Contact Test Center Director Lee Schlesinger Download Communicator eval

By Lee Schlesinger
Network World, 6/16/97

Forget the Netscape versus Microsoft religious wars. Talk time is over. Now it's crunch time, as the first of the companies' ambitious new Internet client packages - Netscape's Communicator - hit the market last week.

Netscape Communications Corp.'s Communicator is more than the next version of Navigator - it's a whole suite of tools that address browsing, messaging, discussion groups, content creation, push/pull technology, and more. We found it excellent in some areas - notably Navigator and the Netcaster push/pull technology - adequate in most others, but overall a superior value.

The Communicator client packs a lot of functionality in a small package. The $59 Standard Edition includes six applications that aim to handle all your Internet collaboration needs, while the $79 Professional Edition adds enterprise features for calendaring, host connectivity and administration.

Netscape Navigator is still at the top of the list of Communicator applications. Anyone familiar with version 3 will feel at home with the new edition. Usability is improved - you can drag a URL to a subfolder within the bookmarks folder, and you can collapse and expand toolbars with a single click. Frequently used URLs can be placed on a Personal Toolbar, allowing you to access them with a single click. If you begin to type in a URL, Navigator will try to complete it based on most recently accessed addresses. And all personal settings are now included in profiles, similar in theory to those in Windows 95, so that multiple users of a single PC can have their own settings and their own bookmark folders.

Netscape has also added support for the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol, which helps integrate Communicator neatly with other LDAP-compliant services. For example, you can enter a person or organization's name, phone number or e-mail address, and bring up directory information from LDAP-enabled Internet white pages sites like Four11, Bigfoot, Switchboard, WhoWhere and InfoSpace. (But don't take what they return as gospel - of the five, only Bigfoot returned accurate information in our test search.)

LDAP is also supported by Messenger, the enhanced e-mail component, which offers hierarchical folders and address books. In the latter case, you can have personal and corporate address books, as well as access to addresses stored in Internet white pages via LDAP.

We found Messenger's interface a little funky - it includes a tabbed toolbar where you specify the recipient's address, with separate tabs for attachments and new options like encryption, digital signature, and return receipt (which returns notification only when the message is delivered, not when it's read).

But Messenger now includes a healthy set of filters that let you take actions on received messages, allowing you to move them automatically to designated folders based on sender information, for example. And it supports Internet Message Access Protocol 4, a standard messaging protocol that lets you leave your messages on the server where you can access them easily wherever you are. Features like this make Messenger a viable alternative to a separate mail client.

E-mail is fine for point-to-point communications, but Communicator also covers conferences with Collabra discussion groups. The Collabra client has been rewritten to use the Network News Transport Protocol. That means you can use it as a Usenet newsgroup reader, or read messages on your own intranet conference server.

You can apply filters to newsgroups as you can with mailbox folders, such as to create a virtual discussion group within a larger newsgroup if you want info on only a specific product.

These three applications are the core of Communicator Standard Edition, but for the same price you get a pair of other applications.

Netscape Composer is the company's Web page composition program. Its highly visual HTML editor with integrated page publishing stacks up well against low-end page composition tools like Adobe PageMill and Claris HomePage, but it compares poorly against more powerful programs like Allaire Corp.'s HomeSite and Microsoft FrontPage. But if you don't do a lot of HTML composing or write only single pages, it's better than the composing capabilities of Microsoft Word, and saves you from having to purchase a separate package.

The other application, Netscape Conference, lets you use voice, text chat and a shared white board with other people on the Internet.

Professional pluses

The Professional version of Communicator also includes IBM Host On-Demand, a 3270 emulator for access to IBM mainframes from the browser.

Real enterprise sites will want the Professional Edition for Netscape AutoAdmin. In conjunction with a separate server-side tool called Mission Control, AutoAdmin lets you set client configuration information such as home page, mail server address and menu items, and lock items you don't want users to be able to change. AutoAdmin also lets you push Netscape components down to clients.

In either edition, support for installing plug-ins is enhanced. Instead of having to download plug-in files and then set them up, a new feature called SmartUpdate lets you grab and install plug-ins in a single step.

Netcaster may be worth the wait

Not only can Netscaster read specifically designed push channels (via Web technology or an integrated Marimba, Inc. Castanet Tuner), it can also serve as an offline browser. Another useful feature is its ability to broadcast software to multiple desktops, making it a real alternative for automated software distribution.

One problem we had with Netcaster Preview Release 2 was its speed, or rather its lack thereof. On our 133MHz Pentium with 32M bytes RAM running Windows 95, screens took far longer than we'd expect to refresh.

Netcaster also won't work with the Channel Definition Format technology making its way through the World Wide Web Consortium standards process.

Is Netscape Communicator worth a place in your organization? The short answer is yes. Its Navigator Web browser is the best in the business. The messaging client is now good enough that you may not need a separate product -- that alone could be enough for cost-conscious organizations to justify the nominal price of the product. The Collabra newsgroup reader is adequate, though power users will still want a more full-featured application. Composer is likewise fine for the weekend Web author, but inadequate for power developers. But toss in all the other components, plus a wealth of third-party plug-ins, and you have a package that's a real value.

If you already run a version of Navigator, you should feel comfortable upgrading to Communicator right away. If you're waiting to see what Microsoft has in store for its next version of Internet Explorer, try Communicator first to see the standard Microsoft will have to live up to.