# 25 years ago, Mosaic 1.0 was released **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 12, 2018, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385 "2018-11-12T01:08:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/1 "2018-11-12T01:08:19Z")
[http://www.ncsa.illinois.edu/enabling/mosaic/versions](http://www.ncsa.illinois.edu/enabling/mosaic/versions) In case anyone isn’t familiar with this: > [@](#): > > NCSA Mosaic, or simply Mosaic, is the web browser that popularized the World Wide Web and the Internet. It was also a client for earlier internet protocols such as File Transfer Protocol, Network News Transfer Protocol, and Gopher. The browser was named for its support of multiple internet protocols. Its intuitive interface, reliability, Microsoft Windows port and simple installation all contributed to its popularity within the web, as well as on Microsoft operating systems. > **[Mosaic (web browser)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser)#End_of_Mosaic)** > > NCSA Mosaic is a discontinued web browser, and one of the first to be widely available. It was instrumental in popularizing the World Wide Web and the general Internet by integrating multimedia such as text and graphics. It was named for its support of multiple Internet protocols, such as Hypertext Transfer Protocol, File Transfer Protocol, Network News Transfer Protocol, and Gopher. Its intuitive interface, reliability, personal computer support, and simple installation all contribut Mosaic was ... Mosaic was followed by Netscape Navigator whose current descendant is Mozilla Firefox. I don’t think I got on the internet until 1994 and I never used Mosaic–I was on dial-up and used Lynx. And it was a few years later that I got a faster speed and used either Netscape or Internet Explorer. Anyone here use Mosaic? What do you remember of the early days of the web? ---
**Author:** ![ohiomstr2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/82dd89/32.png) [@ohiomstr2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ohiomstr2)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/2 "2018-11-12T01:38:00Z")
Mosaic was the first browser i ever used, around 1995. It was while working at a Federal agency. Prior to this i had used CompuServe and AOL from home, so this software was like light years better. Still use Firefox everyday. Mosaic was an amazing piece of technology. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/3 "2018-11-12T01:44:32Z")
I remember using some text-mode browser at some point before installing Mosaic. Mosaic did inspire me to create a simply styled page where people could download papers, get contact info, etc. As for early days, I had the distinct impression that things like character-set mismatches, non-seamless handling of multimedia and attachments, lack of Unicode support, etc., were keeping the browsing experience from being optimal; yet people were working on it and it took a few years to get it basically sorted out. ETA I don’t recall CompuServe offering too much connectivity outside the CompuServe ecosystem, but that was more like 1985. Still, has anyone archived the pages/forums, or are they all lost down the bit bucket? ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/4 "2018-11-12T01:55:23Z")
yep, my first introduction to the “modern” internet was my first year of university, running Mosaic, on Windows 3.11. But it was an older version which relied on X, so it had to launch under the eXcursion X-server for Windows. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/5 "2018-11-12T05:04:41Z")
i remember mosaic i think i used it with aol 1.5 ……. ---
**Author:** ![jasg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f0a364/32.png) [@jasg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasg)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/6 "2018-11-12T05:48:02Z")
I remember downloading both the Windows and Mac versions in 1993. I was fascinated by the concept of networked hypertext after having played with Guide in 1986 and HyperCard in 1987. Two years later I used it to find and purchase a book I had been trying to find since I was a kid. A new company called Amazon had it after I had wasted many trips to used book shops. ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/7 "2018-11-12T06:10:47Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > I remember using some text-mode browser at some point before installing Mosaic. That might have been Lynx: > **[Lynx (web browser)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynx_(web_browser))** > > Lynx is a customizable text-based web browser for use on cursor-addressable character cell terminals. As of 2024\[update\], it is the oldest web browser still being maintained, having started in 1992. > Lynx was a product of the Distributed Computing Group within Academic Computing Services of the University of Kansas. It was initially developed in 1992 by a team of students and staff at the university (Lou Montulli, Michael Grobe and Charles Rezac) as a hypertext browser used solely to distribute c... ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/8 "2018-11-12T06:20:07Z")
That may be a quarter of a century, which sounds quite a long time, but it’s almost no time at all. The change since then has been so rapid. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/9 "2018-11-12T16:53:25Z")
I used it. I still remember the sense of amazement at being able to look at somebody else’s lab results _without needing to use rlogin!_ All you needed was the program, the address, and you could see any text and pictures they’d posted. It downloaded and displayed automatically. It was SO COOL! And any of you who don’t know WTF rlogin, finger and the talk daemon are, are hereby cordially invited to get off my two pots of plants 😛 ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/10 "2018-11-12T17:50:58Z")
