opera 20 vs Chrome

davebowden

davebowden

Google spends whopping great amounts of money to get people to use Chrome. I have to wonder why. Everybody should. That said, I don't really care whether blink or presto is used. My complaint about the "new" Opera is the interface itself. I commented a few months back as well. (FYI, been using Opera for 13 years, tried others, always came back).

It is clear that the myriad of settings I liked are gone forever. Chromium browsers are here to stay. But if one doesn't like Opera 20 or Chrome there are other choices. I do agree with whoever above pointed out that it is hard to justify Opera 20 over other browsers. I may switch to Commodo. It's free, reasonably secure, and not owned by Google. Works well with a mouse.

Oh, a simple fix for bookmarks (prior to Metro) is find a copy of Lotus Smartsuite SmartCenter. Put the bookmarks there. Browser neutral as they open whatever is the default.

With the dropping of email, the switch from Presto to Blink, and other signs I'd say Opera as an open market provider of software will be gone soon. They'll sell to hardware makers and via online stores. As I noted a few months ago (and perhaps some of you might remember), I've used Opera for 14 years and not been asked to pay. They don't owe me a thing, let alone a browser I like. They don't owe you either.

Cheers!

A Former User

@biggerabalone

while you may not want people knowing you're an employee
I'm not an Opera Software employee. And if I was it wouldn't bring any problem to this discussion as that wouldn't change the veracity of anything I said. The fact is you have no more arguments against my assertions other than "it's better to give up because Google is all-powerful" then YOU rely on failed claims that I'm paid to post here.

What I said about slavery was just an example and not meant to be an analogy.
But thanks for your addition to this topic @grandadmiralthrawn, as putting convenience over ideals is really a serious problem in the world today in various areas not just IT, now wait a little and @biggerabalone will start calling you an Opera employee.

they're in bed with someone who's business interests are adversarial to them. what happens if google decides to turn off the taps?
First, those search engine deals don't strengthen Google's NaCl plans.
Second, Amazon is already a global partner. Yandex is already a partner in CIS. Either Bing or Yahoo! would pay to be the new global partners for default search engine. Don't forget that Opera earns money from various other sources like partner Speed Dials, deals with mobile operators (Web Pass, Rocket Optimizer, etc), TV Store, Opera Media Works and soon Opera Max. And Mozilla is diversifying more their revenue sources too with the Directory Tiles.

Google spends whopping great amounts of money to get people to use Chrome. I have to wonder why. Everybody should.
Sigh, what's missing in this topic is the reason why anyone should use Chrome instead of Opera (apart from classic bookmarks manager/menu and sync ATM).

lem729

lem729

rafaelluik,

I agree that the fact that you can create folders of items in the speed dial makes the ability to have multiple pages not as pressing, but it still would be useful to me. It depends really on how much you want to have in the Speed Dial (how many different subject areas), and also, how much of the background wallpaper you want to cover up. I have a gorgeous background for my speed dial, but if I fill it completely with speed dial items, I can't enjoy the aesthetics of the wallpaper.

What would be the big deal with giving the ability to have some extra speed dial pages. Fox Tab Speed Dial 9.2.1 in Chrome permits it, and I make great use of it. I like the ability in Opera to create Speed Dial folders. I don't think it makes unnecessary the ability to have a second or third speed dial page.

Deleted User

Deleted User

You're concerned about the aethetics of the wallpaper being covered by speed dial folders? Seriously? What do you do... sit and gaze at your wallpaper all day? A browser's function is to get you to websites quickly and efficiently. Opera's browser does this flawlessly. This sort of obesession (my beautiful wallpaper will be covered) is why so many complainers are not taken seriously by the Opera devs.

biggerabalone

biggerabalone

rafaelluik

sigh ...

as usual, i'm left scratching my head at your bizarre comments. lets follow this a mite:

you

"Some things Opera removes are benign for us. I don't want NaCl in the browser I use or the latest other non-standardized crap Google is pushing ..."
(from my personal experience i disagree it is crap, so i respond)

me

"-chromes got beef: -nacl is important and a true stand out. it makes chrome a formible gaming platform. gaming is big business. and have no doubt, chrome will push this as a standard, and eventually opera will have to implement it or fold.

