Welcome to Netscape Navigator Version 1.2

NETSCAPE NAVIGATOR 1.2 FOR WINDOWS

You are using Netscape Navigator 1.2 for Windows. These release notes cover

Requirements
What's New?
Bug Fixes
Known Problems
Notes, Tips and Information

REQUIREMENTS

If you are running Windows 3.1 or WFW, you must use the 16-bit Navigator even if you have Win32s installed.
If you are running Windows 95 or Windows NT, use the 32-bit Navigator.
To run the 32bit Navigator, you must have a 32-bit TCP/IP stack. Both Windows 95 and Windows NT provide 32bit TCP/IP stacks that you can setup. If you need help setting up the TCP/IP stack in Windows 95, see http://www.windows95.com.

WHAT'S NEW?

Windows 95 features: The 32bit version of the 1.2 Navigator supports the following Windows 95 features:
- Windows 95 UI shell support, including tabbed dialogs and proportional scroll bars.
- Preference/settings are stored in system registry.
- Internet Shortcuts.
- Long filenames.
- MAPI using MS Exchange client.
Drop-down URL Menu: Drop down URL menu for the Location/Netsite field is New to the 1.2 Navigator. This list remembers the most recent URLs typed into the Location/Netsite field.
MAPI: Win95 users (running the 32bit navigator) can use Microsoft Exchange for sending/receiving mail and posting news. To enable this feature, you need to go to the Mail and News tab in Options/Preferences and make sure "Use exchange client for mail and news" is checked. For MAPI installation instructions, see the Readme.
Page Headers: You now have the option to print page headers and footers, which includes the Document Title, Document URL, Page Number, Page Total and the Date Printed. You can turn these options on/off from File|Page Setup.
New Bookmark Interface: By popular request, the Bookmarks interface has been redesigned for 1.2.
Registry instead of NETSCAPE.INI for the 32-bit version: There is no NETSCAPE.INI file for the 32-bit version.
The 32-bit version now uses the system registry. The purpose of the registry is to incorporate all the configuration information into a registration database file for controlled access.
To manually edit the Preferences, run regedit.exe . Preferences are stored under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Netscape\Netscape Navigator .
Multi-user Preferences in Windows 95 and Windows NT: If you share your computer with other users, you can personalize your Netscape Preferences settings so that your own settings will be restored when you log on. The next person who logs on to Windows can modify his/her own settings without affecting yours.
In order to enable this multi-user settings feature in Windows 95, you need to modify your Win95's User Profile option, which is located in the Control Panel Passwords property. Make sure the second option in your User Profile, which allows users to customize preferences and desktop settings, is checked.
For Windows NT, you don't have to do anything. Each user automatically gets their own Netscape Preferences setting.
The default values for the Netscape Preferences will be the same for each user. Initially, all users will be set up to share the same bookmarks, cache, cookie, global history, newsrc and temporary directories. If you do not wish to share these files, change the Preference settings to point to your own private copies of the files. To change the location of cookie and global history files, you need to edit the Registry directly. The other files and directories can be set under the Options Menu - Preferences.
New FTP and GOPHER protocol features: Now Netscape is smarter when the protocol identifier is not specified when entering a URL into the location field. If the hostname is ftp or gopher, Netscape will use those particular protocols. Otherwise Netscape will default to http://.
Examples:

If you type: home.netscape.com

you'll go to: http://home.netscape.com

If you type: gopher.netscape.com

you'll go to: gopher://gopher.netscape.com

If you type: ftp.netscape.com

you'll go to: ftp://ftp.netscape.com
Also, When logging in to your ftp account, Netscape will now automatically go to your home directory; instead of the root directory.

Downloading in a Separate Context: Saving a file to disk via a user request, or downloading a file in order to launch a viewer is now done in a separate context. A modeless dialog box pops up to let you know which URL you are saving, and the destination or viewer. There is a progress bar and cancel button, too. You can continue to surf in the same window that created the modeless dialog box; while downloading is in progress.

Printing on the fly: You can now start printing while a page is being loaded.

BUG FIXES

Image display:
- Transparent GIFs display faster, especially over a background image.
- Scaled transparent GIFs appear transparent.
Many printing bugs are fixed
- Epson and Cannon BJC printers work (make sure you have the latest drivers)
- Printing on PCL printers improved
- Pages with horizontal rules print on Postscript printers
- Bullets print (Not the exact same shape)
- Borders on tables are centered correctly
- Newsgroup articles print with headers

KNOWN PROBLEMS

Color Palette Problems

If you are running 256 colors and have a Windows background image, minimizing then restoring Netscape, might cause images and the Netscape logo to appear in strange colors. To fix the problem, open a new Netscape window or remove the Windows background image.

MAPI

You can't include OLE objects in messages.
Rich text format is not supported.
You must have mail text if you want to send an attachment.
You can't embed a Microsoft Exchange mail within your e-mail.

Text Color

There is still a problem that if the background and text colors are the same selections will not show up (since we indicate selected text by flipping the text and background colors). For this reason we strongly recommend that authors set both text and background colors when using images as page backdrops.

Backgrounds and Transparency

In 16 color VGA mode, images with transparent backgrounds do not show properly over other background images. Instead of transparent, the background is opaque, usually black.