I used a bunch of text-based Internet stuff, long before it was even called the Internet. I remember especially using Archie and FTP type things to help the kids find stuff for homework. They were the only kids in school who could do this sort of thing. I knew in a few years all kids would being doing this. My first browser was the text-only Lynx. (Which I still use from time to time when setting something up over a terminal connection.) It was nice and all that. Even used it as Gopher client. But then Mosaic hit and it was holy crap! Like a Gibson novel came to life. I knew things were going to be different. Soon I set up a web server at work, did a home page, wrote a demo game for it, etc. The real trick was to surf the web using Mosaic from home. I could dial in to the campus modems, open a terminal, log into my office computer and do Lynx. But I (and the kids) wanted Mosaic! Enter [Slirp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slirp). Before ISPs (as we know them), before home broadband, we wuz surfin’ da Net! ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/11 "2018-11-12T18:07:30Z")
I was using Gopher mostly and occasionally Lynx when Mosaic came out. I think the lab I was at was using some pre-release version for a while before we got the latest. I remember watching pages load with the little ticker at the bottom saying how many bytes per second you were getting. Usually in the thousands, but sometimes dropping to the tens. We’d joke we were being routed through Western Union telegraphs. Besides implementing http page display, Mosaic was important for showing how well open-source code sharing could actually work. Its publicity really sent that movement into overdrive. If I remember correctly, both Netscape and Internet Explorer were built on Mosaic code. They were both rebuilt from scratch later, but that original open-source base was important. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/12 "2018-11-12T18:31:22Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Besides implementing http page display Not to mention HTML page display. 😉 > [@](#): > > Mosaic was important for showing how well open-source code sharing could actually work. Its publicity really sent that movement into overdrive. If I remember correctly, both Netscape and Internet Explorer were built on Mosaic code. They were both rebuilt from scratch later, but that original open-source base was important. [It wasn’t quite as simple as that](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser)): > [@](#): > > The licensing terms for NCSA Mosaic were generous for a proprietary software program. In general, non-commercial use was free of charge for all versions (with certain limitations). Additionally, the X Window System/Unix version publicly provided source code (source code for the other versions was available after agreements were signed). Despite persistent rumors to the contrary, however, Mosaic was never released as open source software during its brief reign as a major browser; there were always constraints on permissible uses without payment. This might be a definitional issue surrounding viewable source versus open source, however. Anyway, it’s true that both Netscape/Mozilla and Internet Explorer had ties to the people and institutions which developed Mosaic. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/13 "2018-11-12T18:47:02Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > Not to mention HTML page display. 😉 That too. 😃 Actually, I meant a page served via http. > [@Derleth](#): > > [It wasn’t quite as simple as that](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser)):This might be a definitional issue surrounding viewable source versus open source, however. > > Anyway, it’s true that both Netscape/Mozilla and Internet Explorer had ties to the people and institutions which developed Mosaic. Yep. The whole open source thing was rather ill-defined back then, with a huge range of licenses, etc. I guess it’s still the same, but it feels more stable now; it was all in flux back then. At least among my peers (poor college and grad students), we used any source code we could acquire, even if the licensing of reusing the code was iffy. The idea that code sharing could be practical and produce actually useful programs really took off around then. Linux started earlier, but was very niche. Mosaic was popular and popularized the internet and code sharing. It felt like an inflection point. ---
**Author:** ![rbroome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/838e76/32.png) [@rbroome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rbroome)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/14 "2018-11-12T19:49:48Z")
I used Mosaic back in the beginning. I was using the internet prior to the introduction of the web for ftp gopher and rlogin. I got curious to see what all the fuss was about with http. I mean, it was just a brain-dead subset of SGML and wouldn’t last-it didn’t follow the rules! 🙂 Shortly after I got Mosaic running (or maybe before I got Mosaic running, it was close either way) Netscape came out and I switched to that. I did know a couple of programmers that were big users of Mosaic back when it first came out though. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/15 "2018-11-12T20:38:46Z")
