In a conference call today with Wall Street analysts, Google CEO Eric Schmidt dismissed the idea that Google is planning on creating its own browser, Reuters reported.

“It looks like people have some good browser[s] choices already,” Schmidt said. “We would not build a browser for the fun of building a browser,” he said.

Schmidt also mentioned that Google has partnerships with Opera Software that encourages the use of the Opera browser.

Late last year there was a rumor that Google was planning on buying the Opera browser, though an Opera official outright denied this claim, after I asked about it, saying, “Rumors come and go. Google is not buying Opera.”

Earlier this year Opera and Google entered into an agreement where Google would be the default search partner for the mobile browsers: Opera Mobile and Opera Mini. Under the one-year contract, Opera will make Google Search a major part of the browser’s home screen.

Opera also has a deal with Google, which includes a search revenue deal, marketing support and technical cooperation.

I sure hope that if Google is sticking with alternative browsers, that it would offer better support or its services for browsers such as Opera and Safari.

(Hat-tip to Tom O’Shea)

The first ever (stable) version of the Opera browser for Windows Mobile and the Pocket PC was released today.

Based on Opera’s latest core code, Opera Mobile 8.6 for Windows Mobile Pocket PC (PPC) includes Opera’s rendering technology that dynamically reformats Web pages to fit the width of any screen size without the need for the horizontal scrollbar. It also supports all major Web standards, including CSS2, DOM 2 and JavaScript.

One very helpful feature in this browser is the auto-complete option. With Web address auto complete, Opera will make suggestions while you type, based on your browsing history and bookmarks. Once you’ve tried it, you would never go back. This should help make typing long URLs on mobile phones much easier.

Opera 8.60 lets you keep up to four open windows (tabs) at the same time, and switch easily between them using either the menu or a shortcut. Each window can have its own settings for zoom levels and page display options.

Today’s release has been much anticipated, as this is the first stable version of the Opera browser for the Pocket PC.

Opera Mobile 8.6 runs on Windows Mobile 5 and 2003 SE.

Features in Opera Mobile 8.6 for Pocket PC include:

• Tabs – Open multiple Web pages at the same time, and switch between them using the tabbed interface.
• Landscape/Portrait Mode - Opera Mobile adapts Web pages to fit the width of the screen in both landscape and portrait modes.
• Web address auto-complete - The browser remembers your typed-in addresses.
• Zoom - Magnify text and images in Web pages for better accessibility.
• Download - Get any files and content from the Web, including ringtones and images.
• Full screen - View Web pages with the browser interface, or in full screen mode.
• Fit-to-screen - Browse Web pages in full size or with Opera’s Small-Screen Rendering(TM) to avoid horizontal scrolling.
• Pop-up handler - Block unwanted pop-ups
• Pad-lock icon on secure sites - The browser can identify trusted sites to avoid scams and phishing attempts

Opera Watch was profiled in the May issue of Opera’s monthly newsletter, Opera Bits, which includes an interview with me.

If you don’t yet subscribe to OperaBits, you can do so here.

The Opera Mobile browser provides support for a wide variety of devices and operating systems. However, one noticeable absent operating system is Palm OS, including the very popular Treo series.

So why hasn’t Opera created a mobile browser for the Palm OS?

A while ago I spoke with an Opera spokesperson, who told me it’s due to the lack of interest by the makers of the Palm. “Opera Software continuously considers new platforms based on market demand. There are no specific reasons why we shouldn’t be able to port to Palm OS if there was sufficient demand – typically from a device vendor”.

I saw in the forums posted this past week a more detailed explanation by Opera’s Rijk van Geijtenbeek.

“Porting Opera to most of those operating systems has been sponsored by phone manufacturers and companies like IBM. Older Palms didn’t have enough capabilities to port Opera in a meaningful way. I don’t know if that would be different for recent versions, but even then it seems the future of the Palm OS is uncertain. But if Palm had wanted this, they could of course have talked to Opera.”

