K-Meleon is a

free and open-source Free and open-source software (FOSS) is software available under a Software license, license that grants users the right to use, modify, and distribute the software modified or not to everyone free of charge. FOSS is an inclusive umbrella term ...

, lightweight

web browser A web browser, often shortened to browser, is an application for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's scr ...

for

Microsoft Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

. It uses the native

Windows API The Windows API, informally WinAPI, is the foundational application programming interface (API) that allows a computer program to access the features of the Microsoft Windows operating system in which the program is running. Programs can acces ...

to create its

user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine fro ...

. Early versions of K-Meleon rendered web pages with

Gecko Geckos are small, mostly carnivorous lizards that have a wide distribution, found on every continent except Antarctica. Belonging to the infraorder Gekkota, geckos are found in warm climates. They range from . Geckos are unique among lizards ...

Mozilla Mozilla is a free software community founded in 1998 by members of Netscape. The Mozilla community uses, develops, publishes and supports Mozilla products, thereby promoting free software and open standards. The community is supported institution ...

's browser layout engine, which Mozilla's browser

Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements curr ...

and its email client Thunderbird also use. K-Meleon became a popular Windows browser and was available as an optional default browser in Europe via BrowserChoice.eu. K-Meleon continued to use Gecko for several years after Mozilla deprecated embedding it. Current versions of K-Meleon use the Goanna layout engine, a fork of Gecko created for the browser Pale Moon. K-Meleon began with the goal of being faster and lighter than Mozilla's original Internet suite. Until 2011, K-Meleon embedded Gecko in a stripped-down interface. Throughout its lifespan, K-Meleon has required small amounts of

random-access memory Random-access memory (RAM; ) is a form of Computer memory, electronic computer memory that can be read and changed in any order, typically used to store working Data (computing), data and machine code. A random-access memory device allows ...

(RAM). K-Meleon 76 supports discontinued versions of Windows such as

Windows XP Windows XP is a major release of Microsoft's Windows NT operating system. It was released to manufacturing on August 24, 2001, and later to retail on October 25, 2001. It is a direct successor to Windows 2000 for high-end and business users a ...

and

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, released five years earlier, which was then the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft W ...

. Mozilla no longer supports these platforms after their Firefox Quantum rewrite. Customization is another primary design goal. Users can change the toolbars, menus, and

keyboard shortcuts In computing, a keyboard shortcut (also hotkey/hot key or key binding) is a software-based assignment of an action to one or more keys on a computer keyboard. Most Operating system, operating systems and Application software, applications come ...

from text-based

configuration files A configuration file, a.k.a. config file, is a file that stores data used to configure a software system such as an application, a server or an operating system. Some applications provide a tool to create, modify, and verify the syntax of the ...

. K-Meleon supports macros, which are small

browser extension A browser extension is a software module for customizing a web browser. Browsers typically allow users to install a variety of extensions, including user interface modifications, cookie management, ad blocking, and the custom scripting and st ...

s that users can examine, write, or edit in a

text editor A text editor is a type of computer program that edits plain text. An example of such program is "notepad" software (e.g. Windows Notepad). Text editors are provided with operating systems and software development packages, and can be used to c ...

. K-Meleon's custom configuration files can trigger macros. Reviews describe the customization features as versatile but intimidating to the average user. Due to its adaptability, K-Meleon was recommended for Internet cafés and libraries in the early 2000s.

History

Christophe Thibault started the K-Meleon project in the 2000s, when many new browsers were launched. To open-source their once-dominant Netscape Communicator Internet suite,

Netscape Netscape Communications Corporation (originally Mosaic Communications Corporation) was an American independent computer services company with headquarters in Mountain View, California, and then Dulles, Virginia. Its Netscape web browser was o ...

founded the

project. K-Meleon was one of several browsers to use Mozilla's browser engine

. Thibault designed K-Meleon to combine Gecko with native Windows interface elements, an approach that was less resource-intensive and allowed the browser to blend into its environment.

