Migrating from firefox and had some questoins

A Former User

I'm in the process of migrating from firefox and am encountering some issues that I need some help with. I've tried searching on the web for solutions, but every solution I find seems to apply to an older version of Opera.

How do I set my homepage? I have an html file on my local computer that I would like new browser windows to go to when I open them. Right now, it seems as though the only option I can get is for it to go to that speed dial page thing.
Is there a way to get all the menu options to show up. Right now, all I have is the Opera button that brings up a limited set of menu options.
Is there a way to open local html files via the windows file browser instead of having to type in the whole directory path and file name (and all the slashes and colons that are part of the filename syntax)?
I'd like to use the startpage.com search engine as my default. I've added it as a search engine via the context menu selection from their page, but I seem to be unable to select it as the default engine.

I am currently running Opera version 20. Is there like a deluxe or enhanced version I can get that has these features that seem to have been in the prior versions?

lem729

lem729

It's been about a year since Opera changed browser engines from Presto to Blink, and while it gives the browser enhanced speed, better rendering of web sites, enhanced speed dial, much greater accessibility of extensions (all Opera and Chrome extensions can now be used) and some other features, the browser has to be re-programmed, so not all of the old features are instantly there. Some may be approximated through extensions. Others may not currently be, but could be added in the future. Others will probably not be added.

On setting up the home page, click on the Opera tab on the top left of the browser, and go to Settings/Browser/Setting up the Home Page. You do not have to have the Speed Dial as the home page (though I like it a lot) (you might want to experiment a little bit with it as you can create folders in the speed dial by moving links/previews of the web page (wrong word but it's the best I can think of :)) on top of each others) (It's a very innovative feature, though if it doesn't interest you, that's fine). Now I believe I remember reading in the forum that you can have a file on the computer for the home page, but I can't remember exactly how. You might experiment with putting that location url to the file in your computer as the home page (in that location I just cited to you -- (Settings/Browser/ Setting up the Home Page), and see if it works. There's a correct way, perhaps, to make an address of a place in the computer. There was, I believe, a discussion in the forum on how you can do it. Of course you can also make a web addresses or addresses your homempage. Or the Speed Dial. Now whatever is your home page, the Speed Dial will come up as the new tab, when you create one. But I there is an extension, "Homepage in New Tab, an Opera extension that, I believe, can change that if you really want (I haven't tried it). Here is a link to it. https://addons.opera.com/en/extensions/details/homepage-in-new-tab/?display=en

You can't have startpage.com as the "default" search engine. There were problems with third party hijacking of searches, and as a result of that, Opera limited in Opera 20 the default search engines to five (that could change in the future. You can add Startpage.com as a search vehicle in Opera. Go to Startpage.com, and right click in the search bar there, create the Startpage.com search engine to Opera. You will see that there is a selected letter, letters, keyword for your searches. It may be just an s. Then all you have to remember when you search from the address bar is to type the letter, letters, or keyword for you search. It may just be an s and your search. Since that's the search vehicle you want to use, you will quickly remember to start the search with the s. Alternatively, I believe you could set up a separate search bar in the browser for Startpage.com. That has been discussed in the forum.

There is no deluxe or enhanced version to Opera 20. There are Opera Next versions floating around for download. Those are like beta versions. We have people who use them and provide input on the version, and that input is incorporated into making a final version, which will replace Opera 20.

On the Menu, you have to click on the Opera tab in the upper far right of the browser and then you can see the menu items. The effort was to keep a minimalist look to the browser. It may seem a bit strange at first, but once you get the hang of going to, all will be easy.

Don't forget to go to click on the Opera Menu/Settings/Browse/User interface to have a check in show the bookmark bar. I'm assuming you'll want to have that, at least till you have familiarized yourself with the browser.

I hope some of this has been of help to you. And welcome to the Opera forum!

A Former User

Is there a way to get all the menu options to show up. Right now, all I have is the Opera button that brings up a limited set of menu options.
I can't see any items missing except...

Is there a way to open local html files via the windows file browser instead of having to type in the whole directory path and file name (and all the slashes and colons that are part of the filename syntax)?
Ctrl+O.

awzx

awzx

I'm in the process of migrating from firefox

L.O.L. why'd someone wanna do that? I'm currently working on an article on why do you need to migrate from Opera to Firefox, based on my personal experience. It's going to be quite a read, I gotta tell you... On the topic:

Is there like a deluxe or enhanced version I can get that has these features that seem to have been in the prior versions?

In short, no, and probably never will be.

lem729

lem729

@awzx

Let's not end up with your attacking Opera again. It's not appropriate in this thread. I've had Firefox on my computer for years, still have it there, and vastly prefer Opera 20 to it.

lem729

lem729

@thephatlady

I meant to add a couple more things you might not be aware of yet. I had said that you can use extensions from the Opera store and from the Chrome Store. To use an extension in this browser from the Chrome Store, you need the Opera extension, called "Download Chrome Extension." And if you should download a Chrome extension, you click on the Opera menu to the far left top, and then click on Extensions, and when you find the extension you just downloaded, you then have to click on "install." With an extension from the Opera store, you just click on Add to Opera and it happens rather instantly.

One final thing. If you want all of the features the older browser, it is still available for download on the Opera website. http://www.opera.com/computer/windows

You can scroll 2/3 of the way down the page of that link, to see where to download, though you have to select your operating system first. Opera has migrated away from that browser (with the Presto engine) to the latest version (with the Blink engine. But in terms of features it's still a wonderful browser, which many Opera users still love, though it's not as fast as the latest one, and is getting a bit outdated on rendering some sites. Opera is no longer working on it, except for an occasional security update. Opera 20 is the browser Opera is committed to developing.

