Opera Gives That C64 Feel

howcome writes "Opera yesterday relased beta2 of the forthcoming 7.0 version. Opera now supports mulitple user style sheets and by selecting "Nostalgia" from the menu all web pages suddenly resemble Commodore 64 (screendump1 screendump2) from 20 years back. Also, there is a handheld emulator to see what a page will look like on a handheld device running Opera. To get you through Christmas, you can also use the "fast-forward" button. Try it on Google (screendump)!"

Comments

Oops

[SmartGamer]

Predictably, the images are down.

Opera just made a mistake, in my opinion, with that. I liked how they kept the browser streamlined and stripped down; this new feature is, possibly, a sign of creeping featurism and surrender to the forces of software bloat.

Oh well. I guess if I want a simple browser, I should stick to Lynx.

Re:Oops

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice attempt at a troll, though.

You responded, he won.

Re:sadly, they are not the world's fastest anymore

[oldwolf13]

have you even used opera?

the engine is still faster then anything else I've used, and I've just about tried them all (especially on older hardware).

and as for opera not being the best... it's got quite a few people who've *actually* used it for awhile who believe it's far superior to anything else out there right now.

One of the first things to go onto my machine is opera, no matter what OS I'm running.

Sure, the c64 thing is silly... that's what it's intended to be... probably a coder just having some fun one day threw it in there as comic relief.

get-a-grip (not the shoes)

Re:sadly, they are not the world's fastest anymore

[Anonymous Coward]

I also just love how sometimes Opera just disappears off my screen for no reason (ie. crashes). Sometimes while just sitting idle it does that. It has always done this since the pre 1.0 days and is the main reason why I never purchased the damn thing. Even the very latest version does it if you use it long enough (2 or 3 times a day is enough to make me very angry). Mozilla on the other hand runs for weeks at a time without crashing.

I'm talking about the Linux version, not Windows which seems a bit more stable (maybe, I haven't used it much there).

Overall I like Opera but the crashing is very unprofessional for a product they expect me to pay for.

Re:Cartridge Linux?

[kirkb]

Yea, just like a Tape ARchive is supposed to be done!

Re:Opera's new marketing campaign

[tfazzone]

Wasn't it Impossible Mission? Man, I hated those damn robots.

Is it just me...

[Anonymous Coward]

...is it just me or am I the only person who hates applications that put so many stupid assed buttons at the top that they take up over 1/3rd of the viewing area?

In the case of those screen shots, literally less than 2/3rds of the client window are dedicated to browsing. Now, I realize a lot of this will be based on one's screen resolution, but I'm running at 1280x960 and it's STILL showing too much wasted space.

I'm something of a hardcore minimalist, and the less pure crap in my work space, the better. I don't exactly like IE, but at least I get to turn off EVERYTHING, and focus just on the page. If I want to leave the buttons active, I can remove the text lables, make them small, and put the address field right next to them taking up almost no space at all. Now THAT is compact, efficient, and minimalistic. Too bad I have to run this silly Windows thing around it.

Opera is fine but:

[theskov]

99.9% of all website work perfectly with IE. That's not true for any other browser I've tried including Netscape, Mozilla and Opera.

I would love to change browser, but I won't accept a browser that doesn't render all the pages I visit. Give me a non-IE browser that renders as large a percentage, and we've got a deal.

I know real nerds prefer text-only (in theory anyway :) but I like to use all those fancy technologies appearing on the web, and so far IE is the only one that can cope with all.

And let's not forget: IE is a very nice browser in itself. The only real reason I want to switch is because suspect to see DRM and the likes in IE Real Soon(TM). Heck - every time I upgrade to a newer version it's a couple of cents out of MS's pockets for the bandwith - what other browser gives you that satisfaction?

Re:Opera is fine but:

[Anonymous Coward]

IE doesn't perfectly render anywhere close to 99% of all websites. Like it for yourself, fine, love it if it floats your boat, and avoid sites that don't look good to you or don't work properly in ie. But don't even try to be telling us ie is like just this side of perfection, because we have tried the alternatives and we know better.

afaik ie doesn't block popups, doesn't have tabs, doesn't do pngs properly, doesn't block ads, doesn't have mouse gestures and other cool features, has gaping security holes, allows malicious scripts to run, resizes images, and doesn't run on Linux. That's nothing like a nice browser.

Re:Opera is fine but:

[theskov]

Actually I agree with most you say - we only disagree on how to react. Yes IE conforms to noone, and sites adopt to that. So it's unfair that all the conforming browsers are the ones suffering the consequences. But I'm not saving the world - I'm surfing the net.

