Christophe Thibault, Sebastian Spaeth, Brian Harris, Jeff Doozan, Mark Liffiton, Rob Johnson, Ulf Erikson, Jordan Callicoat, Dorian Boissonnade, Roytam, et al.
K-Meleon began with the goal of being faster and lighter than Mozilla's original internet suite. Until 2011, K-Meleon embedded Gecko in a stripped-down interface. Throughout its lifespan, K-Meleon has required small amounts of memory. K-Meleon 76 uses the Goanna fork to support platforms no longer supported by Mozilla after the Firefox Quantum rewrite. K-Meleon supports legacy platforms like the early Pentiums' SSE and MMX processors. It maintains active support for Windows XP and Windows Vista.
Customization is another primary design goal of K-Meleon. Users can change the toolbars, menus, and keyboard shortcuts from text-based configuration files. Besides conventional extensions, K-Meleon also supports macros. Macros are small, human-readable extensions. Users can examine, write, or edit them in a text editor. K-Meleon's custom configuration files can trigger macros. Due to its adaptability, experts recommended K-Meleon for internet cafes and libraries in the early 2000s.
History
Christophe Thibault started the K-Meleon project in the early 2000s.[1] During that time, more of the web was made of static web pages,[2] and many projects were formed to create new browsers.[3]Netscape founded the Mozilla project to open-source their once-dominant Netscape Communicator internet suite.[4] When Mozilla released an embeddable version of their Gecko web engine, K-Meleon was one of several browsers to use Gecko in a stripped-down interface.[5] The Mozilla Application Suite used Gecko to both render pages and also create graphical interface elements like toolbars and menus. Christophe Thibault designed K-Meleon to combine Gecko with native Windows interface elements. This approach was less resource-intensive and allowed the browser to blend into its environment.[6]
Embedding Gecko
K-Meleon 0.2
Christophe Thibault released K-Meleon 0.1 on August 21, 2000.[7] While working at Nullsoft, Thibault created the first release during a single day off. He began by building and branding Mozilla's test application for embedding the Gecko layout engine. K-Meleon 0.1 was simple but quickly attracted attention to the project.[1] For the 0.2 release, Thibault implemented expected features including context menus, and he moved development to SourceForge to welcome contributors.[8]
Thibault handed the project over to new developers,[9] notably Brian Harris, Sebastian Spaeth, Jeff Doozan, and Ulf Erikson.[10] The new developers began moving browser functions into a modular system of Kplugins.[11] The K-Meleon team released new versions of the browser to fix bugs, improve stability, and add features like pop-up blocking, cookie management,[12]encrypted downloading of web pages via SSL, and online proxies for anonymity or content filtering.[13] The developers introduced text-based configuration files or configs. The config files provided a way to fully customize the browser's interface and hide interface elements on publicly accessible computers.[14] The developers also created a macro language for users to personalize the browser.[15] In K-Meleon, macros are a smaller type of browser extension designed to be human-readable and modified or created by end-users.[16]
K-Meleon was built with open-source code from Mozilla but its narrower focus offered advantages over the Mozilla Application Suite.[17] The suite bundled components beyond a web browser including applications for email, news, chat, and webpage editing. To create a stand-alone browser, the Galeon project embedded Mozilla's rendering engine. However, Galeon was only available on Linux as it used GNOME's widget toolkit, GTK.[18] The K-Meleon browser brought a similar approach to Windows. It used the native Windows application programming interface (API) to create a lightweight user interface. The K-Meleon developers were able to release a stand-alone web browser on Windows two years before the Firefox alpha release.[19]Mozilla created user interfaces via their cross-platform XML User Interface Language (XUL) layer. XUL allowed Mozilla to build one application for multiple operating systems, but it increased the size of the application. By design, XUL generated graphical controls that did not match the rest of the system. Gecko, not the operating system, rendered XUL.[20] K-Meleon required less memory and was more closely integrated into the Windows desktop. It could even use the native bookmarking system to access Internet Explorer's favorites.[7] The approach that Galeon had taken on the GNOME desktop and K-Meleon had taken on Windows was later used by Camino on macOS.[21]
Mozilla programmers cited the existing stand-alone browsers K-Meleon, Galeon, and Camino when they began developing Firefox,[22] and Mozilla publicly referred to K-Meleon in Firefox's initial alpha release.[23]Dave Hyatt was a founding developer for Safari, Firefox, and Camino.[24] Hyatt criticized Mozilla and Netscape's work on the internet suite in contrast to focused browser projects. He stated, "You don't see Galeon UI designers trying to co-develop their UI with the rest of the world, nor do you see that with [...] K-Meleon."[25] During the time that Mozilla maintained an embeddable Gecko engine, they showcased stand-alone browsers including K-Meleon as examples of the embedding technology.[26]
K-Meleon 0.7 with a simple "Hello World" macro, the optional Tango theme, and several NPAPI plugins installed
By October 2002, K-Meleon 0.7 included many of the browser's core features and rendered pages with the Mozilla 1.0 engine.[27] Version 0.7 implemented skins to theme the browser's appearance.[28] It also provided support for Netscape Plugin Application Programming Interface (NPAPI) plugins.[29] NPAPI plugins, also known as third-party plugins, were a de facto industry standard for embedding media and interactive content in web pages.[30] Ulf Erikson implemented tabbed browsing functionality via "layers" which provided the functionality of tabbed browsing and worked with other Kplugins including macros and mouse gestures.[31] Layers, however, on an API level implemented tabs as separate stacked windows. As a side effect, the operating system would repaint the window and perform the animation for opening a new window each time a different tab was selected.[32] Despite AOL disbanding upstream parent company Netscape in 2003, K-Meleon experienced a relatively stable year. Mozilla continued work on Gecko, and K-Meleon itself was refined with service packs and the incremental 0.8 release.[33]
In 2005, Ulf Erikson announced that version 0.9 would be the final version he would build. He was the project's developer but stated that he was no longer using K-Meleon as his primary browser after moving to Linux.[34] In January 2006, Dorian Boissonnade became the lead developer and began working towards a 1.0 release.[35]
