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Posts tagged Opera
Incredible Web-Based iPhone/Android/HTML5 Browser Games
Jun 8th
Well, hammer another nail in the coffin of Flash. I stumbled upon this amazing website with tech demos of HTML5 based games. Akihabara (ah-key-hah-bah-rah) is a major Tokyo shopping area for electronic, computer, anime, and otaku goods.
The developer behind Akihabara wanted to create an engine for fast, web based, flash free, game development. Each game represents a different style of game, including action RPG (like Zelda), platformer (like Mario), top down shooters, puzzles (Tetris) and arcade games (Pac-man)…, which shows the platform’s flexibility. Developers can get the toolkit on the website.
All the demos available are playable in modern HTML5 computer browsers, but they also work on the iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad and Android. The results are truly fascinating and gameplay is smooth and buttery. Controls are iffy since Safari always wants to scroll if tapped the wrong way, but it did not get in the way enough for me to stop. The future is bright for open web development knowing that it is extremely capable, even in its infancy. Check it out! While the games are simple and only demos, the things they can do still blow my mind. If you don’t have an iDevice/Android phone, the browser versions are identical (even in how smooth they are).
Akihabara
Opera Mini Approved for iPhone
Apr 12th
Almost a full month ago Opera submitted its popular mobile browser, Opera Mini for the iPhone. In the past Apple has had some pretty ridiculous reasons for denying applications’ admittance into the App Store. They have made it more than clear that applications that duplicate the function of a native iPhone application will not be admitted. Despite Apple’s strict rules Opera submitted their browser for the iPhone. However they put a lot of publicity around the submission and even included a counter on their website showing the time elapsed for the decision from Apple.
To the surprise of many, today Opera announced that their app has in fact been approved. The application should be available in the App Store in the next 24 hours and will of course be free. Opera Mini has a speed advantage over mobile Safari especially over EDGE networks. For the non-believers, check out the video after the break. Anyone have any ideas for why Apple broke their own rules and allowed Opera Mini’s presence in the App Store? Sound off in the comments below.
Video Walkthrough: Opera Mini 5 for Android
Mar 11th
Opera Mini 5 Beta for Android arrived this morning for the world to try. While it does not support native multi-touch, there are a few benefits to the browsing experience that will make it, if not my default browser (xScope performs that function admirably) then my heavy-image, desktop browser replacement.
The reason for this is that it is fast. Opera routes traffic through its proxy server before delivering content to your device, compressing images and optimizing page layout to best suit your particular device. I have used Opera Mini 5 Beta 2 on my Blackberry 9700 for months now and consider it to be, by far, the closest thing to a usable browser on the platform.
Android, thankfully, does not suffer from this problem, as there are at least four very usable, very attractive and standards-compliant browsers available in the app market. Opera Mini 5 arrives into a crowded market, but it should flourish through its speed and brand name recognition. At the least, people will download it and forget about it, though I truly hope they don’t.
This is an early beta from the company, and the experience should improve with time. The browser lacks native multitouch, though its zoom functionality is very good; it reacts to text alignment with accuracy, and because it is limited to only two views (zoomed in and zoomed out) the page never has to re-jig itself to realign the text around the images, like other browsers do. This ensures scrolling is always fast, and never stutters (the native Android browser is guilty of this inefficiency).
The other major issue is lack of font customization. The default font is an ugly Arial-knockoff that diminishes the readability of text-heavy sites like The New York Times.
Below is a blurry walkthrough (all I had on me was my Blackberry for video) so I apologize for the lack of clarity and sorry for turning the phone on its side to take the video, I hope you don’t strain too much to see it.
Download Opera Mini 5 for Android in the Marketplace, or by heading to http://m.opera.com/next in your Android browser.
Watch the video walk through:
Who uses what and where? Come see for yourself
Mar 4th
Gizmodo just posted a great article on what amount of market share various mobile browsers hold around the world.
Points I found interesting:
• Apple is EVERYWHERE
• BlackBerry doesn’t make the list in Canada (come on Canucks!)
• People use a PSP for web browsing?
See the details here.
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