Opera 7 for Mac OS X Preview Released

apetime writes "A preview of Opera 7 for Mac OS X has finally been released. The new version brings Mac Opera up to date with the latest Windows and Linux releases, including the Presto rendering engine, Opera Mail client, Opera Chat client for IRC, and integration with Mac OS X's Keychain and Address Book. After fears of cancellation when Safari came out, this is great news for recent switchers and Opera fans, and another great browser choice for Mac users."

Comments

Why?

[xutopia]

What good is Opera when Mac users already have Safari?

Re:Why?

[wibs]

Competition is always good... we can all see what happens to innovation when people say "what good is Netscape when IE is already on my computer?"

Re:Why?

[aflat362]

Bad example. You know what happened? Microsoft and Netscape started making their own prioritary HTML tags and were pushing their own crap like crazy. Developers like us were given huge headaches trying to make websites that work with both browsers.

Now 'a days innovation is coming from Mozilla - not Netscape or IE.

Re:Why?

[rekkanoryo]

Safari is based on Konqueror's rendering engine. While a great engine at heart, it's not as good on some sites as other rendering engines, such as Mozilla's, IE's, and Opera's, are. Granted this has some to do with the design of the site, but design isn't everything. The browser has to help make it look good, too.

Take, for example, Slashdot itself. Try viewing it in several different browsers. Everyone I know find that Opeara and IE tie for first place in making the site look good, with Mozilla/Netscape 6+ as a close second, but Konqueror as a distant third.

Opera, besides its excellent rendering engine, also has the tabbed interface working in its favor. Sure Mozilla has this too, but Opera lets you reopen the browser after a crash or application close and have all the pages that were open at the time of the crash or close. This is a lifesaver at times, for example when your cpu cooler dies and the system overheats, causing it to halt. When you repair the system and return it to operation, you can reopen Opera and have all the pages you were looking at before brought back without having to manually reopen them or hunt for them.

I'll take Opera and Mozilla over the others any day.

Re:Why?

[speechpoet]

Nobody has a monopoly on innovation, and the presence of another browser in the playing field helps spur new features, leaner apps and all the good things we know and love.

(There is a knock at my door. A SCO process server has handed me a cease and desist order to the effect that, in fact, SCO does have a monopoly on innovation. I stand corrected.)

Kudos to Opera for not bailing on the Mac in the face of competition from Apple. Must be nice knowing you have bigger cojones than Adobe.

Re:Why?

[wibs]

Take, for example, Slashdot itself. Try viewing it in several different browsers. Everyone I know find that Opeara and IE tie for first place in making the site look good, with Mozilla/Netscape 6+ as a close second, but Konqueror as a distant third.

First flaw... you're saying it's possible for /. to look good. It's easy to use once you figure it out, no question, but the designers completely ignored aesthetics (which I'm fine with.)

Second, more important flaw... IE, Mozilla, Opera, and Safari render /. exactly the same for me, with the only difference being that I don't see ads while using Safari. Safari handles all the pages I visit well enough to certainly never think there's a flaw in the way it's doing things.

Opera, besides its excellent rendering engine, also has the tabbed interface working in its favor.

As does Safari...

Opera lets you reopen the browser after a crash or application close and have all the pages that were open at the time of the crash or close.

I've used this feature in the past and hated it. To begin with Safari crashes so rarely its essentially never, and on top of that I'm not sure I want to have everything I was looking at open automatically for the next user if I was too lazy to close all the windows before quitting. Sure, some people will say I was looking at pr0n or whatever, but there is plenty of private stuff accessable through a browser (email, for one). This is a feature that's nice for a small group, definitely not for me.

I'll take Opera and Mozilla over the others any day.

Safari isn't perfect, there's room to grow yet. But the only one of your arguments that held water is a niche feature, and you completely ignored rendering speed, actual browser speed (Mozilla can be downright sluggish... Firefox is pretty nice though), how well it conforms to Apple HIG and whether or not it uses the OS graphic libraries (I'm an OS X themer, so that's important to me and everyone else who applies system themes).

After taking the time to look through the new Opera for a good comparison to Safari so I could write this, I've become more convinced than ever that I picked the right browser as my default.

Re:Why?

[gnugrep]

I'll second that. Competition will keep Apple on it's toes so they'll keep improving Safari. Safari is my favorite browser on the Mac now, but I'm glad there are other options.