Boissonnade had co-developed an unofficial build of K-Meleon with Hao Jiang for the Chinese-language Classic Club Forum (CCF) before becoming an official developer. They brought features first introduced in K-Meleon CCF to the official releases, including an improved localization system.[36] Released in July 2006, K-Meleon 1.0 made the browser fully translatable. Previous versions could be translated because they were open-source. The source code could be downloaded, the source files could be translated, and the browser code recompiled.[37] Version 1.0 stored localizations in separate library and config files within existing K-Meleon installations.[38](§ Menus) The layout engine was also updated to the latest Gecko release from Mozilla. This brought improvements to security and usability, including support for favicons, a flexible search engine system, and better support for multi-user environments.[39](v. 1.0) K-Meleon maintained support for its existing system of text-based configuration files and introduced a new graphical interface to change preferences from within the browser.[40]
Version 1.1 expanded the macro system. Earlier versions placed all of the macros into a single config file. Initial releases came with under 50 lines of macro code and instructions for end users to create their own macros.[38](§ News) Later versions came with over a thousand lines of macro code in addition to the macros that users wrote and shared online. By 2008, users were sharing macros as an alternative to the add-ons for Mozilla Firefox.[41] To make the macros more manageable, K-Meleon developers separated them into module files. The modules could be more easily shared, downloaded, and edited.[38](§ News) K-Meleon versions released since have retained compatibility for this system.[39](v. 1.1-75.1) Macro modules, skins, and configuration files were also split into a default stored in the browser's folder, and customizations stored in a user's profile as part of the transition to a multi-user design.[39](v. 1.1)
Version 1.5 introduced a true tabbed interface.[39](v. 1.5) Earlier versions relied on the optional "layers" Kplugin. That had limitations like repainting the entire window when switching tabs.[42] First introduced in the unofficial K-Meleon CCF, true tabs supported drag and drop, could have individual close icons, could be placed on the bottom of the window, and sets of tabs could be restored as a session when restarting the browser.[43] In Europe, version 1.5 was an optional default Windows browser through Microsoft's browser ballot. Due to accusations of abusing their market position to push Internet Explorer, Microsoft introduced a browser ballot in the European Economic Area.[44] By 2010, they offered Windows users a choice of the 12 most popular web browsers including K-Meleon.[45]
7x releases
In 2011, Mozilla dropped support for embedding the Gecko layout engine. As K-Meleon had previously relied on this API to combine Mozilla's display engine with its native Windows interface, this left the future of the browser uncertain.[46] Mozilla's change resulted in the end of the Camino web browser which embedded Gecko within a native interface for macOS. The Camino developers initially explored transitioning to the WebKit rendering engine.[47] When the WebKit transition did not work, the developers discontinued the Mac-only browser altogether.[48] Marco Gritti, the lead developer of Galeon had already forked that project to create GNOME Web and switched to a WebKit backend. GNOME Web developer Christian Persch described Mozilla's support for embedding Gecko on Linux as, "unmaintained and stagnant."[49]
After years without an official, stable release, the K-Meleon group released version 74 in 2014.[50] While Mozilla had ended support for embedding Gecko, they still maintained a technology called XULRunner. XULRunner was a stand-alone implementation of the Gecko engine designed to launch cross-platform applications.[51] K-Meleon 74 was the first official release to use XULRunner instead of Mozilla's deprecated embedding software.[52] Outside of the new engine, version 74 brought small improvements including a new default theme, better CPU usage, and minor bug fixes.[53] This was the final version to support Windows 2000 and therefore still received occasional updates.[54]
K-Meleon 75 was released in 2015 with a Mozilla 31 backend, Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.2 support, a new skin system, a new toolbar implementation, spellcheck, and form auto-completion.[55] Prior to version 75, buttons were defined in pixel size by their skin or theme.[55] For high-resolution monitors, this could result in either tiny icons or a blurry up-scaled browser.[56] Version 75 introduced a skin system that allowed end users to adjust the icon size, and would automatically adjust the default icon size to a degree.[55] K-Meleon 75 also expanded and included the previously optional, JSBridge. JSBridge offered partial support for Mozilla-style add-ons.[39](v. 75) A few Mozilla add-ons like NewsFox and Cookie Keeper took advantage of it but were not direct ports. Yvon Tanguy, the developer of Cookie Keeper, commented that "the only way [he] found to perform" a crucial routine on K-Meleon was to include "cookiekeeper.kmm", a small file that users would have to manually extract.[57] Boissonnade began work on version 76 but suffered a disk failure during beta testing.[58]
Goanna branch
Two screenshots of K-Meleon 76 with the same K-Meleon theme but different system themes
Since 2017, all active development on K-Meleon has taken place using a fork of the Goanna engine.[59] With Firefox Quantum, Mozilla rewrote most of the Gecko engine from the ground up.[60] The Goanna engine is a maintained fork of the pre-Quantum Gecko engine created by Pale Moon developers.[61]
Roytam forked the most recent version of K-Meleon in 2017 to run on the Goanna engine.[62] The project's lead developer, Boissonnade, expressed enthusiasm and approval of this new branch but stepped away from the project without formally transferring control or ownership.[63] Using this forked engine allows K-Meleon to support platforms abandoned by mainstream browsers. K-Meleon remains compatible with Windows XP and can run on as low as 20 megabytes of random access memory (RAM).[64] K-Meleon has the lowest memory requirements of actively developed browsers; although this also means that it cannot leverage extra RAM to increase rendering speed.[65]
Goanna is actively developed but has not fully implemented recent web features introduced by Google like Shadow DOM.[66] Shadow DOM was originally released by Google as a non-standard feature in Chrome.[67] The implementation in Goanna is incomplete and disabled by default.[68]
K-Meleon also does not support the online Digital Rights Management (DRM) introduced in 2017. The Free Software Foundation (FSF) criticized the World Wide Web Consortium for including DRM in the web's specification as antithetical to free and open-source software. FSF executive director John Sullivan responded to the standardization of DRM by saying, "We're mourning the Web."[69] Larger free software projects including Kodi and Firefox have handled the incompatibility of DRM and free software by signing an agreement with Google to side-load their proprietary Widevine DRM implementation.[70] Smaller projects like GNOME Web,[71] Basilisk,[72] K-Meleon, and Metastream have been unable to support these proprietary encryption methods.[73]
