Guest benny Posted February 25, 2003 Report Posted February 25, 2003 No, not the singing kind! Apologies if this has been posted before. Quoted from Silicon.com.... There has never been much of a relationship between the small Norwegian browser company Opera and software giant Microsoft, but what little there was is over, says Opera. Opera, which recently launched its Small-Screen Rendering technology that makes it easy to read standard web pages on smartphones, last week said it will never offer a version for Microsoft-powered devices such as the Orange SPV. The announcement means that users of Windows-CE based smartphones are likely to be confined to using Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser, which many consider inferior when it comes to smartphones and PDAs. Opera's mobile browser, which is currently available on the Sony Ericsson P800 - a smartphone based on the Symbian operating system - and on the Linux-powered Sharp Zaurus PDA, uses a rendering technique that stacks the elements of a web page vertically, meaning that a user only need scroll vertically to see the whole pages. Graphics are automatically reduced in size by the rendering technology, and tiny graphical elements are eliminated altogether. Pal Hvistendahl, communications director for Opera, said: "We think the browser will be the winner application for smartphones. But we don't want Microsoft to win in this space, so we will never do a Windows CE port." Hvistendahl said that although there is currently no port for the Palm operating system either, Opera may do one if there is sufficient demand. "We think that in a little over a year we can get Opera on a lot of phones," said Hvistendahl. "Right now we're working to make the footprint smaller." The antagonism between Opera and Microsoft is well documented. Earlier this month Opera released a new version of its desktop web browser that turned Microsoft's MSN website into gibberish inspired by the Swedish Chef from The Muppet Show. The "Bork Edition" of Opera 7 was Opera's response to what it alleges are dishonest tactics by Microsoft to make Opera look like it is displaying pages improperly when users view MSN. This latest spat followed a similar incident in October 2001 when Opera won a publicity coup after Microsoft was exposed for blocking Opera and other non-IE browsers from access to its MSN site. Hvistendahl said all versions of Opera display web pages properly so long as such tactics as those employed by MSN are not employed. "Most sites are not written to standards - they use what we call street HTML," he said. "To make a browser standards-compliant is easy, but to make one that can render all sites is very difficult. The mobile version of Opera renders cHTML - for i-Mode compatibility - as well as WAP 2.0 and the current HTML so it can render pages written to be viewed on a desktop. Support for the Netscape plug-in API means it can work with Flash, PDF, streaming video and other widely available plug-ins." Opera is now talking to mobile phone makers and to operators. Currently the browser is only available either bundled on or as a download for specific devices, but when the Nokia 3650 mobile phone hits the market, the company plans to release a freely available version for download. Unlike the free desktop version there will be no ads. From: http://www.silicon.com/news/500019-500001/...ml?nl=d20030225 B
Guest sykix Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 As with all of Microsoft's ventures, I'm sure they will extend their existing software to swamp the rest of the market. It's certainly in there interest to do so! And ours :wink:
Guest Chris b.a.r.f. Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 Hmm. I use IE because I like it and I'm *really* stingy. Same with PIE on my SPV - I'm not going to pay for something when IE does the job well enough. I can't believe that Opera on the MS Smartphone would be any better than PIE... Opera - who really cares?
Guest sykix Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 I've tried the desktop version of opera before, and it was really crap. Mainly because it didn't support essential NEW features provided by netscape and explorer that weren't in W3C specs. (I understand this has changed) I don't know the specs of opera for smartphones, but PIE leaves a LOT of room for improvement. The main thing that bugs me is the lack of frames support. But also, there are a lot of bugs when resizing tables of images to fit the screen (it seems only the last column resizes). If there was an alternative that was almost perfect, I would definitely shell out 30 quid for it. But I'm happy for now, got an unlocked, free sms'ed (if retrospv carry on with their service), mobile development platform. Can't wait till april when I can move my contract right down to the minimum.
Guest Chris b.a.r.f. Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 I don't know the specs of opera for smartphones, but PIE leaves a LOT of room for improvement. It certainly does - but there *will* be improvement, and the chances are we'll not have to cough up to get these improvements. Yes, I know updates to Opera are gratis once you've coughed up the purchase price..but I *really* am *that* stingy :)
Guest sykix Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 true. btw, I'm also stingy, can't afford not to be being a british student. However, Microsoft do have a habit of releasing updates rather slooooooooowly, and I would like to get the use out of my phone now rather than later (of which the internet is an essential part). The bugs (or should I say features) of PIE's html shrinking and lack of proper javascript (is there any?) are unneeded. It seems they've recreated internet explorer from scratch - a great example for desktop developers with reusable code.
Guest Chris b.a.r.f. Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 Can see your point - and missing java is a big minus with PIE. Stops me using my bank over the net which is quite an annoyance.