"no, the danger is you will migrate to chrome because it offers so much more ... i'm forced to have chrome on my computer for my kids, they love the games. it's like a nintendo system."

you

"Nope, the only thing it makes is turn Chrome into a browser that doesn't respect the true open web standards".

"So you like bullies! How sweet. You like supporting a big corporation pushing their agenda on other's throats and leaving the ideals and morals at the door, that's something that I'll never do."

   mystifying response.  i indicate the gaming gives chrome beef which my kids eat up.  you become confrontational and respond with web standards, bullies, patronizing ("How sweet") and call yourself morally superior to my kids ("that's something I'll never do").  did i miss something here?  the only thing that was't ad hominem was the web standard thing (which seemed out of place given the conversation).  and even if i was to recognize it, if flies in the face of my warning - that the next generation is in the process of choosing future web standards.

so i continue with my concern for opera

"as for nacl, google is slowly directing (if not dictating) the direction web standards go (and have gone). they will act in googles interest and not for the good of the web (which is what they should do, and their stock prices reflect that). that is presumably why opera ditched presto and was forced to implement blink".

you respond

"You highlighted it as if it's a good point in favor of Chrome, and you seem to think it's amazing that they'll push it into other throats since it's so "important and a true stand out (...) formidable" - if you don't think it's amazing the only other interpretation from what you said is that you don't care, which equally harms the web's cross-browser standards. If that's not supporting a bully corp that disrespects the W3C and WHATWG open web standards goals then I don't know what it is."

    ok, where to start with this.  if kids like it and use it, is it a bad feature?  if only chrome has it, doesn't it work in chrome's favor?  won't more kids start to use it as more games are made and word spreads?  i don't know, i did well i logic class ... but yours eludes me.  what does this have to do with "they'll push it into other throats'?  how are they doing that?  by making a product that kids like?

or ... you say the only other interpretation is that i don't care. really? again, i need to dig up my old logic notes. you say this despite the fact that i've taken all this time warning that ignoring this initiative is potentially foolhardy?

me

"chromes not forcing anything down your throats. it is offering a good feature that makes its browser better and you can adapt or die. at one time, opera used to try that. gaming is big business. and guess what, my kids don't know or care who google is, they just like the games: the feature attracts them"

you

The possibility of having slaves may attract a lot of people and it'd be very profitable, that doesn't mean it's a good thing. NaCl is not a web standard that's what matters. It did not pass the process to become a open web standard so only then it should be shipped by all the browser vendors. The result is the "feature" locks your kids into Chrome if they want to play those games, which means it's the opposite of the goal of the web of being available in any browser"

   you call my kids slaves (remember the context?)?  because they like a chromium feature that opera doesn't have you ridicule them.  did i use to be a slave because i liked opera tabs?  why are you always so derogatory?  why do you continually disparage my children?  as i said, my kids are shaping future web standards by choosing those products that offer the features they consider important.

i could go on, but why bother. to all others, forgive my lengthy response ... it seemed necessary to quote all dialogue.

biggerabalone

biggerabalone

@biggerabalone

while you may not want people knowing you're an employee
I'm not an Opera Software employee. And if I was it wouldn't bring any problem to this discussion as that wouldn't change the veracity of anything I said. The fact is you have no more arguments against my assertions other than "it's better to give up because Google is all-powerful" then YOU rely on failed claims that I'm paid to post here.
What I said about slavery was just an example and not meant to be an analogy.
But thanks for your addition to this topic @grandadmiralthrawn, as putting convenience over ideals is really a serious problem in the world today in various areas not just IT, now wait a little and @biggerabalone will start calling you an Opera employee.
they're in bed with someone who's business interests are adversarial to them. what happens if google decides to turn off the taps?
First, those search engine deals don't strengthen Google's NaCl plans.
Second, Amazon is already a global partner. Yandex is already a partner in CIS. Either Bing or Yahoo! would pay to be the new global partners for default search engine. Don't forget that Opera earns money from various other sources like partner Speed Dials, deals with mobile operators (Web Pass, Rocket Optimizer, etc), TV Store, Opera Media Works and soon Opera Max. And Mozilla is diversifying more their revenue sources too with the Directory Tiles.
Google spends whopping great amounts of money to get people to use Chrome. I have to wonder why. Everybody should.
Sigh, what's missing in this topic is the reason why anyone should use Chrome instead of Opera (apart from classic bookmarks manager/menu and sync ATM).

