Opera Browser Beta Adds Voice, More

An anonymous reader writes "According to an article at DesktopLinux.com, the first public beta of Opera 8 is available for free download. It adds voice input/output and a host of other niceties. Key new features include improved RSS handling, fit to window or paper width, a start-bar for easy access to the most commonly used functions, and automatic update checks. The beta release supports Windows only, but a general release is scheduled for early 2005. Opera and IBM have partnered on XHTML+Voice (X+V) technology for several years, co-announcing a Multimodal Browser and Toolkit early in 2003."

They should fix things instead of adding crap.

[elfarto]

Who cares about the voice thing ?? How many of the readers will care to actually speak to their browser, imagine a office full of people all talking to their browsers.. that's simply stupid.
I think that Opera people should care most about fixing things in it's browser instead of adding features that nobody (95%) will use.
Like M2, it simply sucks with IMAP, i was using it till i tried Thunderbird, did the switch about 5 minutes of starting it up for the first time.
The opera forums are full with complaints, why don't Opera listen to them, i'd do so before my userbase flies right into the open (and free) arms of Firefox.

Re:The new beta is awesome.

[DigitumDei]

I hadn't even looked at Opera because of the slashdot crowd screaming about the "Oh So Annoying" ads. Then, due to the fact that I wanted to test my web site with opera, I downloaded the free version. You have a choice to display this ultra thin text ad at the top of the browser that really does not seem to get in the way of anything other than maybe a few buttons that could be there.

The browser itself is really nice, and the tiny advert does VERY LITTLE to detract from this. Why oh why is this such a huge issue?

Re:The new beta is awesome.

[ender81b]

Because it's not firefox and GOD FORBID you'd have to like pay money for software. Not to mention that nearly every single feature that makes firefox what it is (tabbed browsing, pop-up blocking, mouse gestures, lightweight interface) was pioneered by Opera first.

Sad but true. Not that there is anything wrong with either (I use firefox on linux boxes, opera on windows, and safari on mac) but most of the /. crowd has a mentality that we have to dismiss Opera even though most, if not all, of the revolutionary features of webrowsing were pioneered by opera first.

Absolutely no reason to keep using IE

[hibri]

with opera and firefox available, there is simply no reason to use IE on Windows. Switched to Opera 3 years ago and haven't looked back since.

Let's be clear on a few things here

[Anonymous Coward]

Opera is many things. Before the bashing continues, however, I'd like to make a few things clear:

- it is NOT bloated; it's a 3.5 MB download
- it is NOT crashy
- it is NOT bad because of flashy ads because you can look at tiny, non-flashing google ads
- it is NOT unable to display pages propperly; it handles every webpage I'ver ever been to just fine
- it has a much nicer, more customizable UI than Firefox
- it is considerably faster than Firefox
- it has everything you'd ever want in a browser suite without needing any additional downloads or plugins
- you don't EVER have to use anything in it you don't want to, and even with email and chat turned on, it's still not bloated, and still has less of a footprint than Firefox
- if you turn off everything except web browsing, you'll never hear from it and Opera will have even less of a foot print
- it was well worth the $20 student price I paid for it. I rarely ever register software, and it was one of the few programs I did register without any regrets.

Opera is a magnificent piece of software. Who cares if it's not open source? Not every god damn thing in the world needs to be open. Who cares if it costs money? They're running a business, and selling a product, and a damn good one at that. You get what you pay for. Firefox is good too, but you also get what you pay for with Firefox.

Re:The new beta is awesome.

[Anonymous Coward]

There's no such thing as free lunch, economics 101. The fact that you didn't pay a single $ for the software you use doesn't mean it didn't cost money to develop. Someone has to pay for that, either the developers have another job, or they get paid to develop free software.

Some software cannot be developed with the open source business model, it doesn't work. I'm sure the Opera guys would love to release their software as OSS if they could make money another day. Other niche products won't be OSS any time soon, e.g. Softimage|XSI, Maya, etc. And no, Bender doesn't even come close to them. When will some people understand that not all software has to be free? I don't care what Stallman says, it's not true.

--
HawkinsOS [hawkinsos.com], kicking Smorgrav in the ass since 2004.

Just another "Why I use Opera" comment

[adolfojp]

To achieve with Firefox the functionality that Opera offers out of the box I have to download a dozen plugins. When that is done, Firefox is very slugish and the features don't feel tightly integrated. (I am using a slow computer)

Every feature in Opera feels very natural and intuitive, it doesn't feel bolted on. It is a beautifully refined browser and works great both on Linux and Windows. Of course, a pluggable Opera would be heaven :-).

