14.2. Internet Browsers: Galeon

This section will speak about the Galeon web browser. It will also give, at the end of the section, a list of other web browsers you can use under Mandrake Linux.

14.2.1. What Is Galeon?

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.

14.2.2. Getting Started

To launch Galeon, access your GNOME menu (or KDE menu, if you use that environment). Then, choose the Networking->WWW->Galeon 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 click Don't import bookmarks and move on to the next step. If you did, choose Netscape or Mozilla according to what you already used.

Then, 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.

Note

If, after all, you don't like that toolbar, you can always hide it by clicking on the Bookmarks->Smart Bookmarks Toolbar->Folder actions->Show as toolbar menu. (You can also type Ctrl-B, then right-click on Smart Bookmarks Toolbar and uncheck the Show as toolbar item.)

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.

Figure 14-1. The Galeon Browser

Nice isn't it?

14.2.3. Exploring The Menus

Now, let's explore Galeon's Menubar starting with the File menu.

File

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 Save session as... 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 File->Open session menu and the same dialog box will pop up.

Edit

Includes 4 basic options: Cut, Copy, Paste and Find.

View

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.

Tab

Permits to integrate all your Galeon windows into one. For example, open a new window by accessing File->New window (or simply Ctrl-N). Then, click on Tab->Move to another window->> Mandrake Linux <. This will merge the two windows into one and tabs will appear below the Bookmarks toolbars.

Figure 14-2. Tabbed Windows Under Galeon

Clicking on the X will close the tab and the window associated to it.

Settings

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.

Figure 14-3. Galeon Preferences

Browsing->General

Enables to set your home, startup and new pages. Save session option also available.

Browsing->Bookmarks

Allows to set your general, Autobookmarks and Smart Bookmarks options.

Browsing->History

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.

User Interface->Tabs

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.

User Interface->Windows

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.

User Interface->Toolbars

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).

User Interface->Mouse

Enables you to modify the Context Menus, Mouse Buttons and Mouse Wheel options.

Handlers->Downloading

Permits to select the wanted Downloader and FTP handlers, as well as destination folders.

Handlers->Programs

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.

Figure 14-4. Mailer Preferences

Handlers->MIME Types

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.

Rendering->Fonts/Colors

Permits to define your preferred fonts.

Rendering->Languages

Allows to set your preferred languages.

Advanced->Networks

Enables to define the HTTP protocol and proxy options.

Advanced->Filtering

Permits the enabling/disabling of Java, JavaScript and image loading.

Advanced->Persistent Data

Allows to set the parameters for cookie handling, password recognition and cache.

Bookmarks

Allows to manage your bookmarks, Autobookmarks and Smart Bookmarks. This is where you will find the bookmarks editor (Bookmarks->Edit bookmarks or simply Alt-B).

Go

A substitute to the toolbar. You can also access the last-visited sites from that menu.

Tools

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.

Help

Finally, the Help menu is a direct access to the Galeon manual and home page.

14.2.4. Other Web Browsers

Here is a list of other web browsers which work well under Mandrake Linux:


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