Former Dev Gives Gloomy Outlook On Linux Support For the Opera Browser 181
An anonymous reader writes: "It doesn't take a Columbo to figure out that the 'previous employer, a small browser vendor that decided to abandon its own rendering engine and browser stack' is referring to Opera in this comment answering the question 'Do you actually use the product you are working on?' It appears to originate from Andreas Tolfsen, a former Opera developer who is now part of the Mozilla project. From releasing a unified architecture browser including Linux support since 2001, Opera decided to put Linux development on indefinite hold, communicated through blog comments, and focus on Windows and Mac for their browser rewrite centered around the Blink engine that had its first beta release last spring. The promise to bring back the Linux version in due time was met with growing skepticism as the months went by, and clear answers have been avoided in the developer blog. The uncertainty has spawned user projects such as Otter browser in an attempt to recreate the Opera UI in a free application. Tolfsen's statement seem to be in line with what users have suspected all along: Opera for Linux is not something for the near future."
Opera is dead. (Score:5, Interesting)
It's just a disfunctional Chrome with Opera branding now.
It died when they abandoned their own codebase.
Opera is the fifth wheel on the wagon (Score:0, Interesting)
Before Firefox came along they fulfilled a role, but now we have two widely used open source (and in the case of FF, vendor independent) desktop web browsers, as well as Safari and IE. It's a marketing hole that really can't be fixed by technically superior engineering (which they apparently no longer have, if they ever did).
If they want to stay around they need to find a new mission, some device or service that only Opera can or will do a decent job of serving from. While they're at it, they should come up with a new name b/c Americans don't like going to the opera and haven't for the last 60 years or so - they think going to the opera is for losers.
Sad (Score:5, Interesting)
I had been an avid Opera fan since I first started using it quite a few years ago. I used it when it was the only browser that had tabbed browsing. A feature that is now part of every browser out there. The folks behind the Opera browser were innovators. They had tabs, the speed dial, Opera link (which would sync bookmarks and other items between your browsers), and gestures years before other browsers and they fully believed in being standards compliant. When I heard they were moving away from being a browser developer to being a browser repackager, I stopped using it. They went from innovating to tagging along for a ride. I recently fired up the new version of Opera to be very, very disappointed because it was simply a repacked version of Chrome. Most of the features that I had grown to love were gone and I found no reason to continue using it.
Re:Sad (Score:5, Interesting)