That starting at the last page thing is the biggest selling point of Opera. Now, I do wish that Opera had put more questions in first run. Also, the Advanced mode is a LOT better than the tabbed mode - basically, it uses the tab bar as a sort of taskbar, but only with Opera pages in it. Other than that, it behaves like any other MDI app (multiple child windows in a parent window).
I've never seen an Opera 7 Linux install with proper fonts or sizes... After a lot of tweaking, I can get it usable, but there's the odd site that still doesn't work right (that does on the same version of Opera for Windows).
OK, that takes care of a bunch (unless it's Outlook Web Access, which has proprietary IE extensions that don't render in Opera UNLESS it is changed to "Identify as Opera").
First, you'll only have to buy one license per household. Second, they probably WON'T get it working on Linux, as IBM pulled ViaVoice for Linux, and I think the voice output is by Microsoft Agent (NOT Embedded ViaVoice), which is a Win2K/XP only thing.
Well, my parents tried Opera for a few months, and I had to switch them to Firefox before they switched back to IE... All due to a few sites not rendering right in Opera, and they were too lazy to file a bug report (which is damn easy).
Nitpick: There actually is no selected default in the dialog box for first run. If you ignore the dialog (browse in the Google ad privacy policy window), it'll show an ad banner, so that's the closest thing to a default there is.
For Windows users, Konqueror needs either Cygwin+KDE or a Linux distro with KDE (can be added) to run. I said Firefox was 4.1MB, but I was wrong - it's 4.7. However, while Opera's download size is huge for the Java version, keep in mind - Firefox and Seamonkey don't come with Java either. Here's the sizes of the various browsers:
Opera 7.54u1 (Java/None): 16.7/3.6MB Opera 8.00b1 (None/Voice): 3.5MB/6.0MB (note: voice is a download AFTER the beta is installed) Firefox 1.0: 4.7MB Mozilla Suite 1.7.5: 11.0MB
Functionality of the above: Opera: Web, mail, news, RSS, notetaking, chat, (8.00b1) voice Firefox: Web, RSS Mozilla Suite: Web, mail, news, chat(?), web development
Umm... switch to Google ads, where it's even less intrusive. That said, when I do pay, it won't be to get rid of the ads - if I wanted to just do that, I'd go to my favorite "crackz/serialz" site, type "opera 7 windows", and get a code. I want to support Opera, and I might not even take the student discount, just because I want to support Opera that much.
I'll add in - the download for Opera is, what, 3.6MB for the current version (granted, I remember it being in the 6MB region back at Preview 1, which had voice pre-downloaded). IIRC, Firefox is 4.1MB, and Opera's closest equivalent on the Moz side is SEAMONKEY, not Firefox.
MODERNIZING it? WTH does that mean? OK, so it's not open source. And, it IS free, you just have to have ads. No, it's not Free. Still, it's damn good, and I've heard that 8.0B1 changes the license terms to allow one license to work on any computers you own - no matter the OS.
Actually, THAT inspired an idea here... USB Live Windows 98, but it copies the registry straight from the HDD (rather than using a real Win98 registry - could be a bit dicey, though), and then runs AdAware and Spybot on it...
IIRC, there was actually a C64 web server that survived three Slashdottings (or at least survived for a few hours). One of those times, it was ALSO running TWO VNC servers AND a RealAudio server (playing from the cassette drive). Pretty damn impressive, especially considering that the pages were dynamic, not static.
It IS open source. It's under a license that resembles a BSD+GPL cross (basically, if it's small pieces of the program, it behaves like a BSD license, but for big pieces, it's like the GPL).
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Try 7.6 Preview 4 - it's much of the same, and there's a Linux version. Also, by next week there should be Linux, FreeBSD, and MacOS ports.
That starting at the last page thing is the biggest selling point of Opera. Now, I do wish that Opera had put more questions in first run. Also, the Advanced mode is a LOT better than the tabbed mode - basically, it uses the tab bar as a sort of taskbar, but only with Opera pages in it. Other than that, it behaves like any other MDI app (multiple child windows in a parent window).
I've never seen an Opera 7 Linux install with proper fonts or sizes... After a lot of tweaking, I can get it usable, but there's the odd site that still doesn't work right (that does on the same version of Opera for Windows).
F12>Identify as Internet Explorer.
