A few questions - Opera 12 and Opera 18
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fred959 last edited by
I appreciate that O12 is dead or soon will be, and that O18 ( and later ) is the way forward for Opera users. But can I ask:
1 Is O12.16 still supported for security reasons ( not functional updates etc ), or is it already effectively dead and unsafe to use?
2 Are there any official Opera site pages to state how long, if at all, the O12 range will still be 'security' patched for.
3 Is O18 stable and feature complete or is it still really in development?
4 Whats the privacy of O18 ( and later ) like when compared to the Chrome equivalent version. I've always understood Chrome "Phones Home" quite a bit and assume this will be removed from O18. Does anyone know if this is the case?
For my Chrome look-alike that does not 'phone home' I am currently looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SRWare_Iron but I guess there will be little point in having two Chrome look-alikes so when O18 is stable and feature complete, I can compare the two and decide then.
I'm not having a go at Opera, I've used the developing 12 range for years and been mostly extremely happy with it. But I'm not yet convinced about the 18 range from I've read, so would like your thoughts and assistance please.
Thank you
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blackbird71 last edited by1. yes, still security-supported
2. that depends on what you mean by "official", and whether you mean a hard date in time (none has been stated)
3. yes, it's feature-complete, though Chrome/Blink-engine updates may trigger minor releases; upcoming higher versions are still in feature/stability development
4. I don't know, but probably Opera will phone home less than Chrome (or at least for different purposes) -
fred959 last edited by
blackbird71,
thanks for the reply.
So its safe to use for the near future anyway. Good to know.
2 I just meant any 'official' Opera page as opposed to just a post on a forum.
TVM
Any thoughts/comments anyone else?
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blackbird71 last edited by
Originally posted by fred959:
2 I just meant any 'official' Opera page as opposed to just a post on a forum. ...
From the Opera 15 release announcement (2 July 13) Opera 15:
... We have neither asked nor forced our 12.x users to upgrade to Opera 15, as we know that some features that are important to you are still to come. So, while you are very welcome to test and use Opera 15, Opera 12.x will still be alive for some time. You can expect that we will keep Opera 12.x up to date and secure. In the future, once we are comfortable with the feature set, we may ask you to upgrade. ...
The gist of this statement has been repeated multiple times in various release-blog comments by various devs. The key words seem to be "once we are comfortable with the feature set"... which time has not yet arrived. Feature development seems still very much in play, but the specific time or level of features where Opera feels it's time to turn Opera 12 out to pasture has not been stated by Opera ASA, nor likely will be until it's almost upon us.
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A Former User last edited by
Set Opera 12.16 preferences, Security to “Notify me about available updates.”
If and when they release 12.17 you will learn about it, or if they start recommending that all users update to Opera 21 (or whatever) you will also find out as soon as they change is made.
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fred959 last edited by
Thanks. It is set for that already.
I wasn't sure if they would 'update' to the new Opera ( V18 -> 19 -> 20 etc ) via that mechanism or if that was only used for V12.xx updates.
TVM
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blackbird71 last edited by
Right now, it's only used for 12.xx updates. As to what they will actually do when the decision is made to officially declare 12.xx "unsupported" has not been stated by Opera. I'm not sure that even Opera knows yet what could actually be done automatically or not. It could range all the way from a forced update via the 12.xx update mechanism (which I personally think will be unlikely) to merely a "forced" announcement explaining what a user would need to do to migrate. In any case, I believe it's better to only receive migration notification than to risk a possible auto-migration to a version one may not want at that point.
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biggerabalone last edited by
you can always reinforce your browser if you're concerned: sandboxie, spyshelter (running browser as restricted), online armor (has limiting rights settings), Returnil, Toolwiz Time Freeze (etc etc etc). or run it in a limited windows user account and not as the administrator: it'll help. i also run it through opendns which filters malware sites (there are others, such as comodo's, but i use opendns).
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fred959 last edited by
blackbird71 & biggerabalone, thanks for the extra info.
From whats been said it appears it's secure for the moment and still apparently being "security supported". I'm happy with that.
