Opera is fast.

Blazing fast. Speed is a touchy topic as different benchmarks give different results, and at the end of the day most users (but of course, most reading this are going to be power users, so it most definitely will include you!) are going to find minimal impact with their browsing – but all the same there is a clear point to be made: Opera is fast. You might’ve heard that Chrome is fast, Opera is just as fast, if not faster. If you’re on Firefox and feeling its age, this is something that might lighten your day. Opera even has a “Turbo” mode on slow connections which compresses your pages on the fly to make them load faster.

Opera is innovative and cutting edge.

Despite being closed source, Opera is suprisingly cutting edge. Countless times have they been ahead of the others in producing new innovations (tabbed browsing? Even Firefox’s new design and tab groups were first created by Opera) only to have other browsers copy it and remarket it a while later. You can feel free to use the latest alpha quality and chat with their very open community about bleeding edge updates and changes. A few examples off the top of my head are the integrated tab previews, reopen closed windows, inbuilt cloud tools which I will cover in a bit, and a very nifty UI, including a “fast forward” button which detects the “next” page on what you’re currently browsing.

Opera is feature-complete.

Although Opera also has Widgets (the equivalent of Firefox Addons), Opera is amazingly stuffed and crammed to the top with features already included. Don’t shout bloat yet, as these features are actually useful. Things like being able to completely reorganise your interface, built-in session control, note-taking, private tabs, address bar keywords, account manager, content-blocking, speed dial, tab/window undelete, mouse gestures (love it!), RSS reader, and even an email and IRC client are all builtin. Despite all of this, Opera still manages to load incredibly quickly and handle many tabs constantly (I use 30+ regularly) without slowdown. An even better “feature” is that if you don’t want to use all of this “bloat”, it hides itself away from you and you really won’t notice it’s there.

Opera embraces the cloud.

… and they do it the right way. Other than the previously mentioned Turbo mode which routes your traffic to other servers to compress them, Opera also comes with two very nifty cloud tools – Opera Link and Opera Unite. The former allows you to synchronise all your opera settings, speed dials, notes, history and bookmarks to an online service, and then retrieve it anywhere, or even on another Opera browser elsewhere. The latter, Unite, is an umbrella creation – a set of webapps (which you can add and remove even more available from their repo) which allow you to run your own cloud services and share files from your home computer. Things like web proxies (such as dyndns), web servers (just set a directory and you’re on your way!), photo sharing, and even music sharing where you can access your home music from anywhere through Opera. There is even a messaging service, as well as filesharing (and receiving) services to allow people to immediately upload and download from your home computer. These are dead simple to set up and use, have privacy options, and I must say … they are elegant.

Opera loves developers.

Not only does this closed source company have a very transparent community and listen to bug reports, they also love web developers. Opera comes built in with Opera Dragonfly – similar to Firefox’s Firebug. It allows you to inspect page elements, loading time graphs, mess around with the DOM, and tweaking your Javascript and CSS. Opera is also extremely W3C compliant and implements CSS3. Simply put – Opera is a modern browser.

Finally, Opera is cross-platform.

Opera runs on pretty much everything. Windows, Mac and Linux are covered. Mobile devices have two options – Opera Mini and Opera Mobile, where Mini is a simple smartphone browser and Mobile is a more advanced browser. Windows Mobile is covered. Android – sure, Opera Mobile is getting released for it tomorrow, no problem. iPhone’s have got Opera Mini, and most other phones are covered with Opera Mini. They don’t hold out on their mobile releases either – they’re every bit as faster than the competition as their desktop counterpart is, and still stuffed with features – speed dial and their implementation of tabs are truly amazing.

Well, I hope that short article enlightened you to that in-the-corner browser Opera. If you haven’t tried it out or are feeling the creaks on your current browser, check out their latest beta today – you won’t regret it.

No related posts.

Chrome OS is Google’s attempt at an operating system, and can be described as a browser in a box. It looks identical to its namesake and contains little more. The interface is simply a browser window with tabs for separate “applications”, it’s applications are naught more than websites (or in true 2.0 lingo – “web apps”), and just to ensure that the user is limited as to what they can do, the filesystem is read-only. In other words – the Chrome is good for one thing and one thing only: surfing the web.

Why then, with statistics showing internet usage globally leveling out and laptops being introduced to more and more children, would a generation understanding the capabilities of machines be content with such a handicap as Chrome OS? It’s known that “simple sells”, but too simple?

The answer lies with the market that Chrome OS is truly aiming at: SMEs. With the Go Google initiative the next step is to provide the hardware that supports it. Most uses of a laptop in corporate environments are limited to document processing and web research. Given that they choose the specs of the computers, Chrome OS is able to provide this at a bargain. So when management has to give Joe down at accounting a laptop for his work, he doesn’t need to bother about licensing, cost, endless software debugging and maintenance – but simply throw (yep, SSDs!) a Chrome laptop at him. Data redundancy, “software” upgrades and whatever else the cloud brings is an added bonus. Yeah – it’s not a hard choice. It’s cheaper, gets the job done, and it truly is a “work” laptop.