OK, that takes care of a bunch (unless it's Outlook Web Access, which has proprietary IE extensions that don't render in Opera UNLESS it is changed to "Identify as Opera").
OK, do what I do to save resources and make it blend in:
Press Ctrl+F12. Click "Skin". Click "Windows Native". Click OK.
First, you'll only have to buy one license per household. Second, they probably WON'T get it working on Linux, as IBM pulled ViaVoice for Linux, and I think the voice output is by Microsoft Agent (NOT Embedded ViaVoice), which is a Win2K/XP only thing.
I'm an Opera user, and NOT a Firefox user, but I will say this (I've played with Firefox):
AFAIK, you can open in a background tab on Firefox, and SessionSaver will let you continue from last time (IIRC, even after a crash - like Opera).
Well, Opera 7 is a complete rewrite, so it'd be hard to backport fixes to 6 without just tacking on the 6 UI onto 7, which is just a config change.
8 is 7.6, which is internally very different from 7.5 (which is EXTERNALLY, but not internally, very different from 7.2).
Well, my parents tried Opera for a few months, and I had to switch them to Firefox before they switched back to IE... All due to a few sites not rendering right in Opera, and they were too lazy to file a bug report (which is damn easy).
I haven't tried it on 8, but 8 is actually 7.6, so it SHOULD work, especially knowing Opera's customizability.
Nitpick: There actually is no selected default in the dialog box for first run. If you ignore the dialog (browse in the Google ad privacy policy window), it'll show an ad banner, so that's the closest thing to a default there is.
If it asked, I'd switch to Firefox (shudder) in a heartbeat, troll.
For Windows users, Konqueror needs either Cygwin+KDE or a Linux distro with KDE (can be added) to run. I said Firefox was 4.1MB, but I was wrong - it's 4.7. However, while Opera's download size is huge for the Java version, keep in mind - Firefox and Seamonkey don't come with Java either. Here's the sizes of the various browsers:
Opera 7.54u1 (Java/None): 16.7/3.6MB
Opera 8.00b1 (None/Voice): 3.5MB/6.0MB (note: voice is a download AFTER the beta is installed)
Firefox 1.0: 4.7MB
Mozilla Suite 1.7.5: 11.0MB
Functionality of the above:
Opera: Web, mail, news, RSS, notetaking, chat, (8.00b1) voice
Firefox: Web, RSS
Mozilla Suite: Web, mail, news, chat(?), web development
Umm... switch to Google ads, where it's even less intrusive. That said, when I do pay, it won't be to get rid of the ads - if I wanted to just do that, I'd go to my favorite "crackz/serialz" site, type "opera 7 windows", and get a code. I want to support Opera, and I might not even take the student discount, just because I want to support Opera that much.
I'll add in - the download for Opera is, what, 3.6MB for the current version (granted, I remember it being in the 6MB region back at Preview 1, which had voice pre-downloaded). IIRC, Firefox is 4.1MB, and Opera's closest equivalent on the Moz side is SEAMONKEY, not Firefox.
MODERNIZING it? WTH does that mean? OK, so it's not open source. And, it IS free, you just have to have ads. No, it's not Free. Still, it's damn good, and I've heard that 8.0B1 changes the license terms to allow one license to work on any computers you own - no matter the OS.
Also, if a malicious app somehow disables or crashes Windows services (yes, I'm talking about Blaster), that'll do it too.
No single non-malicious app that doesn't touch hardware directly (drivers touch hardware directly) can crash 2000/XP.
Heck, OS/2 was even designed with DOS compatibility... Windows NT killed it.
Nope, alternating between Apache/Solaris and Apache/Linux.
Actually, THAT inspired an idea here... USB Live Windows 98, but it copies the registry straight from the HDD (rather than using a real Win98 registry - could be a bit dicey, though), and then runs AdAware and Spybot on it...
IIRC, there was actually a C64 web server that survived three Slashdottings (or at least survived for a few hours). One of those times, it was ALSO running TWO VNC servers AND a RealAudio server (playing from the cassette drive). Pretty damn impressive, especially considering that the pages were dynamic, not static.
It IS open source. It's under a license that resembles a BSD+GPL cross (basically, if it's small pieces of the program, it behaves like a BSD license, but for big pieces, it's like the GPL).
Run it anyway. I've heard that it DOESN'T need XP.
And a few more, and it's dead for good (until you start it back up again). It does seem to eat resources, FWIW...