The bottom line for me as a user has nothing to do with the technicalities behind - more sites work with IE so that's what I'm using, even though morally I ought to switch to punish MS for their evil doings.

You don't have a problem with the sites that don't work, because you avoid them. That's like saying it's not a problem to have a car 5 metres wide, because you just avoid all the roads where it doesn't fit. I'll be damned if I'm going to go though all that hazzle to fight the fight against the evil nonconformists - in that sense I'm definitely not geeky enough.

And plzz...

"its people like you who are makeing the experiance worse for the rest of us"

I'm choosing the browser that I like best after trying all the alternatives. Am I morally obliged to use ecological, non-bleached, standards conforming, open source browsers? Crusade someone else Lionheart.

simply the best

[theflea]

I think Opera is the best overall browser.

Some browsers are better for certain things, but I think Opera studied how people actually use their browsers. For instance, when you click the back button in Opera, your previous page is there *instantly*.

It renders pages waaaay faster than anything else, and it comes with a decent e-mail client.

Not that I don't have complaints, though. The toolbars & buttons waste screen real estate. Fortunately, you can download some nice skins and small buttons. Ultimately you have more control over what it looks like.

I like IE & Mozilla, but I realize how great Opera is when I use them.

Opera for the Mac

[Xenex]

The parent post did refer to Opera for the Mac. Have you actually used it before? It's terrible.

Version 6.0 was just release (it's a Carbon app that runs on 8, 9, and X), and it's horribly slow, ugly looking, and uses non-standard keyboard shortcuts. I had very high hopes for Opera on the Mac, but this release has all but shattered them for me. It's almost the exact opposite of Opera 6.0 on Windows.

I've been using Opera on Windows for the best part of 4 years, and swear by it. However, I don't even bother with it on my iBook. Perhaps when they eventually release Opera 7 for the Mac (which will be a *long* way off) things will be better, but I'm not holding my breath...

Re:page rendering

[Anonymous Coward]

It's been fixed in every version since 3. I have never, ever seen a page refuse to render because the images weren't downloaded, and I've forced the issue by adding various hostnames to my hosts file and pointing them to 127.x.x.x.

What is everyone's beef with Opera? Nearly every complaint I've read here today about it has been absolutely bogus.

Re:sadly, they are not the world's fastest anymore

[IdleTime]

I have used Opera since it was launched many years ago and I currently use Phoenix on Gentoo Linux here at work in production. Both are great browsers, but Phoenix is still lacking in some sense.

One feature I miss in Phoenix is handling both the select-buffer and the cut-and-paste buffer in Xwindows, it only handles the select buffer. Opera does and I need it since I do a lot of cut and paste between web-pages and an internal tool written in Java (only supports the cut and paste buffer)

Another issue, which is a bug in Phoenix is downloading UNIX compressed files (.Z). Phoenix does not save them at all.

I can go on and on with differnces, but I don't need to. Both browsers are good and I'm sure Phoenix will be even better as their development goes forward. Browser wars are stupid. Test several browsers and pick the one that covers your usage. It may not be the same as everybody else chooses, but so what?

Re:opera's ui

[Anonymous Coward]

mpt's complaints are mostly whinges, though he does acknowledge that possibility, so it's not all bad.

Three major disagreements:

1) Items that change state when the mouse hovers over them are familar to us now. Get with the program. (Also, beta 2's menus don't underline, they turn into OS X-looking buttons)

2) MDI is not a stupid idea. It keeps all your pages in the browser, where they belong. and in any case you are not forced to use MDI. Along these lines, 'new page' does in fact open a new page! Quit whining over definitions, when the utility of the thing is obvious. Also, having the mail client in the same window is hardly crippling.

3) The `File|Exit' menu option is nothing new, goddamnit! Though giving it a CTRL-Q hotkey is Mac-ish. (Who knew? I was using ALT-F4 like always.)

On the other hand, a lot of his more focused comments (like, why does the printer icon do an (unexplained, unheralded) print preview, rather than bring up the print menu? and, what the hell is with those bloated File and View menus?) are right on the money.

PERFECTLY? *rofl*

[freeweed]

The majority of websites today seem intent on popping up these annoying other windows, which I never requested. Strangely, in Opera I never see this problem.

If having needless application windows showing up all the time is your idea of perfect, you can keep it - I'll take my 'imperfect' browser any day.