Image Display Bugs

For video boards with Cirrus Logic video chip sets on them, and possibly for other makers, an image can be displayed that may occasionally cause the program to "freeze" or GP Fault in the video driver. If this happens, ensure you are using the latest versions of drivers for your video board. You can download the latest version of the Cirrus Logic video driver from their ftp site ftp://ftp.cirrus.com

When the video driver is in 4, 16, or 24 bits per pixel mode, drawing transparent images over backdrop images may have black flicker during drawing. This does not happen when video mode is 8 bits per pixel.

Asynchronous DNS

If you think your winsock is not handling Async DNS correctly, try setting the Async option in the Windows 95 Registry or NETSCAPE.INI file to "no,"

    [Network]
    use Async DNS=no

The default is to use Async DNS, not using it will result in lower performance and can cause problems when multiple simultaneous connections are attempted. You can also set

    [Network]
    Max Connections=1

which will prevent problems when not using Async DNS but will also result in much slower performance.

PC-NFS from Sun and Spry's newly updated stack are the only winsocks we know of that require setting the "Async DNS" flag to "no".

Preferences

The Apply and Help buttons in Preferences are grayed out and don't work.

NOTES, TIPS, AND INFORMATION

Netscape NUGgies

The Netscape Navigator User Group is a great place to find additional help and tips on using the navigator.
URL: snews://secnews.netscape.com/netscape.navigator
(or see: http://home.netscape.com/commun/netscape_user_groups.html)

Delete Cache Before Upgrading

When upgrading to 1.2 it is recommended that you flush your disk cache to remove any incorrect information that may have been saved by an earlier release of the Netscape Navigator.

Right Mouse Pop-up Note

The Bookmarks item no longer appears in the right-mouse pop-up menu.

Running the 32-bit version on Win95

If you get an error message "Netscape was unable to create network socket connection (Reason 10047)," it is probably because you are trying to run the 32-bit version of Netscape using a 16-bit winsock application. To run the 32-bit version of Netscape, you need a 32-bit winsock application. Win95 comes with a 32-bit TCP/IP stack, but you need to install it.

Could not open a News RC file Message

If you receive this message when trying to use news, you must specify a valid path for the NewsRC= line in the netscape.ini (if you're using 16-bit), or registry (32-bit). This line is in the [Main] section. Note: The News RC Directory line in Preferences/Mail and News changes the NewsDirectory= line in the ini or registry.

Audio Player Note

The Netscape Setup program will not delete your old Netscape audio player (NAPLAYER.EXE). If you don't have version 1.2 of the audio player, you must delete the old Netscape audio player (version 1.1) and reinstall Netscape to get the new version.

Export Version Security

The export version has lower-grade International encryption, and will not connect to sites using high-grade US encryption keys. You can find out which version you are running by going to Help | About Netscape...

Norton Desktop 3.0

Turn FileAssist OFF if you are having problems using Netscape's Find function.

Highlighting more than one Screen

To highlight more than one screen of text in a document, position the mouse where you want to start selecting text. Hold the mouse button down while pressing the down arrow key.

Importing Hotlists as Bookmarks

Netscape has an import command on the Bookmarks window that will read any HTML file containing links and convert those links into bookmarks. If you would like to import your NCSA Hotlist into Netscape, you can use the Mozilize utility to convert your hotlist to a Netscape style bookmark list. This program is unsupported so your results may vary.

Helper Applications

For telnet, ftp, and for displaying audio and video, Netscape uses "Helper Applications". These applications are configured in your Preferences window. For help configuring this window, check out our documentation: Helper Applications

On Windows, LVIEW31.EXE (for JPEG images), MPEGPLAY.EXE (for MPEG movies), and WHAM.EXE (for audio files) are all useful applications. One site where these can be found is ftp://ftp.cica.indiana.edu, but that site is often difficult to reach. You can also try the mirror site on ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/micro/msdos/win3/.

The files you want are:

Gif/Jpeg:
---------
ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/micro/msdos/win3/desktop/lview31.zip


MPEG:
-----
ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/micro/msdos/win3/desktop/mpegv11d.zip

ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/micro/msdos/win3/desktop/mpegw32g.zip


Video for Windows (AVI)
-----------------------
ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/micro/msdos/win3/desktop/avipro2.exe


Audio
-----
ftp://gatekeeper.dec.com/pub/micro/msdos/win3/sounds/wham133.zip

How do I use Netscape without a network connection?

If you do not have a network connection but still want to use Netscape to browse local files you should get the file mozock.dll. If you install this file as winsock.dll Netscape will work fine with local file reads. Be sure to shift-click on the above link or else Netscape will treat it as a text document. Doh! If you want to get out to the rest of the net mozock.dll is not for you.

What happened to the Background "Fade-in" and multiple text colors?

Previous versions of the Navigator would recognize multiple <BODY> tags. This allowed people to "fade-in" pages or have multiple text colors. This was a bug in the Navigator. The <BODY> tag is specifically designed to separate the header and footer from the body of a page. It is illegal HTML to have more than one <BODY> tag per page. The newer versions of the Navigator will only recognize the first <BODY> tag. Later ones will be ignored.