Just when you thought it was safe to jump back in the browser hunt and settle down on a primary product, along comes another rocket ship that causes the big boys to shutter and tremble in their boots. A company in Norway has come up with a browser that loads Web pages so fast it's unbelivable; you will find yourself pinching your leg. Would you beleive that the browser also fits on a single floppy disk?
Despite its small footprint, Opera boasts a number of extremely powerful features, making it a great browser for the serious Web user. Multiple windows, a powerful hotlist, online graphics toggling, and various other customization features are very attractive. If you are an advanced user with your own email and newsreader, Opera links to all of them! Opera has gone through a long and tedius beta program starting with Beta 1 back in early 1997 to its final release in early 1998.
Using Opera as a disabled user means being able to access the Net quickly and efficiently. Only Opera makes it possible to navigate entirely with the keyboard, bringing joy and happiness to many thousands of visually or physically handicapped friends all over the world. Changing the fonts and size of text is as easy as a mouse click or keyboard command, and you can make the text up to 1000% larger, making reading Web pages a snap.
Opera was developed from the ground up, and will run on a 386SX computer with 8MB RAM wonderfully, and if you ever have a laptop on the road and your resources are low, Opera can really be appreciated. Opera supports Javascript, SSL 2.0 and 3.0, plus TLS 1.0 - 128bit encryption, HTML 2.0, most of HTML 3.2, client Side ISMAP, client pull, server push, full table and forms support, sophisticated hotlist, secure news server access, popup URLs, context sensitive menus, separate menus for documents, images and links, and automatic window placement (This option lets Opera auto-arrange windows so that the full Opera window is always filled with windows).
The only features that Opera does not support are Java and Cascading Style Sheets. Opera Software says that these features will be added in upcoming versions and that a full email program is also in the works. Even with the few non-supported features, Opera is by far one of the most serious threats to Microsoft and Netscape, and at a cost of less than $40.00 US, it is a wise investment if you are looking for a well designed, fast, and very compact browser that will run on virtually any computer. And with the features that are forthcoming in later versions, Opera could very easily take command of the major players in a much competitive market. Hats off to the little browser with the big heart.