K-Meleon is updated on a weekly rolling release schedule. By default, the browser is a multi-lingual portable application that can run directly from the host computer or removable media.[74] As a fork from the official release chain, K-Meleon will not update automatically; it can be manually updated.[62] It is also included in the PortableApps.com repository.[75]
Customization
K-Meleon's interface can be controlled by the end user or system administrator.[14] Many features can be changed from the graphical user interface. Toolbars can be enabled, disabled, or positioned from the browser window. Preferences can be adjusted from a graphical panel. Deeper customization is possible using text-format configuration files, or configs.[76] The menus, keyboard shortcuts, icons, toolbars, and buttons can all be customized via K-Meleon's configuration files. These configuration files can, in turn, call upon macros. K-Meleon's macros are a type of small extension that can also be opened in a text editor by end users.[16]
A simple "Hello, World!" program could be written in K-Meleon's macro language as below. This would pop up a small window with a message.[77]
HelloWorld{
alert("Hello world!");
}
To trigger the macro above, a user or administrator could add a keyboard accelerator by adding the code below to their accelerator configuration file. This would cause macro to launch if the Ctrl, Alt, and H keys are pressed at the same time.[78]
CTRLALTH= macros(HelloWorld)
Custom toolbars offer more options but the syntax is similar. The example below would create a new toolbar with a button to trigger a macro.[79]
NewToolbar{
!NewButton{
macros(HelloWorld)
}}
This combination of configuration files and macro modules provides users a greater degree of flexibility than in other browsers.[80] It also creates a learning curve for customization that is not present in most browsers. Popular browsers rely on systems like WebExtensions for customization where there is a distinct divide between end users and extension programmers.[81]
K-Meleon never had a community of extension developers as large as those of Firefox or Chrome.[82] The most popular browser in 2020 was Google Chrome which had over 130,000 WebExtensions available for download.[83] K-Meleon did support XUL-based extensions similar to but not compatible with those previously used by other Mozilla applications.[84] Mozilla Firefox supported XUL-based extensions until 2018. When the Classic Adds-Ons Archive preserved the add-ons for Firefox in 2017, there were over 16,000 available.[85] In contrast K-Meleon never had more than a few hundred extension developers,[86] despite support for a small number of major extensions like AdBlock Plus.[87]
K-Meleon's flexibility was a reason that it was recommended in the early 2000s for environments where the browser needed to be customized for general public use, such as libraries and internet cafés.[88] It allowed an administrator to create a custom browser interface for patrons, save this interface in the file system, and then distribute the interface to all public-facing computers.[89]
Legacy Windows versions
K-Meleon supports legacy versions of Windows that other browser vendors have abandoned.[90] The current version supports Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Embedded POSReady 2009, and Windows Vista. Windows XP was released as far back as 2001,[91] and all of these operating systems are disconutinued as of 2019.[92] The latest major browser releases to support these platforms are Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 from 2014,[93] Google Chrome 50 from 2016,[94] and Mozilla Firefox 52 from 2018.[95]ReactOS, the open-source implementation of Windows, is currently only compatible up to Windows Server 2003.[96]
Web browsers cannot access most modern websites if they do not support Transport Layer Security (TLS) encryption via HTTPS.[97] It was initially used for sensitive data transfers like banking. However, by 2018 the majority of web pages used TLS encryption.[98] Most browsers including Chrome, Edge, Safari, Opera, and Internet Explorer rely on the operating system for client certificates. This poses a barrier to accessing the web on discontinued operating systems. Pre-Quantum Firefox and related applications like K-Meleon can use client certificates directly from the browser.[99]
Older versions of K-Meleon receive occasional updates for TLS certificates.[64] When TLS 1.2 was released in 2008, major browser vendors were no longer targeting Windows 2000 or earlier.[100] K-Meleon 74 can access secure websites on Windows 2000 using an older version of the Goanna engine combined with up-to-date ciphers. It provides both access to HTTPS sites and greater web compatibility than other web browsers released for the OS.[54] K-Meleon 1.5 can access secure websites on Windows 9x releases like Windows 98 and Windows Me using TLS patches but receives no updates to the web engine.[101]
Released in 2000, K-Meleon has been under development for over two decades and is still maintained. The most recent version, K-Meleon 76, is updated on a rolling release schedule. All versions of K-Meleon are written for the Microsoft Windows operating system. All versions support Windows XP and Vista.[107] All versions support 32-bit, SSE and MMX processors. Thus, K-Meleon can still run on machines built circa 2000, using then-popular chipsets like the Pentium III.[108] Version 74 is the latest version to support Windows 2000. Version 1.5.4 is the latest stable release to support Windows 98. K-Meleon is not designed for Unix but can run on POSIX-compliant systems if they have an implementation of the Windows API like the Wine compatibility layer.[109]
Complete K-Meleon release history
Version
Initial Release
Latest Update
Gecko Version
Notes
Key: Old release; not supported. Old release; still supported. Current stable release.
^Project hosted at SourceForge; right-click context menus; improvements and bugfixes.
^Major rewrite using MfcEmbed instead of WinEmbed and the BCG Library; Kplugin support for menus and toolbars; preferences dialog; customizable menus and accelerator keys; basic authentication; page source view; option to save files to disk.
^KPlugin interface, support for Netscape bookmarks and fullscreen display, macro extension and history Kplugin; (bitmapped) menus, accelerator keys and toolbars customizable through configuration files; cache support; support for external source code viewer; configurable cookie and image settings; possibility to disable Style Sheets, Java and JavaScript; web search.
^New Kplugins: Layered windows ("tabbed browsing"), support for Opera bookmarks (hotlist), external program control; automatic detection of popular third party plugins; text zoom, print preview, page setup and type ahead find; skin support; various improvements and bugfixes.
^Privacy Kplugin, Flashblock extension and Aggreg8 RSS feed reader; new default skin (Phoenity); numerous usability improvements. Community-driven Gecko updates.
^Full localization support, first official localization (German); find bar and improved URL bar; configurable download options, XUL-based advanced preferences panel; Gecko updates; bugfixes; overall improvements for macros and menus; new default RSS/Atom feed reader (NewsFox).
