While the upgrade includes significant enhancements, its release has produced at least a murmur of complaint -- and perhaps a good bit more -- among Apple users.

The new release requires the most recent version of the Apple operating system, Mac OS X 10.3, code named "Panther." That has left some Apple faithful wondering why the new update was not made backwards compatible with OS X 10.2, known as "Jaguar," which still is used by many. Jaguar users will be restricted to using the previous Safari release.

Apple's decision was necessary, Jupiter Research analyst Michael Gartenberg told NewsFactor. "At a certain point, the company is only going to be able to support its newest initiatives on its newest operating systems." Other software companies often make similar decisions, he noted.

"If users want the full functionality of Windows Media 9, they have to use it on Windows XP, not Windows 2000 or Windows 98," he noted.

New Tools

Clearly, this new Safari update offers some useful new tools. Most significantly, it includes what Apple refers to as "improved compatibility" with Web sites and Web applications.

Earlier versions of Safari were unable to access certain features of sites that were optimized for Microsoft 's Internet Explorer browser. Since IE has a greater than 90 percent share of the browser market -- causing site developers to design specifically for it -- other browser developers are at a competitive disadvantage.

"I know that folks have found greater compatibility with certain sites that were previously grumpy about Safari," Gartenberg said of the new release. "It shows that Apple is taking seriously the feedback it's getting in terms of bug reports and using them to make a better browsing experience."

Faster Cat

Safari 1.2 also includes support for personal certificate authentication, an important security feature. Its new keyboard-navigation capability means a Web surfer would virtually never need a mouse to navigate the Internet.

Users of 1.2 can use the "resume download" feature to continue paused downloads at a later time. And the new browser supports sites that use LiveConnect for communication between JavaScript and Java applets. This function requires users to have Java 1.4.2.

Based on statistics on the Apple site, Safari 1.2 surfs blazingly faster than competing browsers, loading an HTML page in one third the time that IE does. (continued...)

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