Embedding Gecko

Christophe Thibault released K-Meleon 0.1 on August 21, 2000. While working at

Nullsoft Nullsoft, Inc. was an American software house founded in Sedona, Arizona in 1997 by programmer Justin Frankel. Its products included the Winamp media player and the SHOUTcast MP3 streaming media server. History In 1997, Justin Frankel, ...

, Thibault said he created the first simple release to attract attention, during a day off. For the 0.2 release, he implemented features like

context menu A context menu (also called contextual, shortcut, and pop up or pop-up menu) is a menu in a graphical user interface (GUI) that appears upon user interaction, such as a right-click mouse operation. A context menu offers a limited set of choic ...

s and moved development to

SourceForge SourceForge is a web service founded by Geoffrey B. Jeffery, Tim Perdue, and Drew Streib in November 1999. SourceForge provides a centralized software discovery platform, including an online platform for managing and hosting open-source soft ...

to welcome contributions from open-source developers. Thibault handed the project over to new developers, including Brian Harris, Sebastian Spaeth, Jeff Doozan, and Ulf Erikson, who began implementing browser functions through modular Kplugins. The K-Meleon team released new versions with pop-up blocking and

cookie A cookie is a sweet biscuit with high sugar and fat content. Cookie dough is softer than that used for other types of biscuit, and they are cooked longer at lower temperatures. The dough typically contains flour, sugar, egg, and some type of ...

management. These releases introduced text-based configuration files called configs that allowed users to customize the browser or hide interface elements, and a macro language to extend the browser. Early reviews described K-Meleon as small, fast, limited, and visually similar to Internet Explorer. K-Meleon was built with open-source code from Mozilla but its narrower focus offered advantages over the Mozilla Application Suite, which bundled the browser with applications for

email Electronic mail (usually shortened to email; alternatively hyphenated e-mail) is a method of transmitting and receiving Digital media, digital messages using electronics, electronic devices over a computer network. It was conceived in the ...

news News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different Media (communication), media: word of mouth, printing, Mail, postal systems, broadcasting, Telecommunications, electronic communication, or through the te ...

, chat, and webpage editing. To create a stand-alone browser, the Galeon project embedded Mozilla's rendering engine. Galeon was released for Linux using

GNOME A gnome () is a mythological creature and diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, introduced by Paracelsus in the 16th century and widely adopted by authors, including those of modern fantasy literature. They are typically depict ...

's widget toolkit

GTK GTK (formerly GIMP ToolKit and GTK+) is a free software cross-platform widget toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces (GUIs). It is licensed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License, allowing both Free software, free and ...

. K-Meleon brought a similar approach to Windows using the operating system's native

application programming interface An application programming interface (API) is a connection between computers or between computer programs. It is a type of software Interface (computing), interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that des ...

(API) to create a lightweight

(UI). The K-Meleon developers released a stand-alone web browser for Windows two years before the Firefox

alpha release The software release life cycle is the process of developing, testing, and distributing a software product (e.g., an operating system). It typically consists of several stages, such as pre-alpha, alpha, beta, and release candidate, before the fi ...

. Mozilla created user interfaces via their cross-platform

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing data. It defines a set of rules for encoding electronic document, documents in a format that is both human-readable and Machine-r ...

User Interface Language ( XUL) layer. This technology used Gecko to lay out application interfaces. XUL allowed Mozilla to build one application for multiple operating systems but generated graphical controls that did not match the rest of the system. K-Meleon was smaller and more closely integrated into the Windows desktop than Mozilla's browser, and could use the native bookmarking system to access

Internet Explorer Internet Explorer (formerly Microsoft Internet Explorer and Windows Internet Explorer, commonly abbreviated as IE or MSIE) is a deprecation, retired series of graphical user interface, graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft that were u ...

's favorites. KM 0 7

K-Meleon 0.7 was released with the Mozilla 1.0 engine in October 2002. Despite AOL disbanding upstream parent company

in 2003, the development of K-Meleon continued. Mozilla continued work on Gecko, and K-Meleon was updated with

service pack In computing, a service pack comprises a collection of updates, fixes, or enhancements to a software program delivered in the form of a single installable package. Companies often release a service pack when the number of individual patches to a ...

s and version 0.8. In 2005, Ulf Erikson announced version 0.9 would be the final version of K-Meleon he would build. He was the project's developer but stated he was no longer using K-Meleon as his primary browser after moving to

Linux Linux ( ) is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an kernel (operating system), operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically package manager, pac ...

