Latest Technical Preview of NetFront Browser Available

[Nurhisham Hussein]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.theunwired.net/?item=preview-access-releases-another-technical-preview-of-netfront-browser' target='_blank'>http://www.theunwired.net/?item=pre...etfront-browser</a><br /><br /></div><i>"Access, a global provider of advanced software technologies to the mobile and beyond-PC markets, today made available the latest technical preview version of NetFront Browser v3.4 for Windows Mobile 5.0. In addition to the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), a U.S. government block cipher encryption algorithm, the latest technical preview version of NetFront Browser for Windows Mobile for the first time also includes Camellia, a high-security, high-performance international standard cipher jointly developed by Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT) and Mitsubishi Electric Corp."</i><br /><br /><img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/web/2003/hisham-20071203-access_nf34_tp_rotate.png" /><br /><br />And it's free! :D But for a limited time only, it'll cease working on February 29, 2008. :( If anybody cares to try it (and NetFront is one of the better 3rd-party WM browsers out there), be sure to give us a full report, though I'd imagine Menneisyys will give this one his usual thorough going-over pretty soon.

[Menneisyys]

though I'd imagine Menneisyys will give this one his usual thorough going-over pretty soon.

Thanks :) Will have a look at it.

[whydidnt]

Net Front has always been a decent, if pricey alternative to PIE. But, man they are SLOW with new releases. It makes it seem as if there is one guy working part time on these releases. If Access is this slow with development of ALP, it may be soemtime in 2020 before we see a real working release of that software. :D

[frankenbike]

Pretty good. I like the operation better than Opera. But some of their features on their site don't seem plainly obvious to use. Such as the "PagePilot" mode on their website.

I'll probably offer some feedback to them after seeing more comments on forums.

Right now, I think every last browser creation company needs to test their browser on just one site to check its flexibility: YouTube. If you can't go to YouTube and see the text, and select a video, and play it, it ain't a product that fits with the type of thing that people are browsing on their desktops.

This may be another case where the developer is looking at their product as appealing to the "enterprise" market, instead of offering something that real people use for personal use. The funny thing is, a lot of java/flash heavy sites that businesses use won't work if YouTube doesn't.

But besides the gripe that affects every PPC browser, I find the rendering fast, loading is fast, tabs work the way you'd think they'd work, theres a page search feature that's nice. Excellent that they have a finger scrolling mode.

Suggestions for improvements: user hard key assignments (especially for zooming), user adjustable scrolling acceleration, scrolling acceleration "mass" (the page keeps scrolling after you stop moving your finger so you can throw further down the page), "identify as mobile" switch.

I want a WM software company to come out and say: "This product is NOT for the enterprise market. It's for the same people who use YouTube and MySpace and Facebook on their home computers."

Hasn't anyone learned the lesson the iPhone has taught?

[Menneisyys]

Pretty good. I like the operation better than Opera. But some of their features on their site don't seem plainly obvious to use. Such as the "PagePilot" mode on their website.

It's pretty much the same as Nokia Web's overview. (Although I prefer Opera Mini 4's approach - IMHO, it's far quicker / better.)

Right now, I think every last browser creation company needs to test their browser on just one site to check its flexibility: YouTube. If you can't go to YouTube and see the text, and select a video, and play it, it ain't a product that fits with the type of thing that people are browsing on their desktops.

YouTube's case isn't that simple. While the JavaScript support is, at last, sufficient in Opera Mobile and the latest Netfront to play YouTube videos (see my Web Browser Bible at http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=54656 if interested; it's in the "YouTube support?" row of the chart at http://www.winmobiletech.com/032007WebBrowsers/chart.html ; in there, I've thoroughly elaborated on these issues and have even shown of screenshots of these browsers playing back YouTube videos), the sole speed of the current Flash 7 plug-in is plain insufficient. (Dunno if the forthcoming Flash Lite 3 will fix this problem. A beta of it has already been released for Symbian and several N95 etc. users have reported it works OK with YouTube. I haven't tested it yet - will do it on my N95 as soon as I have some free time)

(Note that I've checked the YouTube compliance of the new NF version at http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=55544 with the only one TP version so far to support Flash. It worked, but was even slower than the Macromedia / Adobe implementation.)

This may be another case where the developer is looking at their product as appealing to the "enterprise" market, instead of offering something that real people use for personal use. The funny thing is, a lot of java/flash heavy sites that businesses use won't work if YouTube doesn't.

While I agree YouTube's JavaScript compliance requirements are high, there are even better ways of testing this (along with AJAX). Check out my Web Browsing &amp; compliance testing-related articles for more info.

[Menneisyys]

Net Front has always been a decent, if pricey alternative to PIE. But, man they are SLOW with new releases. It makes it seem as if there is one guy working part time on these releases. If Access is this slow with development of ALP, it may be soemtime in 2020 before we see a real working release of that software. :D

Yup - while, some years ago, back in the PPC2k... WM2003 days, in addition to Thunderhawk, theirs was the only capable alternative to PIE (too bad they haven't implemented native Landscape mode back then), they don't seem to innovate much and are pretty much slow to release new versions. In this respect, Opera is waaaay faster, particularly when it comes to Opera Mini.

(Currently, I recommend Opera Mini 4 for most browsing needs - unless you need copy/paste, Flash or Java applets (NOT to be mistaken for JavaScript!).)

[Menneisyys]

Suggestions for improvements: user hard key assignments (especially for zooming)

Yup, they REALLY should this. Up until then (if they EVER do this - I've bene pushing them for HW button support for years), use specific hardware button macros I've explained in my Button Enhacer Bible at http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=57012

"identify as mobile" switch.

It's already supported - see the "User-Agent: Built-in browser identification change" row in the chart of my Web Browser Bible for a link to my tutorial thoroughly explaining its usage / a comparison to other browsers.

[Jetjockgordo]

Really like NF but having to reinstall every 3 months is getting old. Access, PLEASE give us a retail version so I can use all my bookmarks!!!

[buzzard]

Really like NF but having to reinstall every 3 months is getting old. Access, PLEASE give us a retail version so I can use all my bookmarks!!!
The new 3.4 beta allows all bookmarks.

[buzzard]

Really like NF but having to reinstall every 3 months is getting old. Access, PLEASE give us a retail version so I can use all my bookmarks!!!
The new 3.4 beta allows all bookmarks.

[buzzard]

Really like NF but having to reinstall every 3 months is getting old. Access, PLEASE give us a retail version so I can use all my bookmarks!!!
The new 3.4 beta allows all bookmarks.

[tadevinney]

there is no mention of wm6. will this work with wm6?