Guest spacemonkey Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 From all reports the Opera handheld browser is the absolute dogs b****cks. It is an interesting approach from a company to say that they won't provide their app on M$ platforms in order to make the M$ platforms less successful in the market. My personal opinion is that the inclusion or exclusion of Opera from the Smartphone 2002 platform won't make a hill of beans difference to the ultimate success or lack there of for the micrsoft platform in this space. So really, it's a nice principled stand by Opera and I respect that, but if they've bet on the wrong team and Microsoft comes to dominate this platform I believe you'll see a turn around in their atitudes.
Guest sykix Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 But even if they were to develop for MS smartphone 2002, they would lose revenue in the long-run. Since no-one is going to buy an inferior browser, and as we have seen on the desktop, PIE will not be the inferior browser (give or take a few lawsuits :) )
Guest sprouts42 Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 I use nothing but opera on my desktop, its the don as far as I'm concerned! The whole blocking me from visiting MSN and such just ended up with me not visiting it (like I was missing much :) ). If I can avoid it I do not use microsoft products not because they are inferior but becuase of the dirty tricks they play to keep themselves far and away above the competition. A monopoly is never good and if I can do my bit to stop that, then I will.
Guest spacemonkey Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 Like sprouts I use opera a lot on the desktop Still use IE tho cos my wife is a bit opposed to change...
Guest sykix Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 Microsoft has had the market share for quite a few years now, but it seems to be slipping. Browser Market Shares
Guest ritdaw Posted February 26, 2003 Report Posted February 26, 2003 long live opera, at least they understand web-standards unlike ms, designers get lazy and just code for ms coz "its easy"kill ie bring on opera sa standard, oh that'd be the day!
Guest Big Ron - No Longer a Mem Posted February 27, 2003 Report Posted February 27, 2003 "From all reports the Opera handheld browser is the absolute dogs b****cks." Why listen to reports? Instead, download Opera v7.x (free!) and load it up on your PC. What will that tell you about using it on a phone? Nothing at all.... UNTIL you press (If I remember) ALT + F11. (check the help section) that switches it into "phone mode" - you get to see what the site WOULD look like on a phone. Basically, it rearranges the page layout from "short and fat" to "long and thin" - not perfect, but better than no access to some sites (like Flash ones) at all. Remember, while performing the experiment, that Opera's smaller footprint means it's going to run faster too.
Guest vijay555 Posted February 28, 2003 Report Posted February 28, 2003 can someone tell me why it is so hard to reformat a page to thin view (ie fit to window), and shrink down the graphics? i remember using a palm pilot app that did the same (with about one tenth of the processing power). and on pocketpc, thunderhawk: http://www.bitstream.com/wireless/ is scrumptious. So worst case, why can't someone homebrew a simple single-column browser and opensource it? maybe i'm stupid, but parsing html isn't too difficult. sure no java and frames for now, but even-shuallee? any thoughts?
Guest sykix Posted February 28, 2003 Report Posted February 28, 2003 Yeah, sounds like a good idea. I would try it if I wasn't working on a command interpreter and telnet app (slowly).
Guest spacemonkey Posted February 28, 2003 Report Posted February 28, 2003 Squezzing down normal html is easy, pictures a little harder. Opera does frames as well. What about lynx... text only, fits width of the screen... fantastic. GPL :)
Guest vijay555 Posted February 28, 2003 Report Posted February 28, 2003 sykix - why a CLI? for smartphone? dude? i remember someone cobbling one together for pocketpc, which was a novelty, but what functionality would it include? Telnet would be nice tho. surely a resizing routine for images must be fairly common. (i don't even have an spv yet, so hark at me eh?) Frames: not sure if we have the screen space to make frames too sensible, but i guess one solution would be a zoom-ed out overview screen, showing basic frame geometry (easily extracted from the html), and you could use the joystick to select which frame to view (eg by "flashing" the selected frame), and it would zoom in to that frame - full screen, or press another button to toggle overview again. what say? but anyway, before we get too far ahead of ourselves, i think single column rendering should suffice for now.
Guest sykix Posted February 28, 2003 Report Posted February 28, 2003 Why? The CLI is really just a byproduct of the Telnet app. I need to create a console interface (obviously), and need to experiment with line wrapping, for use with servers that don't support buffer resizing. (i.e. 80*25 size). It's likely that someone else will produce one before I do, as I've got my second year exams coming up this summer. Thinking about it, the frame zoom thing would be a good way to navigate a page. You can zoom out to see the whole page width, or zoom in to a frame's width / height (depends on the frame's aspect ratio), but still able to navigate left and right, up and down around the whole page (as you are in IE, when zooming is not enabled). Anyone want to start development on this, or as a group? I'm willing to help, but cannot be project coordinator.
Guest Yousaf Posted February 28, 2003 Report Posted February 28, 2003 i have 2 say thats a shame but i really do respect opera for it! do u blame after the unfair tactics ms have used to block their sites from being accessed via opera. as for pocket ie vs pocket opera, no contest opera rocks :cry: its a shame its not coming 2 spv but i have a it on my p800 and the small screen rendering is a joy - not perfect ill admit but it speeds up the downloading of pages and and works really well with the stylus. may be it will force MS into improving pocket IE, but it has a lot 2 do to catch up in this dept.
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