Of course Palm users can still use Opera Mini as their browser, however, it’s doesn’t have the full Opera Mobile browser functionality.

Are you a Palm user? What do you think? Is Opera Mini good enough for you? Or are you waiting for Opera to port the browser to the Palm OS too?

Opera Mobile for the Series 60 (S60) mobile phones has passed the Acid2 test in its internal builds (See screenshot below), according to Gerdur Jonsdottir, an Opera developer working on the browser.

This makes it the very first mobile browser to pass the Acid2 test.

“This is a version still in its early stages but this is definitely promising”, says Gerdur.

The Web Standards Project (WaSP) released the Acid2 test, a test page for web browsers. It has been written to help browser vendors make sure their products correctly support features that are part of web standards.

Acid2 tests for features that are part of existing standards but haven’t been supported by major browsers. Acid2 is a complex web page. Though not all web standards are tested, it uses features that are not in common use yet, because of lack of support, and it crams many tests into one page.

Opera 9, Konqueror, and Apple’s Safari browser have passed the Acid2 test on their desktop browsers.

Screenshot of an internal build of
Opera Mobile passing the Acid2 test

Beta 2 of Opera 9 was released today.

This version contains mostly bug fixes and minor changes.

As we reported last week, the Widgets User Interface (UI) has been changed. Widgets are no longer displayed on a faded screen. A “Widgets” menu in the menu bar has replaced the “Opera Widgets” button, which used to be displayed on the top-middle part of the screen. Also new is a Widget management window, which provides options to add, open, and manage widgets.

The default behavior of Widgets has also been changed. When a Widget is opened, it is displayed in TaskBar. One problem I noticed with it, is that you can’t right-click the Widget in the TaskBar and close it, there isn’t even a close button on the Widgets itself, which makes closing the widget a bit difficult.

I’ll be sticking with beta 1 for now, since beta 2 seems to have broken the WYSIWYG editor of Wordpress, which is the publishing tool I use for Opera Watch.

The final version of Opera 9 is scheduled to be released in June.

Read my review on Opera 9.

P.S. Take a look at this week’s poll on Opera Watch.
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Download Opera 9 beta 2
Read Changelog: Windows – Linux – Mac

Firefox, no doubt, has raised the awareness of alternative browsers, and as Opera users we have benefited a great deal by having less of a compatibility issue with broken webpages.

Since its launch less than two years ago, Firefox has captured an astonishing 10 percent of the browser market, which no other alternative browser has been able to do since the end of Browser World War 1 (BWW I).

Firefox’s founder and creator Blake Ross has agreed to be interviewed on Opera Watch, but instead of me asking the questions, I’d like to give you the chance.

Post your questions to the comments of this post, and we’ll send the top 10-12 questions to Blake.

This interview is of course not just for Opera users, Opera Watch has many Firefox subscribers too, and in fact Blake Ross himself subscribes to Opera Watch (Subscribe to Opera Watch). I encourage all browser users to take this opportunity and submit questions.

Here is your chance to ask him the tough questions.

Please let’s keep the interview questions polite and professional, as it serves nobody to be trolls.

Opera is gearing up for the release of Opera 9 Beta 2 of the desktop browser.

One Opera source tells Opera Watch that we can expect the release next week pending any major problems.

The first beta version of Opera 9 was released about a month ago (Read: Opera 9 Review).

Opera 9 Beta 2 will fix many bugs and introduce few new features. On the BitTorrent side, multi-tracker support was added.

Perhaps the most apparent change in the use interface (UI) from Beta 1 is the way Opera Widgets are handled. Widgets will no longer be displayed on a faded screen. A “Widgets” menu in the menu bar has replaced the “Opera Widgets” button, which used to be displayed on the top-middle part of the screen. Also new is a Widget management window, which provides options to add, open, and manage widgets.

The default behavior of Widgets has also been changed. When a Widget is opened, it is displayed in TaskBar. One problem I noticed with it, is that you can’t right-click the Widget in the TaskBar and close it, there isn’t even a close button on the Widgets itself, which makes closing the widget a bit difficult.

