A Sad Sad Day...

[az]

Think she'd still hate Opera if it looked like IE, including most menus, without tabs, mouse gestures,etc.? My GF used to hate Opera, too, but I was more persistant than she was. Little sis and parents now also use Opera

BTW, I think for certain sites she might still need to use IE (those plug-ins you mentioned might need ActiveX, or the site was "optimized" for IE), but for the rest, she should really use a more secure browser. To use my metaphor from above, it's like locking your door (secure browser for the internet), but giving the key to a trusted neighbour (IE for those work sites that need it).

AZ

[xortam]

I still use Opera exclusively ... unless I hit a site that either refuses to let me use it in Opera *coughHeavy.comcough* or the rare occasion it doesn't work. ...

... and that's the rub. I'm not going to load alternate browsers according to where I surf. IE is already bundled into the OS so I don't need to maintain yet another app. I don't need a lot of frivolous browsing features so I set my security accordingly and I'm done. This browser war is very old and tiresome.

I feel your pain Jammy. My wife recently had I/O problems on her ancient NT4 work PC that she uses at home. I'd act as her IT guy when she had time for a quick fix, otherwise she'd lug the PC into work for repair. I've begged her to update for years but she claimed some of their home-grown apps needed NT. She's also been using an old Netscape browser on there forever. I suspected her latest problem was a failing disk but I wasn't given the opportunity to do more than check her event log. The IT folks at her company claimed her problem was likely a SW error (highly doubtful by what little I saw and heard) and stated they could re-image her system or install XP, even though it was underpowered for XP. They later came back and said they couldn't re-image the box since it was a security risk while running NT (she connected through a VPN at home). The IT folks loaded XP on the system and installed FireFox as the default browser. She doesn't want to use FireFox and would rather use IE on the system (her extra-company browser when Netscape didn't hack it). I loudly cautioned her to let me secure IE for her but I was quickly cut off from any discussion. This just occurred this week so I need to sit down with her and get this straightened out before all hell breaks loose.

[xortam]

I'm now told that the new install on the wife's work PC includes spyware watchers as well as the usual compliment of anti-virus apps and such so she should be mostly okay (though not enough for my liking). She also still has to use IE on occasion for some internal sites because they're not supported by FireFox ... again proving my point about alternate browsers.

[High_Jumbllama]

A coworker had a problem where the MS antispyware trashed his network settings. For some reason this "BETA" program is listed as a critical Windows Update.

[magog]

She also still has to use IE on occasion for some internal sites because they're not supported by FireFox ... again proving my point about alternate browsers.

But you do know that some sites won't work because they check the "user agent" don't you?

There are Firefox/Mozilla Plugins that allow it to look for the server as it's MS IE.
Most sites then even work with FF/Mozilla.
One "User Agent switcher" is this: http://www.chrispederick.com/work/fi...agentswitcher/

Opera can also do this "user agent" change.

[xortam]

"Hack, hack sweet Charlotte ..."

[az]

If you knew what you're talking about...

Some sites actively discriminate against alternative browsers by sending them different code than IE, often broken or incomplete code. Read this blog entry from an Opera employee (and I can assure you what he writes is the truth, I've seen it myself, for instance at www.dpreview.com - whose owner I have contacted and managed to convince to do something about it. Unfortunately, he didn't go for my proposed very very easy complete fix but instead hacked together something that only half works).

AZ

[Sasq]

If you only knew the stuff that gets turned off on the forums, for opera users because of quirks in opera's JS as well as DOM system

[VJ]

This software (Dutch) scans a system using a number of packages. Even though the software is Dutch, the list of packages used can be helpfull:

http://www.hitmanpro.nl/

I had similar issues: my neighbour asked me to help him with his computer.
"Do you have a virusscanner?"
"Yes, but I haven't paid (Norton), so my last update was in 2003."
"ok-e... Do you have a firewall?"
"Yes, Norton."
"Nope, that is only a virusscanner."
"Oh, well in that case, euhm, then No, I don't have a firewall."

I took quite a number of hours to rid the system of everything (his browser showed numerous popups and crashed randomly). The hardest to get rid of were the CoolWWWSearch-variants.

I installed AVG Free (Grisoft), ServicaPack 2 (and activated the firewall, better this than no firewall at all) and Spybot.
Now, I think I'll also install Spywareblaster (active shield that prevents spyware from installing) and CWShredder (to make it easier in the future to get rid of the CoolWWWSearch variants).


Jörg

[az]

Sasq I never talked about DOM. I am also not talking about web apps, but ordinary websites which, first and foremost, serve content.

Do you mean you turn stuff off for Opera users or do you mean you turn stuff off for everyone because of Opera users? In any case, I certainly don't miss any functionality.

AZ

[Sasq]

no it turns off stuff for opera users.
Jesse can give a better explination of what you are missing out on, but I do know you are missing out on certain eye candy.

Also more and more web pages are using the DOM for menus, and extra functions, even more so as the distinction between web page and web app becomes blured.

[az]

Opera 8 improves on things a little, mostly due to gmail and google suggest, and fancy menues with CSS1/CSS2 are certainly possible in Opera, though different things are broken than in Gecko

I'd sure like a quick rundown of things that don't work on MURC in Opera, so if you have time, Jesse...

AZ

[VJ]

I'd sure like a quick rundown of things that don't work on MURC in Opera, so if you have time, Jesse...

Az, do you really want another forum to be added?

Just kidding... it would be interesting to know what one loses with Opera (if it is just eye-candy, it wouldn't really bother me much)



Jörg

[az]

I know the thread preview is lost, because it is done with the ALT tag, I think it would work using the appropriate TITLE tag, but I don't know if IE supports this.

AZ

[Sasq]

Better still, instead of listing all the things, why don't you just try an alternative browser?
Also, quite simply, no sane web developer is going to write a per version check for opera and work out which version supports what features.

None of us have that time, for a browser that in reality has so little market share.