VESA.
> 
> The Setup.exe file for DOS was not working, either, because it 
> required
> more free memory then I had, so I edited system.ini manually and 
> figured
> out how to change the driver. I managed to make Windows work in 
> 640x480
> and 16 colours, barely enough to be able to run NN and get the damned
> driver.
> 
> However, this incident had shown to me that Windows was the Achilles
> heel of my system, so I started to look for alternatives to NN in
> earnest. I stumbled upon Arachne, and after the painstaking process 
> of
> setting it up, I was able to connect to the Internet for the first 
> time
> without Windows.
> 
> Of course, I missed many features of the NN, the first and not least 
> of
> which was the file requester.
> 
> However, after three months of Arachne usage, I decided that it was
> acceptable, particularly because of the faster download speed and no
> more crashes. Of course, now that I have a DSL line, Arachne has 
> become
> relatively slow, and I have seen lots of Arachne crashes, too.
> 
> Now that my Windows 3.11 no longer works with my graphics card 
> except in
> standard VGA resolution, and newer Windows versions no longer work 
> in my
> OS, I do not have much of a chance to still use Netscape, either. Not
> that I still wanted to run Windows, that is - I think that putting 
> all
> the functionality that belongs in the OS into an application is a bad
> idea, anyway.
> 
> I bet now would someone ask why I do not use Linux instead. Well, I 
> also
> have six years of Linux experience, and I do not like it either, 
> partly
> for the same and partly for different reasons.
> 
> So I do not use Arachne because I think that it is better than 
> Mozilla
> or IE but because I think that DOS is better than Windows or Linux.
> 
> Having said this, I think I would continue to use Arachne for some
> purposes even if Mozilla was ported to DOS. However, I hope that we 
> will
> not have to wait for Arachne to support most features of Mozilla as 
> long
> as for someone to port Mozilla to DOS. ;-)
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Udo
> 
> -- The DR-DOS/OpenDOS Enhancement Project - 
> http://www.drdosprojects.de
> 
> -- This mail was written by a user of The Arachne Browser - 
> http://arachne.cz/
> 
> Arachne at FreeLists
> -- Arachne, The Web Browser/Suite for DOS and Linux --
> 
> 


Arachne at FreeLists
-- Arachne, The Web Browser/Suite for DOS and Linux --

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