Posts made by canadagoose4everreturns

@ycomp I'm in agreement, particularly from Laporte's insistent mention of politics whenever he sees an opportunity. TWIT is nothing like it once was; a shadow really of its former self.

@canadagoose4everreturns I must be really bored but for what it's worth (not much, I suppose), let me expand before a certain somebody taps me to accompany her to the store(s). I'll use a few examples: shavers, toothbrushes and news channels. I have a bunch of electric shavers (two Norelcos, two Brauns and a Panasonic). Why so many? Well, some claim that they each cut a little differently and therefore you need to find the one that best adapts to your facial hair. Is this true? I don't really know or care that much. I have five shavers because I like shavers and I use them indiscriminately as the spirit moves me in the morning. Ha! But I'm on a shavers forum where men DO become quite emotional over their particular shaver brand to which they are loyal. Strange. I have two electric toothbrushes (Oral b io and a Sonicare) and the same can be said for those... loyal followers some of whom go on YT and diss the other brand for some strange reason. Does one actually clean better than the other? I don't know... I sort of doubt it. Why have two? I like them so I use one in the a.m. and one in the p.m. but in truth, I've no idea if one does a better job. Stick with me. News channels and/or podcasts is a bit more difficult given the undisputed fact that almost all news these days (and perhaps always) is little more than shilling for a particular ideological point of view and/or party. So... I navigate towards the news that meets my preconceived ideas of truth (and that is a tall order and one my dear wife often questions). So... what is truth? This is a question as old as the Bible (asked by a notorious governor long ago of a certain Someone who would change history forever). Indeed... in all of these examples (including the best browsers etc etc)... what is truth? I'm going to be a bit enigmatic here: truth is in a Person and not in these "things" including best browsers etc. And now... those searching eyes have discovered me at my computer and are rapidly approaching. I'm in trouble.

@celticcross Good morning, Celticcross.
Everything I say is simply my opinion and not necessarily factual. It "seems to me" that we can easily become mislead by others commenting online. If you were to take the sum total of all the commenters here and on Vivaldi's forum (etc), and then compare that number with the billions of people online who never bother with forums or asking questions about browsers, I'm certain you'd discover that the number is exceedingly small. As I've mentioned many times now, most people who go online simply don't care about the browser they're using. My wife has a MacBook and a Surface and she uses Edge on her Surface and Safari on her Mac and that's the sum total of it. If I ask her why she doesn't try Brave or Opera or whatever, her eyes would glaze over (I'm being facetious here) and she'd ask me why bother when Safari and Edge work perfectly fine. She simply doesn't care. The sum total of what Blackbird said could be summed up in this: try several and find which browser(s) works best for what you need and then go with it (them). I think a better title for this thread would be: Why are "some" people so emotional about browsers. There are fanboys... evangelists... promoters... of certain browsers but as to why, that's a mystery to me. Really... who actually cares that much? I'll use my wife (since she's sitting right across from me right now on her MacBook) as an example. What is she doing? Shopping! She cares about shopping... not browsers. Safari gets her to where she wants to go - shopping for whatever (oh my aching wallet... haha). I'm only here out of boredom and for nostalgia's sake, having been a part-time Opera user from 2000 onward until the exodus of Jon and many of his loyal developers. Do I care enough to download Opera now and run with it? After checking out Opera One, I see no reason to switch. Currently I have Edge and Brave on my Surface and Safari on my MacBook and that's really it. Hey, just go with what floats your boat. You seem, from your posts, like a great guy who is genuinely interested in technology. Watch some YT videos and do a little research to set your mind at ease as to whlch browser will best fit your needs.

@blackbird71 Well said, Blackbird. Very succinct and informative.

@traveltales All of these chromium browsers are pretty much the same with a little difference in window dressing. You can load extensions from the Chrome store and build whatever it is that you say you "need" so I'm at a loss why the hesitation to use a particular browser. You can have multiple browsers so why not download the ones in which you're interested and run with each one individually for a week to get a feel for the browser you're most comfortable with and then go with it. The browser is simply a program to get you to where you want to go for business or pleasure. Most users do not want something as customizable as Vivaldi simply because they can't be bothered playing around with the browser. Vivaldi is essentially a "geeky" browser and that is why its numbers will always be one-digit. Opera should never have changed to Opera One and because of its association with China (unfair but nevertheless true) it will always remain far behind the others. Your viable choices are: Google Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Brave (with Safari on the Mac) on Windows. And that's the long and short of it.

