I've just received my invitation to test Google Wave (see http://wave.google.com/), which is very interesting indeed.

When starting it up in Avant Browser, it asked for Google Chrome Frame to be installed, which I carried out. Then it kept asking for the Google Chrome Frame to be installed, ignoring which I took the option "If you want to continue at your own peril, go ahead" ... But it did not operate properly inside Avant (displayed the frameset, but not correct contents inside the various frames).

Then I tried Goggle Wave in Firefox 3.5 and Orca Browser 1.2 Build 5, where it does seem to be working.

I wonder why Avant failed but Orca worked. Any ideas?

I don't know enough about Google Wave since I haven't been able to check it out but from what it sounds like, it doesn't support IE which is why Google Chrome Frame needs to be installed. Now, it looks like GCF doesn't work in Avant (or check if you can enable it under Tools -> Avant Browser Options... -> Add-ons).

I just tested and confirmed that Google Wave does work under Internet Explorer (IE8, which is installed as part of Windows 7, anyway). Thanks for the "heads up" about checking for an Avant Add-on, which as usual I had forgotten to do.

But even when the ChromeFrame BHO was activated in Avant's Add-ons list it still gave the same error. So unfortunately it looks like Google Wave and Avant Browser don't get on well together.

I hope that Anderson can minimize this sort of incompatibility in Avant version 12. (Does anyone know if this is one of the objectives?)

There was a discussion about running the Google Chrome Frame with Avant - it did seem incompatible. It may be due to security settings or similar. I may do further tests when I have time...

The reason I believe Google Wave will not work properly with Avant is because there are features of Google Wave that require HTML5. Meaning it needs a browser that has support for certain elements of HTML5 that the rendering engine Avant uses does not support. The rendering engine that is used by Google Chrome, Apple Safari, Firefox, and also our Orca Browser does have support for these elements and thats why Wave works in Orca and not Avant.

But Google Chrome Frame does work with IE6/7/8. I thought that it worked like IETab for Firefox, so that a Google Chrome instance is started in another browser. Looking at the installed files, there seems to be a complete Google Chrome installed...

So then, will Avant 12 be able to support HTML5 and other such newly-appearing goodies?

Avant is a wrapper for IE's Trident engine, it does not add any new rendering features, so (imho) only if the Trident engine does, otherwise support can be added with the Google Chrome Frame (or similar plugin?) which will hopefully be fixed. In the meantime - nag Microsoft

What I, and I guess most others, like about Avant is its large number of features for productivity only some of which (liked tabs) that Microsoft only belatedly added in IE7 and IE8 -- and even then, not always fully. E.g., no multi-row tabs, and tabs cannot be placed at the bottom to remove clutter (quite pathetic).

I find that quite minor Avant features like "Save HTML..." (which I do very frequently) over the months and years have saved me bulk time, and like the fact that this little feature is also in Orca.

I'm not wedded to the Trident rendering engine, and would be quite happy to move over to Orca if only all the things that work in Avant (like the raft of add-ons I rely upon) all worked in Orca -- each and every one of those productivity aids, unless there's a Mozilla add-on which works in Orca in an identical or extremely similar fashion (not always the case).

So if Avant 12 remains restricted by the old-fashioned Trident engine, why not put more work into Orca to bring it up to full equivalency with Avant's features and capabilities?

I wish that there weren't quite so many of those excellent Firefox add-ons that don't function in Orca. ... Sigh.

If I implied that Chrome Frame doesn't work in IE or doesn't allow IE to run Wave then that was not my intention. And you are right Chrome Frame does essentually the same thing as IETab.

@notetracker:
Avant 12 will not be any different then 11.7 in terms of what it can render. If IE doesn't support the elements of HTML5 that Wave requires then Avant won't either. Unless, Avant gets fixed to allow the use of Chrome Frame, which superimposes Chromes engine over top of Trident(IE's engine).

I wouldn't really go as far as to say Trident is old-fashioned, its just that Chromes and Firefox's engines are both open source which means their engines get updated so much faster then IE's does. Simply because Microsoft only releases a new version of their engine when a new version of the browser itself is ready to be released. With Chrome and Firefox, they can just say I want this particular HTML5 feature, they code it up and then upload it to their server and its automatically available to everyone.

Also, HTML 5 isn't a "standard" yet like HTML 4.01 is. It's still a work in progress.

Apparently it doesnt need to be..