Apple Releases Safari Beta 2

April 14 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Apple today released Safari Beta 2, an updated beta version of the Safari browser that delivers highly requested features including tabbed browsing and AutoFill forms. Safari is now the browser of choice for millions of Mac users with more than two million downloads since its free public beta release on January 7, 2003. Safari is the fastest web browser ever created for the Mac, and re-energizes the browser category in general with innovations like built-in Google search; SnapBack to instantly return to search results; a completely new way to name, organize and present bookmarks; and automatic "pop-up" ad blocking.

"Safari is already an incredible success, with more than 2 million downloads since its launch," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "Safari has brought innovation back to the browser market and now we are making it even better."

Building on the innovative features delivered with the first Safari public beta, Safari Beta 2 popularizes the most convenient way to see and switch between multiple web pages in a single window by bringing the latest browser innovation to Safari-tabbed browsing. The new AutoFill feature makes web form completion incredibly easy by using information from the Address Book or previous forms to automatically fill in name, street address, city, zip code, email and other information. The updated beta also provides the option of automatically filling in user names and passwords, which are securely stored in the Mac OS X Keychain.

Because protecting personal information on public computers is essential, Safari Beta 2 introduces the "Reset Safari" option that erases browsing history, empties the cache, clears the Downloads window, removes cookies, clears Google search entries and removes any saved names and passwords or other AutoFill text. Additional Safari Beta 2 features and enhancements include: easy import of Netscape and Mozilla bookmarks, increased support for AppleScript, enhanced standards compatibility for improved web browsing and expanded language support for Japanese, French and German.

Safari is powered by the industry's best rendering engine based on KHTML, from KDE's Konqueror open source project, and Apple continues to contribute to and work closely with the open source community. Safari related sessions planned for the upcoming Worldwide Developers Conference, June 23-27, in San Francisco will help developers learn how to factor Safari technology in to their applications. For more information on conference tracks, exhibits and registration visit www.apple.com/wwdc.

Pricing & Availability
The Safari Beta 2 release is available immediately for free download at www.apple.com/safari, requires Mac OS X version 10.2 "Jaguar" and is optimized for Mac OS X v10.2.3 or later. Safari Beta 2 is a compact 3.9MB download and is localized for English, Japanese, French and German. The final version of Safari will be made available later in 2003.

Mac OS X v10.2 "Jaguar" requires a minimum of 128MB of memory and is designed to run on the following Apple products: eMac, iMac, iBook, Power Macintosh G3, Power Mac G4 and any PowerBook introduced after May 1998.

Source: Apple Computer, Inc.

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