14 DAY TRIAL // After Dave Massy, Microsoft's senior program manager for Internet Explorer, said in a blog that Netscape 8.0 may interfere with Internet Explorer, Microsoft confirmed today the problem.
Also, Microsoft has advised its customers using Netscape 8 and Internet Explorer in the same machine to uninstall Netscape 8, because Netscape causes Internet Explorer to crash.
In fact, according do Dave Massy, Netscape's updated technology interferes with Internet Explorer's ability to display some Web pages. Computer users who install Netscape 8, may see some Web pages appear blank in Internet Explorer.
"We've just confirmed an issue that has started to be reported on newsgroups and forums that after installing Netscape 8.0 the XML rendering capabilities of Internet Explorer no longer work. That means that if you navigate in IE to an XML file such as an RSS feed or an XML file with an XSLT transformation applied then rather than seeing the data you are presented with a blank page," Massy said on the blog.
Uninstalling Netscape 8.0 it is not the only way to solve the problem. Massy himself pointed out that it is sufficient to make some changes in the registry (deleting the XML node from a registry file entitled HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftInternet ExplorerPluginsExtension). Of course, this is an option reserved for advanced users.
According to AOL, however, these measures are unnecessary. "This issue affects a very small number of users who visit sites that require that advanced technology," said Andrew Weinstein, an AOL spokesman. Last week, right after the initial release, Netscape 8.0 was affected by some security issues and AOL released Netscape 8.0.1.