^Multilanguage support, several official localizations; modular macros; session saver Kplugin; improved cookie permissions and password support; easier customization of search engines and mouse gestures; upgradable configuration of accelerator keys, menus and macros; Gecko updates; bugfixes; update checker Kplugin.
^True tabs instead of layered windows; improved multilanguage support; native preferences panel replaced by XUL-based former advanced preferences panel; new configuration options; feature improvements; Unicode build for Windows NT, non-Unicode build for Windows 9X; Gecko updates. This is the final version to run on Windows 98. It receives occasional support to access modern secure websites.
^Gecko update, improvements and bugfixes. The jump in version number is due to some website misreading K-Meleon's useragent. This is the final version of K-Meleon that supports Windows 2000 and still receives occasional updates.
^Gecko updates, added navToggleJS (toggle js pref and js in all page) and pageToggleJS (toggle js in current page); JSBridge expanded, macro language expanded; support for "about:" pages; new spellcheck features; shorter privacy bar using text; various bugfixes; enabled plugin container for Flash by default.
^A new branch switches from Gecko to Goanna. This allows K-Meleon to retain support for legacy systems.
General references for this table include K-Meleon file releases,[134] release notes,[135] changelogs,[39](v. 1.0–75.1) and the Announcements forum.[136]
Software referenced in this article has gone by multiple names. The following may be referred to by previous official names, alternative names, or internal code names in the cited references:
Camino was released as Chimera. Mozilla changed the name of the Mac-only browser for legal reasons. In Greek mythology, the Chimera is a single creature composed of parts from different animals. The metaphor of the web, and hypermedia in general, as a mythical Chimera had already been noticed and used by other browsers. Changing the name to something exclusive made it possible for Mozilla to acquire a trademark on Camino as applied to browsers.
GNOME Web descends from Galeon. Galeon was the first browser to embed Gecko in a GTK interface. The lead developer forked Galeon to create Epiphany. Epiphany initially used Gecko but switched to a Webkit engine. It was later renamed GNOME Web or simply Web but is often still referred to as Epiphany.
Firefox was originally released as Phoenix. Because of a trademark dispute, Mozilla changed the name to Firebird. Then because of another trademark dispute, they changed the name again to Firefox. Before release, Firefox and an earlier unrelated attempt at a stand-alone browser were both referred to internally as m/b short for mozilla/browser or Mozilla Browser.
Kplugins are C++ libraries used by K-Meleon. They are unrelated to NPAPI, or third-party, plugins. Third-party plugins, like Adobe Flash, are also supported by K-Meleon. Confusingly, sources refer to both systems as plugins.[137]
Mozilla Application Suite, or Mozilla, refers to the open-source base for the Netscape 6 and 7 application suites. The browser components of both the Netscape and Mozilla application suites were called Navigator. Mozilla was renamed to the Mozilla Application Suite and marketed as the Mozilla Suite after the release of the Mozilla Firefox browser. Seamonkey (with a lowercase m) was the internal codename for the application suites. When Mozilla stopped developing the suite to focus on Firefox, they provided infrastructure for the community to continue the development of the original codebase. SeaMonkey is a continuation of the project based on the same source code.
^Lee, Timothy (June 16, 2008). "The Browser Is The New Operating System". Techdirt. Archived from the original on December 21, 2022. Retrieved December 21, 2022. As websites have come to look more and more like applications rather than static pages, they've begun to bump up against the limits of what today's web browsers can do.
^McCracken, Harry (March 2007). "For Browsers, the Best of Times is Now". PC World. p. 15. Right now, more viable options are angling for your attention than at any time since the browser wars of the mid-1990s. [...] Tempted to leave IE? Firefox and Opera, the powerful browser from Norway, are far from your only options. These days, in fact, they're part of the old guard. Newer alternatives abound: Flock, for instance, offers built-in blogging, and K-Meleon is snappy even on low-end hardware.
^Dunsdon, Nicole (October 11, 2000). "Rebel Web browsers worth considering". Calgary Herald. p. TB4. K-Meleon [is] one of the first applications designed to showcase the Gecko rendering engine, a technology developed by the Mozilla.org team to speed up Web page display. The long-awaited Netscape 6 browser, due for release before the end of this year, will employ Gecko.
^Boswell, David; King, Brian; Oeschger, Ian; Collins, Pete; Murhpy, Eric (September 24, 2002). "Mozilla as Platform". In Boswell, David (ed.). Creating Applications with Mozilla. O'Reilly Media. p. 7. Retrieved February 2, 2023. Let a Hundred Browsers Bloom: Because Mozilla can be used to create any sort of application, there's no reason why it can't be used to create different types of browsers. Several projects are currently under development independently from the work being done on the default browser. [...] Some examples include [...] K-Meleon (http:// kmeleon.sourceforge.net) for Windows.
^Blanco, Elena (March 1, 2005). "Open source and the web browser". OSS Watch. Archived from the original on May 29, 2010. Retrieved November 8, 2011. K-Meleon is a lightweight web browser designed to run on the Windows platform and makes use of the Windows native interface for the applications toolbars and menu so that it is tightly integrated into the look and feel of the Windows desktop.
^ abFoley, Mary Jo (August 22, 2000). "K-Meleon browser part Mozilla, part IE". ZDNet. ZDNet News. Archived from the original on November 8, 2001. Retrieved March 5, 2022. K-Meleon's biggest claim to fame is its small size and fast loading time. The full K-Meleon package, including the installer, is 2.85MB. [...] K-Meleon features the Internet Explorer (IE) bookmarking system,[...](Mozilla)
^Brown, Luke (2000). "K-Meleon". PC Monkey. Archived from the original on October 2, 2000. Retrieved September 9, 2022.
^Spaeth, Sebastian (February 13, 2001). "Release Notes". SourceForge. Archived from the original on August 16, 2001. Retrieved January 14, 2023. Originally created by Christophe Thibault, K-Meleon was released up to version 0.21 in 2000, and received mostly positive feedback. Christophe, being busy with coding Winamp3, was not able to satisfy the demand of the public for faster development. The development team was enlarged in the end of January and development continued with [Brian Harris] as lead coder.
