Doesn’t Firefox have a cache?

I just noticed that when you save an image from Firefox, the browser doesn’t just copy the already downloaded image to the destination of your choice, it downloads the image again. I noticed because I was on a chan where remote linking is prohibited, and images (naturally) open in a new tab. When I tried to download an opened picture I would get the “no hotlinking” image instead. I had to download from the thread link.

This is annoying on several levels, it’s a waste of bandwidth, a waste of time, and it makes it practically impossible to download a picture that has expired, I’d have to take a screenshot, which is silly. I already knew that Firefox always re-fetches a page when you use the back button, but I didn’t know about the image thing.

I think I’ve been using Firefox for six years now, since 1.0.6 or something like that, and I like it for its many often very useful add-ons, but slowly I’m beginning to wonder if it might not be time to look for another browser, one that uses its cache properly.

Remembering AltaVista

I just read on Oh Internet that Yahoo! will probably close down AltaVista this year. Actually the article is probably old, according to Wikipedia, the shutdown occurred in May, and AltaVista is now a hollow shell, just a front end for Yahoo!’s own search.

Back when I first connected to the Internet, AltaVista was often considered the best search engine, especially on European topics, the other search engines were more America-centric. It was also something of an insider tip, most people used Yahoo!. That Yahoo! bought AltaVista is something of an irony in itself.

I guess it doesn’t really matter. Things come and go. If I hadn’t read the article, I wouldn’t even have noticed, like most people I use google near-exclusively. Still it’s a bit strange. Another piece of the old Internet gone.

Twelve years on the Internet

I just noticed that it’s now more than twelve years that I’m on the Internet. I got my connection on August 5, 1999. Since I bought my first new computer on this occasion, this was also the time I started playing computer games seriously. I took possession of the web space that came with my cable connection in November or December. The first things I uploaded were German poems by various authors. I don’t think I posted anything game related before 2001. The oldest game-related uploads I can still date are the Legal Crime docs in January and You Play Too Much DOOM When… in February. I had a favicon since June in that year and used style sheets since at least September.

The web sure has changed since then. Sometimes I miss the old days. There was no Wikipedia, but there were millions of websites on GeoCities, FortuneCities, Yahoo, Xoom, and countless smaller servers that often had excellent information about a wide variety of topics. There was no almighty Google, but there were links between these websites. I used to surf for hours, swinging from site to site like Tarzan swings from tree to tree. There were no blogs but sometimes people told interesting or funny things from their lives on their websites.

Things change. Not always for the better.