> I recently was looking to see if the web browser Opera was available for
> Linux. Well, when looking at their site I discovered that they are
> currently
> doing a poll of sorts to see how many Linux users (along with some other
> OSs)
> would be interested in their browser. They have pledged that if they have
> 3000 Linux people interested by the end of November (when the poll closes)
> that they will start working on developement.
[...]
> The Opera page can be found at http://opera.nta.no (sorry I forgot it the
> first time...)
The URL listed in their announcement on c.o.l.a recently had the following
URL (which will immediately put you on the right page for the linux
conversion info):
http://www.operasoftware.com/alt_os.html
Maybe I should add to that, Opera is not just doing a "poll", to see
who's interested, but they are actively requesting orders for Opera 3.0 at
US$35 each. They'll be billing you those US$35 if they manage to get 3000
pre-orders for the platform, and then use the money to pay those
programmers working on the port.
Second addition, while I browsed over their pages, I saw that the
standard price is US$30, and asked why they were trying to charge US$35
for the linux/OS2/mac/beos conversions. They replied that the US$35 is the
official price for Opera 3.0, which hasn't been released yet. The US$30 is
the official price for the (current) Opera 2.0. The port to linux/... will
be done on the basis of Opera 3.0 and therefore be subject to the US$35
price of the Windows Opera 3.0.
Personally I already ordered two copies for myself, because I see this
as a chance to get some real competition to Netscape; arena, w3, mosaic,
mnemonic, and amaya are not yet ready for prime time, and it'll be a good
while until it is. I think that $35 per copy can still make a cheap
alternative to netscape's usual prices (and especially I hope they will
pose to be an alternative to Netscapes' support when Opera gets released,
because Netscapes' support SUCKS).
Unfortunately, they only got something like 300 orders for linux yet -
2700 left to go in the next 4 weeks. I hope, that some of you will get
through to risking that sort of money to help develop a new browser on
linux and to help get some more competition going on that market, which
can only profit us all (remember, emacs' highest growth phase has been
after Lucid/XEmacs was out, and FSFs GNUemacs got some real competition.
Finally, I am not related to Opera, except through the order of two
copies of Opera. I'd just really like to see this browser coming to linux.
[Besides, if this works with Opera, this might also lead other companies
to the linux market, that are looking at it more sceptically at the
moment. Maybe some of them can be talked into either porting their product
to linux, or try something similar to gauge the current interest from the
linux community]
Benedikt
Windows 95: n.
32-bit extensions and a graphical shell for a 16-bit patch to an 8-bit
operating system originally coded for a 4-bit microprocessor, written
by a 2-bit company that can't stand for 1 bit of competition.
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