The objective isn’t to throw it into the market as a whole or start from the housewives and grandparents with such a simple laptop but instead the objective is to turn it into an industry standard – an industry standard that works best when companies have Gone Google. Most SMEs don’t care about the drawbacks of using a cloud-based system either – this makes the costs of moving to such a standard minimal. Both sides win. This approach into the market is only one that Google can employ – and is the reason why Chrome OS can break in successfully compared to others like Moblin, even though Moblin has the same simplicity and speed.

Then of course some of the less computer literate (which is the majority of the world, unless you live under a rock) don’t mind using it either. Chrome OS makes the netbook what it should be – a netbook, and schwoop we have another player in the market. In a nutshell. The trick behind this is the frictional costs. The frictional costs of moving to such a system is minimal. I say this as a relative term in comparison to the costs of switching from a cloud-based system.

The conclusion is not that Chrome OS is going to take over the OS market. No – especially in large firms the costs of moving to such a system is unquestionable. However this approach will definitely break the barrier between lightweight computer users and Linux-based OSes. Whether or not this is a good thing for existing Linux platforms is still unknown and free for speculation.

Of course, in the future when our needs for computers far exceed this, Chrome OS is definitely not the choice for that generation – but then again, Google has plenty of time to work towards that!

No related posts.

Now is the time to see what exactly is going on.

My feelings in a nutshell

• Would I buy such a product? If it were cheap (100 dollars or so), yes.
• I feel Google is harming open-source.
• Cloud computing is very important to me for accessibility and synchronisation.
• We cannot fight, and should not fight.

The story behind it

The first point is easy to justify and I do believe this is very agreeable. This is an area of the markt people have always looked towards with an expectation of a “trustworthy” brand, and Google has just provided that to them. People will buy for this OS.

To a company, Google is probably executing its marketing strategy in the most effective way possible. They use a product-orientated approach, making the product first then selling it to the market – or so it seems. Google knows two things: 1) They have craploads of data, and 2) They own (pretty much) the biggest mass marketing device in the world. However they do know that even though they “own” this realm, they cannot control it. It’s like a pet – you own but cannot control it.

They way you control it is by feeding it. Such is the nature of open-source development. However Google is able to turn open-source into money by producing a good percentage of the product before open-sourcing it. This allows Google to keep the leash on the project. You developers aren’t building the product side by side – no: you are doing the grunt work that turns a framework into something consumers will love – something with the name Google slapped onto it.

Let’s move onto my third feeling. This is because of a trend I have noticed over time. Computers is no longer about being in full control of your data – it’s about being in full control of your data no matter where you are. Cloud computing sorts this out – it’s no wonder Google’s objective is “to be the hub through which all the world’s information passes through“. Sorry guys, but the fact is that most consumers want this. The only time they won’t is when the company providing it has a bad reputation – but Google? No, Google’s never been evil have they? Not to the average joe they haven’t. It’s the average joe that changes the workflow – it’s the average joe that makes such a way of working part of your daily routine.

You see, Chrome isn’t about making an operating system to do useful stuff – Chrome is all about changing people’s workflow to become web-centric. Instead of moving into the desktop market, what Google is doing is moving consumers into the web market.  Why do you think it’s named Chrome after their browser? It saves on the advertising costs. You advertise the OS, you advertise the browser. Google is pushing ahead HTML 5 specifications to redefine what the web is capable of, and their browser Chrome going to be the biggest, baddest boy in the playground that knows the meaning of the word “compatibility” backwards. Advertise them both at the same time – what you get are people getting the “wow” experience Google can provide with all its toolkits online from the browser, and making it easy as pie to integrate it into how they work. It’s not because Google Docs is simply an application that allows you to edit documents online, it’s because it’s a shared, accessible, compatible, synchronised alternative.

We cannot and should not fight.

Yes. My last point is so awesome it deserves its own special section.

You cannot fight once a market leader has made a choice on a product/system. We saw it with Windows and we may very well see it again. (I assume you have all seen Google Wave?) Instead we have to understand the market. What does the market want? How do we provide for it?

Now, I am a KDE user myself but what I see as major areas for Linux and DEs in general to focus on are:

• Plasmoids (in KDE at least) – this is a stepping stone to integrate new technologies and the web into the desktop workflow
• Provision of private clouds, complying with open-standards – for private, secure and PERSONALISED (imagine giving users the freedom to shape their cloud environment) mobility and synchronisation
• The social desktop
• The semantic desktop

Am I right, am I crazy, have I missed out stuff?

Shower me with your thoughts please.

No related posts.

That’s right, my conspiracy theory about Google (orignally posted a good month back) has come true, and it’s going to be out there around late 2010.

Brief summary: Google is making an operating system (Linux-based too) with help from the open-source community that focuses on getting the user online and into a browser as quick as possible. The browser is now the ultimate tool on the system. It is currently mainly meant for stuff like netbooks (note this is a separate project from Google Android) but will apparently also be able to provide a good experience for any desktop setup.

Since it’s too late to grimace at Google during their drawing board sessions, I like to ask myself what would an OS be in a time when many of our activites are web-centric.

