The Omni Group announced today that they have shipped OmniWeb 3.0 for Mac OS X Server, Mac OS X DP1, and OpenStep 4.2 systems. Representing almost exactly two years of development since OmniWeb 2.7, the 3.0 release adds functionality, speed, and compatibility to a web browser that was already much-loved for its ease-of-use and clean interface. OmniWeb is the most mature web browser in existence: its first version was released on March 3, 1994, before Netscape incorporated and before Spry wrote Internet Explorer for Microsoft. OmniWeb has undergone three major architecture rewrites since its early days ñ it is now so modular that InfoSeek and other companies have licensed sections of its library to parse HTML files quickly.
OmniWeb 3.0 is the only native web browser for Mac OS X Server and Mac OS X, and the only web browser on any platform that is truly multithreaded; it will actually get faster on multiprocessor machines. During the five year development of OmniWeb, other browsers have often borrowed features that Omni pioneered, including hierarchical bookmarks, the separate bookmark window, drag-and-drop URLs between windows and bookmarks, bookmarks that check themselves for updates, and downloading files by drag-and-drop. In addition, Sherlock's web searching was inspired by OmniWeb's advanced search panel, the first to query multiple search engines simultaneously and combine the results in a table. Despite these attempts at copying OmniWeb, most users feel that OmniWeb does the best job of tightly integrating what is useful and throwing out what is not. OmniWeb is designed to be a tool, not a flashy toy, and Omni believes any good tool should be invisible when it is doing its job correctly.
OmniWeb 3.0 is free to the first user at any site, and costs $59.95 per machine or user beyond that. The company also has educational and volume prices. You can find more information and download links in the Full Story.