

Opera’s new Android beta is out, and it includes some pretty big changes - iProject
http://gigaom.com/2013/03/05/operas-new-android-beta-is-out-and-it-includes-some-pretty-big-changes/

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dave1010uk
It will be interesting to see how many (if any) HTML features they've dropped
by switching to WebKit/Chromium. CanIUse [0] shows the latest Presto-based
Opera having the following features that Chrome on Android doesn't:

    
    
        getUserMedia/Stream API
        Shared Web Workers
        CSS3 object-fit/object-position
        Color input type
        Drag and Drop
        Datalist element
        WebGL - 3D Canvas graphics (partial support)
    

[0] <http://caniuse.com/#compare=op_mob+12.1,and_chr+0>

~~~
bgarbiak
According to the official blog post at <http://my.opera.com/ODIN/blog/> Opera
14 for Android is based on AppleWebKit/537.22 and Chrome/25.0.1364.123 but
with added support for:

    
    
        input type=color
        Microdata
        WebGL 3D context
        CSS3 @supports

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MatthewPhillips
Heh, first icon in Speed Dial is to Google+. Even though the browser is nearly
identical to Chrome for Android under the hood, Google is still serving the
basic html version to Opera.

~~~
johansch
Waiting for them to wake up and fix. :)

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aw3c2
I can't believe they moved the tab selector to the top. Who can easily reach
the top of a screen with a finger in single-hand use? I cannot. Placing
buttons up there makes using these apps incredibly annoying. Even worse would
be on the top left, since that is the place farthest from my finger.

Apart from UI changes there does not seem much new. I am still hoping they
will make site preferences easily accessible so one can protect his privacy
and security easily even on mobile devices. And of course extensions (they had
a beta once).

~~~
veeti
Chrome for Android lets you move between tabs easily by swiping from the left
and right corners of the screen (and swiping in general is used for tab
navigation in Android). Maybe Opera could rip that off.

~~~
yareally
I hope they go for the quick toggles (touching the sides of the phone/tablet
if enabled) like the stock browser has, but either option is better than none.

~~~
Freestyler_3
I hope they go for gestures. Hold finger on position then move left right top
bottom for their respected options.

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vladev
For me, the killer feature of Opera has always been the ability to reflow text
to fit any size and zoom. Can anyone confirm this is still in?

~~~
infinita740
I just downloaded it and tested that, it's not present, zooming is now as bad
as in other android browsers (but some of the HN comments are in bigger size
than others so there is no need to zoom, it's quite a strange behavior though)

Also as another user pointed it, tabs on the top is not practical and
unreachable (especially on big devices like samsung GS3)

~~~
ZoFreX
How about the "scrolling guides" when you're zoomed? Not sure if there's a
proper name for that, but with Opera when I zoomed and the text reflowed, it
would lock me to vertical scrolling only as long as I don't wiggle too far
horizontally. Easily my favourite thing about it.

~~~
exterm
also not in as far as I can see. I hope that gets added again in the future,
together with the reflow.

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simfoo
Have been using it for the past 10 minutes. It's considerably slower than the
stock browser in 2.3.7.

Also, using 36MB is kind of unacceptable - I only have less than 100MB
internal storage on my Galaxy Ace.

~~~
gcp
Normal size for all browsers that have to bundle the entire rendering engine.
Chrome is 50Mish, Firefox 30Mish, last time I checked.

Only the built-in-browser-skins are smaller.

~~~
ZoFreX
I have Opera installed on my Ace for two reasons:

1\. Speed 2\. Size

If it's slower than stock and takes up a similar amount of space to Firefox...
then there's no reason for me not to use Firefox.

~~~
fyzlman
How do you install Firefox (or Chrome) in Ace?

~~~
gcp
Download it directly from the Mozilla site: <http://www.mozilla.org/en-
US/mobile/aurora/>

The Ace has very little available memory, so Mozilla still blocks it for Beta
& Release because they think it doesn't work well enough. But your mileage may
vary (greatly).

This is the Aurora build (Firefox 21) which has some more optimizations.

Chrome can't run on a phone that doesn't have at least Ice Cream Sandwich
(Android 4.0+) AFAIK.

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shurcooL
A question to anyone who knows/remembers this. I remember seeing a video that
showed off a new experimental and highly different mobile UI that either
Firefox or Opera created.

In it, there was a much smaller distinction between closed tabs and browsing
history - they appeared the same.

Whatever happened to that prototype? I thought it was a good idea, but I never
got a chance to see it in action. Is the project dead or does it exist
somewhere. If the latter, is any good?

~~~
johansch
In this press release, somewhat buried, is this message:

[http://business.opera.com/press/releases/general/opera-
gears...](http://business.opera.com/press/releases/general/opera-gears-up-
at-300-million-users)

“Opera is also experimenting with WebKit in several research and development
projects, and many of you got a peek of one of them, codenamed ‘ICE’, last
month. As a leading innovator in browsers, we are very excited that ICE
received such great buzz. We will provide more information about ICE and other
exciting R&D projects in the future, but as we are also really proud of our
new browser on Android and our Opera Web Pass operator offering, those
products will be the main focus at MWC,” says Wium Lie."

------
Someone
Any comments on _"Features such as the combined URL/search bar may be
unoriginal, but they were worth copying."_?

On iOS with its split URL/search, I like it that the keyboard layout and
autocorrect adjust to what you are doing. Is that less of an or no issue on
Android, with its different way to do autocorrection?

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sirn
Interestingly, the Off Road mode is still using Presto version of Opera Mini:

Opera/9.80 (Android; Opera Mini/14.0.1025/28.4079; U; en) Presto/2.8.119
Version/11.10

------
chayesfss
Is Opera popular in other countries?

~~~
aw3c2
Other than what?

~~~
chayesfss
The USA. Looking at stats I see in Jan of this year they've got 1.9% market
share (<http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp>). But I just saw
that they're based in Norway so I'm sure it' popular there.

~~~
yareally
Stats are kind of misleading, since Opera's larger base is mostly Mobile
browsing and other embedded devices (Wii, Nintendo DS, etc).

Mobile stats show it has ~16% of the market share[1][2]

[1]
[http://imageshack.us/scaled/landing/189/statcountermobilebro...](http://imageshack.us/scaled/landing/189/statcountermobilebrowse.jpg)
(flash alternative)

[2] [http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_browser-ww-
monthly-201202-...](http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_browser-ww-
monthly-201202-201302) (flash)