^Erikson, Ulf; Holman; Mutch; Moses; Sachner; Zarneth (2002). "K-Meleon User's Guide and Reference Manual". K-Meleon Documentation Project. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 22, 2022. ((cite web)): |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 24, 2006 suggested (help) § 8.1 Acknowledgements
^Harris, Brian (January 31, 2001). "Re:News". kmeleon-dev@lists.sourceforge.net (Mailing list). Archived from the original on November 27, 2002. The plugin design is based losely on general plugins in winamp. Right now the only thing a plugin can do is add itself to the menu and process commands. The api for that isn't quite finished yet, but you can see the preliminary stuff in kmeleon_plugin.h.
^Blasko, Larry (December 6, 2001). "K-Meleon: Lean, mean Web browser". USA Today. Archived from the original on November 18, 2022. Retrieved March 14, 2022. It is very stable, and lightning fast at loading pages. Good cookie control, and best of all — pop-up ad blocking!
^ abJesdanun, Anick (June 16, 2002). "Mozilla an adaptable browser". Spartanburg Herald-Journal. Spartanburg, South Carolina: Kevin Drake. pp. E1, E7. Andrew Mutch helps develop and uses a version called K-Meleon in the Waterford Township, Mich, public library, where he is systems technician. He says other browsers don't let him turn off features the way K-Meleon does, making them difficult to manage in multiple-user settings.
^ ab"The Kmeleon browser is a godsend for weak computers". sev-radius.ru. September 19, 2015. Archived from the original on January 11, 2023. Retrieved September 4, 2022. The browser has a simple and intuitive interface. In addition, due to the settings and the ability to change the interface in text-based configuration files, you can precisely define the order and location of elements, creating a completely customized solution. In addition, K-meleon has a macro module that allows you to significantly expand the functionality of the browser. Also, it is possible to write macros yourself if you learn the K-meleon macro language.
^Orlowski, Andrew (November 26, 2001). "Galeon zips while Mozilla slips". The Register. Situation Publishing. Archived from the original on September 10, 2022. Retrieved September 9, 2022. Galeon pulls the Gecko rendering engine out of the Mozilla wreckage, and builds a lightweight, but very fully featured browser around it, using Gtk and Gnome code. [...] It isn't the only browser to build on Gecko [...] for Windows there's the K-Meleon project.
^Boswell, David. "Mozilla Browsers". O'Reilly Media. Archived from the original on June 7, 2014. Retrieved December 22, 2022. Galeon and K-Meleon are projects that also have the goal of creating a simple standards-compliant browser using Mozilla's rendering engine. Galeon uses Gecko to create a browser for the GNOME desktop and K-Meleon uses Gecko to create a Windows-only browser. [...] Another interesting project to keep on eye on is Phoenix. There isn't much known about this yet, but there are some pages in bugzilla and on the mozilla.org site that have some information. It looks like Phoenix is based on an earlier project called m/b (short for mozilla/browser) and has a goal to create a user-friendly, stand-alone browser that is free from most of the constraints placed on the default Mozilla browser.
^Mackey, Kurt; Aeirould (July 31, 2002). "Mozilla Milestone 1.0: the Review". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on December 8, 2002. Retrieved December 21, 2022. Unfortunately, the new features are overshadowed by Navigator's problems in the more basic areas, such as the user interface. Many of the problems stem from Navigator's cross platform implementation, forcing the developers to create a more generic application instead of targeting a specific platform and optimizing the interface to fit in and interact nicely.
^Iverson, Will (April 24, 2003). Mac OS X for Java Geeks. O'Reilly Media. p. 127. Camino, available at http:// www.mozilla.org /projects/camino/, is an excellent Cocoa - based web browser that uses the Gecko HTML rendering engine from the Mozilla open source project.
^Ross, Blake. "README". Phoenix 0.1 Source Code. Mozilla. Archived from the original on January 30, 2005. This project is a redesign of the Mozilla browser component, similar to Galeon, K-Meleon and Chimera, but written using the XUL user interface language and designed to be cross-platform. Note that the linked document is a later revision; the quoted text is the same between versions.
^Murhpy, David (June 1, 2013). "Mac 'Camino' Web Browser Gets Put Out to Pasture". PC Magazine. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 22, 2022. For example, Dave Hyatt, Firefox co-creator, moved over to Apple to help the company kick-start Safari shortly after he helped the early "Camino" team build the first version of Chimera.
^Hyatt, Dave (July 2002). "It's Just the UI, Stupid". Archived from the original on August 26, 2003. Retrieved September 12, 2022. You don't see Galeon UI designers trying to co-develop their UI with the rest of the world, nor do you see that with Chimera, m/b, K-Meleon, or OEOne. [...] I began working on Chimera largely out of frustration with having to deal with all of the lousy work being done on the Navigator front end (both in UI design, marketing nonsense and lousy implementation). It wasn't so much that I wanted to learn Cocoa or anything; I just wanted to work with a small number of talented people instead of an uncontrollable mob.
^"Embedding: Mozilla Examples and External Projects". mozilla.org. Archived from the original on June 6, 2003. Retrieved December 18, 2022. K-Meleon browser: the Windows answer to Galeon . Fast IE-look-alike browser, uses IE and NS bookmarking system, fast loading time, privacy features, Java support and complete control of the menus and "hotkeys". Implemented with Mozilla embedding APIs.
^Goldoni, Emanuele. "K-Meleon: Toolbar Skins". Archived from the original on November 8, 2002. Retrieved September 10, 2022. K-Meleon 0.7 – Because this new release uses a new macro-based skinning system, skins and throbbers are now stored into the directory containing the used skin (C:\...\K-Meleon\skins\SKIN_NAME\).
^"K-Meleon 0.7 Release Notes". January 8, 2011. Archived from the original on April 10, 2005. Retrieved February 13, 2023. What's New, Improved and Fixed in This Release: - Automatically detects several major 3rd party plugins (Acrobat, Sun JRE, Quicktime, Windows Media Player 7)
^Jin, Xing; Wang, Lusha; Luo, Tongbo; Du, Wenliang (December 29, 2015). "Fine-Grained Access Control for HTML-5-Based Mobile Applications in Android". In Yvo Desmedt (ed.). Information Security. Germany: Springer International Publishing. p. 314. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-27659-5_22. ISBN978-3-319-27659-5. S2CID15516113. Retrieved February 2, 2023. In browsers it is often necessary to allow JavaScript to interact with browser plugins, such as Flash, PDF reader, Java Applet, etc. A de facto standard for such an interaction was initially developed for Netscape, but was subsequently implemented by many other browsers. It is called Netscape Plugin Application Programming Interface (NPAPI) which provides cross-platform plugin architecture for browsers.
