OmniWeb
This section reflects general ease-of-use and aesthetic values that are not well reflected in the tasks. Thus the score can not necessarily be quantitatively justified, as it is a personal judgement.
The general impression of Netscape was positive. The package was easy to install, fairly simple for a novice to learn, and ran with few if any problems. The ability to open multiple windows and use News and Mail further enhanced its appeal. The bookmarking system allowed for a fairly simple categorization of links to help in their future retrieval. The incremental loading of images, and the visibility of images while loading was reassuring for the user, since progress could be easily gauged.
The converse was true with Mosaic. The installation process took about four hours (download time included). When running it, it often crashed, or just went away to la la land. The open URL panel was confusing with its pulldown menus and pre-filled textfields. While it was nice to be able to stop images one by one, it was of limited use since you could not see what image you were stopping. It would be better to have incremental displaying, rather than waiting for the complete load. The entire user interface was just frustrating to use, earning it this low rating.
Lynx doesn't really start out with any promises of grand performance or dazzling displays. It is the Volkswagen of these browsers: not flashy, but it gets the job done. It's interface is very simple, with only single-key commands to learn. It also can get a job done much more quickly when all that is wanted is a file or text downloaded from some location. However, it is still just a text browser, and as such can only be considered obsolete.
If Lynx is the Volkswagen of this group, then OmniWeb must be the Rolls-Royce. Sleek, classy, and a pleasure to drive, there are very few negative comments about this package. If only every computer was running NextStep so we all could use this. It offered the most flexibility and value for an office, especially with its easy drag-and-drop metaphor for copying all or part of an HTML document.