New “Widgets” menu in Opera 9 Beta 2

Opera today released a minor update for Opera Mini 2.0.

Some of the issues that have been solved:

• Navigation animation should not disappear after memory problems.
• Bookmark list should not disappear after memory problems.
• Various Palm improvements, like less resetting.
• BlackBerry should now be able to download content.

Opera’s Christoffer Årstrand points out “This fix is for some Sony Ericsson, Siemens and Nokia devices where the option to turn on navigation animations might get disabled after a number of Opera Mini sessions with it enabled. More precisely non-Symbian MIDP2 phones from these manufacturers with a screen width less or equal to 176 pixels is affected.

If you run Opera Mini 2.0 on one of these devices, we strongly advice you to update. If you don’t then we advice you to update anyway due to other bug fixes.”

To update your Opera Mini simply go to mini.opera.com.

Google today released Google Notebook, which allows you to clip and organize information from across the web in a single online location.

The new Google Notebook is available only for Internet Explorer (IE) and Firefox as a plugin/extension. The Opera and Safari browsers aren’t supported at this time, but Google says that it may add support for it in the future.

While Google Notebook doesn’t support the Opera browser, Opera users need not worry. Most of the functionality that Google Notebook provides is already built into the Opera Browser by default.

Opera calls this feature “Notes” (No surprise there). It operates similar to Google Notebook, you select (highlight) some text on a webpage, right click, click on “Copy to note” and the text will be copied a Note. Your notes are stored in the “Notes” panel (To show/hide the panel, click on the left most part of the browser or you could use the F4 shortcut key). You could also access your notes by going to Tools > Notes in the menu bar.

Opera allows you to easily search your notes; double clicking the note opens the original web page. You could also edit the note in real-time without the need to save it.

One of the main advantages to Google Notebook, however, is that your notes are saved online, which gives you the ability to access them on other computers. With Opera’s notes, it only saves it to your local computer (similar to POP3 email).

The “Opera Notebook” feature has been available since Opera 7.

So there you go, us Opera users won’t be bullied by Google

Yahoo today released a preview of its newly redesigned website, and for the moment they block the Opera browser.

Users of the Opera browser who visit the new yahoo.com are shown a message saying “Thanks for your interest in the sneak preview of the new Yahoo! home page. Unfortunately, you’re using a browser we don’t support today.” (See screenshot below).

The new Yahoo site currently only supports Internet Explorer (IE) 6 and Firefox 1.5. I’m not sure about Safari.

Using Opera 9’s new “Site preferences” (See: Opera 9 Review), I was able to mask my browser as Internet Explorer, and was able to view the new Yahoo with no problems. All of the new Yahoo pages seemed display fine in the Opera browser. The only problem that I encountered was tv.yahoo.com, which doesn’t display properly in Opera 9 even on the old Yahoo site. But other than that I’ve seen no problem.

Since the new Yahoo site is still in preview mode, Opera users can still access the old Yahoo website.

It’s important for Opera to get this issue worked out, after all Yahoo is one of the most visited websites on the web.

When I spoke with an Opera spokesman a little while ago about the incompatibility between Opera and the new Yahoo Mail, he sounded optimistic, saying “Yahoo applications have worked fairly well with Opera historically, so we are optimistic. Obviously we will contact them immediately if any compatibility issue exists.”

This is where Opera gets bitten for having such a low market share, less than 1% (10 – 15 million active users).

Having a big market share is not just for bragging rights, it’s almost essential for every browser. Webmasters would naturally be forced to make their websites Opera compatible, if Opera were to have a bigger market share.

Is Yahoo becoming the new Google nightmare for Opera users?

New Yahoo site blocking Opera
(Click on image to enlarge)

Opera CEO Jon von Tetzchner has been interviewed on the BestDamnTechShow.