defensive about the employee assertion, huh. must have struck a cord. my reference is almost a 4 page admission on your part. or that you have more posts than the moderator. or that your topics are usually concerned with voting competitions somewhere on the web for which browser is the best - and you want us to vote for opera (those are employee postings usually), or that you have unnaturally geeky insider knowledge concerning opera's inner workings (whether pc, phone, etc), or that you don't believe that opera 10 years ago was better than it is now. i could go on, but anyone who reads my reference can plainly see it. if i'm wrong ... i feel sorry for you, you should really get a life.

you missed the point on the search engines.

Deleted User

Deleted User

Raphael, the man is a known troll. The best advice I can give you (as well as myself) is to not feed him. He craves attention and gets it by bad-mouthing Opera. Why he is here is anyone's guess since he clearly does not belong. We desperately need an IGNORE button so we can relegate trolls like these to cyber non-existence.

A Former User

Chrome is a finished and working browser while Opera Chrome isn't, its been released as one when the truth is Opera 12 should have been updated while working on the Opera Chrome Alpha

Deleted User

Deleted User

Their resources are limited so updating a dead browser is no longer an option. Chrome is produced by an evil company... a company whose attitude towards your privacy is cavalier at best. I would not have that browser anywhere near my system. I'll stick with Opera 20. It does exactly what I need it to do and it does it well.

A Former User

There are enough posts in this topic for people to read through and understand the things I'm talking about, and these have nothing to do with whether I'm an employee or not.

But LOL, just because I figure out things and post my bets and assumptions based on publicly available info I "have unnaturally geeky insider knowledge concerning opera's inner workings" and therefore I'm an employee... If I inform people there's a contest somewhere for us to vote (and of course for Opera since these are the Opera forums if you haven't noticed yet) that means I'm an Opera employee and not just a supporter. I could go on...
What's funny is I post feature requests or disagree with some things they say/intend to/implement in these forums and Opera blogs myself. If I was an employee I wouldn't need to do that, you can't see any employee doing that. I'd be certainly advised to not do that actually, since these discussions are meant to be internal.

Deleted User

Deleted User

Whenever someone is complaining, he/she does not want to hear anything to the contrary. Therefore, anyone who has the audacity to support Opera's new browser must therefore become a shill or a paid employee. They've been using this tactic since last July and while it's amusing, it's also wearing a bit thin.

blackbird71

blackbird71

I've always looked with some amazement at the energy and intensity of the fights (or even riots) that sometimes ensue at Soccer matches and American football games... that is, the fights in the stands or the parking lots. The people almost always involved are simply "fans" - observers, not players. While the fans may have paid for their tickets, they're not the ones taking the hits out on the field or whose salaries depend on performance and winning, they simply derive enjoyment from watching the game when it involves "their" team.

Opera is a free web browser, one of many free web browsers available today. In past versions, it offered a variety of configurability and performance attributes, as well as some limitations, with regard to web viewing. In the latest versions, those have all changed, and users have noticed, myself among them. User reactions, as expressed in the forums, have varied from supportive to opposing, and the intensity of the reactions has ranged from mild up to extreme.

What amazes me, however, is the white-hot intensity of the reactions sometimes expressed in the forums. With the fact firmly in sight that Opera is only one of many free browsers, costing users absolutely nothing, what is there that stimulates the harsh rhetoric, the exaggeration, the end-of-world desperation, the personal attacks on anyone disagreeing, the seeming sense of betrayal, and the angry outbursts between posters - even to the point in some threads of obscenity-laced 'yelling' at one another - all over a free web browser?

Like other users, I've felt the inconvenience/frustration of lost (but important-to-me) Old Opera features and adjustability in New Opera. So, after a time of patiently waiting and making (I hope) level-headed suggestions to Opera in forums and blogs, I trialed a number of other browser flavors and selected one to use for my primary browsing, retaining Opera 12 as a secondary or backup browser. Eventually, if Opera's new design evolves sufficiently toward my personal needs and preferences, I may migrate back to New Opera... if not, life will still go on, for both Opera and for me.