Re:Why?

[Gogo Dodo]

I dunno about Opera being better than Adobe. You forget that Opera whined about Safari when it came out.

Re:Why?

[MoneyT]

True but adobe quit.

And don't you remember the 80's? Winners never quit.

Re:Why?

[speechpoet]

But there's a difference between whining about how hot the water is, and actually getting out of the pot. (The link in my original post pointed to a story about the whining.)

The difference: Opera 7 for OS X is available. Adobe Premiere Pro for OS X: eh, not so much.

Re:Why?

[MoneyT]

How did you get safari to block to ads for slashdot? They're still there for me.

Re:Why?

[Udo Schmitz]

Take, for example, Slashdot itself.

And here I always sat thinking that /. was meant to look shitty.

Re:Why?

[potHead42]

Quick hack:

add "127.0.0.1 ads.osdn.com" to your hosts-file

Re:Why?

[rekkanoryo]

Well, I never said /. was beautiful, just that it looks better in some browsers than others.

Re:Why?

[fsterman]

The entire OS including all applications should do this. Even with a Gig of ram, several minutes to hours could be simply saved to disk, compressed. And I am sure that I am taking a simplistic, non elegant approach. I doubt this is how Opera does this.

Re:Why?

[rekkanoryo]

First flaw... you're saying it's possible for /. to look good. It's easy to use once you figure it out, no question, but the designers completely ignored aesthetics (which I'm fine with.)

Well, I'm not saying /. looks beautiful. I'm just saying it looks better in some browsers than in others.

Second, more important flaw... IE, Mozilla, Opera, and Safari render /. exactly the same for me, with the only difference being that I don't see ads while using Safari. Safari handles all the pages I visit well enough to certainly never think there's a flaw in the way it's doing things.

I can tell a difference easily between IE, Mozilla, Opera, etc. Most notable are differences in color, although most people tell me I'm just imagining it. But I can also tell a difference in the way the browsers render the table code /. uses to accomplish the layout.

Rendering speed is irrelevant for me--I'm on dialup so I don't notice a rendering speed difference because it takes forever to download the page anyway.

As for saving the open tabs, I find it extremely useful as the power in my area is prone to frequent half-second outages. And the theming and HIG don't bother me in the least--I don't care how the UI looks as long as it lets me get the job done. To each his own, though.

Re:Why?

[wibs]

How did you get safari to block to ads for slashdot? They're still there for me.

Download and install PithHelmet. It's free, it's easy, it's effective. I don't even see flash ads very often anymore.

Re:Why?

[Dixie_Flatline]

I use Opera at work on my Windows box, and use Safari at home on my G5. I admit, I'm probably going to change to Opera when I get home. Opera is a lot bigger than Safari. Safari is a brilliant implementation of a simple, functional browser. I think they should stick with that, and NOT follow Opera's example. That said, I've been using Opera since version 5 something, and I'm having a hard time giving it up.

I can drag and arrange the tabs however I want. Opera has an inline find in page facility, mouse gestures, and a handy feature for paging through galleries where the images follow a simple incremental progression or have a 'next' or similar recognizable link in the page. The tab implementation is generally superior, I find. When I say that I don't want things to open in a new window in Opera, I mean it, and it works. I have that option checked in Safari, but it still opens new windows all the time. I NEVER want another window popping up under ANY circumstances. If I need a new window, I'll open it up myself, manually. I'm VERY fond of the tab state being saved on close, because I always use the same tabs when I first start up. (I've faked it out in Safari by making a bookmark folder that I open when I start up the browser, but I always lose the 'temporary' URLs that I haven't quite finished with yet, and I don't like saving temporary bookmarks in a seperate folder.) Opera is quite fast at rendering pages, at least under Windows. Oh, and provided that Opera maintains its key configurability, it'll definitely have a leg up there on Safari. (My outlook on that is mostly due to me wanting Opera-like keybindings in Safari. When I type 'Cmd-N', I want a new TAB, not a new window.

I'll probably use Safari here and there, but I'm pretty much stuck on Opera. I'll give OmniWeb 5 another shot when it gets more stable. Trying out the betas is fun right up to the moment where everything crashes for the fifth time.

Hopefully, Opera will be reasonably stable. If it is, I'll be happy to use it again under OSX.

Re:Why?