Jon talked a bit about Opera’s history as well as the new Opera 9 beta. The interview lasts for 15 minutes and is available as a podcast download here.

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Hat-tip to shoust for the heads up.

The internet is buzzing with the recent announcement of the Nintendo Wii. Of course today Opera announced that the Nintendo Wii would come with the Opera browser.

I was able to dig up a bit more information on the Nintendo-Opera deal.

In January, Opera received an initial payment from Nintendo of 670,000 Euros (around $851,000 U.S. dollars) to cover the engineering work. Opera will receive a royalty fee per unit sold.

Both the Nintendo DS and Nintendo Wii will sell millions. Do the math yourself, and see what’s in it for Opera financially.

Opera today announced that Nintendo’s much anticipated new generation game console, Wii (pronounced “We”), will use the Opera browser.

This is not the first partnership between Nintendo and Opera. A few months ago Nintendo announced that the Nintendo DS will include the Opera browser too.

The Opera browser for Nintendo DS will be sold as an optional DS card. Users simply insert the card into the Wi-Fi enabled Nintendo DS, connect to a network, and begin browsing on two screens. As of now it will only be available to Nintendo DS users in Japan.

Users of the Wii console will be able to browse the Internet using their consoles. Navigating via the innovative new Wii Remote controller, users can visit Web sites in between gaming sessions even while the console is on standby mode.

The Opera browser will be stored on Flash ROM which is almost as fast as a telephone or television and can be powered up in just a few seconds.

“For our Wii console launch in 2006, we required a browser that was fast and secure with support for the latest standards including AJAX. Opera proved perfect for our purposes and is an exceptional addition to both the Nintendo DS and the Wii console,” said Genyo Takeda, senior managing director and general manager, Integrated Research & Development Division, Nintendo Co., Ltd.

The Nintendo DS browser is scheduled for release in Japan this summer. Nintendo has not yet announced its global launch plans for this product.

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Screenshots of the Opera browser on the Nintendo DS.

Opera Mini has been chosen for the LAPTOP Editors’ Choice Award by LAPTOP Magazine.

From the review: “This is a must-try for anyone who is serious about having access to the full Web on the go.”

Opera released Opera Mini 2.0 earlier this month. Since its initial release in January of this year, more than 2.5 million users downloaded Opera Mini and countless mobile phone operators have agreed to distribute the browser to their customers.

Opera Mini Mighty Market Maker

In case you’ve been living in a cave, Opera’s strategy for mobile devices using the Internet has come up with a real market maker. Opera mini is a full web browser that runs on a wide range of mobile phones. Opera’s use of and experience with AJAX technologies led to the development of Opera mini for low-end phones. Server side technology development is the magic behind the Mini. Opera’s marketing strategy of giving away the software to build a customer base for firms that license Opera mini for their cell phones is a market maker.

Released in January 2006 for full commercial use, the beta trials that were announced in October 2005 garnered over a million downloads. Opera is building market share by following the same path for Opera mini that it established in September 2005 when it dropped the licensing fee for its desktop browser.

The way this marketing strategy works is that Opera licenses the Opera mini to mobile telecommunications carriers and to handset manufactureers. They make money by selling time on their networks for end-users. Opera’s mini software is attractive enough to encourage end-users to try other services with their cell phones including web browsing, using data services such as stock price alerts and sports scores, and downloading multi-media products like ring tones, pictures, and video clips. The more users who download Opera mini, the larger the installed base of the product, and the more cell phone operators will want to license it from Opera to sell cell network time to subscribers.

According to Eskil Sivertsen, an Opera public relations manager, End-users get to surf the real Web on their phones, faster and cheaper because of Mini’s compression; Operators get all this data traffic from users that would normally not be surfing if it hadn’t been for Mini; Content providers reach the mass market with their existing sites and services.

In short, Opera mini is making the market for the mobile device industry. In April 2006 Opera reported that its Mini software was rapidly increasing billable network traffic for cell phone operators. Opera said more than two million people were using the Operas Mini by surfing the web on their phones.

