Wunderbar98

Hi siria. The first post statement 'RetroZilla v2.2 appears to be the only open source web browser that presently connects to modern HTTPS websites in vanilla Windows 98' is true in my experience. When i previously trialed a K-Meleon build from @roytam1 in vanilla Windows 98 it had no installer and would not launch the browser, presumably since my system did not yet have a K-Meleon profile. Since there was not a readily available guide, it was not apparent which K-Meleon to install first to get a profile, then the @roytam1 build on top. You've mentioned somewhere a simple *.ini file could launch the browser, couldn't find the information again. So never had the chance to confirm how it handles TLS v1.2 or even if it runs on a vanilla system. Also IIRC the @roytam1 builds were 7-Zip files, a barrier discussed at length below. If someone can provide a well documented guide to getting K-Meleon up and running on a vanilla Windows 98 system, not on this thread please, i would be happy to test and change the statement to something like 'RetroZilla v2.2 is one of the only open source web browsers that presently connects to modern HTTPS websites in vanilla Windows 98.' The old chicken and egg problem. Windows 98 is 22 years old and most everyone has access to a newer system with a mechanism to get the needed files (burned CD, USB stick, multi-boot, network). On a fresh Windows 98 bare metal install another system is usually necessary just to fetch the required ethernet driver, otherwise getting online is a non-starter. Anyone using Windows 98 virtually should have a capable host. The direct download link provided on page one by loblolly986 is for a 7-Zip file (http://o.rths.ml/gpc/files1.rt/retrozilla-suite-tls12-20200131.7z). Windows 98 can not handle *.7z files after a fresh install and a base install browser, such as Internet Explorer 5, can't access their download site (https://www.7-zip.org/download.html). Are you able to find a reputable link to a 7-Zip v9.20 release that is HTTP only (i could not)? As 7-Zip is GPL licensed a tinyupload[dot]com HTTP link may be acceptable, someone clarify if they know for sure, although a link to a proper website is preferred. If so please provide and i can update the first post. Regardless the information in the first post is accurate. There is nothing misleading about 'the official RetroZilla download is from an HTTPS site'. This is a true statement, it is the official build and it is hosted on an HTTPS site, the other releases are further forked. Quick tested, Internet Explorer v5 appears to download this link fine: http://o.rths.ml/gpc/files1.rt/retrozilla-suite-tls12-20200131.7z. This release does not have an installer but after un-zip the RetroZilla executable launches the browser fine and initiates a new user profile if one didn't already exist. The HTTP link you provided above (http://o.rths.ml/gpc/files1.rt/index.php?sitemap) does not display properly in Internet Explorer v5 or RetroZilla. In RetroZilla a message indicates 'This XML file does not appear to have any style information associated with it. The document tree is shown below". Is this link correct? As you noted the first post is already long, even after linking most information. It gets longer every time something gets added, eventually too much for those who text and tweet. Can't comment on @roytam1's DNS provider, your description sounds shady indeed. Since i've only used the 'official' SeaMonkey-based build, can't comment on what does/not work in the Firefox-based build, such as the RetroZilla Search Engine and RetroZilla Extensions Collections. Nevertheless the retrozilla-suite-tls12-20200131.7z link provided by loblolly986 i believe is for the SeaMonkey-based release.

Hi cov3rt. Don't bother quoting, i know who you are and for now monitor the thread :) Just retested in RetroZilla due to frequent YouTube changes, all still works fine. Just install the *.xpi extension into the profile directory. Don't forget, after the user-agent-switcher extension is installed, re-start the browser, add the Googlebot User Agent string, then actually select it from the drop down menu otherwise the browser will still use the default user agent. Googlebot Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; Googlebot/2.1; +http://www.google.com/bot.html)

Got a rough prototype for YouTube Trending search using the new polymer layout. It does not require a Googlebot User Agent or modified polymer_disable URL, likely to be abandoned by big G anyway. The data is finicky and it will take more work to consistently parse titles, durations and URLs.