[wibs]

I can drag and arrange the tabs however I want. Opera has an inline find in page facility, mouse gestures, and a handy feature for paging through galleries where the images follow a simple incremental progression or have a 'next' or similar recognizable link in the page.

Mouse gestures for all cocoa apps (including Safari) can be done for free with Cocoa Gestures. I love it. Arranging tabs, along with tons of other features, can be done with Safari Extender or Saft, $10 each (buy both of them and that's still half the price of Opera). Inline finding in a page... try Cmd-F.

As for paging through galleries, that does sound nice and I can't think of a Safari equivilant. However it also sounds like I wouldn't have a need to use it most of the time and forget to use it the rest of the time.

When I say that I don't want things to open in a new window in Opera, I mean it, and it works. I have that option checked in Safari, but it still opens new windows all the time.

I completely agree, I'm the same way. Saft (link above) has excellent window management prefs, including forcing all windows into tabs in one window, or getting rid of the menu bar and going full screen, etc etc.

Oh, and provided that Opera maintains its key configurability, it'll definitely have a leg up there on Safari. (My outlook on that is mostly due to me wanting Opera-like keybindings in Safari. When I type 'Cmd-N', I want a new TAB, not a new window.

You can bind keys using ReKey (donationware) or the Keyboard Shortcuts tab in System Preferences > Keyboard and Mouse. I actually have Cmd-N set to create new tab and Cmd-Shift-N for new window (which is normaly for new bookmark folder, so I bound that to Cmd-Ctrl-N because I never use the keyboard for making new bookmarks).

There are of course advantages to things being built into Opera rather than requiring 3rd party plugins like for Safari. They all fit in so well though that after I finish installing them (5 minutes of time lost... damn) they might as well be stock features. The plugin route is also cheaper than just buying Opera.

Re:Why?

[Dixie_Flatline]

You don't have to buy Opera. I haven't. I like the ads, and I click on them now and then. They've managed to get contextual text ads, and google searches into the ad bar, so it's actually kind of handy sometimes. They're even less obtrusive than in windows.

2 things:

1) You misunderstand what I mean by 'inline find'. I don't want a popup panel so that I can type what I'm looking for, I want the search to find items AS I type. If I'm looking for the word 'encyclopedia' on a page, in Opera, I use the inline find, and it's found the word by the time I've typed as far as 'enc'. With Safari, and most other search dialogues, I have to type the whole word, or hope that when I type 'enc' in the panel, I find what I'm looking for right away. Actually, I'm probably terming this incorrectly. Opera's find isn't just 'inline' it's also incremental.

2) 'Reload page every n minutes'. For news and weather sites, I love this feature. I just set /. to reload every 15 minutes, and every time I check, there's new news. It's a minor feature, but I appreciate it. It's even better now that it works on a tab-by-tab basis. I have several tabs that automatically load themselves at different times. (In the early implementation, everything had to reload at the same time, or you could only reload one tab...it's actually useful now.)

Like I said, I love and appreciate Safari for what it is, a small fast browser. It's light on the bloat, but does a lot, which I can respect. I've gotten to Opera and all the little conveniences that it provides, so I'm going to stick with it, even though I realize that in comparison it's an overly complex monstrosity.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

How did you get safari to block to ads for slashdot?

You can use a style sheet like this, just copy&paste that into a file and select it from preferences->advanced->style sheet. Works well and no extra hacks required.

Re:Why?

[pmsyyz]

Since the HTML spec doesn't specify how to render invalid code, I'm not surprised.

Re:Why?

[Illissius]

Opera lets you reopen the browser after a crash or application close and have all the pages that were open at the time of the crash or close. By default, Opera has a startup window that lets you choose between starting with your home page, no pages, at the same place you left off last time, or opening a session you've saved (and yes, you can do that). You can easily turn this behaviour off by clicking a check box at the bottom, and it won't ask you. If the browser crashes, however (which it does rarely), it will show the startup window with continuing your last session as the default option, which is exactly what I want it to do. If you're paranoid about it showing your private data, then just make sure to re-open and close the browser normally if it crashes.

Re:Why?

[Ilgaz]

I bought one of the most expensive machines from Apple, upgraded to latest "Panther" etc, now using latest Safari....

Man I tell you, its the only app in OS X I try to stay away. If Opera guys fix Java 1.3.x lockdown issue, I will buy it as I did in my windows days.

Yes, Apple codes great stuff, completely "pro" but believe even not giving user chance to use other engine rather than Google makes me mad.