My \*VaxStation at work had mosaic installed. I got an early introduction to the Internet. \*A VaxStation ran VMS and operated very similar to a Vax minicomputer. Our school had 4 Vax 11/780’s clustered. We also had a few VaxStations installed in employees offices. They were similar in size to a pc. The Vaxstation was a shared networked resource. Mine ran a Office Suite for my dept. The staff could access Word Perfect, Lotus, and a calendar/scheduler. We also ran Focus for ad hoc reporting. Staff used VT220 terminals to access the Office Suite and Focus. [http://home.iae.nl/users/pb0aia/vax/vs3khw.html](http://home.iae.nl/users/pb0aia/vax/vs3khw.html) ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/16 "2018-11-12T21:07:25Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > That too. 😃 Actually, I meant a page served via http. > Yep. The whole open source thing was rather ill-defined back then, with a huge range of licenses, etc. I guess it’s still the same, but it feels more stable now; it was all in flux back then. At least among my peers (poor college and grad students), we used any source code we could acquire, even if the licensing of reusing the code was iffy. > > The idea that code sharing could be practical and produce actually useful programs really took off around then. Linux started earlier, but was very niche. Mosaic was popular and popularized the internet and code sharing. It felt like an inflection point. You’re missing a big example: BSD Unix was established as open source, and had been both open source and very useful indeed for over a decade by the early 1990s. BSD Unix was one of the important varieties of Unix, with the very proprietary System III/System V systems being the other, and definitely the more advanced family, and the one more popular with programmers. [Here’s an old Unix hand saying outright that System V was backwards for a long time](https://utcc.utoronto.ca/~cks/space/blog/unix/SystemVWasBackwards): > [@](#): > > Do you like job control in your shell? System V didn’t have that. Do you like being in multiple groups at once? Nope. Things like symlinks and renaming directories? Of course not. Paged virtual memory? Believe it or not, System V spent a surprising amount of time without it (although less than I thought until I looked it up). The result was that merely using a System V system at the shell level was fairly different from using a BSD system, in a way that is not the case for Linux versus the \*BSDs. Speaking as someone who knows Unix and understands all that, all I can say is… stone knives and bearskins. 😉 System V was missing fundamental pieces essential to being a nice, productive platform, especially one for day-to-day use. Anyway, BSD Unix was open source even before it “should” have been, because it was derived directly from the (_angelic choir_) Original Unix Sources (/_angelic choir_) and, when AT&T decided to enforce its copyrights post-Consent Decree, Keith Bostic had to go through the most recent BSD source distribution and remove and replace everything AT&T owned. He succeeded, but AT&T still sued, so BSD started out the 1990s under a nontrivial legal cloud. This was… part of what helped allow Linux to grow, but the fact Linux originated on PCs, and supported more PC hardware than BSDs did at the time, was a factor, too. So open source software wasn’t completely niche, and, indeed, it could show a whole OS as one of its successes. Mosaic was an inflection point. Netscape open-sourcing Mozilla was another. But the idea goes back further, even though some explicit practices don’t. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/17 "2018-11-12T21:27:31Z")
Note also that the original GPL license was released in 1989, and the GPLv2 in 1991. These were and are popular, easy-to-use licenses that anyone could slap onto their project to ensure it was open-source. ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/18 "2018-11-12T21:35:57Z")
The huge advantage of Netscape is you could read the text of a page while the images loaded. I remember when Mosaic was released and I was using Linux as BSD was under the lawsuits at the time. In fact the first machine I ran mosaic on was a.out based Linux. The GNU project was started in 78, and most of what people consider “linux” was was from that GNU project. SVR4 was feature complete and SVR3.12 from At&t was fine but some other vendors were trying to charge for core features. Really SVR4 having a built in TCP/IP stack, POSIX support and X/Open was the big step. Of course many vendors suck with the older SRV3 based offerings well into the 1990’s ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/19 "2018-11-12T21:57:16Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > Note also that the original GPL license was released in 1989, and the GPLv2 in 1991. These were and are popular, easy-to-use licenses that anyone could slap onto their project to ensure it was open-source. And the GPL was made famous by two individual projects, both near and dear to many developers: GCC and Emacs. [GCC, for being a _good_ C compiler in an era when many C compilers were sub-par](https://utcc.utoronto.ca/~cks/space/blog/unix/GccEarlyEnthusiasm), and Emacs, for being a _really good_ text editor in an era when many text editors were… ugh… vi. > [@rat\_avatar](#): > > The GNU project was started in 78, and most of what people consider “linux” was was from that GNU project. [1984](https://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.en.html), but you’re mostly right: The basic Linux userland is GNU, but the GUI isn’t, and various other pieces aren’t. Which is why I think “GNU/Linux” is misguided, but that’s a rant for another day. > [@](#): > > SVR4 was feature complete and SVR3.12 from At&t was fine but some other vendors were trying to charge for core features. Really SVR4 having a built in TCP/IP stack, POSIX support and X/Open was the big step. You can make note here that the first widely-used TCP/IP stack was born on BSD. The standard userspace API for networking code is _still_ called Berkeley sockets. > [@](#): > > Of course many vendors **suck** with the older SRV3 based offerings well into the 1990’s (Emphasis mine.) You can say that again. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [November 12, 2018, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385/20 "2018-11-12T22:39:33Z")
> [@Derleth](#): > > And the GPL was made famous by two individual projects, both near and dear to many developers: GCC and Emacs. [GCC, for being a _good_ C compiler in an era when many C compilers were sub-par](https://utcc.utoronto.ca/~cks/space/blog/unix/GccEarlyEnthusiasm), and Emacs, for being a _really good_ text editor in an era when many text editors were… ugh… vi. still waiting for GNU/Hurd, though. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/25-years-ago-mosaic-1-0-was-released/824385.md?page=2)