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Apple ponders history, plug-in upgrades for Safari

updated 10:40 am EDT, Thu September 25, 2008

Apple Safari patents


The proposed alternative is a tree diagram, depicting the links between particular pages. "Roots" in the history would consist of pages manually visited by a user; off of this would spawn branches, representing pages clicked within a tab or window. Much like Apple's Time Machine utility, users would also have access to a time shifter, and on top of this could be sliders for tweaking the scale and depth of visible trees.

The second patent addresses a problem common to "browsers other than Internet Explorer," Apple writes, in which the software is forced to locate a plug-in needed to launch a media file. If a plug-in is not already installed, browsers like Safari will typically refuse to launch the file.

The Apple answer would be to have Safari examine metadata in a file, and either display the file through an alternative format, or install plug-ins automatically as required. Metadata could also be used to gauge factors like bitrate, in turn allowing media to be shown in a preferred form.

by MacNN Staff



  1. UberFu

    Joined: Dec 1969


    this is not surprising..

    ...seeing as how Google's Chrome - which is based on Apple's WebKit is using a limited 'visual history' of the top 9 or 10 most viewed pages by the user.

    But one thing is certain - what ever they do - it will end up with the now defacto iTunes/ iPhoto interface and most likely all of the navigation will be down the left side.

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