^Gralla, Preston (July 16, 2007). "K-Meleon". PC World. IDG Communications, Inc. Archived from the original on September 20, 2022. Retrieved September 18, 2022. It gives you all the features you've come to expect in a modern browser, including tabbed browsing, and some nice extras as well.
^Erikson, Ulf; Holman; Mutch; Moses; Sachner; Zarneth (2002). "K-Meleon User's Guide and Reference Manual". K-Meleon Documentation Project. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 22, 2022. The Layered Windows Plugin, layers.dll, tries to mimic tabbed windows,((cite web)): |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 24, 2006 suggested (help) § 6.5 Layers.
^"MozillaZine Review of the Year 2003". MozillaZine. December 31, 2003. Archived from the original on January 1, 2023. Retrieved January 1, 2023. The penultimate month of the year brought Bugzilla 2.16.4 and 2.17.5 and the opening up of the Mozilla Firebird CVS partition. Other developments included version 0.8 of the Windows Mozilla-based K-Meleon browser, the launch of the redesigned mozilla.org website and the Mac-only release of Mozilla 1.5.1. In addition, MozillaZine reported on some of the organisations employing ex-Netscape Mozilla contributors.
^Erikson, Ulf (January 8, 2005). "K-Meleon: Dead or Alive?". kmeleon-dev@lists.sourceforge.net (Mailing list). Archived from the original on December 18, 2022. Retrieved September 17, 2022. Andrew is right on an important point: That line was not meant as a: "Do as I want, or else..". It was a comment about my frustration. I *have* asked myself more than once the last months whether it wouldn't be better to stop; Whether my offer to help build K-Meleon 0.9 had been a mistake. In case you didn't [know] I have never had any plans to continue after the release.
^Jiang, Hao. "[Recommend] K-Meleon for SeaMonkey 1.0". K-Meleon CCF Unofficial Version. Archived from the original on January 13, 2006. About localization of this build: The sources contain a kmeleonloc folder which permit to build a dll of ressources. Instead of "hacking" into the exe to localize k-meleon, you can translate the resources, build the dll, and put it in the k-meleon folder with the name k-meleonloc.dll. K-meleon will use it instead of its internal english resource. You can make a language.cfg file to translate menus, toolbars and macro (as long as they use the new _T() function).(Mozilla)
^Pogson, Geoff (December 28, 2004). "Computing in Welsh". Multilingual Computing & Technology. Vol. 16, no. 69. MultiLingual Media LLC. pp. 37–40. 'Open-source software is practically built for localization,' says Jones, 'Its originators envisaged it as multilingual. You can localize it at no cost and without having to ask for permission.' [...] Volunteers have also localized Opera and K-Meleon.
^Karaboychev, Kalin (July 14, 2008). "K-Meleon – инсталация и настройки". Kaldata. Archived from the original on December 31, 2022. Retrieved December 31, 2022. (Refer to the visual tour of the "Advanced Preferences" panel.)
^Erikson, Ulf; Holman; Mutch; Moses; Sachner; Zarneth (2002). "K-Meleon User's Guide and Reference Manual". K-Meleon Documentation Project. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 22, 2022. The Layered Windows Plugin, layers.dll, tries to mimic tabbed windows,((cite web)): |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 24, 2006 suggested (help) § 6.5 Layers.
^Wang, Mao (August 23, 2009). "快速网页浏览器K-MeleonCCF ME 0.094版". Archived from the original on December 23, 2022. Retrieved December 23, 2022. K-MeleonCCF是一个非官方K-Meleon版本，源自K-Meleon 1.0 branch。最新CCF版与最新K-Meleon 官方版间最大的不同在于CCF版支持"real tab structure"（由Dorian开发）。[...] K-MeleonCCF ME 0.09版本的标签上可以显示关闭按钮, 标签栏可以置于窗口的下方。 [K-MeleonCCF is an unofficial K-Meleon version that comes from the K-Meleon 1.0 branch. The biggest difference between the latest CCF version and the latest K-Meleon official version is that the CCF version supports "true tab structure" (developed by Dorian). [...] K-MeleonCCF ME version 0.09 can display a close button on each tab, and the tab bar can be placed at the bottom of the window.]
^Schofield, Jack (December 16, 2009). "EU drops Microsoft browser charges with agreement on 'ballot screen'". The Guardian. Archived from the original on December 19, 2009. Retrieved September 9, 2022. The deal covers "specifically the region known as the European Economic Area, which includes 30 nations," says Smith. Existing Windows users in Europe, including XP users, will also get the ballot screen via a Windows Update download. This will invite them to choose from a list of the 12 most-widely used browsers: Apple's Safari, Google's Chrome, Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Mozilla's Firefox, Opera, AOL, Maxthon, K-Meleon, Flock, Avant Browser, Sleipnir and Slim Browser.
^Foresman, Chris (April 1, 2011). "WebKit best option for Camino as Mozilla drops Gecko embedding". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 21, 2022. Camino—the Gecko-based browser with a native Cocoa user interface—is considering switching its underlying rendering engine to WebKit. Developer Stuart Morgan announced the proposed change this week after Mozilla effectively put an end to the project that supported embedding Gecko into other software.
^Slivka, Eric (May 31, 2013). "Camino Browser for Mac Officially Discontinued". MacRumors. Archived from the original on January 5, 2023. Retrieved January 1, 2023. In 2011, project contributors announced plans to shift Camino to the WebKit engine used by Safari, Chrome, and other current browsers, but the effort never took hold. Camino was last updated in March 2012, and today the project's website has been updated with a message announcing that development has ceased.
