Opera, the "other" PC browser famous for it's speed and compact size, has been ported to a number of alternative platforms, but previously they've not been interested in a RISC OS port. However, they now appear to be willing to have their minds changed, according to a posting on comp.sys.acorn.misc by John Duffell. Which is where you lot come in.
Opera need to warrant the cost of developing the browser for RISC OS, so you need to show support for the idea by visiting their news server (news.opera.com or news.opera.no), joining the opera.wishlist group and posting supportive comments (preferably to the "Opera on RISC OS" thread). Opera employees read and take note of postings on this group, so now's the time to make your voice heard!
For those of you who haven't come across it before, the browser in it's PC version comes with mail and news programs, and is free so long as you submit to a banner add in the top corner (the ads go away if you pay for the browser). It's a very solid browser with good support for style sheets etc., while taking up very little disc space or download time. Think of having Internet Explorer or Netscape-type standards support but without the bloat! Stop reading this and get posting now!
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Help get Opera ported to RISC OS! |
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(15:57 7/6/2001)
Marco Frissen (16:53 7/6/2001)
Marco Frissen (16:58 7/6/2001)
Richie (17:10 7/6/2001)
Michael Stubbs (17:24 7/6/2001)
Rob Kendrick (17:51 7/6/2001)
Richard Walker (19:05 7/6/2001)
Gunnlaugur Jonsson (19:20 7/6/2001)
John Duffell (21:41 7/6/2001)
Graham (00:04 8/6/2001)
Gunnlaugur Jonsson (00:25 8/6/2001)
Marco Frissen (05:35 8/6/2001)
Gunnlaugur Jonsson (09:53 8/6/2001)
Lee Johnston (11:57 8/6/2001)
Rob Kendrick (13:21 8/6/2001)
Steffen Huber (13:52 8/6/2001)
Gunnlaugur Jonsson (15:29 8/6/2001)
Michael Gerbracht (15:48 8/6/2001)
Feugey david (17:57 8/6/2001)
Wrath (21:52 8/6/2001)
John Duffell (13:49 9/6/2001)
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Michael Stubbs |
Message #88663, posted at 15:57, 7/6/2001 |
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I discussed this with Opera ages ago and one of the fellas there stated RISC OS was one of his personal favourite platforms :-) He said porting was not possible at that time due to low user base etc but he sounded really interested none-the-less. Off I go to add some comments... |
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Marco Frissen |
Message #88664, posted at 16:53, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88663 |
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Hey, if they port for EPOC and BeOS (and QNX), if we'd push _really_ hard, maybe it'll succeed.
However, I'd rather see a new Oregano out soon... |
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Marco Frissen |
Message #88665, posted at 16:58, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88664 |
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Eh, Oregano maybe good, but the full fledged Opera is more feature wise. But I guess that could take a while to develop (although, who knows, and maybe they're running a secret alpha version already internally) |
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Richie |
Message #88666, posted at 17:10, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88665 |
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Regardless of how likely it is to come off, It's gotta be worth a shot. RISC OS needs all the help it can get. |
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Michael Stubbs |
Message #88667, posted at 17:24, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88666 |
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This can only be viewed as a Good Thing be RISC OS users, except of course for Castle and RComp. However, maybe if Opera was out for RISC OS, it would ensure Oregano did not go for so long without being updated. From a designer's point of view, the more browsers to test in the better :-) I am hopeful - isn't Opera out for Amiga? Says it all... |
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Rob Kendrick |
Message #88668, posted at 17:51, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88667 |
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I suppose it'd help if RISC OS had a good X Server. I use the QNX port of Opera at work, but it was an early one that uses X for Photon, rather than the native Photon. If we had a good X Server, so much more nice software would become instantly available. Hohum. :( (Also, QNX's font engine's a bit cack, which makes browsing with it a bit painful; just go and look at one of BT's internet phone boxes to see what I mean) |
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Richard Walker |
Message #88669, posted at 19:05, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88668 |
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I don't think it's so simple... Why don't we have a modern C++ compiler? A port of the GIMP? Mozilla? Konqueror? KDE productivity applications? Why is it such an effort to port something from another platform? Simple. RISC OS doesn't have the required development tools. As soon as Opera look at the technical feasibility of porting their browser to RISC OS, they'll run a mile. :-( |
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Gunnlaugur Jonsson |
Message #88670, posted at 19:20, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88669 |
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...or port a decent C++ compiler to RISC OS :-) One can always dream! |
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John Duffell |
Message #88671, posted at 21:41, 7/6/2001, in reply to message #88670 |
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Use
http://groups.google.com/groups?num=25&hl=en&lr=&group=opera.wishlist&safe=off&start=0&group=opera.wishlist
if you don't want to reconfigure Messenger Pro or whatever. It posts new articles to the server periodically, but the thread's appeared now.HTH |
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Graham |
Message #88672, posted at 00:04, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88671 |
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Why should we need Opera so desparately?
Oregano isn't so bad really and Opera has trouble with a lot of the sites too.
True, it is better than Oregano, but isn't the real problem that we have, the lack of Java, upto date Flash etc..?