But when I read some of the angry rhetoric in forum posts, I find myself asking out loud: "Why??? It's only a web browser, and a free one at that!" I'm still groping for an answer...

lem729

lem729

leushino: You're concerned about the aesthetics of the wallpaper being covered by speed dial folders?

YES, ABSOLUTELY. And what the hell is the point of giving us the right to use wallpaper or to set our own wallpaper for the speed dial if we can't make browser interface attractive to us. Are other things important too in terms of the browser. Of course. But don't dismiss other people's comments, just because you don't care about aesthetics. I do!

Now do I like the Opera Speed dial? Yes, I do. And I think the folder concept is great. But I also think it wouldn't hurt but would help to give an option for the user to set up a separate page or two. I mean, we have people who have hundreds of bookmarks and/or bookmark folders. They might find a good use for the extra pages.

Deleted User

Deleted User

But when I read some of the angry rhetoric in forum posts, I find myself asking out loud: "Why??? It's only a web browser, and a free one at that!" I'm still groping for an answer...

Hard to say but my guesses would include a "sense of entitlement." Many users have this sense in which they believe Opera "owes" them the browser of their choice. And if it is not delivered right down to the color of the frames, well then, Opera becomes an unthinking, uncaring, ungrateful company that will surely die. We've seen this "entitlement" behavior demonstrated over the dismantling of the former MyOpera Community. For many years Opera provided this community free of charge along with all the services that it entailed. And what thanks did it get? Nadda! Only vehement, obscenity-laced posts of angry users. It's a curious thing but it's becoming increasingly predictable in this selfish generation in which we live. Very sad commentary on our times.

berng

berng

What amazes me, however, is the white-hot intensity of the reactions sometimes expressed in the forums. With the fact firmly in sight that Opera is only one of many free browsers, costing users absolutely nothing, what is there that stimulates the harsh rhetoric, the exaggeration, the end-of-world desperation, the personal attacks on anyone disagreeing, the seeming sense of betrayal, and the angry outbursts between posters - even to the point in some threads of obscenity-laced 'yelling' at one another - all over a free web browser?

The posts on this forum can be used as the basis for a few doctoral theses in psychology.

alica

alica

Opera Link just isn't implemented in the newest stable version yet.
Yes, not yet. There has been ONE year since Opera's initial transition announcement, but to date Link support is still not provided in these Opera 15+ version bumps. I don't know when will they ship Opera with link support; maybe Opera 22, maybe Opera 42, or maybe never?

While not relating with this forum, Opera for Linux is in a similar situation; no definite words of "drop support" or "(supposed) release schedule" is given. Maybe the dev team shall be more clear on this.

A Former User

Yes, not yet. There has been ONE year since Opera's initial transition announcement, but to date Link support is still not provided in these Opera 15+ version bumps.
Link is provided in experimental state since Opera 19.

I know but it takes time, I mean, it's normal. I miss it a lot too but I see that they have to work on a lot of other things and not only Opera Link. And when we compare to Opera Presto it's understandable:

Opera 9.1 was released in December 18, 2006. Then first Opera alpha build with Opera Link (9.5) has been released on September 4, 2007 (9.2 comes here in the middle) and the 9.5 final version came in June 12, 2008. That's +-18 months for a feature to come from "scratch" to final. Now for 15+ they're rewriting almost the whole UI from scratch and implementing many different things up to Opera 21 and it hasn't been a year.

With all the other extension APIs they're implementing in each new version we can figure out they can't simply copy the code from Chromium and have it there enabled instantly (otherwise everything would be working in 15.0 already), and more so with things implemented differently from Chromium (the mechanisms for Speed Dials, Stash, etc) I suppose the server-side and client-side sync code couldn't be simply copied from Chromium (needless to say they can't just copy from Presto either).

Deleted User

Deleted User

I had no idea it took that long to implement Link back then. Thanks for the information.

alica

alica

Sorry for my fault for not noticing the opera:flags option, but the Link feature currently provided does not include bookmarks, which is my most used portion inside Opera Link. Only able to access my bookmarks through link.opera.com is not an option to me.

vinczej

vinczej

I have these reasons, why I prefer Opera over Chrome:

Speed Dial packages, more usability
Closing last tab doesn't close browser
I can use both Opera extensions and Chrome extensions

And of course I'm waiting for classic Opera features