@bestcodes But it isn't safer. No browser password manager is safer than the open source program, Bitwarden. There are several third party pw managers as good but none better. Security software guru, Steve Gibson recommends Bitwarden. Check it out.

@lord-of-the-lost Great links (although I see that the one link was from a thread I posted in a while back... haha). The fact that it is publicly listed and traded and that it follows European regulation suggests that it is perfectly safe to use. But as Leo has said a number of times: it's really up to each of us as to what we choose to believe. So in the end, it is exactly what you stated several posts back - a matter of trust.

@lord-of-the-lost No doubt there are many who don't trust the browser because of its Chinese connection. And even though it is subject to Norwegian privacy laws this still doesn't appear to convince them that their data will be safe from a prying Communist government. So in a manner of speaking, yes... you are right in saying that it becomes a matter of trust. We know that the browser is secure since it receives regular security updates. But as for privacy and the question of what information is collected and what is done with that information, I can't give an answer. Let's put it like this: personally, I felt safer using the browser when it was owned and developed in Norway. While I believe that our data is being harvested by Google and MS (which is another reason I refuse to use their browsers or search engines), the political realities still enter my mind and so I feel a bit safer with them although that may be a mistake on my part. I'm typing on a MacBook Air right now and I know that it was assembled in China. Is there spyware on this device? I doubt it but I suppose anything is possible. Just trying to be as honest and forthright as I can be and admittedly, I have not really used Opera on a daily basis since the acquisition a few years back.

@lord-of-the-lost said in Why is Opera not widely used by people?:

@canadagoose4everreturns
After alternatively playing around with Edge for a short time, I begin to appreciate the simplicity of Firefox again. Edge was full of bloat and waste, I couldn't bear it that much. And TBH, I've always even liked Google better than Microsoft. I avoid them whenever I can.

Edge has become a bloated mess. It's revealing to see MS being forced to push its Bing search engine and browser via their reward program. In other words, "we'll bribe you with points that you can cash in with Amazon, if you use Bing and Edge." Seriously? I'm not that hard up for cash to bolster your numbers, MS. If they had left legacy Edge alone and simply modified it to stay current, it might have been more attractive but they shoved all of their shopping connections and AI into the mix so that what is left is a bloated mess. At this point I'll stick with FF simply because it dares to be different. Hey, nice chatting with you. Have a good one.

@kane12 Exactly. Simplicity and the fact that it just works with most extensions and most websites. There is a reason why Chrome has the lion's share of users and you've essentially outlined it. The fact that it is not exactly privacy focused is apparently unimportant (and/or unknown) to most users. I've said this many times now: people, in general, don't really care about the myriad of customizable options offered by Vivaldi nor for the gaudy GUI of Opera One. They don't care about the browser. They don't spend hours playing with the browser to add extensions and change skins and so forth. The browser is simply a tool to get them to where they want to go: social media, shopping, banking, news and so forth. And it is undoubtedly the reason that these browsers will attract a very dedicated following, albeit a small, one-digit user following and remain this way... permanently. People want simple - not complicated. People want uncluttered - not pretty. This is why Google Chrome remains far and away the most popular browser... it's simple, it works... period.