The point is, as we like Apple, OS X we don't HAVE TO like Safari. I am one of them.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Safari is based on Konqueror's rendering engine. While a great engine at heart, it's not as good on some sites as other rendering engines, such as Mozilla's, IE's, and Opera's, are. Granted this has some to do with the design of the site, but design isn't everything. The browser has to help make it look good, too.

I'd say it has everything to do with the page. It's not the browser's fault if it can't render crappy and invalid or sloppy & invalid HTML (aka CIHTML or SIHTML) the same way that the author intended, or exactly the same way another browser renders the same crappy, invalid code.

Take, for example, Slashdot itself. Try viewing it in several different browsers. Everyone I know find that Opeara and IE tie for first place in making the site look good, with Mozilla/Netscape 6+ as a close second, but Konqueror as a distant third.

/. is loaded with SIHTML. Just run this page through the official validator at http://validator.w3.org -- You'll see plenty of errors. At least they mostly seem to be the sloppy variant (Netscape specific tags, crossed tags, no &s, etc.) and not the clueless, crappy type.

Re:Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Bravo! More so-called professional web developers need to remember this. It drives me up the wall when these yahoos that really don't know what they're doing blame my browser of choice because it doesn't render their invalid, non-standards compliant HTML exactly the same was as the most recent version of IE for Windows. It's even worse when they state that IE sets the standard, so as long as it looks as they intended in IE, there can't be anything wrong with their HTML.

I find it hard to get excited about this

[tiktokfx]

I'm not saying the developers aren't providing a useful product, it just raises a question in my mind of how worthwhile it is.

Looking at this release, it's not a bad program, but it just feels... bulky. The interface isn't remarkably clean... like a large number of crossplatform programs, it's a sort of bastard, unnatural amalgam of design ideas that don't sit very well with me, at least.

In addition, I continue to not understand the point of writing one application to do several tenuously-linked tasks. Safari, Mail and Address Book are all separate apps, as an example. It's cleaner to provide well-defined applications to do certain functions, and integrate them through communications interfaces than it is to just stick functions X, Y and Z into one ball.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[ogre57]

It's cleaner to provide well-defined applications to do certain functions ..

Which is why I prefer mutt, kmail, etc, detest evolution, outlook, other everything+kitchen-sink apps.

What makes this "can't win" amusing, go back a few versions. Opera was just a browser, arguably the best on the market, yet heavily diss'd for not having .. mail, address book, ...

While Safari is clearly much better than IE, some of its design decisions are annoying, and don't care for Mac's email client. When I get back to the Mac I will definitely download this latest Opera, give it a shot.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[useosx]

*sigh*

Who cares whether you get excited about it? I'm not trolling here, I'm just pointing out that there are lots of people who get excited about using Opera for various reasons. Maybe it's all the accessibility options for persons with disabilities. Maybe they just like certain features you can't find in any other browser (like being able to move tabs around).

Look, I'm not an Opera fanboy. I was excited about the new release, tried it for awhile, and went back to Safari. Neither of these browsers are perfect, and Opera has a load of problems but my point here is that you unfairly and focus on the negative aspects. This is not constructive.

Maybe you should take a glance at the features list before you completely write it off.

Not to mention you can customize the interface to look pretty much however you want.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[rixstep]

It's cleaner to provide well-defined applications to do certain functions, and integrate them through communications interfaces than it is to just stick functions X, Y and Z into one ball.

Cleanier and less buggy too, it might be worthwhile to point out.

Otherwise I'm in complete agreement with almost all of the early posters here: 288 points Lucide Grande 'BFD'.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[Feral Bueller]

Cleanier and less buggy too, it might be worthwhile to point out.

I'd like a browser/spellcheck combo with fries, please.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[Feral Bueller]

"like a large number of crossplatform programs..."

Hi. Some of us have to develop content for browsers. Not a blog, but content. Work. Jobs (if not careers) are involved.

Opera is the only browser right now that I'm aware of besides the Mozilla family of browsers( camino, firebird/fox/chicken/etc. ) that is being written for so many platforms. Personally I think Mozilla's becoming a bit of a clusterfuck, but if you like tinkering with 15 browsers, go nuts: I've got work to do.

