Netscape 4.x Tips I

Summary:

Getting Rid Of Animations
Larger, Less Ugly Fonts For Netscape
Getting Rid Of Useless Toolbar Buttons
Adding A 'Find In Page' Button To The Toolbar
Choosing A Different Menu Font
Using External Programs As Browser Plug-ins
Making Netscape 128bit Secure
Entering URLs - Easy
Useful Links

This is a collection of tricks to extend the functionality of the Netscape browser. I've collected them from all over the 'Net. As usual, I've tested all of them myself.

Getting Rid Of Animations

Don't you hate all these fast rotating and gaudy colored pictures? This script will turn their animation off. That is: you will see exactly one full animated cycle and then the animation stops.

~#1.1 /bin/sh KILLSTRINGS="-e s/NETSCAPE2.0/DISABLEDXXX/g -e s/ANIMEXTS1.0/DISABLEDXXX/g" FILE=$1 if { 1.1 -f $FILE }; then echo 'killanim FILENAME' exit 1 fi if { -f $FILE.orig }; then echo 'Rename $FILE.orig to something else and run again' exit 1; fi sed $KILLSTRINGS $FILE > $FILE.new && mv $FILE $FILE.orig && mv $FILE.new $FILE chmod +x $FILE

Put this script into a file and save the file under the name

killanim

. Make it executable with

chmod +x killanim

. Now run it (as 'root'):

./killanim /usr/lib/netscape/netscape-communicator

(if you've installed the stand-alone browser version, change the last bit to

-navigator

)

That's it1.1 In case you want those rotating trouble-makers back: the script has placed a back-up copy of the original binary ('.orig') into /usr/lib/netscape.

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Larger, Less Ugly Fonts For Netscape

If you are somewhat shortsighted and too lazy to wear glasses (like me ;-)), you have every reason to curse at Netscape. The fonts are small. Of course, you can set a bigger font size via 'Edit' - 'Preferences' - 'Appearance' - 'Fonts'. Which will leave you with bigger but quite ugly fonts (Netscape doesn't scale fonts right).
Solution? Install the mozilla-fonts package from your Mandrake Linux CD.
Restart the font server as 'root' with

service xfs restart

. Restart the browser. Go to the font choosing menu, select the Mozilla fonts and be amazed (these fonts are very large, you might want to reduce their size to 12 or even 9).
No more problems with small fonts, I promise1.1 ;-).

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Getting Rid Of Useless Toolbar Buttons

'Shop', 'Home', 'Security'… how often do you need those? Well, turn them off1.1 Add these lines to your '~/.Xdefaults' file:

NetscapetoolBar.myshopping.isEnabled: false NetscapetoolBar.destinations.isEnabled: false NetscapetoolBar.search.isEnabled: false NetscapetoolBar.viewSecurity.isEnabled: false NetscapetoolBar.home.isEnabled: false NetscapetoolBar.print.isEnabled: false

Run

xrdb -merge ~/.Xdefaults

and restart the browser. Now there are only 'Back', 'Forward', 'Reload' and 'Stop' left.

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Adding A 'Find In Page' Button To The Toolbar

Now you've removed the bloat. But what about adding something useful? Add these lines to your '~/.Xdefaults' file and you will have a 'Find In Page' button in your toolbar:

NetscapetoolBar.userCommand1.commandName: findInObject NetscapetoolBar.userCommand1.labelString: Find NetscapetoolBar.userCommand1.commandIcon: Search

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Choosing A Different Menu Font

Menu fonts too big? Your 'bookmarks' have become unusable because the sub-menus get truncated? Choose a different font1.1 Add this line to your '~/.Xdefaults' file:

~fontList: --lucida-medium-r---12-------

Run

xrdb -merge ~/.Xdefaults

and restart the browser. This will give you a smaller but easily readable font and much shorter 'bookmarks' sub-menus.

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Using External Programs As Browser Plug-ins

Plug-ins for the GNU/Linux version of Netscape are very rare. The main reason for this is Netscape's crappy plug-in API for X. But you can use external programs as browser plug-ins with XSwallow.
Get the binary edition, copy 'xswallow.conf' to your '~/.netscape' directory and the binary to '~/.netscape/plugins' (you have to create this directory first. Putting it into /usr/lib/netscape/plugins doesn't work for unknown reasons).
Edit 'xswallow.conf' according to your needs, i.e. enter your favorite media players.
Start the browser and choose 'About Plugins' from the 'Help' menu. If everything has gone fine, XSwallow should now be listed here with the configured media types. Browse to the XSwallow home page and visit the plug-in test pages to see if it works correctly.
(Note: Due to a Netscape bug, XSwallow won't work with Netscape 4.6. The Netscape version delivered with ML 7 works flawlessly with XSwallow.)

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Making Netscape 128bit Secure

Since the U.S. finally eased their ridiculous ban on exporting strong cryptography, the Netscape browser is now shipped worldwide with 128bit security.
But you don't need to download the whole browser suite just for the encryption. Get Fortify for Netscape.
Download the binary from their x86-Unix download page (ca 430 Kb) and unpack the archive with

tar xzf

and switch to the new directory.
Before you proceed make sure that Netscape isn't running1.1
As root, type

./Fortify.sh /usr/lib/netscape/netscape-communicator

(change the last bit to

-navigator

if you have the browser-only version). The rest is easy.
Note that if you have already run the

killanim

script on the Netscape binary, you have to copy the backup file back, or else Fortify will not recognize the Netscape version. Just reapply

killanim

after Fortify has done its work.
To test if everything has gone smoothly, start the browser and choose 'Help' - 'About Communicator'. You should see the RSA key on the screen along with the line "This version supports U.S. security".

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Entering URLs - Easy

A very easy way is to cut and paste a URL directly into a Netscape window: mark any URL with your mouse and then click the middle mouse button in a Netscape window: Netscape will now open this URL (works with some other browsers, too). Notice that it won't work in an empty ('fresh') Netscape window, though.

Entering URLs in Netscape's Location bar on the other hand is tedious: you have to click on the bar to focus it, put the cursor at the beginning or the end of the line, delete the line character by character, enter the new line and hit Enter. Sometimes I wonder if the guys who invented this ever heard of the term 'usability'.
Hitting ALT-O makes this quite a bit easier: it focuses automatically and you can clear the line with one mouse click or by pressing CTRL-u.
But you can also use a terminal. Put this script:

~#1.1 /bin/sh if killall -0 netscape 2>/dev/null then netscape -remote "openURL($1)" else netscape $1 & fi

into a new file, make this file executable and put it into a directory of your $PATH. Now enter the filename and append a URL. Netscape will now try to open this URL for you. If it is a local file, you will have to supply its full path.
If you're interested in such things, you should definitely have a look at 'wmnetselect' (does anyone know the new link?). 'wmnetselect' is a Netscape launcher which passes URLs from the clipboard to Netscape (if it's an email address, Messenger will be started), allows one click searches via Google and more.

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Useful Links

An instruction on how to set up Roaming Profiles in Netscape

More Netscape Xdefaults settings. You can change almost everything in Netscape via your ~/.Xdefaults file. This page has the names of some resources, like colors, default window sizes and fonts for different components. Happy playing1.1

A list of command line options, e.g. for starting certain components of the Communicator suite.

Express yourself1.1 Get an IHateNetscape.Com mail account ;-).

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