@lord-of-the-lost Thanks for clarifying.
Everything I'm writing here is a pure guess since I have no idea why people use one browser over another and then badmouth the other. It seems to me that the people who choose Vivaldi want a browser suite (email, calendar, RSS feed, browser) and one that they can endlessly customize. There is no other browser quite like it and it seems to be the darling of a small niche (aka: nerdy) group for the most part. Up until Opera One, I loved Opera's aesthetics (its GUI) and its heritage (I had used it from 2000 onward until it dumped Presto and many of its developers left). I'm not a huge fan of Opera One as you can tell. Brave jumped on the privacy and ad-blocking wagon early on and thereby won over a lot of users disenchanted with Google Chrome's lack of privacy (the cryto currency stuff and the BAT rewards are something many just turn off). It's my belief that all of these browsers will likely remain single digit in the overall use worldwide. As for Firefox, it's the only one that dares to remain outside the Chromium coral and has the Netscape heritage so there are many faithful that continue with it as an outlier, a renegade and our only hope to withstand a monopoly. But sadly it is a dying breed as fewer and fewer developers code for it. It remains my browser of choice simply because I started with Netscape 3.0 Gold and continued with it until I discovered Opera, then used both. Going forward, Chrome and Edge will dominate in the Windows OS and Safari will remain firmly as the Mac standard. This is all guess-work on my part and truth be told, I just don't care one way or the other. I'm happy with Firefox so I'll remain with it.

@lord-of-the-lost I doubt many people are "keen to find out what is bad about the browsers they're not using." There are always going to be some people in forums that are fanboys of certain browsers and will rag on others for whatever reason but you have to bear in mind that most people never join forums and don't care one way or the other. Use whatever browser you want and leave it at that. There is no riddle waiting to be solved and there is no mystery here. Most people just don't care - period. I'm one of those, albeit I've been with Opera for so many years that I still enjoy reading the forum news and comments and yet I no longer use Opera as my daily browser. I cannot think of a single person in my extended family (both sides) that makes an issue about the browser he/she uses and they range from Google Chrome to MS Edge and over to Safari. Most of them don't even care about privacy (with one exception). You're projecting when you imply that large numbers of people care about their browsers - they don't.

@modemjunkie

I found this answer in the forums which might be of some help. Here it is:
I just recently got a new laptop with Windows 11 and found that the tabs in Opera browser were too small. I reached out to Opera and got no suitable answer and decided to try and find answer in Windows settings. Right clicked on Desktop and stumbled around awhile then clicked on Accessibility and changed Text Size which changed both the Opera tab font size and the page font size, so I left the text size the same that I had changed in the Accessibility section of Settings then went back to Opera page and used Control - to change the page font size and the tab font did not change.

@davidadley You've outlined its many positive features and then asked the question as to why it has not received much attention. Why do you think? Laziness (just take the browser that comes with the device) and an attitude of not caring (since Google is by far the most popular Search engine and when going there it entices the user to switch to Chrome, many follow through. Some are afraid of the Chinese connection and so they avoid Opera. Many (my wife is an example) simply don't care about ads (for some reason they either don't see the ads or they don't care that they're there.... I've never been able to figure this out and when I ask my wife about it, she thinks I'm nuts for caring about the ads). I'll use myself as an example. When I bought my first computer, I went over to Bell Canada and signed up for internet access. They gave me a cd to connect and it came with Netscape 3.0 which I adopted as my browser since I didn't know any better. And as Netscape evolved, I just accepted the latest version each time. Bottom line: I didn't care, even when I heard about other browsers. My story is getting too long so I'll end it there.

@garysloop Then don't use it. The solution is really that simple.

@darthgtb An extension to revert would be awesome. I agree, however, that Opera is not going to go back from Opera One regardless of the discontent some feel about the new design.

@hucker A simple apology would have been better. Given that you appear only interested in pushing your views and then making explanations that seem to justify your actions rather than simply saying: "Look, I'm sorry. Let's start over", I'm going to block you going forward. I'm sorry to have to do this but I think it's best for you as well as me. I'll leave my message up here for a few hours so that you can read it before I do this. Again, it's too bad that we can't discuss things in a reasonable and friendly manner.

@hucker It's pretty obvious to everyone reading this threat that you have anger issues. Seriously, Man, you might want to think about why people feel that way instead of offering excuses and then turning your last response (as you did) into a rather nasty ethnic slur.

@hucker I've read through this thread and I feel compelled to add that it is "you" who might not understand the term "obnoxious." Why so animated? Chill out a bit. It's a browser, after all, not a life-altering issue. Relax.

@davidf44 You make a great deal of sense (to me, at least). Thanks for the insights.