A new browser isn't going to cure the lack of these things, and IMO these are needed much, much more than yet another browser (especially one as appauling to use as Opera!) |
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Gunnlaugur Jonsson |
Message #88673, posted at 00:25, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88672 |
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Because Opera is a high profile browser that's being converted to many different platforms and is really trying make a name for itself. One of their playing cards is the number of platforms it's available on and why not use that to promote RISC OS - RISC OS really needs the outside attention unless people are really happy just sitting on their a**e looking at their favorite OS fade away.
Oregano may not be so bad but with it's current development speed, it will take 5-10 years before they're up where Opera is today that is if it doesn't disappear in the next year or so because it's author has got a job. Face it, that's the main reason most applications disappear from the RISC OS platform!
No disrespect for the developers of Oregano, they simply don't have the resources Opera has.
Am I correct in thinking that this might be the first major player on the Windows platform to even noticing RISC OS (other than MS stealing practically everything in Win95 from it) |
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Marco Frissen |
Message #88674, posted at 05:35, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88673 |
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Richard Walker: no decent C++ compiler? What about gcc then, widely considered among the best (don't really know the status of it on ROS though). |
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Gunnlaugur Jonsson |
Message #88675, posted at 09:53, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88674 |
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RISC OS GCC is very much out of date, although it's back in development and it's way off the ANSI standard for C++. I've no idea if it will get anywhere near the standard with the next release but then there will be a huge problem with the lack of a WIMP class library. Specially since RISC OS Ltd. doesn't want to comment on if Toolbox is the way to go or if they're working on some other solution. ROL has OTOH stated that they're working on getting a development tool for RISC OS. What that is remains to be seen. Hopefully it's a good C++ compiler with a good class library and some decent form of debugging. |
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Lee Johnston |
Message #88676, posted at 11:57, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88675 |
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AIUI RISC OS GCC is as up to date as any other version. The RiscGuiLib guys are still working on a class library - at least the mailing list is periodically active. I don't know how far it's come along as I can only find links to a library generously donated by Colin Granville and I'm not sure how this relates to RiscGuiLib. As far as ROS Ltd sorting out improved tools goes I wouldn't be surprised if it's an official release of Paces updated versions of the Norcroft compiler although I did read somewhere that someone is working on a much improved version of !ResEd |
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Rob Kendrick |
Message #88677, posted at 13:21, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88676 |
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QNX asked Opera to port their browser to QNX 6 because they want to target the Set Top Box market, and supply a middle-of-the-road browser (QNX's native browser, Voyager, is tiny, but not very functional, and you have Mozilla at the other end). Having Opera available for as many OSes used in set top boxes is obviously an advantage to Pace, RISC OS included. |
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Steffen Huber |
Message #88678, posted at 13:52, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88677 |
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I don't know why people always make strange comments like "Why don't we have a modern C++ compiler?" or "RISC OS GCC is very much out of date [...] and it's way off the ANSI standard for C++." RISC OS GCC is a port of GCC version 2.95.2, which is only one small version behind the current one (2.95.3 was released March 16th). It is much better at implementing the C++ standard than e.g. Microsofts C++ effort. There is currently no C++ compiler available that fully implements the C++ standard. GCC is our only hope to get a decent C++ compiler. The ARM offering will not work with current RISC OS things (it is only ELF enabled), Norcroft will always be plain C. So please help the GCC guys - porting the forthcoming GCC 3.0 will be another major effort, and helping with UnixLib is always a good idea. Yes, we will still need a decent RISC OS class library, but don't think that this will come from either Pace or RISCOS Ltd. - help the RO-GuiLib guys to accomplish the task. Apart from that, writing code in C++ still helps a lot, even when using it with something low level like OSLib. |
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Gunnlaugur Jonsson |
Message #88679, posted at 15:29, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88678 |
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This is because I read an article about EasyC++ sometime ago - don't remember where at the moment. That article complained that Easy C++ could only compile a very small part of the ANSI C++ samples available somewhere (don't know where), then compared it to the Norcroft compiler that was a little better. I asked around and I was told that the current version of GCC for RISC OS was even further away from the standard than the other two. No one has objected to that anywhere that I have seen and therefore I assumed it was true and didn't even bother checking it because I didn't see the point in getting a compiler that was worse than the one I had already (Acorn C/C++). If the GCC compiler is somewhere near the ANSI C++ standard I'd love to hear about it and I'll get downloading and using it. Yours is the first comment I've read stating that the GCC compiler is close to the standard so please convince me. I'll start a thread in the Programming Forum here on IconBar where you can try! |
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Michael Gerbracht |
Message #88680, posted at 15:48, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88679 |
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You will find more information on GCC at the following website: http://www.arcsite.de/hp/gcc/index.html |
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Feugey david |
Message #88681, posted at 17:57, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88680 |
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Opera team should not forget that a port for RISC OS means a port for some PACE STB. And there are a lot of these (a few millions now). So it's not a little market, but a hudge one. Anyway if they give me sources, eQ will try to port it. |
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Wrath |
Message #88682, posted at 21:52, 8/6/2001, in reply to message #88681 |
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And DavidF is certainly an excellent worker. |
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John Duffell |
Message #88683, posted at 13:49, 9/6/2001, in reply to message #88682 |
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DavidF: post on the opera.wishlist newsgroup and offer your support if you want :-) |
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