Hi Dave-H. Your inputs in this thread are appreciated, probably all the same questions and barriers i would have trying to get TLS v1.3 running. Just an FYI, the primary site you were having problems with in old Opera loads fine using RetroZilla. I'm just running the basic RZ install, not the @roytam1 version at the moment. The Conventional Consumer Pattern 16.123.50 file downloads fine too, without JavaScript. Maybe i just hit a lucky (old) server, anyway works fine. https://downloadcenter.trendmicro.com/index.php?clk=tab_pattern&clkval=33&regs=nabu

YouTube Trending search in the 9xweb script broke today. No combination of Googlebot User Agent string or polymer disable appears able to load the old style trending page. If someone finds a magic combination for a Windows 9x browser please tell. https://www.youtube.com/feed/trending Still some good, custom YouTube searches still work in 9xweb using the existing Googlebot code. Also 9xweb's Wget executable successfully fetches YouTube's new 'polymer' based HTML pages. Although obfuscated the video title, information, duration, image thumbnail and download URLs are hiding in plain site. Having spent a fair amount of time on the last 9xweb update, just going to chip away slowly. Will likely wait for custom searches to fail too, then convert all 9xweb's YouTube functions to process the new and shiny polymer format, hopefully won't be too difficult.

Thank-you Gansangriff for your input. Wonder how much further the Windows 9x DOS-based systems could have come with long term active support. Guess we'll never know. This MSFN forum seems to be the most active for Windows 9x information. There are at least a couple other sites that i periodically check out, if anyone's interested, no JavaScript needed. https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/f/9/windows-9598me/ https://retrocomputing.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/windows-98

Timeline of Windows 98 development (codename Memphis, no JavaScript needed). https://enacademic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/8758931 Apparently Windows 98 was first released on June 25, 1998. Coincidentally the 'finished product' was build number 1998. Find that hard to believe, maybe some number fudging, don't know. By the time Windows 98 SE (Second Edition) was released on May 5, 1999, Microsoft was on build number 2222a. Certainly lots of development time and effort spent on the product. To me software development is hard. Plus it's always a moving target due to hardware development, the changing interweb, security holes, etc. To manage such a large project, with so many developers and testers, is amazing. It still amazes me that computers for the most part work, there's so much that can go wrong. IMO as Microsoft tried to cover as much hardware as possible, compared to Apple's locked-down hardware model, the job would be much tougher. Congratulations Bill Gates and company for producing something decent that can still be enjoyed so many years later.

Windows 98 SE was installed long time ago on this daily use hardware (800 MHz, 384 MB RAM, 32 MB GeForce 2 graphics). Don't recall doing anything special for the Pioneer CD/DVD hardware install, it's reportedly using a Microsoft driver from 1999. Since only using Windows 98 for 22 years, to my knowledge the first time DVD media was ever inserted, only remember using CDs with Windows 98 before. To great surprise it reads the DVD no problem, what a champ. Although Device Manager lists the drive under 'CDROM', it correctly identifies the DVD hardware. Just dug out Neverwinter Nights Diamond, which includes Neverwinter Knights, Shadows of Undrentide expansion, Hordes of the Underdark expansion, Kingmaker expansion with three modules (Kingmaker, Shadow Guard, Witch's Wake). This is a beast of a game, intentionally left aside for years. Bought it used for $10 because he never had time to play. No wonder, it will probably take me years to finish. This hardware barely meets minimum system requirements, will eventually give it a go.

On my system using RetroZilla browser and 9xweb's keepvid[dot]works fallback for video download, the video is automatically named 'videoplayback' without a file extension. If too lazy to rename the file with a system recognized 'mp4' extension, just right-click 'videoplayback' and select SendTo for quick media player launch. To add a SendTo item, create a media player executable shortcut in C:\WINDOWS\SendTo.

Recommend checking out https://distrowatch.com/. There are hundreds of distributions. Something more popular likely has better documentation and forum assistance. Personally Devuan, older Debian (Wheezy), Tiny Core Linux and occasionally Puppy Linux. All of these are able to run lean and support a variety of hardware, even 20 year old stuff. To keep things lean use a window manager instead of a full-blown desktop environment. Favourite Window Managers are Openbox and Fluxbox. Window Mananagers that look like more traditional Windows include IceWM and Joe's Window Manager. A decent more traditional desktop environment is Xfce.

