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The latest technology preview of Opera 9 is available today. We've added several big features – including BitTorrent support and Widgets. Give it a shot and let us know what you think.
We at Opera believe in an open Web for everyone. We try hard to use open standards in everything we do. We hope Opera Labs, by providing active encouragement for standards, will play a vital role in shaping an open and shared future for the Web.
Opera 9's Technical Preview 2 was unveiled today, along with Opera Labs which looks similar to the purpose of Google Labs.
[labs.opera.com...]
[labs.opera.com...]
[edited by: encyclo at 11:43 am (utc) on Feb. 8, 2006]
[edit reason] added links [/edit]
What's the aim for Opera with the 9.x release?
[edited by: encyclo at 4:33 pm (utc) on Feb. 7, 2006]
Added content blocking feature. Right click on a page and select "Block content", then click on content that you want to block. Alternatively, use Tools > Advanced > Content blocked to manage blocked content.
Just what we need, another browser with improved and selective ad blocking.
If my ad income wasn't skyrocketing this week thanks to some SERP update I'd be upset and start a rampage, maybe later.
For this to be perfect, the image needs to generate faster, or the tip needs to show quicker. I don't want to have to hover it for 3 seconds, just to see the thumbnail. I could have clicked on the tab, then back to my first tab in that amount of time.
They've still got a ways to go on the bookmark manager. I thought that was going to be worked on for this release.
I agree with encyclo's take on the Widgets. If this is what the final implementation is going to look like I'll pass. Reminds me of the old push applications that were popular in the late 1990s. I can't see using them in their current form.
Overall I like it though. It seems even faster than my 8.51 when rendering pages. I'm going to set this one as the default browser for a while and see what happens.
Other than that, I'm loving it :)
Just what we need, another browser with improved and selective ad blocking.
It goes with the territory, and anyway what would you prefer? An Opera user who may (rarely) selectively block your ads, or an IE user ridden with spyware which is replacing your ads with another network? Those who actively choose to block ads aren't going to click anyway.
a thumbnail of the page
How powerful a machine do you have? This is a very cool idea, but is also a sign of bloat - too much fancy stuff which sounds good in theory but is far from essential.
Compared to Opera 8.51, is there really any major change or advance in Opera 9?
Jennifer
The interface appears more or less unchanged from 8.51 (which I used only very infrequently). Actually whilst trying the widgets I have become a little less sceptical: I could see myself using them, but they remain very peripheral in terms of importance.
I'll see if I can use this thing for a while of if I'll go back to Firefox rapidly. :)
<added> There is a bug in my version with the menu at the top of this page: the mouseover yellow highlighting covers up the text on the line above. A line height issue perhaps? </added>
bookmark manager
The only changes I'm not too thrilled with are whatever they did to the Gmail compatibility. Gmail works a lot better in 8.5x than this beta. I'm hoping they fix that in the final.
And why is the browser ignoring the cache instructions for this page? I post and the page refreshes to a browser cache without my new post showing - it goes back to an earlier version even after a refresh when I edit. I have to F5 to see it, which is incredibly annoying!
Is there actually any simple way of organizing my bookmarks and personal bar folders in an order of my choosing rather than alphabetically?
I've had this beta crash on me a few times today, so it's got a ways to go on the stability side. I may have to switch back to 8.51 if this keeps up.
Pages not refreshing is a serious bug, which came into play with Preview 1. What also happens is that pages refresh randomly, even when the content hasn't changed! Try going back and forward between a few pages and they'll start refreshing! Never happened with version 8.
I've had this beta crash on me a few times today
I think we've been a bit confused by the nomenclature used by the Opera team for their test releases: apparently a "preview" for them is pre-beta and is considered unstable. Beta follows after the TP versions. See:
[snapshot.opera.com...]
So the bugs we are seeing are more understandable, and Opera 9.x has still a way to go before release.
The refresh bug is killing me...particularly on WebmasterWorld. I'm also not too fond of the way it handles forms. I'm seeing text wrapping in odd places on some sites and sometimes not wrapping at all (horizontal scroll bar).
This has been fun, but I think I'll wait for beta before I try any more testing of O9.
