Arve Bersvendsen

HTML/XHTML archive

ACID3: Strike ninety-eight. Make that 100

2008-03-26 21:20

Below is a screenshot of the Acid3, taken straight from one of our developer's machines. It's a screenshot of the builds we use to test core functionality in Opera (cue the weird, minimalistic user interface).

Yes, it says 100/100. I'm not going to say too much about it right now, other than send some Kudos in the general direction of the developers responsible (whom for some reason always seem to keep a low profile), and point to what Anne said earlier when we reached 98.

Note that there is a small rendering glitch left, but we will fix that too in due time. If you want to follow what happens in the future, visit the desktop team blog

This entry has more text, continue reading “ACID3: Strike ninety-eight. Make that 100” | Six comments | Browsers , HTML/XHTML , Javascript , Misc , Opera , Standards , Technology , Web

Opera 9.5 alpha, Kestrel, released

2007-09-04 14:44

Ok, I never got around to blog the release of Opera Mini 4 beta 2 — apologies for that. Let me instead introduce you to Opera 9.5 Alpha - a.k.a. Kestrel.

A quick overview is available on a separate product page

So, what’s new? In a nutshell:

History search
Bookmark synchronization
Dramatic performance improvements
Web site compatibility improvements
Improved standards support
Huge improvements to M2

The Changelog

I wish I could get through all of the changelog here, but I’m afraid it’s way too long, and I could blog until 2011 about it, in which case Kestrel would already be severely out of date. Instead, I’ll just give you the links.

So, let’s go through some of the changes

History search

I’ve lost count of the times in the past, when I’ve visited some page, somewhere, and have been totally unable to remember where it was, on what domain, or even what the document title was. In other words, finding what I have already visited has been a very hard task, bordering on impossible. Enter history search.

With history search, Opera creates a full-text index of each and every page you visit, and when you go to the address bar, you can simply start entering words you know have been on pages you’ve visited before, and items matching your search show up. It’s a kind of magic, really. At least compared to what browsers have done in the past.

Not only can you do this, but there is also an internal web page, named opera:historysearch that gives you a more traditional web search interface that allows you to bookmark your searches. Speaking of which …

Bookmark synchronization

Bookmarks have changed in Kestrel. In the past, the only way to get your bookmarks from machine to machine was to export the bookmarks, copy the opera6.adr file, or use external software to transport them. In Kestrel, you simply log in with your My Opera account, and sync your bookmarks, speed dial items and personal bar with the server (The synchronization is using https, fwiw, so you don’t need to fear that your data are being compromised).

So, you may say “I never use two computers, why should I sync?”. Real men don’t do external backup. They just cry a lot - when their offices catch on fire!. That’s why.

M2

I have been absolutely dependent on M2 as my mail client for years, but it has had a number of annoying issues, related both to IMAP, and to indexing, where I’ve seen mail go into the wrong access point for no reason. I’m happy to report that I haven’t seen any such issues with mail with Kestrel for a long time.

Keyboard shortcuts

Now, this change is probably somewhat controversial for old-time Opera users, since they probably have single-key shortcuts as part of their muscle memory. For newcomers, though, Opera is going to feel a lot less alien, as all single-key shortcuts have been removed in the default setup. This prevents these newcomers from performing accidental navigation, or from changing their browser’s settings without knowing how.

Those oldtimers who want the old setup back, can do so, though, by checking the box in opera:config#UserPrefs|EnabledExtendedKeyboardShortcuts (Alternatively, by going to Preferences->Advanced->Shortcuts and and check “Enable single key shortcuts”.)

Now, on to more developer-related stuff

Selectors

Kestrel has top-notch support for CSS3 selectors, as shown in this demo.

Backgrounds

Kestrel has also added support for SVG in background-images, plus support for the background-size property. David Storey has created an extremely nice demo, also including a showoff of Opera’s extended selector support (mirrored with permission, as the My Opera file store doesn’t allow external referers).

Overflows

Opera now support both the overflow-x and overflow-y from the CSS3 box model specification. This both improves web site compatibility, since there are a few sites out there that use this, and it allows you, as an author improved control over those scrollbars.

getElementsByClassName

Library vendors, take note. Opera supports getElementsByClassName natively. This should allow for even faster selectors.

Dynamic media queries

In Kestrel, CSS3 Media queries support has improved, making them dynamic. For you, as a developer, you can now count on Opera actually applying the correct style when the user resizes his window, instead of re-rendering on a resize event. You can view this yourself here - note how the content changes in the max-width & min-width tests when you resize the window.

Getters and setters

Opera now supports Getters and setters from JavaScript 1.5.

Offline support

While Opera doesn’t yet implement a peristent storage, the Navigator.onLine is now supported, with window.online and window.offline events for when the value changes.

