Many web browsers are available under Mandrake Linux. For the purpose of this book, we chose to document Galeon since it's arguably the fastest browser on the planet! It manages standard technologies such as JavaScriptTM, JavaTM and Flash, and its interface is lean and beautiful. It is based on Gecko, which is Mozilla's rendering engine. In case you are wondering, Mozilla is the open-source version of Netscape. To use Galeon, then, you need GNOME and Mozilla.
To launch Galeon, access your GNOME menu (or KDE menu, if you use that environment). Then, choose the Don't import bookmarks and move on to the next step. If you did, choose Netscape or Mozilla according to what you already used.
-> -> sub-menu. A wizard will pop up and ask you several questions. The first ones concern the migration of bookmarks and preferences from other browsers, namely Netscape and Mozilla. If you did not use those browsers before, simply forget about it and clickThen, the wizard will ask you if you want to create a Smart Bookmarks Toolbar. This includes a very useful toolbar holding specific search engines such as Google. Choose the ones you want and click the Next button.
![]() | If, after all, you don't like that toolbar, you can always hide it by clicking on the Smart Bookmarks Toolbar and uncheck the item.) -> -> -> menu. (You can also type Ctrl-B, then right-click on |
The next step concerns GNOME Integration. This allows you to configure Galeon as the default browser when you click on an URL inside a GNOME application. Choose the protocols you wish Galeon to handle.
Then comes the Configure Internet Configuration window which allows you to enter the appropriate settings if you use a proxy behind a firewall. If you don't, just click the Next button. And that's it. This is what you should get once the configuration is over.
Nice isn't it?
Now, let's explore Galeon's Menubar starting with the File menu.
This menu holds the most basic operation such as opening a new browser window or tab, opening pages or URLs directly from your hard disk, and printing. One interesting option is which enables to to save the current session to a file. A dialog box will appear with which you can save your session to the /home/username/.galeon/sessions/ path. To open a saved session, simply choose the -> menu and the same dialog box will pop up.
Includes 4 basic options:
, , and .Allows to enable or disable the different toolbars. You can also select a different stylesheet than the one loaded by the viewed page with the Stylesheet sub-menu. Other options include Zoom and language encoding.
Permits to integrate all your Galeon windows into one. For example, open a new window by accessing Bookmarks toolbars.
-> (or simply Ctrl-N). Then, click on -> -> . This will merge the two windows into one and tabs will appear below theClicking on the X will close the tab and the window associated to it.
Includes technology-related options such as enabling/disabling of JavaScript and Java, Proxy settings and image-specific options. This is also where you set your Galeon preferences.
Enables to set your home, startup and new pages. Save session option also available.
Allows to set your general, Autobookmarks and Smart Bookmarks options.
Enables the setting of your history (in days). The completion option is very useful since you only have to type the first letters of an URL and then the Tab key to complete it if you visited the said URL recently.
Allows to set the Tabbed Browsing, Tab Names and Tab Colors you prefer. For example, you can set Galeon to open every web site in a different tab.
Permits to set what you see in the title bar, to choose which menus should be displayed in full-screen mode, as well as the default windows layout.
Allows to choose the toolbar's appearance (Text only, Text beside icons, Text under icons and Icons only), to add functions to your toolbar, to change your toolbar theme as well as the spinner (the little GNOME foot at the extreme-right of the toolbar).
Enables you to modify the Context Menus, Mouse Buttons and Mouse Wheel options.
Permits to select the wanted Downloader and FTP handlers, as well as destination folders.
Allows to choose the external program to view sources, with what program should the Help files be displayed, as well as the default Mailer. Since we documented KMail (see Internet Mail: KMail, we suggest you set this parameter to kmail --composer %t. Note that the default mailer is Evolution, a suite of groupware applications resembling Microsoft Outlook. Although it has made giant steps towards stability and ease-of-use, it is still resource-intensive on slow/old systems. We still suggest you try it out because it's a great, well-integrated application.
Enables to set the program you want to associate to file types. For example, you could set the audio-x-mp3 MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) type to XMMS by editing the default value.
Permits to define your preferred fonts.
Allows to set your preferred languages.
Enables to define the HTTP protocol and proxy options.
Permits the enabling/disabling of Java, JavaScript and image loading.
Allows to set the parameters for cookie handling, password recognition and cache.
Allows to manage your bookmarks, Autobookmarks and Smart Bookmarks. This is where you will find the bookmarks editor (
-> or simply Alt-B).A substitute to the toolbar. You can also access the last-visited sites from that menu.
Enables to change parameters concerning cookies, images, passwords and history. Also allows to open the Java console (not functional), the JavaScript console as well as the first time wizard.
Finally, the
menu is a direct access to the Galeon manual and home page.Here is a list of other web browsers which work well under Mandrake Linux:
Konqueror (a file manager which can be used as a web browser);
Lynx (text-mode only);
Mozilla;
Nautlius (a file manager which can be used as a web browser);
Netscape Communicator;
StarOffice (the StarOffice suite has a built-in URL toolbar which can be considered as a web browser).