I also notice you said "looking" at this release. Have you tried it? One of the developers I work with swears by it and so I've been using it for a couple of weeks now. While I'm not ready to make it my default browser just yet, it's a great product. Try it for a while. You might like it.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[tiktokfx]

Your entire post seems to be based on the premise that because a program is cross-platform, that it somehow makes it more pleasant to use, as far as I can tell. Please note that I said program and not web browser, as I was referring to PROGRAMS and not WEB BROWSERS. Nowhere was I talking about HTML rendering. I'm talking about interface design.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[tiktokfx]

There's one reason to not get excited about Opera. Safari - native Cocoa spellchecking Opera - have to install gnu aspell etc etc

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[hkmwbz]

" go back a few versions. Opera was just a browser"

That is incorrect. Even Opera 3 had a newsreader and a send-only e-mail client. Opera hasn't been "just a browser" for a very, very long time. If ever.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[ogre57]

Good catch. Iirc both were new with Opera 3. Send-only email client was for posting news via nntp, relatively minor to also support smtp.

Re "if ever", expect Opera has always supported ftp. Never tried, maybe even gopher, etc. To me that's still "just a browser". Ymmv.

Basic "can't win" point stands. Earlier Opera was diss'd for not having Netscape-like support for email, address book, etc. Now it does (?) and people are griping about that.

Me? I'd prefer they implement as separate programs, integrated so each invokes the other(s) by default, but configurable so they could run anything, with some pre-defineds for those who prefer eg the standard OSX email client.

Re:I find it hard to get excited about this

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi. Some of us have to develop content for browsers. Not a blog, but content. Work. Jobs (if not careers) are involved.

Opera is the only browser right now that I'm aware of besides the Mozilla family of browsers( camino, firebird/fox/chicken/etc. ) that is being written for so many platforms

What's the big deal? Write standards compliant HTML, remember what HTML was designed for, and you won't have to worry about finding cross-platform browsers.

At last!

[Golias]

Yet Another Browser!

Now can at last I can do exactly what I could already do with a slightly different interface.

ugh`

[seven5]

Opera is pretty crappy, costs money, and renders poorly and slowly. Gimme a cocoa browser any day, it looks a ton better. And exactly why should i get excited about all those new features? If i wanted a bloated browser like that i'd use Mozilla, its free. Opera needs to take a look at what Mozilla is doing, and forget about a mail, irc, etc client inside their browser, we dont need it.

Re:ugh`

[MikeXpop]

Flamebait? Whoever modded this doesn't own a mac on OS X. Trust me when I say Opera is probably the sloppiest port of a good program I've ever tried. I used to use it on Windows and Linux before Firefox won my approval, but on the mac the thing's horrible. It just doesn't feel like a mac program. We've already got some great cocoa browsers (Safari, OmniWeb, Camino, etc), so why should we bother with this mess?

Does this mean...

[Anonymous Coward]

Safari is using the Opera rendering engine?

I Like Opera

[lotsofno]

Though I'm not entirely sure what the Opera 7 browser brings to the Mac world as I'm mostly a PC user, nor could I say how it stacks up against Safari, but I can vouch for it's performance on Windows.

1. It's VERY customizable. Aside from the hundreds of skins you can download... Buttons, toolbars, panels, etc., can be dragged anywhere you want. There's even a window you can open with all the possible buttons that you can drag'n drop onto where you want them on thr browser. This may not be as much of a selling point for Mac users (i.e. iTunes brushed metal look vs. Winamp's nearly unlimited possibilities for it's GUI/appearance), but being able to alter the browser to fit my needs, instead of having to learn to adapt to the browser's limitations, was very much appreciated.

2. Want to search for something on google? Type "g query" in the toolbar, and you're here. Amazon? "z query". Ebay? "e query". I can barely program, but even an idiot like me figured out how to alter a few lines of code so "t query" gave me the results at thesaurus.com for a word I needed synonyms for.

3. DAMN GOOD implementation of mouse gestures--which of course are highly customizable. I can open windows in the background, open links in new windows, go back a couple pages, with the quickest of movements. I barely even touch the navigation buttons.

4. This is what F12 quickly lets you do.

5. It's frickin' FAST.

6. I can turn off images/stylesheets with a quick click.

7. Userful for when web designing: Opera shows current size of window in it's title bar. Also, checking if a page's code is validated can be accessed by hitting ctrl-alt-v.

Re:I Like Opera

[Udo Schmitz]

It's VERY customizable.