Spatial navigation

Controlling keyboard navigation can be a major pain in web applications, in particular if your application is on a device with “keyboard” as the only input device, which is the reality if you want to make web applications tailored to mobile devices, or you want to accomodate those unable to use a mouse. Opera support for these scenarios have improved in two ways.

First, Kestrel supports a custom CSS pseudo class -o-prefocus that applies to form elements that have been reached via spatial navigation, allowing for better styling. Further, Opera also now support four methods on the document object, document.moveFocusLeft(),document.moveFocusUp(),document.moveFocusRight() and document.moveFocusDown(), allowing you to initiate spatnav on regular keyboard events. I have put up a very simple demo that demonstrates a use of this property. When you navigate of the right end of a table, the code in the example moves the spatial navigation focus to the far left of the table row below. The code is not commented, but should be fairly simple to understand.

Text-shadow

Kestrel also adds (full) support for the CSS3 text-shadow property. Unlike WebKit’s support, Opera supports multiple text-shadows, comma-separated (More precisely: You can have 12 of them).

There’s more?

Yes. There’s lots more, and like I said, I could continue posting stuff from the aforementioned changelog until 2011, now go download a build for unix, Mac or Windows

Have fun.

Opera 9.5 alpha, Kestrel, released | Browsers , CSS , CSS3 , HTML/XHTML , Javascript , Linux , Misc , Opera , Standards , Technology , Web

Opera 9.20 beta 1

2007-03-28 15:49

Opera 9.20 is out. Here’s stuff for you to read:

So, what’s new?

There’s now a menu item in Tools -> Advanced that brings you to a landing page for developer tools. The developer console really is quite nifty
Speed Dial, a default blank page which allows you to keep up to nine URLs handy, with thumbnails and instant keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl-1 to Ctrl-9 accesses your speed dial sites directly). If you’d just prefer the regular plain old blank page, go to opera:config#UserPrefs|SpeedDialState and set the value to ‘3’ to turn it off. The allowed values are:
- 0: Folded
- 1: Shown
- 2: Read only, and always show speed dial
- 3: Disable speed dial
Multiple other fixes, for rendering, stability and security. Too much to list, read the changelogs if you need the details.

You know you want it, so go get it!

Opera 9.20 beta 1 | One comment | Ajax , HTML/XHTML , Javascript , Opera , Web

Komodo Edit add-ons

2007-03-20 16:26

Since making the switch to Komodo Edit, I’ve made a few customizations to it, to make my day-to-day editing of markup a bit easier. The files are available through SVN. Documentation follows.

This entry has more text, continue reading “Komodo Edit add-ons” | Three comments | HTML/XHTML , Javascript , Komodo Edit , Opera , Widgets

I see a shitstorm coming

2007-03-15 10:17

I just noticed this assertion of intellectual property rights on canvas from Apple, Inc (That is, they claim to own patents on the technology). Without elaborating further, and only speaking on behalf of myself: This has the potential to make people upset.

I see a shitstorm coming | Four comments | Browsers , Canvas , HTML/XHTML , Javascript , Programming , Standards

The WHATWG Blog

2006-11-14 10:03 – Leave a comment

Opera Developer Community site launches

2006-11-01 13:29 – One comment

Opera launches a beta of the new Opera Developer Community site, named Dev.Opera. Here's a quick walkthrough

HOWTO: Painless markup validation with Opera and Ubuntu

2006-10-03 15:18 – 11 comments

How to install the markup validator locally in Ubuntu Linux and configuring Opera to use the locally installed validator in place of the w3c hosted one.

Aptana

2006-07-25 15:37 – Leave a comment

Opera 9

2006-06-20 10:26 – Seven comments

Opera 9 is out. Go get it: Widgets, BitTorrent, improved standards support

Opera passes Acid2

2006-03-12 20:06 – Five comments

Opera 9 now passes the Acid2 test, as the second browser to do so, behind Safari.

Draconian error handling hurts business and real people; XHTML be doomed

2005-11-25 16:18 – Leave a comment

Why would anyone want a word processor?

2005-11-13 08:52 – Three comments

Tim Bray asks: "So, I understand why we still need spreadsheets and presentation packages, but assuming you had a Web editor with a good change tracker, why would anyone want a word processor any more?" I'm also wondering

Why microformats is a good thing

2005-11-08 09:56 – Seven comments

Why microformats is a good thing, why you should embrace them, and use them whenever possible.

Doctype switching for SGML comments

2005-11-07 09:44 – Leave a comment

The reinvention of the broken wheel

2005-07-02 00:18 – Three comments

Hey kids, it's 2005. The last couple of years have been about making a cleaner, better web. Not that I expect regular "web pages" to look better, but please don't stuff your space-wasting, superflous, crap quality markup and "style everything with HTML" down my throat.

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