Opera
From Compsci.ca Wiki
Opera is a web browser devolped by Opera Software, based in Oslo, Norway, which also has a built in e-mail and IRC client. It runs on a variety of operating systems, which include: Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, Solaris SPARC, FreeBSD i386 and GNU/Linux systems that use the SPARC, i386 and PowerPC architectures. It also can be run on mobile phones, smartphones and Personal Digital Assistances (PDA's).
Opera is now free of charge for desktop versions, but the mobile versions require a fee. There are trials versions available.
History
The browser was, until version 2.0, called MultiTorg Opera and was not available to the public. It was known for its multiple document interface (MDI) and 'hotlist' (sidebar), which made browsing several pages at once much easier.
In January 2003, Opera 7 was released and introduced a new layout engine "Presto", with improved Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), client-side scripting, and Document Object Model (DOM) support.
On April 19, 2005, version 8.0 was released. Besides supporting SVG Tiny, multimodal features and User JavaScript, the default user interface has been cleaned up and simplified. The default home page is an improved search portal. The changes displeased a number of existing users since some advanced settings became hidden.
On January 12, 2005 Opera Software announced that it would offer free licenses to higher education institutions — a change from the previous cost of 1000 USD for unlimited licenses. Schools that opted for the free license included Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard University, University of Oxford, Georgia Institute of Technology, and Duke University.
With the release of Opera 8.50 on September 20, 2005, Opera announced that their browser would be available free of charge and without advertisements from then onwards, although the company still sells support contracts.Enhancments included: automatic client-side fixing of web sites that did not render correctly, and a number of security fixes.