I hope that the new Opera ( 15 and up ) is eventually as good as the old one was. O12 was by far the browser of choice for me, having tried a few. Maybe you get used to what you know but it just felt right for me
biggerabalone - I run as a "user" account for day to day tasks, hardly ever log on as Admin these ( W7 ) days.
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blackbird71 last edited by
Originally posted by fred959:
blackbird71 & biggerabalone, thanks for the extra info. ...
You're welcome.
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krasen last edited by
Too bad opera 12 is losing support for too many sites (witch was the case for a very long time for opera team as too many sites dont like Presto) and I had to go for OperaBlink.
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blackbird71 last edited by
As time goes by, websites will increasingly be incompatible with Old Opera. Part of this will be from site coding that intentionally discriminates against older or minor browsers the site doesn't want to bother testing and/or coding for compatibility, and part will be due to coding confusion over the user agent string identifying the Opera browser now that a second "kind" of Opera is roaming the earth. Yet a third source of difficulty is that Old Opera is 'frozen' with respect to evolving new technology and techniques that will increasingly be used by web sites as time goes by.
Sticking with an Old Opera version is going to be a diminishing solution over time. The more complex or frequently re-coded the site, the sooner the problems are likely to appear. Unfortunate, but it's just the nature of things...
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fred959 last edited by
Sorry, one more question:
Can I install The latest stable version of "Opera new" and keep "Opera 12" to run side by side?
If so, do I need to just run the default new installer, or do I need to manually pick a new folder to install it into ( say 'OperaNew' instead of just 'Opera' in program files). I don't want to over-write Opera 12 just yet.Thanks
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fred959 last edited by
Many thanks.
Is this officially documented somewhere in an Opera Wiki or the like. Just don't want to keep asking the same old questions as I guess the top posters get fed up reading the same old request.
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blackbird71 last edited by
IMO, well-organized, searchable documentation has never been Opera's strength. In the past, they've put tons of information up in various support pages and blogs, but never tied it together comprehensively or in ways that lend themselves to retrieving it topically. They've been redesigning their support pages and the potential for better-organized data seems to exist there, but a lot of Old Opera information fell overboard in the process, and the pages seem not well-populated yet with New Opera information. Many answers to user questions still have to be dug out of Development Blogs, comment dialogues to Release Announcements, as well as searching through forums like this... or, indeed, politely asking questions as you have. (With which, by the way, you've done a commendable job! Not all users do.) Some resources to try, going forward, include:
1) Opera Help for computers This is the official index of Opera helps documentation. I find it still "spotty", with a lot of missing pieces for versions prior to or following the 12.xx family.
2) Old Opera wiki This is a somewhat dated wiki index about Old Opera versions. For older Old Opera versions, it has been useful, but somewhere around version 11.xx, it started falling behind.
3) New Opera wiki This is a new wiki index about New Opera versions. Thus far, it's rather bare.
4) The search box in the upper right corner of these forums. For most questions, I recommend clicking the Advanced Search option, then clicking the "posts" option (rather than the "topic" option)... it will sometimes track down posts buried within unrelated threads. Choosing the best search terms is where the "trick" to using the search function really lies... you have to be creative in trying to think how someone else might have described information related to what you're seeking, and realize you will get a lot of irrelevant "hits" in the process; also, try to limit your search to just a few most-relevant words - the searching seems to ignore more than three or four, or at least ignore what it deems less "findable" terms amongst more than three or four terms. Keep trying different terms and sifting through the results. Also be aware that you must adjust the timeframe of posts through which Opera sifts to before or after a certain point of time, so try expanding that if you don't get results for a certain narrow time slot... just be aware that the wider the timeframe searched, the slower will be the search.
5) And, of course, you can ask polite questions of other Opera users in these forums as they're presently constructed, and in the new forums that Opera will be implementing at some point not too distant. Also, there are the "comments" sections where questions can be asked in the various Development and Release blogs, which are the places most likely to get the attention of real, live developers.
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fred959 last edited by
Once again thanks.
I downloaded Opera 19 and installed it in a different separate folder to Opera 12.
Investigating.
