[lug] Navigator 4.7 address book

[Michael J. Hammel]

Thus spoke Tony Dyson
> When I had RH 6.0 & Netscape 4.6/7 installed I didn't have these
> particular problems either. I did have problems with Java crashing
> Netscape (which did not happen with RH 5.x & any version of Netscape up
> to 4.6).

RH 5.2 and 6.0 use different (and apparently incompatible at some level) C
libraries.  I think, but am not sure, that RH5.2 uses glib2.0 and 6.0 uses
glib2.1.  Something like that.  I know the two are not exactly compatible
because 6.0 won't run my version of Applix, but 5.2 does.

You might check to see if there are different versions of Netscape for each
of these versions of the C library.  I think there is, but I never remember
the details when I go download something like Netscape.

> Disabling Java doesn't seem to help the address book problem, but it may
> stop Netscape crashing so often.

Java in Netscape on Linux is broke.  Has been for a long time.  I suspect
5.0 will be better, but don't hold much hope for any of the 4.x versions.
I also expect 5.0 Java support to require the newer kernels and C
libraries.  There goes my nice and stable 5.2 installation.  *sigh*  I hate
upgrading the OS.

> Now when Netscape crashes it frequently locks-up the entire X-Windows
> session, whereas before I was usually able just to "destroy" its window,
> remove the lock-file & start again. I started using Linux to escape
> crashing UI's, & this is not very encouraging.

This is frequently a sign of C library issues.  There are cases where it
can happen, but they are less frequent these days.  The frequency is also tied 
to the stability of your X server.  Xi Graphics hasn't crashed on me in years.
XFree86 SVGA has a couple of times, though its far less seldom these days
than a few years ago.

Of course, even if X dies, the OS continues on its merry way.  That doesn't
happen on other OS'es.  Restarting X is much faster than rebooting the
computer.
-- 
Michael J. Hammel           |
The Graphics Muse           |   Chinese Proverb:
mjhammel at graphics-muse.org  |        Man who run in front of car get tired
http://www.graphics-muse.com