History is being erased. Both links in the 'RetroZilla Extensions Other' section in the first post of this thread were replaced with archive[dot]org links. This may keep them alive a longer but not all associated *.xpi extension download links will necessarily work :( http://users.skynet.be/fa258499/extensions.html stopped loading recently, maybe temporary. Replaced with http://web.archive.org/web/20191225070534/http://users.skynet.be/fa258499/extensions.html. http://xsidebar.mozdev.org/modifiedmisc.html now redirects to generic https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/. Replaced with http://web.archive.org/web/20191228112850/http://xsidebar.mozdev.org/modifiedmisc.html.

Hi siria. Thank-you for the information. Couldn't get any release of read-easily*.xpi successfully modified for my RetroZilla either. Glad it works for you with the @roytam1 build. Feel free to post on the RetroZilla Community Edition thread, including a download link to your modified extension. Please specify it's for the @roytam1 build to avoid future confusion.

An updated 9xweb script is available for download (forum login required), v20200712 Beta. Relevant information and links, including helper software, can be found on post #1 of this thread. The changelog has been updated on post #2.

Thank-you Deomsh, testing this change since yesterday, hopefully will help. For anyone interested, MDGx provides lots of SYSTEM.INI information. http://www.mdgx.com/lastweek.htm

Probably a limitation of how Windows 98 handles multiple processes. During audio or video playback there is sometimes noticeable stutter when other CPU intensive tasks are performed simultaneously. Fondly remember an old employer upgrading Windows 3.1 and 9x systems to Windows NT 4.0. It was so professional, smooth, polished and stable. For the most part the NT family of releases seemed to do away with much of these stutters and instabilities. Query whether it was solely NT development or whether these newer systems ran updated media players complete with bug fixes and performance improvements. Also on the same ancient hardware, running a modern but tweaked GNU/Linux release doesn't cause stutter either. In Windows 98, TCPMP's priority can be increased in the settings. It actually helps at the expense of slowing other processes, obviously there's only so much CPU to go around. Seems the user, based on preference and hardware limitations, needs to decide what level of stutter or performance hit is acceptable. SMPlayer's MPlayer 'config' (actual file name) can be configured with a 'priority' entry, not yet tested. Options include: idle, belownormal, normal, abovenormal, high or realtime. Realtime isn't recommended by them, as it may cause instability. For me running MPlayer standalone, bypassing SMPlayer, is the leanest of all my media players so stutter is not much of an issue with this player. Note MPlayer's config file is located in C:\Program Files\SMPlayer\mplayer\mplayer\ when running Windows media. If using MPlayer through Cygwin-Lite's 9xweb (Windows 9x Web Helper), the 'config' file utilized is likely in C:\cygwin\home\your_user_name\mplayer\. VLC also has an advanced option preference to increase process priority, which seems to work well. As VLC is, however, the most resource heavy of this system's media players it rarely gets used. Very nice and professional media player though. If anyone has any CPU priority suggestions, particularly with media playback, any advice welcome :)

Same search string as screenshot above, titles now appended with durations. https://i.postimg.cc/SRHmsdYk/9xweb-YT-search-3.png

Hi Sergiaws. Doesn't help with a screen reader query but just trying to help. For RetroZilla would either of these extensions be useful. The download links still work but the extensions were not installed or tested. I can try to help with any installation issues. NoSquint http://xsidebar.mozdev.org/modifiedmisc.html#nosquint TextZoom http://xsidebar.mozdev.org/modifiedmisc.html#textzoom

Video Fetch screen showing personal preferences and [c]ached search string. https://i.postimg.cc/htWxmhPK/9xweb-YT-search-1.png Search results screen. https://i.postimg.cc/5NVHnTLV/9xweb-YT-search-2.png