. In January 2006, Dorian Boissonnade became the lead developer and began working towards a 1.0 release. K-Meleon 1.0 was released in July 2006 and made the browser fully translatable. It stored localizations in separate library-and-config files within existing K-Meleon installations. Parts of the browser could be translated in a text editor. K-Meleon 1.0 maintained support for its existing system of text-based configuration files and introduced a new graphical interface to change

preferences In psychology, economics and philosophy, preference is a technical term usually used in relation to choosing between alternatives. For example, someone prefers A over B if they would rather choose A than B. Preferences are central to decision the ...

from within the browser. Version 1.1 expanded the macro system. Earlier versions placed all of the macros into a single config file. Initial releases came with fewer than 50 lines of macro code and instructions for end users to create their own macros. Later versions came with over 1,000 lines of macro code, and the macros users wrote and shared online. In response, K-Meleon developers separated macros into modules. Version 1.5 introduced a true tabbed interface. In Europe, version 1.5 was an optional default Windows browser through Microsoft's browser ballot. Due to accusations of abusing its market position to promote Internet Explorer, Microsoft introduced a browser ballot in the

European Economic Area The European Economic Area (EEA) was established via the ''Agreement on the European Economic Area'', an international agreement which enables the extension of the European Union's single market to member states of the European Free Trade Asso ...

(EEA). By 2010, it offered Windows users a choice of the 12 most popular web browsers, including K-Meleon.

7x releases

In 2011, Mozilla ended support for embedding the Gecko layout engine; because K-Meleon had previously relied on this API, the browser's future became uncertain. In 2013, after years without an official, stable release, the K-Meleon group began developing version 74. While Mozilla had ended support for embedding of Gecko, it maintained a technology called XULRunner. XULRunner was a stand-alone implementation of the Gecko engine designed to launch applications. K-Meleon 74 used XULRunner instead of Mozilla's deprecated embedding software. Outside the new engine, version 74 brought small improvements, including better CPU use and minor bug fixes. K-Meleon 75 included a spelling checker, form auto-completion, and a new skin system. Boissonnade began work on version 76 but suffered a

hard disk drive failure A hard disk drive failure occurs when a hard disk drive malfunctions and the stored information cannot be accessed with a properly configured computer. A hard disk failure may occur in the course of normal operation, or due to an external factor ...

during beta testing.

Goanna branch

Active development on K-Meleon takes place using Goanna, a fork of Gecko created for the browser Pale Moon. With Firefox Quantum, Mozilla rewrote large parts of its browser engine. In 2017, Roy Tam forked K-Meleon 76 to run on Goanna. The project's former lead developer Boissonnade wrote; "Thanks for taking care of that little lizard fter Ileft it". K-Meleon on Goanna remains compatible with deprecated versions of Windows and can run with smaller amounts of RAM than those required by mainstream web browsers. K-Meleon has lower memory requirements than other low-resource browsers. K-Meleon is updated on a

rolling release Rolling release, also known as rolling update or continuous delivery, is a concept in software development of frequently delivering updates to applications. This is in contrast to a ''standard'' or '' point release'' development model which uses ...

schedule. By default, the browser is a multi-lingual portable application that can directly run from the host computer or removable media. It is also included in the PortableApps.com repository. By 2023, K-Meleon was not compatible with major web apps and social media sites. As of October 2024, the final planned release is version 76.5.5.