A Former User

My version of Settings/Browser doesn't have an option for setting the home page. The closest there is Start Page, which lets me set various options for the speed dialer, but no way to designate my home page.

That addon for the homepage helps a lot. It gives me a button that I can click and takes me to my home page (similar to the way firefox does it). Although, when I open a new tap, it still takes me to the speed dial, thus making it a two click procedure (one to open the tab, and one to go to my home page).

I have added the statpage.com as a search enging with the shortcut of 's'. I have no idea what that means though. Pressing s while viewing a page does nothing, pressing s while entering an address just adds an s to it (as one would expect). I can see the tab for startpage, but just don't know how to select it (short of clicking it with the mouse).

I also found out that pressing Control-O will open up the file browser window to let me open a local file. Do you know if there's an extension that will add that to the abbreviated menu thing?

A Former User

One other thing... I have adobe acrobat reader installed. With firefox, it'd open pdf's in the browser. With Opera, it just downloads the file. Do I have to reinstall the reader to get it to open in the browser or is there a setting somewhere to tell opera how to open pdfs?

lem729

lem729

If you go to Settings/Browser/On Startup there are three choices in Opera 20. You can put the dot in: (1) continue where I left off, (2) Open the Start Page, or (3) Open a specific page or set of pages.

I believe for what you want to do, you will put the dot in no. 3 above. Then click on set pages, and you can put in the url or urls that you want. It's got to be there in Opera 20. That is what you ware using? Right?

On your PDF question regarding Adobe, I'm not sure about it, so someone else might need to weigh in, but Opera does have a PDF extension that, I believe, is similar to what is in Firefox.

https://addons.opera.com/en/extensions/details/pdf-viewer/?display=en

It supposedly, "uses Mozilla's PDF.js (http://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/) to display PDF files directly in Opera."

I'm glad the homepage extension helps. I'm surprised from what you say, because of the title of it, which made me think that it could open your homepage in a new tab. Having to do the two clicks isn't ideal I'm not sure if there's anything else out there. What you want is to have your home page in a new tab. There may be a way to do it, but I haven't explored that issue.

What that search engine means is that now that you have added startpage.com as a search engine with the s as the code, you can go to the address bar and do a search with it. For example all you have to do is type the code letter [space] and then the query. For example in the address bar type: s Chrome store
and you should get a lot of hits using the startpage search engine. So all you have to do is to type s before your searches. I added startpage to my searches, and what I just described works fine. If you don't do that (add the s before your search, the Opera default engine will do the search.

Now you asked: "I also found out that pressing Control-O will open up the file browser window to let me open a local file. Do you know if there's an extension that will add that to the abbreviated menu thing?" I haven't researched it, but I very much doubt that abbreviated menu can be changed. However, there may be some hidden feature I'm not aware of. If so, others can feel free to correct me here.

A Former User

One other thing... I have adobe acrobat reader installed. With firefox, it'd open pdf's in the browser. With Opera, it just downloads the file. Do I have to reinstall the reader to get it to open in the browser or is there a setting somewhere to tell opera how to open pdfs?
There's a link to check the installed plug-ins in the settings but to make it simpler type "opera:plugins" in the address field and press Enter. Can you see the plug-in(s) to handle PDFs? If you have more than one they may be conflicting so disable any you don't use and leave Adobe Reader enabled. You can then try to open the PDF link again.

If you see the Reader plug-in enabled but it still doesn't work, my advice is you should try updating it (to Adobe Reader XI, open it then go to the Help menu → Check for updates). I have the Adobe Reader plug-in version 11.0.06.70 and it works in the latest stable version.

If that doesn't solve your problem you could share the link to the PDF here so we can test? Or use the Opera desktop bug report wizard.

lem729

lem729

@thephatlady

Well, here's an Opera extension I tested that does let you set a new tab page that is not the speed dial. It's called, "Custom New Tab Page"

https://addons.opera.com/en/extensions/details/custom-new-tab-page/?display=en

It seems that you are limited to one url. I don't know whether a url to something in you computer would work with it or not, but you can try. And if you want a new tab page, other than the speed dial, and where all you have to do is mouse click for a new tab (or via keyboard, control T), this could well be the right ticket.

sgunhouse

sgunhouse Moderator Volunteer

To answer question 1 ... No version of Opera has defaulted to new tabs opening your home page in years - even Presto-based versions would either open a blank page or speed dial; if you wanted something different you needed a custom command. The page(s) that open when you start the browser can be set, but they just figured most times when you open a new tab it was going to be to open some different website. You can of course put a link to your page on the Quick Access bar and then middle-click it whenever you want a new page, or use an extension.

As far as searches ... there are some adware and malware which will redirect searches to obnoxious or even malicious sites - Opera's answer to that problem was to limit the default search to one of the 5 built-in search engines. Not sure I'd consider that the best answer, but that's why you can't make Startpage your default search engine.

As the other questions seem to have been answered already, I guess that's all I need to add.

lem729

lem729

@sgunhouse

The Opera 20 extension, "Custom New. Tab Page" opens a new tab to whatever URL you set for it. Independantly, you can set "the same" URL for your home page. The new tab doesn't open your home page, but it can take you to the same URL as your home page. If you set the browser that way, all roads lead to Rome

A Former User

I installed the custom new tab page extension and it seems to work as I would like. Opening a new tab automatically goes to my locally stored webpage (yay).

Thanks for the description of how to do the search from the address bar using startpage. It was that space key that I didn't catch until I saw what you wrote.

lem729

lem729

@thephatlady

Bravo! i'm glad you made progress. I tested that Custom New Tab Page extension on a website, but didn't quite know how to give it an address to my computer, though was hopeful it ought to work, even for that. Your searches with startpage.com should be reasonable now from the main address bar. Happy browsing!