Since Windows 98 browsers now have problems connecting to YouTube without jumping through extra hoops, primitive YouTube search functionality was added directly to the 9xweb script. This will allow the user to query YouTube for 'Trending' results or a custom search (eg. 'DOS games'). The video titles are dumped to screen in 9xweb's command.com window, select the video you want to add to clipboard, then use 9xweb as normal. Not interested in wasting a lot of time on this so [c]ache is limited to the last search performed, replaced by a new search. First page search results dumped to screen typically number 20-30 titles depending on the query, and a 'YouTube Trending' search usually fetches 85 results. The 'less' command, similar to DOS's 'more', is used when the list exceeds command.com window rows, so results can be scrolled (up/down arrow, page up/down, [q]uit to exit 'less'). Will resist the urge to add additional cache, search history, next page type functionalities. It's all possible but takes effort and time. Since hardly anyone is using this script anyway, it's just a hobby project and future YouTube changes could cause it to fail anytime. If internet bandwidth is an issue consider any/all when using 9xweb: - Set video quality to 640 x 360 - Set a 5 - 10 second Wget preview to determine if the video is worth the bandwidth - End search query with ' ,short' (space comma short) for < 4 minute duration videos Hopefully YouTube, forum members and forum admin will be okay with this. If an objection is received, at least this component of the 9xweb project will be abandoned (took snapshot before adding search). Will upload work in progress screenshots shortly and release script after some test and polish.

Spend part of an evening last week exploring sourceforge[dot]net. Couple great old school roguelikes were downloaded and briefly play tested: Rogue Clone IV version 2.1 and Mike's Adventure Game (MAG, query v1.1). Not sure, believe both these games were released in the 1980s. There are so many releases and variations of the original Rogue, hard to keep them straight, the original releases are much older. If the world stopped producing games, music and entertainment 20 years ago, there would still be many lifetimes of good stuff to enjoy.

A new $AskKeepvid variable was added for 'ERROR: 403 Forbidden' YouTube videos. # Ask to open https://keepvid.works/ in configured browser tab for # failed 'ERROR: 403 Forbidden' YouTube videos, use 'yes' or 'no': AskKeepvid="yes" During script runtime, if a 403 error is encountered the dialogue below will be displayed. Note keepvid[dot]works does not require any JavaScript to be running to work, just paste the clipboard's URL into the keepvid[dot]works browser page, then click Download. The page will refresh, then just click the 'Download video' button, slightly obscured in RetroZilla but clearly visible and works fine. The video's description can then be read via 9xweb as desired. Just going to test it out for a few sessions before issuing a formal release. ***** ERROR 403: Forbidden Error retrieving file, note 9xweb does not process 403 Forbidden errors. Open retrozilla.exe tab to https://keepvid.works/ for manual download attempt, note the URL is already in clipboard for quick pasting, [y/n]? y Display video description [y/n]: y

Just to follow-up siria, the YouTube URL you provided above also did not require the '&disable_polymer=1' addendum to work with 9xweb. Cute Baby and Cats Playing Together... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-z7hoEWaH4

