To love Opera, or not to love Opera

This is what I don’t get. I don’t understand why the rendering engine is so closely tied to the overall appearance and functionality of the browser. I don’t understand why switching to Webkit also means having the same functionality as Webkit. Surely the whole point of having different browsers using the same rendering engine is that you can make them different? The hard work has already been done, leaving you free to play with the fun stuff.

I had no great love for Presto – in years gone by, it was great to have the only browser that rendered even close to the standards (well, both great and incredibly frustrating at the same time!), but as the others have caught up and overtaken it, that’s no longer a USP and it’s no longer a feature I’m bothered about. But why do we have to throw the baby out with the bathwater?

First off, Opera is Blink not Webkit.

Secondly, Opera 24 does not look like Chrome, does not behave like Chrome, does not feel like Chrome.

This goes to show a user should take the time and dive deeper instead of basing their opinion on false premises fed by other misinformed users. Really, take the time and document the likeness. You’d be extremely surprised how much different they are.

True unless Opera Presto became a big mass of spaghetti code without any basis for interfacing with another rendering engine. Who knows, this can be true. Opera’s source code can be really dated if they didn’t do any refactoring in recent years. I guess it was easier to take Chromium and slowly mould it to something different than to make Presto’s ancient UI code talk to a modern rendering engine.

Opera is much more similar to Chrome than to Opera Presto. And out of all major browsers today Chome is the most similar one to Opera. And Opera’s rendering engine is almost identical to Chrome, which means it has inherited all the virtues and bugs of Chrome, for example long opening of large xml documents, long parsing of certain large html documents, no built-in smooth scrolling, font rendering method (deteriorated in latest Chrome so we can expect it to trickle down to the next Opera version) and a lot more.

But these opinions didn’t appear out of thin air. They came from people actually using the new Opera. It’s true that Opera gradually is adding more features so these opinions can be a bit outdated - but Opera themselves are to blame for this misinformation because they used the name “Opera 15” for a completely different browser to Opera 12 - a browser that was in early alpha stages was given number 15 implying it’s a largely improved version of Opera 12. It is logical then to expect that Opera 15 is more and better than Opera 12 while the opposite was true (only the rendering engine could be called “improved”). When starting a new piece of software the numbering should start at 1, not at 14, 15 or whatever, and unfinished or experimental releases should be called alpha, beta, pre, etc. instead of having full numbers in the vicinity of 20.

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And that’s where the similarities end. Opera web browsing is NOT Chrome web browsing experience, UI wise, features wise, user experience wise.

Presto was introduced in Opera 7. By your logic, it’s a new piece of software, so they should have started at 1. Also, Opera 7 Presto was a mess. So, these opinions are not coming from people using new Opera, they come from people looking for something to complain about. It just happens to be new Opera they complain about.

As I said, I couldn’t give a stuff what rendering engine is used. When Opera 7 was launched, regardless of whatever was going on behind the scenes, from the user experience point of view it was an evolution of Opera 6. Sure, they may have been some additional bugginess (although I don’t remember any), but apart from that it had all the same features as before plus some new ones. It made sense to count it as the same browser and increment the version number, because functionally it was a newer version of the same browser. That isn’t true of Opera 15+. It doesn’t function like a newer version of Opera 12.

I don’t go out looking for things to complain about. When there’s something that bugs me, I try to ignore it, I try to look for the positives, I try to see if I can cope with it … I’m not one of life’s whingers … but Opera has fundamentally changed its game here, and made a deliberate choice to alienate its established user base, who were its most powerful advocates. Yes, that’s their prerogative, but they can hardly get upset when those self same people complain about Opera turning its back on them.

If you genuinely can’t comprehend why people who were power users of a cutting-edge advanced browser are upset and frustrated about being given a choice between (a) an old browser that is being left to moulder and will become obsolete, and (b) a basic browser that remains current but offers them a significantly worse experience and none of the advanced functionality that they were used to, then I guess we will never find any common ground and its pointless to continue this discussion.

