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By 1999, Netscape had fallen behind Microsoft in browser technology. It also had trouble navigating relationships — with both its new parent AOL and the developers of its open source project, Mozilla. By the end of 1999, Netscape was a startup shipwreck. Fortunately, the good ship Mozilla was in much sturdier shape.
Read More 1999: The Fall of Netscape and the Rise of Mozilla
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1995 was a big year for web servers — it was when both the open source Apache and Microsoft’s IIS were launched. Apache and IIS ended up usurping their direct competitors (NCSA HTTPd and Netscape’s web servers, respectively). However, Apache was the web server that most influenced the future direction of web development.
Read More 1995: Apache and Microsoft IIS Shake Up the Web Server Market
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It may seem like Microsoft won the browser war in 1998 (despite a looming anti-trust case), but looking back it, was actually the year the web started to open up. It was when open source projects like Mozilla and open standards like DOM began to steer the web towards a more open, equitable future. It was also the year that a coalition of independent web developers arrived on the scene to promote open standards — The Web Standards Project (WaSP). All of these developments would impact the web’s direction for years to come.
Read More 1998: Open Season with Mozilla, W3C’s DOM, and WaSP
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DHTML, or Dynamic HTML, was essentially a combination of HTML, JavaScript, the newly released CSS standard, and an emerging web programming model called the DOM (Document Object Model). That said, the precise definition of DHTML depended on which browser company you spoke to: Netscape or Microsoft.
As it turned out, Microsoft’s vision for DHTML was more compelling from a technical perspective than Netscape’s (perhaps the first time that could be said about a web technology Microsoft pioneered — but it would not the last). What Microsoft wanted to achieve with DHTML was to make every element of an HTML document into a programmable object.
Read More 1997: The Year of DHTML
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By the start of 1997, JavaScript had become a regular topic for tech reference websites and books. JavaScript was now a sophisticated language, with new features like layers adding a further dynamic dimension to its capabilities.
Read More 1997: JavaScript Grows Up and Developers Push the Boundaries
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After Microsoft upped the ante in the browser market in 1996 by integrating Internet Explorer 3.0 into Windows, Netscape began the new year with a renewed focus on the open web. Co-founder and CTO Marc Andreessen and the Netscape product team introduced a new strategy called “crossware.”
Read More 1997: Netscape Crossware vs the Windows Web
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In March 1996, at Microsoft’s annual Professional Developers Conference (PDC), Bill Gates announced a set of internet technologies called ActiveX. “Part of the unique thing that Microsoft is doing,” he said regarding Microsoft’s approach to the Internet, “[…] is a strong level of integration into Windows.” It was the moment Netscape, Sun Microsystems, and other web-focused companies had feared — Microsoft was embedding the Internet into its powerful Windows ecosystem.
Read More 1996: Microsoft Activates the Internet With ActiveX & JScript
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Browser technology and JavaScript in the second half of 1996 expanded beyond the initial document-focused delivery of websites that we saw over 1994 and 1995. In 1996, we began to see web applications emerge.
Read More 1996: Netscape Lays the Groundwork For Web Applications