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Browsing the web on 98/ME in 2019 and beyond


Destro

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Opera 11 has no Marlett selected gliphs as CharlesF said. This strange font replacement is only with Opera 12. Dis-enabling webfonts works.

Note I have changed information in https://msfn.org/board/topic/178283-how-you-really-browse-the-web-on-98me-in-2019/?do=findComment&comment=1176984 again.

Edited by Goodmaneuver
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  • 2 weeks later...

Anyone know how to get those **** virus-diagrams visible in old browsers, or yet better, a site that shows them as normal images??
Everywhere I get to see only teeny tiny preview thumbs now, but no readable CURVES :-(

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I'm giving this a try, since I have my old P4 machine with Windows 98 on it setup, and I've found this forum to work quite nicely on both Opera 12.02 and @roytam1's special Firefox 3.6 build, particularly if I switch the forum theme from "Switch (Default)" to "IPS Default."

"Switch (Default)" is usable, but kinda glitchy with the odd layout issues that people here have reported, whereas "IPS Default" renders almost perfectly (although the reply box is broken on Firefox).

I tried logging onto eBay.com, which mostly works, but the sign in page is broken, and I can't log on (no loss there, as it probably isn't the wisest thing to do anyway).

The main annoyance is that there are random errors in the encryption where a page will not load due to an encryption error, but will load fine if I remove "https://" from the beginning of the URL.  But it can't be a hard error (like a missing cipher or some such), because it only happens sometimes.  KernelEx-related, maybe? (I'm running straight 4.5.2, if that matters).

I wish I could make the forum render somewhat properly on Retrozilla, as I definitely prefer its lightness, and the fact that it's natively Win9x compatible, so no need for KernelEx.  Maybe in time, as Retrozilla gets improved, this will be less of a problem.

c

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1 hour ago, cc333 said:

I just managed to get Firefox ESR 24.8.1 to run!

It's extremely sluggish and javascript needs to be disabled, but it works!

c

Any screenshots? Sorry, but this is the first of April.

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This is no joke!

I'll get screenshots shortly.

By the way, I've got 31.8 ESR working too!  There's some weird artifacts around the tabs (probably due to Windows 98's lack of proper transparency support), but as with 24.8.1, it works with JS disabled!

c

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I don't think this has been done before!  Does that mean I'm the first to have made this accomplishment?

This is with KernelEx 4.5.2019.24 and the Windows XP SP3 preset.

c

Edited by cc333
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Just tried 38.8.0 ESR, and it crashes before loading the browser chrome, so it looks like the newest version that will work is somewhere between 31.x and 38.x.

c

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1 hour ago, cc333 said:

I don't think this has been done before!  Does that mean I'm the first to have made this accomplishment?

I think so. Can't find anything else other than this:

http://kernelex.sourceforge.net/wiki/Mozilla_Firefox

Quote

Firefox 11 installs and runs unmodified on KernelEx systems, but are slow and have noticeable rendering glitches.

Firefox 12 freezes after a few seconds.

Firefox versions 13 and higher cause an error in MSVCR100.dll and don't start.

Were any special KernelEx settings needed?

Edited by win32
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13 minutes ago, win32 said:

Were any special KernelEx settings needed?

No, which surprised me!

I just tried Pale Moon 26.5.0, and it keeps performing an illegal instruction, so it would seem that any remotely modern browser is going to have issues.

Still, Firefox 31 is a whole lot newer and better than Firefox 10!

Based on this, do you think it's possible to fork from this version and backport security fixes and maybe remove some things that aren't Windows 9x compatible, such as transparency effects?  If it can be done, this would certainly be a far better place to start than  Retrozilla or Firefox 2, because the layout engine is new enough that sites still mostly render properly.

c

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loblo said:
> Not sure which site specifically you're looking for but Opera 12 does great with
> https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ through https://sitenable.asia/ web proxy.

Thanks! YES this site shows curves in Opera12.
Was only confused about the proxy, don't need it for that site. But will come in handy for other sites.
What I'm mostly after are curves of total infections in some Western and Asian countries, separate curves but together in 1 diagram, for easy comparison of development. Have seen an old version somewhere as screenshot, and in the upper right corner was a button to "add more countries", but couldn't get it working at the time.

(offtopic)
Side note: if anyone is wondering about the "mysteriously" low death rate in Germany, that becomes slightly less mysterious when knowing that hardly anyone "qualifies" to get a TEST. The normal population isn't aware of this, and the conditions may vary depending on which area or federal state people live in, but after reading countless news around the web for weeks, have also come across several announcements that in order to save the far too few and precious testkits, only those people are allowed to get a test who:
- are already SERIOUSLY sick
- AND have visited superdangerous areas, or had close contact with an "officially" infected person
- AND are extra endangered (high age, previous diseases, healthworkers)
That 3-conditions requirement was stated by official health institutions. Otherwise no chance for a test, no matter how sick, and if any possible yet, non-qualifying people are simply told to stay at home and isolate themselves, just in case. Was also confirmed by several forum or article comments of people who tried hard, but no chance. And of course, people who die untested, e.g. in retirement homes, die of "normal" lung infections or heart probs and will never land in the statistics either. Made me wonder about how anyone ever got tested, but guess the final decision is still up to people's family doctors. The most incredible thing I've read, in an interview some official person actually declared something along the lines of "infection numbers are now just estimated, it's a normal procedure worldwide, and more accurate anyway as just a few tests here and there". But saw this only once, and just one sentence, so who knows. Would sure look like them though.
But considering the test-requirements it just keeps amazing me again and again how they get off with shiny claims of "early mass testings", but oh well, politicians.
Only a few days ago the the number of conditions was officially reduced from 3 to 2.
Except that now they're running out of "chemicals" for testing, and can do less tests yet again.

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1 hour ago, jumper said:

Several years ago I had enough success with KM74_31 to recommend it. But I haven't tested it lately and didn't have the CPU or ram for FF.

Good job! What CPU?

Thank you!  I'm running a Northwood Pentium 4 at 2.8 GHz and 2 GB of DDR1 RAM (I had to apply Rloew's rampatch to make that work, of course).

c

Edited by cc333
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