Customization

Customization of K-Meleon's interface is possible using text-format configuration files called configs. The menus,

, and more can all be customized via K-Meleon's configuration files. These configs can call upon macros, a type of extension that can be opened in a text editor. A simple

"Hello, World!" program A "Hello, World!" program is usually a simple computer program that emits (or displays) to the screen (often the Console application, console) a message similar to "Hello, World!". A small piece of code in most general-purpose programming languag ...

could be written in K-Meleon's macro language that would pop up a small window with the message "Hello world!". HelloWorld To trigger the macro, a keyboard accelerator could be created by adding the code below to the accelerator config, causing the macro to launch if the Ctrl, Alt, and H keys are pressed at the same time. Doozan described the accelerator syntax to add a macro command as "Sample Usage: in accel.cfg KEY = macros(example)" with "example" being the name of an individual macro sections enclosed in brackets. CTRL ALT H = macros(HelloWorld) Custom toolbars offer more options, but the syntax is similar. The example below would create a new toolbar with a button to trigger a macro. Doozan documents the formatting as "ToolBar Name " with many optional parameters including size, "Tool Bar(16,16){ = NAME OF TOOLBAR* (WIDTH, HEIGHT), DEFAULT=(16,16)", and bitmap "image file for various states. NewToolbar{ !NewButton{ macros(HelloWorld) } } This combination of configs and macro modules provides control over much of the browser. It also creates a

learning curve A learning curve is a graphical representation of the relationship between how proficient people are at a task and the amount of experience they have. Proficiency (measured on the vertical axis) usually increases with increased experience (the ...

for customization that is not present in most browsers. A CNET review criticized K-Meleon because it "requires some knowledge of computer code to get the most out of it". Popular browsers use systems like WebExtensions, where there is a separation between users and extension developers. Because of its flexibility, K-Meleon was useful for environments in which the browser needed to be customized for

public use Public use is a legal requirement under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution#Eminent domain, Takings Clause ("nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation") of the Fifth Amendment to the United State ...

, such as

libraries A library is a collection of Book, books, and possibly other Document, materials and Media (communication), media, that is accessible for use by its members and members of allied institutions. Libraries provide physical (hard copies) or electron ...

and

Internet café An Internet café, also known as a cybercafé, is a Coffeehouse, café (or a convenience store or a fully dedicated Internet access business) that provides the use of computers with high bandwidth Internet access on the payment of a fee. Usage ...

s. It allowed administrators to hide some features from patrons. For example, a library could hide interface elements like the address bar or limit the computer's access to an online resource like the

library catalog A library catalog (or library catalogue in British English) is a register of all bibliography, bibliographic items found in a library or group of libraries, such as a network of libraries at several locations. A catalog for a group of libra ...

Legacy Windows versions

K-Meleon supports a range of legacy software and hardware. Version 76 supports

(2001) and

(2006). Windows XP and its Windows Embedded POSReady 2009 variant have been unsupported since 2019. The latest major browser releases to support these operating systems are Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8 (2014),

Google Chrome Google Chrome is a web browser developed by Google. It was first released in 2008 for Microsoft Windows, built with free software components from Apple WebKit and Mozilla Firefox. Versions were later released for Linux, macOS, iOS, iPadOS, an ...

49.0.2623.112 (2016), and Mozilla Firefox 52.9.0 (2018). Web browsers cannot access secure websites if they do not support

Transport Layer Security Transport Layer Security (TLS) is a cryptographic protocol designed to provide communications security over a computer network, such as the Internet. The protocol is widely used in applications such as email, instant messaging, and voice over ...

(TLS)

encryption In Cryptography law, cryptography, encryption (more specifically, Code, encoding) is the process of transforming information in a way that, ideally, only authorized parties can decode. This process converts the original representation of the inf ...

. As of 2018, most major web sites use TLS encryption via

HTTPS Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) is an extension of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). It uses encryption for secure communication over a computer network, and is widely used on the Internet. In HTTPS, the communication protoc ...

. Early versions of K-Meleon for Windows 2000 and

Windows 9X Windows 9x is a generic term referring to a line of discontinued Microsoft Windows operating systems released from 1995 to 2000 and supported until 2006, which were based on the kernel introduced in Windows 95 and modified in succeeding version ...

receive occasional updates for TLS certificates. K-Meleon 74 can access secure websites on Windows 2000 using an old version of the Goanna engine combined with up-to-date ciphers. K-Meleon 1.5 can run on

Windows 95 Windows 95 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft and the first of its Windows 9x family of operating systems, released to manufacturing on July 14, 1995, and generally to retail on August 24, 1995. Windows 95 merged ...

