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I wouldn't wanna get along without without WannaBe. With my slow, rural dial-up pipeline to the Internet, I rarely connect at more than 26,400 kbps. There are no cable or DSL alternatives available here yet, so consequently, Web-surfing speed leaves a lot to be desired, to understate the case. However, 95 percent of the time textual information is what I'm primarily looking for on the Web. With my PowerBook G3 or Cube and a 56k modem, performance is good enough that I now keep the pictures turned on in regular browsers like iCab and Mozilla, but some of those graphics-heavy pages still load awfully s l o w l y. Enter WannaBe, David T. Pierson's text-only, web browser for PowerPC or 68k MacOS computers. WannaBe loads Webpages like lightning, even through my crummy dialup connection I'm obliged to live with. I LOVE WannaBe. WannaBe 1.0b10 is the latest development version, incorporating a few changes: • It fixes a bug whereby Basic HTTP Authentication always failed because server responses were not being handled by prompting the user for credentials. (David notes that "This bug had been around for about 18 months with no one reporting it. I guess that just shows how little HTTP authentication is used anymore.") • Also fixed is a bug whereby an incorrect text style would be used when a server returned pages in certain size chunks. • Opera has been added to the list of browsers to which URLs can be passed. WannaBe 1.0b9 is now the designated stable version. WannaBe is strictly a text-only web browser. Non-text "http" URLs are downloaded and saved to disk, in the folder specified by Internet Config, which is required. URLs with schemes other than "http" and "file" are passed to Internet Config. Navigation in WannaBe is supported through hyperlinks, direct URL entry, and home, back, and forward commands. The text of pages can be copied to the clipboard or saved to a local file. A find command allows searching for text strings within a page. Web searches can be done only through plug-in files based on Apple's Internet Search Interface Language (the same plug-ins used by Apple's Sherlock application). Plug-ins based on the HTTP POST method are now supported starting in version 1.0b9. WannaBe doesn't support bookmarks directly. It is possible to define the bookmark file of another browser as WannaBe's homepage. It's bookmarks can then be accessed with Command + H. How to set up Internet Config for this is described in the help under "Bookmarks". The second way is to just save the page onto the disk. WannaBe stores the URL in the file's info field, from where it can be copied. To access the info field, select the file in the Finder and press Command + I. 
Personally, I just keep an alias of my iCab Hotlist on the Desktop, open it in WannaBe, and Command click on the links to open Web pages. You can use Sherlock search plug-ins with WannaBe. That is probably an easier solution than adding WannaBe's custom form resources. See the documentation pages for more info http://mindstory.com/wb2/docs/. Of course, a text-based browser will never be a major threat to full-featured browsers like Communicator or Internet Explorer or iCab. Some pages are totally graphics oriented; WannaBe doesn't support frames; and sometimes you just want to look at the pictures. No problem. If you're surfing with WannaBe and hit a frames-only page, or want to look at a graphic, just pull down the Go menu and select "Open This Page In..." The choices are currently: Navigator, Explorer, iCab, Mozilla, CyberDog, and MacWeb. The page then opens in the browser of your choice. Slick. System requirements: annaBe should run under MacOS 7.5 and later versions, and may also run under System 7.1 if the Drag Manager and Thread Manager are installed. It also requires Color Quickdraw, which is available on all PowerPC and 68k Macs except those with the original Motorola 68000 processor. Finally, WannaBe requires Internet Config 2.0 or later. For German users there's a patch and more Plug-ins and information available at: The latest version and information regarding WannaBe can be found at the WannaBe home page:
For my full review of WannaBe (alpha version), visit:
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