OS/2 e-Zine!

Snap! - by Lief Clennon

Summary: A nice try with some good news feeds, maybe it'll get better, but to an OS/2 user this is an alien landscape.

Snap is the first major portal from an Internet publishing company (C|Net) rather than a search engine. When I looked at it there were no customization features, but just before going to press a beta of "My Snap!" became available. Too late to write a full report on, I've discussed a little of what it offers later in this review.

Homogenized

Since search engines have been overdone I decided to start with the more flamboyant features of a modern Internet Portal Service. Prominent on their list: chat. There was a page asking you to sign on, or click a button to create a new account. Seemed simple enough, but then you get the following message:

"Please choose a Chat plug-in for your system from the list below. You will then be taken to a download page containing further instructions for downloading the proper software."

The only available plug-ins were for Netscape under Windows 95, a note also mentioned that the Win3.X version was not yet available. This really isn't starting well. Maybe I should go back to the basics.

A search for simply "OS/2" pulled up a single category, and no hits from elsewhere in the database. Well, not too bad -- nearly three dozen items, including WarpCast, the SuperSite, and the e-Zine! In fact there were two entries for us -- identical links, but one had a capital E. Notable absences were Gary Hammer's OS/2 Must-Have Utilities, the Master Updates List, and the Hobbes archive. Also, despite having Indelible Blue Ink (Indelible Blue's newsletter), OS/2 mail-order giant Indelible Blue itself was not listed.

Pressing ever onward...

Back to the less run-of-the-mill functions. Software Downloads looked like as good a place to start as any. There was a little more diversity here than in the chat feature -- you have a platform option. "Any", "Windows", "DOS", "Mac". And, "Special: Download Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.01". Well, sometimes there's gold beneath the surface, so I dug through the categories a bit.

There were a smattering of Java applets, ready to drop into your web site. Iron pyrite, maybe; not gold. The next feature on the list: Classifieds. A "Computers" category was boldly displayed, and among the many subcategories was "PC Software."

But unfortunately, the search engine just didn't cut it. There was nowhere to enter a specific query -- you could only select from categories for manufacturer and product category. "IBM" and "Operating Systems" showed several copies of OS/2 for sale. If I'd had the money, I probably would have snagged Warp Server at $195. However, it would be difficult to find anything else of interest without the ability to type a search string.

As an aside, there were notify-list options within the classified search. I hadn't seen any reference to buddy lists or what-have-you anywhere else on Snap -- but then I glanced at the URL, and discovered that I was actually on Classifieds 2000. Ironically, the outside contractor has better technology than the main site.

My Snap!

Entering beta phase too late to review here in full was Snap!'s attempt at mimicking the customization features of the other Portals. At best, this feature was a mediocre copy of what Yahoo is doing, although there's nothing to say it won't improve before final release. There's no way to customize the layout -- you're stuck with whatever arrangement Snap! decides -- no way to customize the colors, and the number of features besides news is small. What good can be said about it is that it has an excellent range of news feeds to choose from, larger than any of the other Portals tested in this roundup.

Another flaw I noticed was that even after choosing a name and password to access My Snap! with, you still had to sign up with another name and password to access the Chat rooms. I don't know why the two services couldn't share the same database of users, but then again this might just be temporary until the Beta phase has ended.

Breaking point

In a last resort to find some OS/2 relevant content I did a quick search of Online Shopping. A few deals on DB/2 that could easily be gotten elsewhere -- and in fact most of the listings were directly filched from Insight or software dot net. At this point, I pretty much gave up. Desperate for anything positive to say about Snap!, I searched for a few of my own nontechnical interests. I'm happy to say that their Jethro Tull category has only one entry fewer than Yahoo!'s, with some non-overlapping sites. They're even equal if you discount Yahoo!'s listing of the alt.music.jethro-tull newsgroup.

All in all: Snap! doesn't have much to offer that isn't done better elsewhere, and it has next to nothing of specific interest to OS/2 users. I'll be sticking to Yahoo! and AltaVista, myself.

Snap!

by C|Net
MSRP: Free

Lief Clennon is a computer hobbyist and Team OS/2 member currently residing in Albuquerque, NM. He can usually be found badgering his friends on IRC.