HotJava Browser 1.0

[Thomas Dowling]

> From: Wilfred Drew <drewwe at morrisville.edu>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <web4lib at library.berkeley.edu>
> Subject: Re: HotJava Browser 1.0
> Date: Monday, March 31, 1997 11:08 AM
> 
> I have been playing with this browser this morning. Don't waste your
> time.  It doesn't appear to recognize Java applets and JavaScripts that
> work very well in Netscape.  There is no place to set up a telnet
> program or TN3270 program.  I was hoping it would be a good replacement
> for Netscape on our public Windows 95 stations since it is supposed to
> be configurable for such purposes.  I will keep playing with it.

I don't get the impression that Sun has ever really considered HotJava a
candidate to compete in the full-fledged browser market.  Like niche
browsers such as Arena, Amaya, and UdiWWW, it's more a proof of concept,
the concept in this case being Java (and Java's ability to break
Microsoft's hegemony over the desktop, topple Bill Gates, and reveal Scott
McNealy as the One True Computing Superstar).

That aside, it's slower than molasses in January.  Buggy, too--but I think
I need to unininstall/reinstall before judging if that's just my
installation or not.  I had the mitigated pleasure of downloading HotJava
1.0beta a couple months ago, the same week I downloaded the preview version
of Corel Office for Java.  Talk about performance dogs--it was enough to
make me wonder if Java's future isn't being seriously oversold by some of
its more zealous proponents (largely in the hopes that it really might
break Microsoft's hegemony, etc etc).

Thomas Dowling
Ohio Library and Information Network
tdowling at ohiolink.edu