The options file is stored in @{"Users/Default/Choices" link Users/Default/Choices/Main} by default. Most of the settings can be changed from within NetSurf by selecting Edit preferences from the Settings menu.
@{b}drag_save_icons@{ub} Enables displaying Workbench-style transparent icons under the pointer when performing drag saves (ctrl-drag of objects available if NetSurf is running on the Workbench screen) and text selection drags. If set to 0 the pointer style will change instead. OS 4.0 users may want to set this to 0 as icons will appear opaque and obscure the drop position.
@{b}redraw_tile_size_x@{ub}/@{b}redraw_tile_size_y@{ub} Specify the size of the off-screen bitmap. Higher will speed up redraws at the expense of memory. 0 disables tiling (will use a bitmap at least the size of the screen NetSurf is running on)
@{b}font_antialiasing@{ub} Switch text anti-aliasing on or off. Defaults to on in true-colour modes, but text rendering performance can be improved by setting to 0.
@{b}window_simple_refresh@{ub} If set to 1, NetSurf will use SimpleRefresh rather than SmartRefresh windows. These have slower redraw but use less memory. Note that this setting has no noticeable effect if compositing is enabled. Defaults to 0 (SmartRefresh)
@{b}dithering_quality@{ub} Specify the dithering quality from all values supported by picture.datatype. Currently these are 0=None, 1=Normal, 2=High quality. Other values are undefined. This is only used when NetSurf is running in palette-mapped mode.
@{b}mask_alpha@{ub} Threshold to use when determining which alpha values to convert to full transparency (0 - 255, where 255 will convert even opaque pixels to transparent). Defaults to 50 (0x32). This is only used in palette-mapped modes where alpha blending is not currently supported.
The font to use for each font type can be defined in NetSurf's options. OS4 NetSurf supports soft styles for bold and italic, however designed fonts look better and it is highly recommend to set them as follows:
If the font NetSurf is trying to use does not contain a specific character used on a web page, it will try the Unicode/fallback font. It is recommended to use a font which either:
(a) Contains as complete a Unicode character set as possible or
(b) Is complete for the pages you are likely to visit (eg. if you visit a lot of Japanese pages, set the Unicode fallback font to one with a complete Japanese character set)
For most users, installing and selecting @{"Code2000" rxs "address netsurf 'open http://code2000.sf.net'"} or @{"Bitstream Cyberbit" rxs "address netsurf 'open http://ftp.netscape.com/pub/communicator/extras/fonts/windows/'"} is the best option.
Additional fall-back fonts can be provided since NetSurf 3.0. These need to go into Users/user/Choices as a comma-separated list, for the font_unicode_list option.
NB: Since NetSurf 3.0, NetSurf will scan the provided Unicode fonts, and the rest of the system fonts, on first startup. Setting font_unicode_only:1 will prevent fonts not in the preferred Unicode fonts list from being scanned or used as fallback fonts. If the system fonts or NetSurf's fallback fonts list changes, this cache will need to be re-generated. This can be forced by deleting the font glyph cache (which defaults to Users/user/FontGlyphCache).
The default and minimum font sizes can also be set.
NB: The resolution setting on the "Rendering" tab in NetSurf's preferences affects how big text appears on screen (the conversion between point and pixel sizes) amongst other things. To find the correct value, divide the number of pixels on the screen vertically by the physical height of the screen in inches (horizontal resolution is calculated automatically if NetSurf is running on a custom screen, square pixels are assumed on all other screens).
AmigaOS NetSurf supports basic theming of gadget imagery. Themes live in the Resources/Themes directory, and two are included by default:
Default - default theme with no external dependencies.
AISS - theme using Mason's AISS images for buttons, and the def_pointers package for 32-bit pointer images.
The file "Theme" in the theme directory contains the files used for that theme. See @{"Default Theme file" link Resources/Themes/Default/Theme/Main} for more details.
Opens URL in current window or a new window/tab if NEWWINDOW/NEWTAB is specified. Saves the location without displaying if SAVEAS and a filename is specified (SAVEAS available in 2.6325)
Close the current page. A window or window and tab can be specified. Note that when a tab is closed, the tab number of tabs to the right of it will change, and the currently active tab may also change. If the last tab or window is closed, NetSurf will usually exit. Make sure you account for these situations in your code.
Returns the current version of NetSurf in RESULT. You can also do version checking by supplying a VERSION and optional REVISION to check against. If the version of NetSurf is the same or higher 1 will be returned, if it is older 0. If RELEASE is specified, the command operates on the release version rather than the internal version number.
Returns the active window (or tab if TAB is specified). Commands automatically operate on the active window/tab so you do not normally need to use this.
The W=WINDOW/K/N,T=TAB/K/N parameters were added in 2.10656 and allow targetting a window other than the current one. Both WINDOW and TAB must be specified (TAB=1 for tabless window) except in the special case of the CLOSE command.
The ARexx menu will be populated with scripts named #?.nsrx in @{"arexx_dir" link options 12}, up to a maximum of 20 entries. The titles of these entries will be the comments field of the file (or the filename if comments field is empty).
Special scripts @{"arexx_startup" link options 13} and @{"arexx_shutdown" link options 14} will be run at startup and shutdown of NetSurf. These will execute after NetSurf has fully initialised with the initial window and before NetSurf frees resources (ie. at the last stage of startup, and the first stage of shutdown)
NetSurf determines the MIME types of local files primarily by checking the icon of the file. If the icon is not found it will check the default icon for the file type.
It looks for a tooltype MIMETYPE and, if found, will use the contents as the filetype of the file. If not found it will use datatypes.library and do a reverse lookup based on the contents of Resources/mimetypes[.user]
There are a number of options which can be changed that will affect the speed of NetSurf's rendering. Here are a list of the fastest settings which may help decrease rendering time on slower platforms:
@{lindent 2}* Ensure NetSurf is running on a @{b}32-bit screen@{ub} if possible. NetSurf down-converts from 32-bit ARGB for display, which can impact performance.@{lindent}
@{lindent 2}* In preferences, General tab, enable @{b}Fast scrolling@{ub}.@{lindent}
@{lindent 2}* In preferences, Rendering tab set:
@{b}Cache native versions@{ub} to @{b}Scaled@{ub} (or preferably @{b}All@{ub}, but this will use more graphics mem, and scaling images is a bigger performance hit)
The source code can be obtained from http://www.netsurf-browser.org SVN or (in the event the service is unavailable) chris@unsatisfactorysoftware.co.uk or any other of the NetSurf developers.
