The only browser that fits in a floppy!. Review on Opera

When many leading browsers started getting hefty in their bytes, a new browser came out with a size of less than an MB! Yes, friends, Opera's size is around 950KB!

Here I am talking about it's fairly old version of 4.02, when it wasn't free and was about to capture the market. Just as Linux came in and shattered the walls of Microsoft's Windows, in the same Opera came out and hurted the egos of browsers like Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator.

There are many helpful options in Opera that makes me select it for my daily web surfing. I would like to share them all with you, and tell you all why I like this simple and small browser.

Introduction

The browser was developed by a person called Eric Young in the year 1995. He wanted a browser which would be just around 1 MB in size, but should be compatible with all OS and must have all the features included in IE or Netscape. It was like David challenging the Goliaths of IT industry. The efforts resulted in the small and compact browser called Opera.

The Size and Easy Installation

As I said, it is the only browser that will fit in a floppy. Other browsers were busy adding in features that made them go well over 25 MB. Opera, inspite of having many features, stands at around an MB. The installation will take just around 3-4 MB of your disk space. The installation procedure is very simple and fast. It just puts in the required .dll files and other .exe files. Everything is arranged nicely in individual folders. All is done in a snap, and you are ready to use one of the most versatile browser of all time.

Hotlist

Usually, we have to search for web sites that we want to see. But Opera has a readymade list of web sites that will match your likings. All the websites are listed in appropriate categories and titles. Let's say, you want to know the latest news or sports happenings. You just have to select the category 'Sports', and view the appropriate page. Then there are other categories with loads of websites like 'Business', 'Downloads', 'Culture', and so many more. You can also have your own category. And yes, you can even add your bookmarks like any other browser.

Different Window View Modes

This may be the only browser where you can select you Zoom Percentage. If you are viewing a page which has a large photo that isn't fitting the screen, you can just select the 50% zoom option and see it all! Then you can cascade or tile your windows. You cannot just decrease the size of your window, but can enlarge it to more than 1000%! So, you will not miss the minute details on the web page.

Effective Cache System and History

Cache is the folder where all the images, sounds, HTML pages, etc. go and settle down whenever you view a web page. This helps in fast downloading of the page when you visit the site again. Opera has a very good cache system. It has a single cache folder, unlike IE where everything is in many different folders. If you don't need the files, you can delete them easily. The cache works for easy offline viewing. There is no hassle of the web address getting displayed on the Address bar of your browser window. The address does not get stored in that address bar. So, you can escape by visiting some websites without getting caught! People would not know where have you been strolling on the web. There is also nothing like History, which can tell people where you were during those few hours of web surfing. Some may feel that this is not a good feature. But it sometimes helps.

Image Toggle

Sometimes you visit a website just to get the text information. But you find that you are being bombarded by loads of images. Opera gives you option of turning them off and on by just clicking a small button on its left bottom corner. When I turn the image option off, the pages get displayed in a jiffy. Also, Opera loads text first and then the images. This works out for its speed. Its functionality is very close to IE.

Other Party Tools

Opera does not have any in-built plug-ins or clients. This is why it is so small in size. It gets all its plug-ins from other browser, which it automatically takes in. Also, its E-mail client is some other software running through it. Let's say if you send a mail through Opera. Your mail will be actually sent by Outlook or Messenger or Eudora. Also your incoming mails will go in to these clients. So, Opera actually needs other browsers to support it. But, nowadays, it has everything in-built. Also, you have the option to have specific plug-ins for Opera. Its plug-in folder is very flexible and can have any of them.

Status Bar

The other nice thing about this browser is that it tells you everything it is doing. It tells you how much of the page is loaded in percentage, how many images have been loaded and how many still left to be loaded. It gives you all the information. It is a useful feature.

This was all I have to say about Opera. When I first installed it on my PC, I was amazed to see its speed and compatibility. It has never crashed yet. I usually surf using Opera.

There are some glitches in this browser as well. It does not support database-backed buttons. It just supports HTML buttons. Sometimes, a web site will look good only in IE and Netscape, but would appear haywire in Opera. It is just because designers design a web site keeping the top two browsers in mind. They usually neglect browsers like Opera. So don't be surprised if some web sites look different. Also, having all external clients for Opera makes it necesary to have atleast one of the top two browsers. Also the browsing window is quite small and crowded when compared to IE or Netsacpe.

But all in all, it is a nice browser. I think it is free now, and the size has gone up to more than 2 MB for the latest version. But then to, it is still as good as it was.

Just have it!