ICab

Infobox Software
name = iCab



caption = iCab 4.0.0 under Mac OS X 10.4.11
developer = Alexander Clauss
released = initial release|1999|02|17
frequently_updated = yes
operating system = Mac OS 7.5–9.2.2, X
language = English, German, French, Danish, Spanish, Russian, Norwegian, Chinese and Japanese
genre = Web browser
license = Proprietary
website = http://www.icab.de

iCab is a web browser for the Macintosh by Alexander Clauss, derived from Crystal Atari Browser (CAB) for Atari TOS compatible computers. It is the only browser being developed for Mac OS 9 and earlier, [cite web|url=http://www.mozilla.org/download.html#os9|title=Looking for software for Mac OS 9?|publisher=Mozilla Foundation|accessdate=2008-08-14] and is the only one available for 68k-based Macintoshes that features tabbed browsing.Fact|date=August 2008

The downloadable product is fully functional, but is nagware, periodically displays a dialog box asking the user to register the product, to upgrade to the "Pro" version. Once the registration is purchased, this dialog box is no longer shown.

Versions

iCab 2.x

While no longer maintained, iCab 2.9.9 is still available for download and registration. It supports both 68k and PowerPC Macintosh systems running System 7.5 through Mac OS 9.2.2.

iCab 3.x

As of January 2008, iCab 3 is still maintained. This version can run on PowerPC systems running Mac OS 8.5 through Mac OS 9.2.2, or PowerPC or Intel systems running Mac OS X 10.1 or later.

iCab 4.x

iCab 4 was rewritten to use the Cocoa API and the WebKit rendering engine. It can run on PowerPC or Intel systems running Mac OS 10.3.9 or later.

History

iCab's original rendering engine was often criticized for not supporting CSS and DOM. iCab 3 introduced improved rendering capabilities, including support for CSS2 and Unicode (via the ATSUI toolkit). iCab 4 switched to WebKit for its rendering engine, giving it the same rendering abilities as Apple's Safari browser.

Features

iCab features a powerful filter manager which allows users to avoid downloading advertisements and other unwanted content. This helps speed slow internet connections and avoid visual distractions. Currently iCab comes with two filters (ads and video). Other kinds of filters add features, such as the YouTube video filter which adds a download link on all YouTube page views so you can easily download the videos.

Depending on the validity of the HTML of the web site currently viewed, iCab displays a smiley face. Clicking on the smiley will bring up a list of any errors on the page. This feature was first seen in the same author's earlier web browser, CAB. iCab also contains the following features:

* Tabbed browsing.
* JavaScript and CSS2 support.
* Multiple language support, including Arabic on older Macs (cannot display UTF-16 pages).
* Filtering:
** Sophisticated filtering out of images and plugin content (e.g. ads).
** Adjust rendering, network, JavaScript, and cookies settings for individual sites or types of pages.
* Kiosk mode: full screen display and access controls.
* Download manager:
** Allows the user start, stop, resume and review downloads.
** Maintains a download history.
** Supports downloading one page or a whole site (crawling) with many configuration options.
* Portable web archives: ability to save pages as a ZIP archive containing HTML and images.
* Acid2 test compliance.
* Very configurable print dialog.
* History window which can sort by title, last access date, or URL.
* Hotlist (bookmark) mechanism which can automatically or manually check for updates to bookmarked sites.
* Reload a single image on a page without needing to reload the whole page.
* Disable web "annoyances" such as animated GIFs and embedded sound files.
* Pretending to be another browser.
* Support for sessions (i.e. saving and then loading all open windows and tabs).
* Add any query (e.g., search engine, Wikipedia) to the toolbar search widget by point-and-click.

See also

* List of web browsers
* Comparison of web browsers
* Comparison of layout engines
* InScript

External links

* [http://www.icab.de/ iCab website]

References