21
May
operabrowser

Completely Redesigned Opera Browser Exits Beta, Now Available In The Play Store

Posted by in Applications, News

Opera has been talking up its new browser entry into the Android world for a few months now, with a beta version hitting the scene back in March. That beta has now graduated into a final release, which just landed in the Play Store this morning. The overall appearance and functionality seems to be largely unchanged from the beta, so users who have been testing out the browser should feel right at home with the first stable offering (which is a completely new listing in the Play Store, not an update to the beta).

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This is a much-needed leap for Opera, as it forgoes the Presto rendering engine in lieu of Webkit  (a la Chrome), which is arguably much faster.

03
Apr
chromiumtiny

Google No Longer Cares For WebKit Either, Apparently, Forking The Engine Into New Project Called 'Blink'

Posted by in Google, News

Man, WebKit cannot catch a break today, can it? After Samsung announced that it would be teaming up with Mozilla to build their own mobile browser engine called Servo, Google says its planning to fork WebKit to create a new project called Blink. Unlike Servo, this one will still be based on WebKit, but this new fork actually seems to be aimed not at competing with whatever Samsung is putting out, but rather at gaining freedom from another browser: Safari.

You see, Chrome doesn't actually use the entirety of WebKit. It mainly uses what's called WebCore, which handles HTML and CSS rendering.

04
Mar
unnamed

[New App] Opera Browser Beta, With Ground-Up Redesign And Webkit Rendering Engine, Is Live In The Play Store

Posted by in Applications, News

Get those fingers ready, Opera fans: the biggest thing to happen to your favorite mobile browser in years has arrived. Opera Software announced a new and retooled version of their browser in February, and demonstrated it during Mobile World Congress. The Opera browser beta (no Mini or Mobile here, it's the "full" version a la Chrome) is live in the Play Store. It's a free download for just about any Android device, so get to it.

Screenshot_2013-03-04-21-33-29 Screenshot_2013-03-04-21-31-04

The biggest draw in this new release is the WebKit rendering engine, the same one used by both Chrome and the AOSP Android browser.

25
Jan
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Kongregate Makes A Few Tweaks To Its App, Submits It To The Android Market Once More

Posted by in Applications, News

Having your app unceremoniously pulled from the Market just a few short hours after it launches can certainly be discouraging, but the developers behind Kongregate Arcade didn't let that stop them from trying again.

Indeed, Kongregate Arcade has returned to the Android Market, albeit with a few tweaks intended to please Google. Most importantly, the app no longer downloads game data to users' SD cards; instead, the information is stored in the standard browser cache (Kongregate Arcade is actually a WebKit-based browser with some heavy modifications). Additionally, the address bar is visible when the app is loading a game (though it switches back to full-screen mode shortly afterward); in the original version, the URL was completely hidden from the user.

08
Nov
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[Updated: Now In The Market] Opera Mobile 10.1 Beta Now Available For Android, Pinch To Zoom And YouTube Support

Posted by in Applications, Apps/Games, News

It's been but a few weeks since Opera's announcement of Opera Mobile for Android at their Up North Web conference, and now the browser is out there navigating the maze of tubes that is the Internet. While they didn't quite meet their "within the month (October)" promise, we can forgive them for wanting to polish things a little further.

However, glancing at Opera Mobile for the first time, your look might be one of the askance variety; "What's this? It looks just like Opera Mini!". While this is true, the real differentiation in the Mobile version versus the Mini version is beneath the hood.

06
Oct
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Fennec Dev Discusses Differences, Benefits, And Challenges Of Bringing Firefox To Android

Posted by in Applications, Development, News

We've seen Fennec (or Firefox for Android as it's now called) gradually progressing over the last few months, reaching a state of real usability in the last couple of weeks. There are many excited by Fennec's journey and the ability have a browser with near-full-desktop functionality, but it seems that even more struggle to see a place for another browser on their phone. After all, the stock Android browser is lightning-quick and works well enough for a pretty satisfying web experience.

Mozilla mobile developer Matt Brubeck recently penned a blog post set to explain the reasoning behind Firefox for Android, and why he believes it is a worthwhile addition to both Android and Mozilla families.