Let me say this. You are a power user. I don’t really know what this means when it comes to Opera 12 browser, features and all, Firefox and Chrome are honestly way more advanced, are being used as OSs in a number of devices, so the title would fit well there, but I know this: if you don’t give a stuff about the rendering engine but you care deeply about something else then you’re using it wrong. It’s a not a web browser you need. Fortunately, Opera understood what it has become and made the move back to being a browser, instead of some SeaMonkey-like weird animal. And if you can’t comprehend a browser has a browser job to do first then you can go on and get upset and frustrated all you want.

Exactly.

Opera 7 included all of the functionality from Opera 6 and simply changed the rendering engine.

With Opera 15 none of the functionality (which has always been the reason for Opera’s popularity) was transferred across. They basically started off with Opera 15 as a brand new version one browser (no matter what number they give it).

As for what rendering engine is used - who cares - all of the rendering engines these days work basically the same. There may be a few of the newer things that Presto can’t handle which may eventually become a concern in a few years time but at the moment with most of the web still basically using HTML 3.2 that is a long way off.

It is the functionality the browser provides that counts the most and at the moment Opera 12 is still decades ahead of all the others in that area.

No, Opera did not understand anything like that, it simply laid off most of its best developers, for whatever reasons, and as a result lost the resources needed to support their own browser (link and link) - or the other way round, they laid off staff because they stopped caring about the browser. Opera browser as we see it today is not a result of careful and thought out planning but is a consequence of difficulties, problems and turmoil that happened in recent years at Opera. They never figured out how to be successful with their browser (in terms of market share) and finally gave up and reduced the developer team to the bare minimum needed to maintain a Chrome offshoot. They are now in a much safer place, taking fewer risks but at the same time making fewer innovations.

Some people will like the new browser, some won’t (as usual) but one thing is sure - there is no more so much passion in what they do and the browser has gone into the background in their order of importance. Only time will tell how it will play out for them - quite often simple and dumbed-down technology can make a lot more money than advanced stuff that appeals only to a small percentage - it’s mostly a question of good marketing and being in the right place at the right time.

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That’s a bold statement! Where do you get this information!? Despite the fact that all are not programmed in the same language, despite platform differences and developing teams having different priorities and approaches, there are long long tables of consistent differences: canisue: Compare browsers


No, it’s not.

After a long, dark age of badly rendered pages, Opera’s now near-perfect in that regard. I say this even after uninstalling it just a few months ago due to its incompatibility with PCWorld’s own web tools. Updates have smoothed out those kinks, and it’s only a hair slower than Chrome.

Despite the list of minor complaints, Opera is currently my main work browser because it’s nearly as fast as Chrome, but easier to configure.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2605933/browser-comparison-how-the-five-leaders-stack-up-in-speed-ease-of-use-and-more.html?page=2

There’s another side to this:

I used Opera for years and indeed found it to be quite fast. But the page-rendering issue you mentioned, along with the general arrogance of its developers and fanboys, eventually caused me to ditch it for Firefox. Maybe I’ll give it another look.
http://www.eightforums.com/windows-8-news/54031-browser-comparison-how-five-leaders-stack-up-speed.html#post429640


They are making innovations that count for the general public, make it a browsing friendly environment for a larger audience is the logical aim, instead of addressing a smaller group that turned out to be so vindictive and unsupportive. Proof they made the right choice by giving up on them.


Opera won’t survive because you and a few hundred other users say it lacks the essential features you must have? The browser never surpassed 3% general usage for many reasons, one of which was its perception as a geek-oriented browser that while it did many things, it did them in a convoluted, backward way.
http://forums.opera.com/discussion/1831625/from-opera-12-to-20-a-giant-leap-back-for-mankind/p1

Just because you are vindictive and unsupportive of their browser doesn’t mean that all their other users are.