Most of the main problems I outlined for Google in my conspiracy theory was how they could convice people to change their workflows. Apparently Google has decided to give them an operating system. This interface can easily be optimised to make it feel natural to shift their workflow completely into what they can do in a browser, some tabs and the new shabang HTML 5 will come with.

I took a look at Moblin, another netbook Linux-based OS – one thing instantly popped through my head: this doesn’t look like any window manager, it looks like a website or single application. Something you might expect similar to MythTV. (If I am wrong please correct me).

The first decision I would make on designing a UI for Google’s purposes is not to have any start menu. Something similar to Apple’s dock with modifications (also with an auto-hide) would be great for optimising screen real estate. I would also integrate what I now see as KDE Plasmoids as part of the entire interface (as in within applications itself too instead of only the desktop shell). I would also ask myself what applications could be and should be replaced by web applications. Such examples are email, document editing, chatting, and social networking. What could not and should not be are graphics and multimedia editors, games, and system management tools. It seems very much now that we can split our activities into 2: if you want to make technology, do it offline. If you want to use technology, do it online.

Personally, I can easily now see how easily I can adapt my workflow to this internet-centric pattern.

What about you? What do you expect from Google’s OS?

No related posts.

The other day I was surfing the web and read an article about Google Chrome in some sort of hacking competition – this then prompted me to check out Google’s progress on porting Google Chrome to Linux and Mac. For those that don’t know Google Chrome is Google’s attempt at making a browser. So far it seems like a really good attempt.

It seems as though lately the Linux builds (I ignored the Mac stuff – but I hear it’s getting good too) seem to be getting to a usable state. Definitely not finished, definitely buggy, but usable. So, like any other Gentooer, I began trying to find out how to get it.

Step 1) Any ebuilds out there?

Why bother do hard work myself if somebody’s already put it in portage? With some google-fu it seems as though there are a couple ebuilds. One by the French, and another by the Chinese. The French one (have not tested) is available in the `THE` overlay, available by doing layman -a THE. The chinese one seems to be called “Shellex-overlay”, and can be accessed here. I’m not quite sure what the French one does as the ebuild didn’t really like my amd64 system (note: Google Chrome only supports 32-bit as of writing). However the Chinese one fared better and provided me with a binary. If you are on a 32-bit system (x86) you should try those ebuilds.

If you don’t want to compile from source, check the depencies list just a bit further down, then check out the build bot. Note: the build bot provides binaries for Windows, Linux AND Mac, so if you’re on a Mac, you’re in luck!

For more information, you should visit the Chromium Linux Building page.

Under `Prerequisites`, it lists down the dependencies as packaged by the Ubuntu system. Here is the list of dependencies as what Gentoo calls them:

• Python >= 2.4
• Perl >= 5.x
• gcc >= 4.2
• bison >= 2.3
• flex >= 2.5.34
• gperf >= 3.0.3
• pkgconfig >= 0.20
• nss >= 3.12
• gconf
• glib
• gtk-engines-murrine
• nspr
• corefonts
• freetype
• cairo
• dbus

Their version requirements are listed as needed.

Step 2) What about 64-bit systems?

There are several techniques of getting Chromium on a 64-bit system. However no matter what, I highly recommend that you create a 32-bit chroot. If you want to track each library individually and symlink your system to hell (as I first attempted), be my guest, but you’re wasting your time. So, first create a chroot by following this nifty guide.

Once you’ve got your chroot up, you can either try out the ebuilds I mentioned before, compile it yourself from source (via Google’s instructions) or be lazy and grab the binary from the Chromium build bot. I have tested the latter two techniques (can’t trust the French nor the Chinese!). To compile it yourself from source, follow the Chromium Linux Building page. Note: you will require quite a bit of HD space (the sources tarball itself is 640MB+), I also suggest you bootstrap from the tarball, the subversion checkout seems a lot longer and a waste of time really. Finally, if you’re just interested in getting the binary and running Chrome (not development), I would do use Release mode (see the building page for instructions). Of course, after making sure you have the dependencies I listed above, you should have Chrome compiled!

If you’re lazy and don’t want to compile, there is a build bot.

Step 3) Run Chromium on Linux!

At this stage, you should have the Chrome binary (either by compiling from source or ebuild, or getting the build bot binary). Now you just have to run the program and enjoy. If you’re running using the chroot, you should use the xhost hack. Do xhost local:localhost outside the chroot, then try run the binary again. Obviously you don’t want to waste time setting up X in the chroot.

Finally, here is a screenshot of Chromium running on Fluxbox! (I normally use KDE, but I wanted a more lightweight WM when compiling Chromium) You might also consider doing nice -n 10 when compiling if you want to continue doing your stuff. In fact, I’m running Chrome right now on KDE to write this post. It’s very fast, uses about 1% CPU, separates itself into different processes per tab, and so far seems pretty “stable”. However I have found that opening a file browse dialog (eg: in an upload form) makes Chromium jump up to about 50% CPU, which sucks.

Any thanks, issues or problems feel free to ask.

No related posts.