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Date:      Tue, 23 Sep 2003 19:06:37 +0000
From:      Mark Valentine <mark@valentine.me.uk>
To:        Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@online.fr>
Cc:        chat@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: BSDCon photos
Message-ID:  <200309231806.h8NI6bJu054779@dotar.thuvia.org>

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> From: Mark Valentine <mark@valentine.me.uk>
> Date: Tue 23 Sep, 2003
> Subject: Re: BSDCon photos

> Last time I tried Opera it was at least as flaky and just, well, weird.  Maybe
> I should give it another try, it's been about a year.  (Footnote: installed
> Opera 6.12 [static] and it seems to run reasonably - didn't drop core until I
> exited; anyway, it looks like I can now configure it into something not too
> wasteful of screen space - apart from that banner ad - so I'll give it a spin
> for a while.)

Well, having given Opera another chance, it doesn't look like it passes muster
just yet, though it's generally quite promising.

Opera 6.12 installed easily enough and generally ran well, but a few things are
still a regression from Netscape 4 for me:

  * mis-layout of tables for the my.yahoo.com page;

  * some strange rendering (e.g. of button fonts, creating large bold font
    buttons);

  * pop-up windows appearing in the wrong virtual desktop under olvwm;

  * annoying advertising pop-ups (no, I won't pay for their removal in the
    browser's current state);

  * one core dump during normal use in my short trial (and one every time I
    exit) - they're smaller than Netscape's, though!

The 7.20 beta wouldn't run for me due to missing libawt - and no, I can't
install the JRE port even if I delete the offending mtree file (at least it
looks like the FreeBSD Foundation's binary package changes permissions
even outside of its target installation directory), due to gtk dependencies.

I'll keep it around and try to use it for a few more things, but I'll have to
keep Netscape 4 for the tasks Opera doesn't quite hack it for yet.

In short, all the whizzy new stuff Opera brings me (its general technical
excellence and adherence to modern standards, some neat usability innovations)
are of little consequence if it gets basic things wrong when applied to
day-to-day tasks.

		Cheers,

		Mark.

-- 
"Tigers will do ANYTHING for a tuna fish sandwich."
"We're kind of stupid that way."   *munch* *munch*
  -- <http://www.calvinandhobbes.com>;



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