Slashdot Mirror
Ask Opera CEO Jon von Tetzchner
Opera Software
has gotten all kinds of media play lately, including rumors that both Google
and Microsoft
were buying the company. Whether you love or hate Opera, you've got to
give them credit for building a decent browser and grabbing a small but
noticeable market share in the face of competition from both MSIE and
Firefox. Co-founder/CEO Jon
von Tetzchner is obviously reponsible for at least some of
this success -- and for much of the company's high press
profile, due not only to the Opera
Browser itself but to at least one whacky PR stunt
and at least one high-profile beef
with Microsoft. So who is this guy? Ask and find out. He's
obviously not your typical software company CEO, so we don't expect
typical CEO-type answers from him. We'll send him (direct, not through
a PR person) 10 or 12 of your best questions Friday
afternoon (US EST), and run his answers during the first week
of 2006.
I can understand how a company competes against microsoft in the browser world, but how has things changed now that Mozilla and Firefox came into the picture. How do you plan on making money when a free, open source product is directly competing with you? Not only is it a complete product, but because it is open source, it has addons for just about anything available. Seems like an impossible battle to fight...
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
As the CEO of Opera, do you have any idea how many inncent men you've put through a night of HELL as we patiently sit through the damn thing in order to get into some chick's pants? OH, sorry. Wrong Opera. (Please don't really send this to him...)
local.google.com
Native user agent switching
Opera 9's upcoming Acid2 compatibilty
Eye candy and general coolness factors
Can you give us a taste of new, unannounced features we'll see in future versions?
- Just my $0.02, take with a grain of salt, your mileage may vary.
Does he think that the advent of Firefox et al signals an end to Microsoft dominance of the browser market? If so, does he think this will be good or bad for Opera as a company?
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
What is your favorite development platform? Your most promising browser platforms seem to be mobile. What do you plan to do in the future in terms of supporting more platforms (mobile, or other)?
The Television Wiki
Do you find that the majority of Opera users are on the IT side of things, and if so how do you plan to get more users who are the "typical user", or only use their computer at work for their assigned tasks? Since IE is embedded when they get their new machine out of the box, how are you introducing Opera to users that probably have a limited understanding that they can have a different browser, or even more than one browser on their machine?
http://www.linkedin.com/in/dougneedham
What do you see happening with your browser in 2006? Are there any exciting new features coming, or are you trying to get your browser bundled with any major PC company (ex: Dell with FireFox in the UK)? Give us a good reason to use Opera in the coming year.
Thanks for your time,
Bob_Villa
Why would you hate Opera?
Because this is Slashdot where the available options are limited to:
1. Love
2. Hate
3. Cowboy Neal
4. Boobs!
?
KFG
Recently someone suggested that MS should simply buy Opera as a web browser for Vista. What do you think of that idea? Would you sell?
--LWM
Opera has been an innovative browser for some time; it was one of the first to offer popup blocking, tabs (or MDI of some description), sessions, mouse gestures, and so on. However, since then, other browsers have implemented them as well; Firefox has extensions offering mouse gestures and sessions, and popup blocking and tabs are now commonplace.
After offering so many features, would you prefer browsers such as Firefox and IE to come up with their own ideas instead of taking them from other browsers, or prefer the sharing of ideas so the web is better off overall?
Guy asked me for a quarter for a cup of coffee. So I bit him.
I'm one of the few people who switched from Opera to Firefox. The reason was AdBlock. Why doesn't Opera have a rightclick-blockad feature? Is this simply just a case of the absence of a feature, or rather an expression of your company's policy on internet advertising?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm just curious to what you think would happen to your comany if you were to merge with Google. I'm guessing with Google's corporate culture, you willl still be able to innovate browser technology like you have been in the past. But the Google tag with your browser will help gain more market share, and promote people coding web pages with W3C compatibility. For the good of all concerened, Opera and Firefox need to be the dominant web browsers in the market. What do you think?
Was Google just the obvious choice because of its scope, or is there some flirting going on in the hopes of a more lasting relationship?
Better extensions/plugins. Firefox has earned great acclaim for its dynamic extension support. Extensions such as Fasterfox, Adblock, Web Developer, and many others are the sole reason people use Firefox over Opera (or any other browser). I know Opera is working to help unify the Netscape plugin API, but the upcoming version 9 doesn't appear to have anything that can match Firefox's extension capabilities. When will we see Opera support plugin/extensions as powerful as Firefox's?