I still always recommend Firefox as an IE replacement, but for power users I will recommend Opera.

Cheers,
Adolfo

About the ads. The google ads take half the screen real estate that the graphical ones take and, to be honest, I have found them to be usefull more than once.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:The new beta is awesome.

[hkmwbz]

"The internet is information, and information should be free IMHO. No browser is worth $39, especially a closed source one."

It's well woth 39 bucks, considering that Opera innovates, and the rest try to keep up with Opera. Do you think tabbed browsing, popup blocking, mouse gestures, etc. would have been around if no one came up with them? Most of the features Firefox brags about on its front page were either invented by Opera, or implemented in Opera ages before it was available in Firefox.

The same is true for Minimo. Did you read the CNET article about Minimo and all the "fantastic innovations"? Guess what, Opera invented all those things, but the Minimo spokesperson tried to make it sound like they were Mozilla firsts [techwhack.com].

There's a pattern here. Opera comes up with all these new things. Without Opera, Firefox and other browsers would have been in the Browser stone age.

This is why a company which makes money is a good thing: They are forced to do research and development beyond what everyone else is doing, to come up with new stuff to stay ahead.

Want the Zaurus version

[sgtron]

Since my SL6000 came with Opera I wonder if they'll make a mobile version.

Re:The new beta is awesome.

[kesuki]

(tabbed browsing, pop-up blocking, mouse gestures, lightweight interface) was pioneered by Opera first.
I will give you mouse gestures, but i'm sure someone can cite and earlier example of a program using mouse gestures... lightweight interfaces i'd give some much earlier text-only browser credit for trying to make as light wight an interface as possible, and as far as tabbed broswing goes, the first browser I ever used with tabbed browsing was way back in the true browser wars. When Netscape 1.1 was king of the hill, GNN Global Network Navigator had a bizarro cool interface, you could split the window into more 'panes' or have new 'tabs' (which it didn't call tabs, but had some other nifty name for them) But then AOL bought GNN and proceeded to make the company into nothing... All this from a browser that only used 4 MB of ram... (but then 4 MB of ram cost $125 back then...)
Every innovative brower function was pioneered during the era know as the browser wars. there were was many as 151 commercial web browsers available for windows 3.11 concurrently.. It's long since ancient history, Microsoft and Netscape partnered up to quash virtually every browser on the planet by making thier editors output junk HTML that would crash, or simple render a site unusable in competitors browsers...
Opera isn't a bad browser but innovative? hardly, it's just a bunch of 'good ideas' that other people had already had for browsers, but they had come into the game too early, and were crushed by the evil empire.

Re:The new beta is awesome.

[hkmwbz]

"It's simply that [open source] software is better."

Opera is smaller, faster, yet more functional than Firefox. In my opinion, Opera is better than Firefox. You may have a different opinion, but it is still just an opinion.

"And this evolves into the belief that all code should be open. Many sets of eyes and many people collaberating can make software better."

Opera has nearly 200 people working on it, the majority being programmers. Do you really think most people even bother to read the Firefox source code? Do you think they know how?

"Plus not enough people are using it to justify serious security audits, and since it's closed, who knows what's wrong with it."

In case you haven't noticed, security experts like Secunia are actively looking for flaws in Opera.

"Firefox is open and has millions of users, so people are constantly looking at it's code and finding / fixing problems."

Give me a break. Millions of users are looking at the code? Please.

Also, how do you think most security problems in Firefox have been found? That's right, not by looking at the code. People like Secunia, who also test Opera, find it by testing the compiled program.

"IE at least has 86% of the internet's users using it, so the holes in it eventually come out by sheer dumb luck. But, I wonder how many holes go unpatched in Opera?"

You are blinded by zealotry, it seems. The holes discovered in Firefox have not been found by inspecting the source code, but by security analysts who have run the compiled program through tests.

"The time for paying for browsers has come and past. Oh, wait. That time was never. From gopher to lynx to mosaic to netscape to IE to mozilla to firefox, web browsers have always been free."

You are wrong. Opera has been a commercial browser for ten years. There's even a browser for Mac, OmniWeb, which costs money. And Netscape wasn't free to begin with either.

Better learn your browser history before making such remarks.

"There's your answer on Opera."

And a typical misleading and grasping for straws one at that :|