^Persch, Chris (April 1, 2008). "ANNOUNCEMENT: The Future of Epiphany". Gnome Development Announcements List (Mailing list). GNOME Project. Archived from the original on August 22, 2022. Retrieved August 28, 2022. Also the embedding API of Gecko (GtkMozEmbed) has been unmaintained and stagnant for a long time.(GNOME Web)
^Leggit, Bob (October 18, 2014). "K-Meleon: A Lightweight, Low-RAM Browser For Old PCs 2014". Archived from the original on November 20, 2014. Retrieved December 30, 2022. Thankfully, however, K-Meleon has received a recent update which has put it right back at the centre of the map for those with restricted RAM and resources. K-Meleon has been around for a long time, and has always been genuinely light on resources, but from the turn of the decade it went years without an update, and that left it completely useless in 2013 – let alone in 2014.
^Feldt, Kenneth (February 9, 2009). Programming Firefox. O'Reilly Media. p. 374. XULRunner is a deployment method that uses the stand-alone Gecko runtime engine (also known as XULRunner) to launch XUL applications.
^Boissonnade, Dorian (November 3, 2013). "Anyone still using kmeleon?". Archived from the original on September 13, 2022. Retrieved September 10, 2016. I've updated kmeleon to work with the latest mozilla release (25). [...] If someone could make it a bit more usable by tweaking chrome and macros, this would be nice. As you can see I've just used firefox xulrunner.
^Tur, Henryk (March 6, 2014). "K-Meleon 74 beta 4" (in Polish). Archived from the original on December 31, 2022. Retrieved December 30, 2022. K-Meleon posiada w pełni spolonizowany interfejs użytkownika. Polecamy jako ciekawą alternatywę dla innych narzędzi do przeglądania stron w sieci. W nowym wydaniu poprawiono wykorzystanie zasobów procesora oraz wprowadzono szereg drobnych poprawek. [K-Meleon has a fully translated Polish user interface. We recommend it as an interesting alternative to other web browsers. In the new release, the use of CPU resources has been improved and a number of minor fixes have been introduced.]
^ abcSerea, Razvan (November 26, 2014). "K-Meleon 75 Beta 1". Neowin. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 21, 2022. K-Meleon 75 Beta 1 changelog: [...] Toolbars/Skin: Support for PNG and other formats, Button size scale with dpi and can be user set., Skin now have a skin.cfg file for icon definition. [...]
^Joseph, Cliff (November 28, 2014). "The Glorious Resolution: Feast your eyes on 5 HiDPI laptops". The Register. Archived from the original on December 19, 2022. Retrieved December 19, 2022. High-DPI displays do have their drawbacks. The main one is that few third-party applications are designed to support High-DPI displays, and you may find yourself having to lower the resolution of your expensive laptop in order to read application menus or view tiny toolbar icons that were never designed to scale to these ultra-high resolutions.
^Tanguy, Yvon (April 5, 2016). Cookie Keeper. Archived from the original on December 24, 2022. Retrieved December 24, 2022. K-Meleon macro: It's the only way I found to perform the shutdown() code of CookieKeeper. This solution is obviously weird/bad/dirty/[add your word here] The CookieKeeper javascript code listen for a change of the preference "cookiekeeper.kmeleon.exit". When toggled, the shutdown part is executed.
^Boissonnade, Dorian (December 20, 2016). "K-Meleon 76 RC". Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 22, 2022. I had another SSD crash and Windows decided to format my backup... I though I had another backup except it was *only* 8 months old. I already didn't like much windows before that but now I wish I could really avoid using it. So, I've gathered what I have to make what could be a RC2. But I'm afraid this could not be complete and could have more problem than the RC. I don't have a changelog except for the code history
^López, José María (March 10, 2022). "Navegadores web minimalistas y ligeros para ordenadores viejos" [Minimalist and Lightweight Web Browsers for Old Computers] (in Spanish). Archived from the original on August 29, 2022. Retrieved August 29, 2022. Está basado en Mozilla Firefox. Pero en vez de usar su motor Gecko, utiliza un derivado o fork llamado Goanna. [It is based on Mozilla Firefox. But instead of using the Gecko engine, it uses a derivative or fork called Goanna.]
^Mossberg, Walt (January 26, 2017). "What's up with Firefox, the browser that time forgot?". The Verge. Archived from the original on December 19, 2022. Retrieved December 19, 2022. Project Quantum, a new under-the-hood browsing engine that will replace big chunks of Mozilla's ancient Gecko engine
^ abShareef, Tashreef (March 30, 2022). "The 7 Best Browsers for Old and Low-End Computers". www.makeuseof.com. Archived from the original on August 13, 2022. Retrieved August 13, 2022. Where K-Meleon shines is in its compatibility. You can run it on the latest Windows 11 as well as the legacy Windows 95 operating system.
^Krause, Jörg (2021). "Shadow DOM". Developing Web Components with TypeScript. Apress, Berkeley, CA. pp. 43–51. ISBN978-1-4842-6839-1. To recap some of the facts shown here, it's recommended to have the Chrome browser available. (...) Once again, it's a non-standard attribute. It's specific to browsers using the Chromium engine. (...) Note that this is currently implemented by Chrome.
^Serea, Razvan (February 2, 2021). "Pale Moon 29.0.0". Neowin. Archived from the original on December 31, 2022. Retrieved December 30, 2022. [...] Google WebComponents (CustomElements and Shadow DOM). The incomplete code is behind a preference (dom.webcomponents.enabled) and it is strongly suggested you do not touch it [...]
^Tiwari, Aditya (July 8, 2018). "Tim Berners-Lee Gives Green Signal To Web DRM, FSF Says We Have Lost Control". FOSS Bytes. Archived from the original on September 4, 2022. Retrieved September 3, 2022. John Sullivan, FSF's executive director, said: 'We're mourning the Web today, as the W3C sells everyone out. This is still not the end; it can be appealed. Don't let giant corporate publishers control the Web.'
^Salter, Jim (November 3, 2020). "HBO Max quietly restored service to Linux users". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on December 19, 2022. Retrieved December 19, 2022. The full, proprietary Google Chrome browser supports Widevine (which is a Google protocol) by default; it can also be enabled relatively easily on Chromium and on Mozilla Firefox.
