Opera sues designer for leaking trade secrets to Mozilla
Norwegian browser maker Opera Software has filed suit against Trond Werner Hansen, one of its former developers, alleging that Hansen took trade secrets with him when he went to work with Opera rival Mozilla.
As first reported by The Next Web, Hansen worked at Opera from 1999 through 2006. There he led design and UI development, first for the Windows version of the Opera browser, then for the cross-platform Desktop version. He later returned as an independent consultant from 2009 to 2010, at Opera's request.
Then in 2012, Hansen began to work with the Mozilla Foundation, makers of the open source Firefox browser – and that's when things got dicey. Read more...
Opera updated following unexplained Outlook.com lockout
Opera Software is working on a fix to ensure Microsoft’s Hotmail successor Outlook.com works in its browser.
Opera has pumped out Update 12.01 to make Outlook.com work with its browser but warned fans might continue to encounter problems with attachments. It has also patched a critical vulnerability in desktop versions of its browser software in the update.
The browser company said here: “There may still be some issues with attachments for the time being, but we are working on getting that taken care of as soon as possible too.”
The idea of Outlook.com is you can open Word, Excel, and PowerPoint attachments in a browser window through the hosted version of Office, Office Web Apps.
You can get Opera’s fix here.
Microsoft launched Outlook.com on Tuesday and immediately Opera users found themselves unable to use the service. Read more...
Google makes Opera bloggers an offer they can’t refuse: Use Chrome
Google is warning Opera web browser users they must switch to Chrome in order to use Blogger.com, the search giant's blog-hosting service. No technical incompatibilities have been found to justify the alarm.
After a reader tip-off, El Reg created a Google blog using Opera 12.0 for Mac this morning, and received this message:
Blog off, Google
The site continues to operate just fine and dandy using Opera. However, the Blogger warning message is persistent: dismiss it, and it reappears. The alert box is banished if Opera changes its user-agent string - the line of text the browser sends to a server to identify itself - and pretends to be a build of Chrome. Read more...
New Opera 12 hooks web apps to 3D graphics acceleration
A new version of Opera's desktop browser rolls out today, six weeks after the public beta.
The list of new features hasn't changed much - and the new version also deprecates older features such as Opera Unite and widgets. HTML apps can now take advantage of experimental hardware acceleration and also access to the computer's webcam.
The hardware acceleration drills into the machine's 3D graphics processor to render pages, WebGL JavaScript code and the browser's user interface. It is enabled on an opt-in basis and remains labelled "experimental". Read more...
Opera 12 Beta Launches, Loses Voice, Unite and Widgets
Opera is launching the first official beta of the next version of its desktop browser today. As usual, the Opera 12 beta includes a number of new features and enhancements, but this release also marks the end of some of the company’s more ambitious projects. With Opera 12, the company is ending support for Unite, the browser’s built-in personal cloud/streaming media platform that made its debut in 2009, and Opera Widgets. Opera is also phasing out support for its built-in speech recognition, text-to-speech and VoiceXML technologies.
This release isn’t just about removing features, though. Far from it. Among the new features is a new engine for writing and displaying browser themes (Opera previously called these ‘skins’). Read more...
Android passes Opera to become number one mobile browser
For years, Opera has quietly dominated the mobile browsing scene. Even when the iPhone’s popularity skyrocketed, Opera’s massive installed user base kept their browser firmly in the lead. But there’s a new number one now: Android has crept into the pole position.
The reason for the shift is easy enough to see. Opera used to offer something no one else did: a capable browser that ran on very inexpensive phones. Even on older BlackBerry phones, the Opera browser was the way to go. Today, however, there are scores of low-cost smartphones available from carriers around the globe running Android. Read more...
Opera Mobile 12 for Android gets a massive update, Intel and MIPs versions debut
Opera has made some major improvements to its Mobile and Mini browsers in recent versions, and today at MWC 2012 they’ve announced a new spate of enhancements to their smartphone and tablet versions.
First up is a new channel for Opera Mini, Opera Mini Next. Just like it is on the desktop, Opera Mini Next is aimed at beta enthusiasts that don’t mind trading the occasional bug or application crash for cutting-edge functionality. For this go-round, Next is offering up a glimpse at the new Opera Mini Smart Page, a social networking complement to the company’s trademark Speed Dial page. The Speed Dial itself has been improved and now supports an unlimited number of shortcuts. Read more...
Opera’s new store beams HTML5 apps into tellies
Opera Software is making a play for turning your TV into a window-on-the-web with the announcement of Opera TV Store.
The browser maker's unveiled e-shop will flog HTML5 apps that you can use from your TV. The idea is to make it possible to access web content and apps using your existing HD-TV and remote controls, without needing to hook up a media centre or keyboard.
Opera said in a release: "By introducing easily navigated HTML5 apps such as Facebook or Vimeo to your living room, it expands your TV entertainment options." Opera TV Store was unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas on Monday. Read more...
Facebook porn storm used same tactics as May’s Bin Laden spam
IE8, IE9, Opera and Safari vulnerable to 'self-XSS' attacks
The attacks against Facebook that planted pornography on users' news feeds relied on the same trickery as a campaign last spring that touted the death of Osama Bin Laden, a security researcher said today.
On Tuesday, Facebook confirmed what it called "a coordinated spam attack" that resulted in sexually explicit images, as well as photos of animal abuse, spreading on member's pages.
Facebook identified the hacker tactic used to hijack pages and bombard friends with the photos as an exploit of what it called a "self-XSS browser vulnerability."
That label -- self-XSS -- has been used by other researchers, including those at Commtouch, to describe a ploy where spam messages tell recipients to copy and paste JavaScript into their browser's address bar. The script, however, is in fact malicious and exploits a bug in the browser. Read more...
Opera 11.50 debuts with Speed Dial extensions
Opera has officially released a new version of its desktop browser – Opera 11.50 – adding widget-like "extensions" to the familiar Speed Dial page that appears each time you open a new tab.
Previously, Speed Dial only offered thumbnails that linked you to oft-visited sites. But with Opera 11.50 – announced in the early Norwegian hours on Tuesday – you can also install extensions that provide real-time access to content directly from the page. "These are basically like small front-ends to websites," Jan Standal, Opera's vice president of Desktop Products, tells The Register. An extension might provide weather updates or the latest news headlines. Read more...
Opera releases Web page debugger
Opera Software has embedded into its Web browser a beta set of tools, collectively called Dragonfly, that can help developers find errors in their complex Web pages, the company announced Monday.
"Dragonflies eat bugs, and that is exactly what we want [Dragonfly] to do for developers around the world," said David Storey, an Opera developer relationship manager, in a statement.
Dragonfly is not the first browser-based debugger. Mozilla, for example, offers Firebug, and Google's Chrome browser also features some built-in element inspection features as well. Dragonfly also offers the ability to debug Web pages on smartphones, televisions and other devices, by hooking them up to the developer's PC. Read more...