“I’m not going to pretend that I’m a fan of the new Netscape 6
interface. I’m not. I find it overdesigned and very inconvenient to
use, with familiar tools scattered all over the interface, and
there seems to have been a lot of change to the interface for the
sake of change. The Netscape folks argue that it’s a simpler
interface with fewer buttons, and I suppose that’s technically
true; but it seems like a lot of important things, like easy access
to bookmarks, was deemphasized in Netscape 6.”
“Now, having said all that, I will admit that Netscape 6
will become essential software for every Linux user over the next
two years. I’ll even go farther and argue that if the
performance issues with Netscape 6 are worked out, Netscape 6 has a
very good chance of regaining some market share from Microsoft
Internet Explorer in the overall Web-browser market.”
“The core of Netscape 6 is Netscape Gecko, a new browser engine
that’s also being positioned for use in a variety of situations
past Netscape 6, including net devices, embedded devices, and
set-top TVs. This engine contains no legacy code, and in our tests
it did appear to render pages faster than older versions of
Netscape Navigator. (Overall, however, this beta release is slower
than previous versions of Netscape Navigator, proving that
rendering pages is only one portion–albeit an important
portion–of what a Web browser must do.)”