^"DRM support for Epiphany (GNOME Web)". 2020. Archived from the original on January 1, 2023. Retrieved December 31, 2022. Google refused us permission to use Widevine. Unless someone wants to donate lawyers, there's nothing we can do here, sorry.(GNOME Web)
^Straver, Markus (March 3, 2022). "Pale Moon future roadmap". Archived from the original on April 1, 2021. Retrieved August 29, 2022. Also, we do not intend to have DRM in any UXP-based application, and the browser will as such remain properly DRM-free.
^Doctorow, Cory (April 3, 2019). "After years of insisting that DRM in HTML wouldn't block open source implementations, Google says it won't support open source implementations". Archived from the original on September 4, 2022. Retrieved September 3, 2022. Samuel Maddock is a free software developer who is creating a new browser called Metastream, derived from Chromium, the free/open version of Google's Chrome. [...] Maddock wanted to allow his users to do this with the videos they pay to watch on Widevine-restricted services like Hulu and Netflix, so he applied to Google for a license to implement Widevine in his browser. Four months later, Google sent him a one-sentence reply: "I'm sorry but we're not supporting an open source solution like this"
^García, Rocío (March 9, 2022). "Sin instalación y para llevar: Los mejores programas portables" (in Spanish). Archived from the original on September 4, 2022. Retrieved September 3, 2022. K-Meleon es de código abierto, está disponible en muchos idiomas y además de su versión instalador, también podemos descargar K-Meleon portable desde este enlace. [K-Meleon is open-source, it is available in many languages, and in addition to its installer version, we can also download K-Meleon portable from this link: kmeleonbroswer.org.]
^Geere, Duncan (March 1, 2010). "Wild Wild Web – the browser ballot's lesser-known options". Pocket-lint. Archived from the original on September 10, 2022. Retrieved September 10, 2022. It's open-source, and all aspects of the interface are flexible and able to be configured and customized. However - there's no interface for doing so - just a set of files that you can tweak in a text editor [...]
^Erikson, Ulf; Holman; Mutch; Moses; Sachner; Zarneth (2002). "K-Meleon User's Guide and Reference Manual". K-Meleon Documentation Project. Archived from the original on December 22, 2022. Retrieved December 22, 2022. ((cite web)): |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; December 24, 2006 suggested (help)§ 7.7 Macro Language
^Doozan, Jeff (2001). "Definition Files". K-Meleon 0.6. Macro Definition File for K-Meleon (macros.cfg). Doozan describes the accelerator syntax to add a macro command as "Sample Usage: in accel.cfg KEY = macros(example)" with "example" being the name of an individual macro sections enclosed in brackets.
^Doozan, Jeff (2001). "Definition Files". K-Meleon 0.6. Toolbar Definition File for K-Meleon (toolbars.cfg). Doozan documents the formatting as "ToolBar Name { Button Name { command id (required) } }" with many optional parameters.
^Wayne, Richard (June 2004). "An Overview of Public Access Computer Software Management"(PDF). Computers in Libraries. Information Today. pp. 28–29. Archived(PDF) from the original on September 4, 2022. Retrieved September 4, 2022. K-Meleon from kmeleon.org also allows you to control many browser functions. It is free, open source software.
^Lanxon, Nate (August 7, 2009). "Tested: Five Web browsers you've never heard of". CNET. Archived from the original on September 12, 2022. Retrieved September 12, 2022. K-Meleon is the most popular browser for people to complain about us not testing when we write about other, more popular options. Having given K-Meleon a full test, we now know exactly who most of these people are: coders and hackers, and it's clear why they love this browser. [...] K-Meleon's is much more customisable than most others, but it requires some knowledge of computer code to get the most out of it.
^Merkulov, Yurij. "Русский хамелеон" [Russian Chameleon] (in Russian). Archived from the original on August 29, 2022. Retrieved August 29, 2022. K-Meleon не поддерживает эту структуру, разработка расширений для него требует особых знаний и навыков, что отпугивает многих разработчиков. Как следствие, база модулей дополнения к хамелеону в несколько раз беднее, чем у той же лисички. [K-Meleon does not support this system, so development of extensions for it requires special knowledge and skills, which discourages many developers. As a result, the database of add-ons for the chameleon is several times poorer than that of the fox.]
^Aupeix, Alain. "K-Meleon" (in French). Archived from the original on March 8, 2019. Retrieved December 26, 2022. Firefox utilise des extensions basées sur XML, alors que K-Meleon utilise un langage macro qui permet de créer de très nombreuses extensions, de plus, bien que n'implémentant pas entièrement chrome, peut aussi, utiliser des extensions Firefox.
^Geere, Duncan (March 1, 2010). "Wild Wild Web – the browser ballot's lesser-known options". Pocket-lint. Archived from the original on September 10, 2022. Retrieved September 10, 2022. It's open-source, and all aspects of the interface are flexible and able to be configured and customized. However - there's no interface for doing so - just a set of files that you can tweak in a text editor, meaning that it's useful for libraries, web cafes and other places where you don't want users messing with settings too much.
^Adams, Matthew (August 19, 2021). "5+ best browsers to use on old and slow PCs". Windows Report. Archived from the original on February 24, 2022. Retrieved February 22, 2022. K-Meleon is also a super quick browser that runs on Windows 95, XP, Vista, and other platforms that predate Windows 7.
^"K-Meleon 0.9 Release Notes". January 18, 2005. Archived from the original on October 6, 2005. Retrieved March 3, 2023. ((cite web)): |archive-date= / |archive-url= timestamp mismatch; October 6, 2006 suggested (help)
^For versions 0.2–0.8.2: "File Releases". Archived from the original on June 4, 2006. Retrieved January 6, 2023. (Individual version release notes available under the respective [Notes] link.)
^For versions 1.1–76: "K-Meleon: Announcements". Kmeleon.sourceforge.net. Archived from the original on September 13, 2022. Retrieved November 25, 2014.
^"K-Meleon 1.6-1.7". Archived from the original on July 9, 2020. Retrieved December 22, 2022. Часть функционала K-Meleon реализована в виде отдельных dll-модулей, называемых "К-плагинами". [Some of the functionality of K-Meleon is implemented as separate dll-modules called "K-plugins".]
/ February 11, 2023