Hi siria. Thanks again for more information. Thus far the 9xweb script is working quite well without any of the workarounds. No User Agent string has been specified for the Wget executable, thus far churning nicely, even without adding '&disable_polymer=1' to any YouTube destination URLs. The next 9xweb release will, however, have the updated Googlebot User Agent string plus the polymer addendum noted in the comments section, in case it's required for a future release. Just did some quick testing, checked the first 10 hits in YouTube Trending (https://www.youtube.com/feed/trending). Eight out of ten videos were successfully retrieved, although one required the assistance of keepvid[dot]works. So 9xweb is batting 70%, keepvid[dot]works helped out a bit and the two that failed outright i believe were VEVO music videos. So just like mentioned before, it really depends on what you want out of YouTube. If you're looking for informative videos, retro computing and gaming, etc the success percentage should exceed 70%. If you just want to watch the latest pop/rock type videos, not so good. Note adding '&disable_polymer=1' to the failed YouTube URLs did not make a difference for either 9xweb or keepvid[dot]works. Think the next release will incorporate keepvid[dot]works as a USER CONFIG variable, that will ask the user if they want to open a new keepvid[dot]works tab in the configured web browser for videos that fail with the dreaded 'ERROR: 403 Forbidden'. With any luck keepvid[dot]works will be able to update their site to keep up with YouTube's changes. To me using 9xweb first, then keepvid[dot]works as a fallback is preferable, as 9xweb: - Auto-names the MP4 file - Provides playback preview - Allows viewing the video description 1. GOOD - 9xweb BLACKPINK -How You Like That 20200704 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2cxVV5JAms 2. GOOD - 9xweb WATCH LIVE: Trump holds July 4 celebration at Mt. Rushmore https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQpWydz7J1Y 3. GOOD - 9xweb Clash Royale: CLAN WARS 2 UPDATE REVEAL! ?? TV Royale Special https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hw0AFLsTLDE 4. GOOD - keepvid[dot]works POP SMOKE - GOT IT ON ME (OFFICIAL VIDEO) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPnnX7hOcQM 5. GOOD - 9xweb When you're trying NOT to look dumb in front of your smart friend. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pRxp2FKq_U 6. FAIL Pop Smoke - For The Night (Audio) ft. Lil Baby, DaBaby https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9pjm4cNsfc 7. GOOD - 9xweb 2020 Austrian Grand Prix: FP1 Highlights https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OT3I_OdHVew 8. FAIL Pop Smoke - The Woo (Audio) ft. 50 Cent, Roddy Ricch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24cbJedcfsc 9. GOOD - 9xweb An American Pickle | Official Trailer | HBO Max https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBC0pTh6GDM 10. GOOD - 9xweb AUSTRALIA'S BIGGEST PUMPKIN Vs. GIANT AXE from 45m Tower! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D7suCsa1kzM

Just updated my personal GNU/Linux YouTube script (Bash youtube-dl front-end) with the Googlebot UA, this has temporarily fixed the breakage there too. Without the proper UA string, noticed YouTube now serves the HTML data page using a different, more obfuscated, format. As the Cygwin-Lite install has access to awk, sed and such, it is likely possible to parse the new data page format if the UA string work-around starts to fail, effectively turning 9xweb in to a rudimentary command line YouTube searcher/browser. Not sure how far i want to go with this, however. Of course if Cygwin-Lite's old release of wget no longer connects, then 9xweb's YouTube functions are dead anyway. For now all is good, keep limping along fellow Windows 9x users.

Hi cov3rt. The RetroZilla Extensions Collection link on the first post of this thread contains the extensions collection for download plus detailed instructions on how to install extensions in RetroZilla. Below is a paste of the 'Install and Remove' section from that linked post. Note the extensions in the collection have been well tested, can probably ignore the breakage dialogue below. All eleven extensions, including modified NoScript which is a separate download, are highly recommended and combined make for a decent browsing experience. If you have not yet installed the RetroZilla Search Engine collection, it's also quite useful as RetroZilla's built-in search engines are now broken or no longer exist. = Install and Remove = Extension installation and removal in RetroZilla is messy and may lead to breakage. Recommend backing up the entire RetroZilla user profile before installing extensions or test drive the extension(s) in a new test profile. A full browser removal/re-installation may be helpful in case of severe breakage, as extension files may install into both the user profile and the browser installation directory, default pathways: C:\Program Files\RetroZilla C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\RetroZilla Ensure RetroZilla's Edit dropdown -> Preferences -> Advanced -> Software Installation is set to 'Allow web sites to install extensions and updates'. This is required even when installing extensions locally. For security reasons it is best to disable this checkbox after all desired extensions are installed. To install extensions go to File dropdown -> Open File -> select and install extension -> restart browser. To cleanly remove extensions either restore a previously backed up profile, delete the profile's chrome directory (created on restart), create a new profile or fully uninstall/reinstall the browser. Note not all extensions install cleanly into only the chrome directory (eg. NoScript) and some extensions even alter the browser's Preferences configuration window (eg. ImageZoom).