I’m on the “to love Opera” side. It’s the Opera 12 users threatening to forget about Opera in a less than polite manner. I have no issues leaving Opera 12 behind, I use Opera 24 as my current browser and I love it :sunny:

I am not threatening to forget about Opera. Opera 12 is the only current browser that has the functionality I use all the time. I will continue using it until the functionality I need is added to another browser. If that functionality gets added to Opera 27 or 28 or whatever (which is more likely than it getting added to a non-Opera browser) then I will switch to that Specifically I am waiting for the reintroduction of the REWIND button…

I haven’t seen anyone threatening to leave Opera in this thread at all (just claims that the new version isn’t yet worthy of the name Opera because it can’t do all of what all Opera users have come to expect it to do)…

Opera themselves say that about half of their users have upgraded and the other half are still using 12. There is no suggestion of anyone actually abandoning Opera, just sticking with 12 until the person sees the functionality they want added into the new version. I would expect to see Opera 12 around for quite a few years yet unless Opera suddenly add all of the missing functionality into the new Opera. It is only going to be a problem if Opera tries to force people to upgrade before adding back the missing functionality.

Here are quotes from your posts:

where you clearly state that new Opera is not even an option for you. Which is what pretty much every bitter Opera old fan is overstating these days. I, for one, am trying to give new Opera a chance. But the bitter old users simply adopted a wrong dialog style when Opera started over, even though it was explained to them, over and over, Presto took 10+ years in the making, and the features they like took from Opera 7 until Opera 12. But no, “we want this and WE WANT IT NOW”. What’s expected of them is simply to enjoy new Opera with its standards and rendering improvements, with its Aura improvements, with its address bar search improvements, with its UI improvements, and thus support Opera browser and the Opera team I’m sure will then find resources to make things the way everyone likes it.

And if you bother to take a look at the release notes, you’ll see that the rapid number succession is due to the latest Chromium/Blink release schedule. And yes, they had always had beta releases, called Opera Next, now being called beta releases again. Nonetheless, every release adds improvements and missing features. And think about this, what if Opera 8 users chose to turn against Opera and had caused such a war over the incompleteness of the browser? It’s not hard to imagine that with enough discontent users, Opera 12 would’ve only be a figment of imagination. So, start using new Opera, it’s a snappy fast secure and capable browser. Reward will come with supporting. “I WANT THIS NOW” may work only if you have enough money to throw at it, which is clearly not the case here, you get Opera for free. And the reality of all says that even with enough money, there are no guarantees to “GET IT NOW” for anything at all.

Okay, the discussion has come back full circle to feeling personal again, so since we couldn’t keep it on the right track, this thread is officially closed. Plus we seem to be going in circles and having the same discussion over and over again. It seems this discussion has run its course.

This topic is now opened per request. New replies are allowed.

Yeah, just found out about that—a new browser by some people associated with Opera who wanted to get back to the old days? Can’t quite tell, as the site is a bit vague. But they are taking suggestions for extra features, so if any of the old Opera ones that you love aren’t in there, just suggest them. I see Speed Dial is in there.

Good news indeed.

The rewind button doesn’t work yet but at least it is there and so presumably will be fully functional by the time the browser gets to version one.

Looks like I spoke too soon - while labelled as a rewind button it is actually just a back button for when you use fast forward. As they are using the rewind button for something completely different than what opera uses it for it will be completely useless.

Why can’t someone add that extremely useful button - rewind - into other browsers so that the choice of browsers to use is something other than Opera 12, Opera 11, Opera 10…

One of the FastMail devs gave a talk on JMAP and I asked him if FastMail was the company vivaldi was talking to about implementing mail… and he could only say “there have been mails” [to the CEO]. While I never was one for mail in the browser (I like mutt), many of my Opera-using friends were.

(btw if anyone wants to help FM not be the sole company/group/people writing a new protocol for mail (the protocol to end all protocols by being compatible with all the other crappy proprietary mail protocols, plus needed fixes to IMAP), jump in or send that link to hacker friends who know Perl and stuff about protocols. The link there has both code and a proxy.)

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