Using Safaris Webkit I can build my own browser :)

There's even a window you can open with all the possible buttons that you can drag'n drop onto where you want them on thr browser.

This sounds very Mac OS Xish.

Re:I Like Opera

[miryth]

This sounds very Mac OS Xish.

That's funny, what I thought of was MS Office. Still haven't seen a toolbar customization system that matches it, or even comes close. (plus, the buttons in Office XP look pretty darn neat)

Meh.

[mikedaisey]

It just isn't very exciting. Between Safari, Camino, Firefox and Omniweb there aren't any browsing needs that remain for me to have filled...and Opera looks like boiled crap on the Mac.

Re:Meh.

[bdaehlie]

Don't forget about the Mozilla app suite and iCab - they also have their uses. If people are willing to put in the effort, I'll take all the choices I can get. Here's a list in my order of preference:

1. Camino (use a nightly, not 0.7)
2. Safari
3. Firefox
4. Mozilla app suite
5. OmniWeb
6. Opera
7. iCab

Re:Meh.

[mikedaisey]

That's my preference order as well--I just don't need more than 5 or so.

Re:Meh.

[Anonymous Coward]

While you said about Camino, I see it as a real rival to Apple Safari. Also developers user friendly attitude makes a great chance.

IF there was a isolated place we could discuss its bugs, making it even more user centric etc, I would definately use a nightly.

Mozilla's "fanatics" makes me hesitate those

Re:Meh.

[Anonymous Coward]

Definitely don't forget about iCab. I have yet to find any other browser that can come close to iCab's image, cookie and ECMASript filtering capabilities.

Re:Meh.

[bdaehlie]

I am one of the Camino developers and we'd love to have your help. Here is where to find us: 1. IRC: irc.mozilla.org #camino 2. mozdev.org's Camino mailing list 3. bugzilla.mozilla.org

I care if it's excites me.

[tiktokfx]

That's why I said I don't. As with everyone, my opinions just as valid or invalid as any other. I was commenting on how it FEELS, and I FEEL that it FEELS uncomfortable. I looked at the features, and none of them do anything for me. In addition, customizing the interface to look like other things does nothing for me. There's nothing unfair about what I said. It's all opinions.

Rather, I care if things don't excite me.

[tiktokfx]

Telling someone why you don't like what they do is constructive, even if it's in very touchy-feely ways.

Bzzznt!

[Gropo]

Open fresh Opera 7.5 window, single click on the address bar--selects all text in the string rather than inserting the cursor.

Goodbye Opera, Maybe I'll see you again when you hit 8?

Re:Bzzznt!

[FFFish]

Of course it selects all the text in the string. Not too often one's wanting to actually insert text instead of type a brand new URL that reuses the window.

A second click sets the insertion point. Groovy.

Re:Bzzznt!

[great throwdini]

Of course it selects all the text in the string. Not too often one's wanting to actually insert text instead of type a brand new URL that reuses the window.

I call bullshit. Speaking for myself, at least, I pretty much click on the string within the location bar to add (or remove) characters. Complete URL replacement is usually accomplished by pasting (after Cmd-L'ing), through a bookmark, or in a new tab/window with a clean location bar. Could just be me, but I generally only fiddle with a populated location bar to edit, rather than replace by overtyping.

In the grand scheme of things, this isn't onerous though. Firefox behaves similarly, though Safari and MSIE on a Mac sets an insertion point on first click instead (though Cmd-L selects the whole string in Safari). However, were I in Opera's shoes, it would probably make more sense to emulate the behavior of Mac's bundled browsers (past and present) and set behavior to insertion rather than selection on first click.

To each their own.

Re:Bzzznt!

[Gropo]

No, I disagree. I want all text entry fields across the entire frickin' OS to act identically, tyvm. Counteracting behaviors cause me undue thought processes, and in turn disdain towards the careless developer that made the decision to break the interface guidelines.

I'm quite in the habit--wether it be in a word processor or browser--of triple-clicking to select an entire string/paragraph.

Re:Bzzznt!

[.com b4 .storm]

However, were I in Opera's shoes, it would probably make more sense to emulate the behavior of Mac's bundled browsers (past and present) and set behavior to insertion rather than selection on first click.

