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Former Dev Gives Gloomy Outlook On Linux Support For the Opera Browser

Posted by Soulskill on from the blink-and-you'll-miss-it dept.

An anonymous reader writes: "It doesn't take a Columbo to figure out that the 'previous employer, a small browser vendor that decided to abandon its own rendering engine and browser stack' is referring to Opera in this comment answering the question 'Do you actually use the product you are working on?' It appears to originate from Andreas Tolfsen, a former Opera developer who is now part of the Mozilla project. From releasing a unified architecture browser including Linux support since 2001, Opera decided to put Linux development on indefinite hold, communicated through blog comments, and focus on Windows and Mac for their browser rewrite centered around the Blink engine that had its first beta release last spring. The promise to bring back the Linux version in due time was met with growing skepticism as the months went by, and clear answers have been avoided in the developer blog. The uncertainty has spawned user projects such as Otter browser in an attempt to recreate the Opera UI in a free application. Tolfsen's statement seem to be in line with what users have suspected all along: Opera for Linux is not something for the near future."

3 of 181 comments (clear)

  1. OPERA!? by agapeton · · Score: 5, Funny

    The Opera Browser?? WHAT YEAR IS IT!? (Robbin Williams)

  2. Opera is dead. by suss · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It's just a disfunctional Chrome with Opera branding now.
    It died when they abandoned their own codebase.

  3. Opera was great... till v12 by diorcc · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Been an Opera user since '98. Not die hard, but I always had Opera running in conjunction with other browsers. For a time solo, and now back to using FF, and Chrome (which is what the new Opera really is, minus the extensions - so what's the point?). It was a great browser because it was like an swiss army knife - one that is highly configurable WITHOUT the need for any extensions. Couldn't agree more with the ex-Opera dev. Sadly, they've decided to kill it. I'll keep an eye on Otter browser and keep using v 12 as my research / search and rescue - browser.