I like Opera...in fact, I have stopped using Firefox in favor of Opera for reasons mentioned in someone elses question. Would you ever consider going back to charging for the browser, yet making it Open Source, and offering support for the paid version?
I'm not a troll, but I play one on Slashdot.
I'm a bit of a Firefox evangelist, and one of the huge problems I've had is that a vast number of non-technical types don't even understand what a "web browser" is. "Firefox? Uhm, no, I already installed the Internet on my Windows."
The problem is that these people form a large chunk of users, necessary for gaining large market share, but they don't even know that Internet Explorer is different from the Internet. What is Opera doing to get installed on the computers of people with "technology IQs" lower than their ping times? Is market share even a goal to Opera, or would it just be icing on the cake?
OMG! Wau!
I'm a happy user of Mozilla Firefox browser on both Linux and Windows. As Opera CEO, can you give me some possible reasons why should I switch to Opera? What advantages or outstanding featues it has, compared to Firefox?
Why would Opera's code be GPLed? They developed it themselves, and they've never released their source code.
In your mind, why have most of the people, who switched to alternative browsers, chosen Firefox over other ones such as Opera.
Opera Watch - An Opera browser blog.
So, theoretically.... Would you prefer Google or Microsoft ? :)
I've worked in a few high profile companies in the UK who are all very serious about adhering to web standards, checking all designs in internet explorer, firefox and safari, but I've yet to encounter a company who will ensure that Opera renders page layouts correctly.
What level of market share would you say is required by Opera for web developers to ensure their layouts render correctly ?
A slashdotting - you get the stick first and then the carrot !
I have seen a PCWorld article http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,123615,p g,4,00.asp claiming Opera 9 will support widgets, however I am unclear on what the magazine means by this. Will they be on the desktop or will they be somewhat like Firefox's extensions?
Also, to all of those claiming Opera does not have Adblocking features, try going to this page:
http://nontroppo.org/wiki/BlockAdvertisements
I suggest using OperaAdFilter (http://www.operaadfilter.com/) for the most integration with the browser and for its ease of use.
I love Opera and bought it... several years ago, then a recent upgrade. THEN, you made it free!!!
So, that makes me think, maybe you made the PC version free, and are going to concentrate on the mobile versions, which you probably really make money on. Does this mean that the free PC version will stagnate? Or will future versions be built, with fun new features?
Also... how about a new logo? Or maybe a cross-marketing deal with Oprah?
Thanks!
"Would it kill you to put down the toilet seat?" -- Maya Angelou
Which web browser(s) do you use and why? and Are there any plans to release the sourcecode now that it's gone 100% free?
Dear Sir,
I work in a college library. Libraries have a lot of 'online databases' they subscribe to now days; typically several dozen. One week I got bored and tested various browsers against all of our databases that we pay for, and a few that are free.
Opera was not working very well with some of them. And there are certain ones, such as Ebrary's collection of e-books, which use Active-X plugin thingies, that wouldn't work at all.
Thus, we cannot use Opera in the library. It is not that it is a bad browser, it is just that the higher ups have payed thousands of dollars for these databases; some of them are very good databases and contain information important to our library users, but many of them are only designed to work with IE.
Is there any business case for making Opera compatible with all the little twiddles of IE, so that it could work for certain segments of the internet population? Such as, for example, databases of the type that are used in libraries?
Currently, common wisdom says that Opera is being kept profitable by it's market-share in the mobile market. It's probably safe to say, however, that in the future other browsers will try to eat into that market share. Are you planning on trying to stay ahead of the curve and depend on the mobile market for profits, or do you have other markets your trying to make profits in?
1. Opera Bug Tracking System
My experience with Opera's bug tracking system are rather frustrating. I can not check if some bug is already known ( describing a bug and creating a test case is time consuming). Also, I reported some things and never ever got any feedback besides an automatic email. I do not know if Opera considers it a bug, if it is not a bug but an error on my side, if someone works on it, if it was fixed, simply nothing comes back. The Opera BTS is a black hole, and since some time now, I do not feel like making the effort to report bugs.
Do you plan to open up the BTS or at least allow the submitter to view the ticket? Or enhance the feedback?