Not only that, but it's the little things in a UI that can get on your nerves. In pretty much any OS X app, clicking in a text field will place the insertion point. Double-clicking will select the word under the mouse, and triple clicking will select the whole line. When an application (especially one you would potentially use very often throughout the day, like a browser) ignores these simple conventions that you don't even think about, it can be disconcerting. Case in point, many Java apps that look like Cocoa apps, but often don't behave like them in small (but noticeable) ways.

Re:Bzzznt!

[miryth]

Right, now who's not too lazy and wants to send in an idea report?

(not it!)

On a related note, I don't seem to be able to add linebreaks in my comment through use of the enter key any more... I need to use a br tag. Bug in Opera or bug in Slashdot?

Re:Bzzznt!

[Ilgaz]

Also Opera is a commercial browser which makes money from selling browsers to ordinary people.

Read: If 99% of people clicks there to replace whole text, it will ship that way.

Mac IE 5.2 gives user a chance via its preferences (not hidden) how it should act when that field is clicked. Guess what is default? ;) complete text.

Re:Bzzznt!

[zonker]

Nice, rag on a version that is still in early beta...

Preferences Advanced Stylesheet

[Anonymous Coward]

Create your own which blocks the normal advert sizes, and perhaps some urls.

Why Opera:

[Illissius]

For those wanting an *exhaustive* (and yet likely incomplete) description of what it has to offer, look here.

Oh, and the trolls whining about bloat should get a clue. It's only 3-4MB, browser, mail, and everything else included. It's one of the least bloated apps I've ever seen (possible exception of windows/total commander). When your browser alone is twice that (firebird/fox/?), I don't see what grounds you have to complain.

And while I'm at it, although Opera *is* ad-or-payware, might I mention that it does its advertising in the best way possible: a context sensitive Google text ad in the toolbar. Not annoying at *all*, and it can even be useful occasionally.

And I could go on, and on, and on. But I'll just mention that the default configuration (both UI and otherwise) is halfway braindead (popup blocking *off* by default, when it's one of the main selling points? wtf?), so just make sure to customize it (which is rather simple, and takes only a few minutes).

And since this is a Mac forum, some good OSX-esque skins are Safrad (which I use myself, not because I want to emulate a mac, but because it actually looks good), Sofa King, and Lars Kleinschmidt's various OSX and iMac skins. They're available here. (Oh, and by the way, this is a preview release, and there is supposedly a new default skin in the works, just so you know.)

I like

[Unregistered]

I have to use Opera for the now until i can figure out why the firefox keeps crashing and it's the only other browser out there with mouse gestures. I have to say that the new version looks much better than the old. I still mis my fox, though.

Re:I like

[Nalmar]

camino, safari and omniweb, like every other cocoa programs, all have mouse gesture with CocoaGesture

Opera is good, but...

[davegaramond]

http://www.geocities.com/david_garamond/opera7-ran ts.html.

Typical.

[MoeBot]

I'm getting tired of the whole 'Mac user as second class citizen' thing, having to patiently wait for features found in Windows versions of software to get ported over to my platform.

I mean really, where the hell's my Bork?

Hurray!

[a8f11t18]

Finally Opera 7 is out for my apple as well!
Been testing it... looks very, very good!
I hear some people here dissing it, but IMO
it's way better than safari and the various
mozilla-variants.

Re:Hurray!

[Ilgaz]

/. isn't a good place to read reviews about following:

1) Real, Realone, even opensource stuff coming out from Real Networks like Helix
2) AAC
3) Non open source, paid programs like Opera.

Especially on Mac SW. Don't believe? Check back this posts points 1-2 days later ;)

Too Late?

[TheRaven64]

Before I got a Mac, Opera 7 was my primary web browser. I used it in Windows, Linux and FreeBSD, and really liked it. When I got a Mac, I emailed Opera and asked if they were going to release version 7 on the Mac. They said yes, but not yet. So I started using Safari. I missed mouse gestures, but fortunately cocoagestures can provide them to any Cocoa application. There are only three features I miss on Safari now.

1. The ability to re-order tabs. In Opera you can drag and drop tabs
2. The ability to re-open a browser window with the same tabs it had before it was closed. I frequently hit command-Q instead of command-W, and end up closing Safari instead of the current window.
3. The user/author mode toggle in Opera. Some people seem to think that making your background colour as close as possible to your text colour is a good idea. In Opera, a single button press can switch to black-on-white.

I'll probably try this version of Opera, but I'm not sure that the benefits will out-weight the fact that it doesn't properly follow the HIGs and has a very cluttered UI.