Windows 98 Windows 98 is a consumer-oriented operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the second operating system in the 9x line, as the successor to Windows 95. It was Software ...

, and

Windows Me Windows Me (Millennium Edition) is an operating system developed by Microsoft as part of its Windows 9x family of Microsoft Windows operating systems. It was the successor to Windows 98, and was released to manufacturing on June 19, 2000, and t ...

. Occasional TLS updates allow version 1.5 to access secure websites.

Release history

K-Meleon, which was first released in 2000, has been under development for over 20 years and is still maintained. The most-recent version K-Meleon 76 is updated on a rolling release schedule. All versions of K-Meleon are written for Microsoft Windows operating systems. {, class="wikitable sortable mw-datatable mw-collapsible" , + class="nowrap" , Complete K-Meleon release history , - ! scope="col" , Version ! scope="col" data-sort-type=date , Initial Release ! scope="col" data-sort-type=date , Latest Update ! scope="col" , Gecko Version ! scope="col" class="unsortable" , Notes , - , - ! 0.1 , Aug 21, 2000 , Aug 21, 2000 , data-sort-value="0.0.17", M17 , , - ! 0.2 , Nov 26, 2000 , Jan 29, 2001 , data-sort-value="0.0.18", M18 , , - ! 0.3 , Feb 13, 2001 , Feb 13, 2001 , 0.8 , , - ! 0.4 , May 11, 2001 , May 11, 2001 , 0.9 , , - ! 0.5 , Sep 27, 2001 , Sep 27, 2001 , 0.9.4 , , - ! 0.6 , Oct 30, 2001 , Oct 30, 2001 , 0.9.5 , , - ! 0.7 , Oct 31, 2002 , Feb 12, 2003 , 1.2b , , - ! 0.8 , Nov 10, 2003 , Dec 23, 2003 , 1.5 , , - ! 0.9 , Jan 18, 2005 , Apr 25, 2006 , 1.7.13 , , - ! 1.0 , Jul 15, 2006 , Sep 22, 2006 , 1.8.0.7 , , - ! 1.1 , May 22, 2007 , Jul 18, 2008 , 1.8.1.17 , , - ! 1.5 , Aug 8, 2008 , Dec 9, 2022 , 1.8.1.24 , , - ! 1.6 , Nov 14, 2010 , Dec 12, 2010 , 1.9.1.20 , , - ! 74.0 , Sep 8, 2014 , Aug 14, 2021 , 24.7 , , - ! 75.0 , Nov 25, 2014 , Jun 24, 2015 , 31.5 , , - ! 75.1 , Sep 19, 2015 , Dec 14, 2022 , 31.8 , , - ! 76.0 RC , May 2, 2016 , Dec 20, 2016 , 38.8 , , - ! 76.G , Nov 28, 2017 , Dec 15, 2018 , data-sort-value="52", Goanna 3.x , , - ! 76.2.G , Jan 10, 2019 , Aug 22, 2020 , data-sort-value="52", Goanna 3.4.6 , , - ! 76.3.G , Aug 29, 2020 , Feb 5, 2021 , data-sort-value="52", Goanna 3.4.6 , , - ! 76.4.G , Feb 12, 2021 , Apr 7, 2023 , data-sort-value="52", Goanna 3.4.6 , , - ! 76.5.G , Dec 1, 2024 , Oct 10, 2024 , data-sort-value="52", Goanna 3.6.0 , , - , - class="sortbottom" , colspan=5, Notes General references for this table include K-Meleon file releases, release notes, changelogs, and the Announcements forum.For versions 1.1–76: , -

Notes

References

External links

Unified XUL Platform MDN Backup
– Archive of pre-Quantum Mozilla documentation applicable to the Goanna engine and UXP applications
Roy Tam's repositories on GitHub
– Refer to developer Roy Tam's repositories for the latest version of the browser shell and browser engine source code * {{Navboxes, list= {{gopher clients {{Timeline of web browsers, 2000s {{Lightweight web browsers {{Web browsers, desktop 2000 software Free web browsers Gecko-based software Gopher clients Portable software Windows-only free software Windows web browsers