Some background on all this is probably in order. Opera mini works with AJAX technology. That acronym stands for “Asynchronous Javascript and XML.” This isn’t a new programming language. It is a collection of technologies. The intent is to mediate the relationship between the end-user’s device, such as a desktop PC or web-enabled mobile phone, and the server sending the data. The key benefit is that the entire web page, like this one, doesn’t have to be reloaded everytime the user makes a change. The result is smaller amounts of data are exchanged and response time increases with a better web browsing experience for the user. The most significant advantage is that users can get web browsing experiences on their cell phones similar to what they are used to on their desktops.

This advantage isn’t lost on Opera which pushes the concept in its promotion of the product to cell phone operators. Opera said in April 2006, Users can visit the same Web sites they can browse from their desktop and in the same way, using Web address formats they are already accustomed to. As Opera Mini is based on Opera’s core technology, it is tried and tested and has everything users would expect from a browser including search, bookmarks and history.

Opera software has done well exploiting AJAX technologies with the Opera Mini. Since January 2006 the firm has inked a number of deals with cell phone and network operators. In February 2006 Opera signed up MediaPlazza, a global distributor of media content to cell phones. The deal puts the Opera mini on cell phones in 60 countries. In March 2006 Opera signed a deal with T-Mobile to put a customized version of the Mini on high-end phones in Europe including devices made by Sony and Motorola.

At this point Opera is making the market for web-enabled electronic commerce on cell phones. Version 2.0 of Opera Mini released this month goes right for the ecommerce sweet spot by making it easier for people to buy things with their cell phones. It links transactions to the network operator’s billing system and keeps the user on the web page where they found the product. Another cool feature is speed dialing for your favorite web page using a bookmark.

Other software developers aren’t sitting still while Opera scoops up all the marbles. A quick review of products includes Thunderhawk by Bitspream, Nokia’s browser for their series 60 phones, and a new service from America Online (AOL) that competes head-to-head with Opera. According to PC Magazine, AOL’s browser service competes with Opera Mini from Opera, which uses a similar trick of reformatting pages on a server to get around the limited processing power of many phones. But Opera Mini is a Java application you must download to your phone, where AOL’s service works through the phone’s existing WAP browser.

The competition is heating up. According to ZDnet, Microsoft, Palm, and others are racing to bring products to market, Microsoft, Palm and Handspring all offer browsers designed to view full HTML Web pages on handhelds, with Palm and Handspring’s models relying on proxy servers to do much of the necessary reformatting.

Microsoft is purusing mobile web browsing, but some analysts think the Redmond software giant is stuck on desktop technologies and will be undercut in terms of market share by mobile browsing. Little has occured with Mozilla’s Minimo mobile browser which is still in development.

One Internet analyst said that Opera’s technology was substantially better than anything else available. I think it’s absolutely phenomenal technology,” said Michael Gartenberg, analyst with Jupiter Research, when the browser first appeared. “This is the kind of situation where Opera could potentially give Microsoft a run for its money in mobility.

Another prize in the mix is targeting advertising the cell phone users surfing the web through their wireless devices. Tom Burgess, CEO of Third Screen Media, says “the small screen is clearly ready for prime-time advertising.” In an interview with MediaPost Publications, Burgess says targeting will be very precise, by handset, user, demographics, time of day, and even location. Products supported by paid targeted advertising will include video, voice/data, Java applets, games, and text messaging. Actual usage behaviors will be readily available to cell phone operators and content providers based on number of impressions per page and click through traffic. You will have lots of options but you may not have much privacy. However, your data will be merged with millions of others leading to a contradictory case of personalized anonymous surfing.

This revenue potential is clear to Opera and Google. In December 2005 the two firms inked a deal that makes Google the default search engine for Opera’s browser on cell phones. Opera earns revenue from Google when users click through on targeted ads that appear with search results.

This is an exciting market to watch, and in the coming months I’ll continue to focus on the crossover between desktop and mobile web browsing.