2. Developer Tools
How about a DOM Inspector (and a Javascript Debugger)? Firefox's DOM Inspector and XMLHttpRequest Monitor are dearly missing in Opera.
3. HTML/CSS/JS
Any word on opacity support? On a Richtext Editing component?
Does Opera have any plans to improve the cookie managing ability of its browser?
many websites would block Opera outright
Ah, but you see, that is nearly impossible! Why? Because! Opera had the brilliant idea that by default, it would identify itself as Internet Explorer, so that sites trying to lock out non-IE browsers would be fooled. I can understand the reasoning here, but as a web developer, it is actually really frustrating. Opera can do most everything IE can, as far as I can tell, but some of its CSS is a bit wacky. Not as wacky as IE, but certainly wacky in other ways. But because of the faked User Agent by default, I can't detect Opera and include changes to CSS to make it behave properly.
But, anyways, from the comments already, it seems built-in AdBlock is in high demand. I'd have to agree with this sentiment. If I had to choose only one extension that I couldn't live without, it would be AdBlock. Whenever I use a computer without it, I am appalled by how annoying the internet trully is.
Joseph?
Dear Mr. von Tetzchner:
With all the rumors as-of-late about Opera being acquired by Google or Microsoft, I'd like to ask you the question of what you would consider a realistic price tag for Opera would be?
Many of us non-IE web browsing enthusiasts would like to see the best features and code of both Opera and Firefox put together into a single open source offering. A sale to Google could make this a possibility, depending upon how restrictive the pre-existing licensing agreements your company has with various mobile phone manufacturers (which you probably cannot discuss legally).
So, with that having been said, what's your price and would you remain aboard such a project post-sale if given such room in a contract?
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
From previous Opera related posts on Slashdot, it has come to my attention that you have some real babes working for you in Norway.
Are any of them single and if so, would they be interested in dating a guy who reads slashdot? BTW I use Safari but I can be persuaded to switch...
Putting syrup in coffee is some form of blasphemy.
Why is NTLM not supported in Opera, even though IE and Firefox support it out of the box? It's a feature many Opera users have requested for several versions now, especially in corporate environments. I know about the NTLM Authorization Proxy Server, but that's an inconvenient workaround. Is NTLM support something we can look forward to in the future?
This is not the greatest sig in the world, no. This is a tribute.
Most browsers on the mac fall into one of two categories: supported by a mega-corp (Safari, Internet Explorer) or backed by the Mozilla engine (Mozilla, Camino, Firefox). What is Opera's market share when considering only the mac platform? What advantages do you think your product offers over Omniweb, for example, which is another browser that does not fall into either of the two categories mentioned? Do you have significant development effort put into your mac product to help meet or beat the market share of one of the dominant mac browsers? Or are you mostly "maintenance" on that platform?
The UA.ini featuers (and upcoming site specific features) can be "push" updated in 8.0 and up. That will fake out problem sites. Moreso, browser.js allows Opera ASA to rewrite javascript on problem pages and "push" that as well in updates. That's why the Help -> Report a site problem is useful, and important.
You can also edit Userjs yourself, and UA.ini.
If you want to go beyond js editing in Opera, there is always the venerable and still most powerful proxomitron if you're on windows.
Opera, Proxomitron-Grypen,GPG 0x0A1C6EE3
One of Opera's many strengths is it's excellent rendering engine, Presto, which is light, fast, and standards compliant. To this point, is has held an edge over the competition -- over just about everything in terms of speed, over IE in standards compliance, and over Gecko in a clean and agile codebase (admittedly I haven't seen either, but judging from results and what I've heard).
However, it now has some significant competition from KHTML/WebCore, which enjoys both corporate backing from Apple (and to a lesser degree Nokia), and the support of the open source community. It too has a clean and flexible codebase (this was the reason Apple chose it for Safari instead of Gecko, in the first place), it has a degree of standards compliance comparable to Opera's, and with Safari 2, it's also the only browser to seriously challenge Opera in terms of speed. There has also been movement (by Nokia) to adapt it to the mobile market, which is, if memory serves, Opera's main source of income currently.
What do you think of KHTML/WebCore? Do you see it as a threat to Opera's position in the desktop and/or mobile markets? If so, how do you plan to stay ahead of it?
Work is punishment for failing to procrastinate effectively.
o/~ Join us now and share the software