K-Squared Ramblings

Browser Sniffing Strikes Again!

As the first major web browser to reach a double-digit version, Opera has been testing out alpha releases of version 10 for months now. One of the early problems they encountered was bad browser detection scripts that only looked at the first digit of a version number and decided that Opera 10 was actually Opera 1, and therefore too old to handle modern web pages.

After extensive testing, they’ve concluded that the best way to work around this is to pretend to be Version 9.80. From now on, all versions of Opera will identify themselves as “Opera/9.80″ with the real version appearing later in the user-agent string.

For example:

Opera/9.80 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X; U; en) Presto/2.2.15 Version/10.00

This is similar to the way all Gecko-based browsers identify themselves as Mozilla/5.0, then list the real browser name and version number later on, which makes me wonder why they didn’t just stick with that increasingly irrelevant prefix — though I suppose any scripts looking specifically for Opera versions might have still picked up Opera/10 later on in the ID.

It’ll be some time before Firefox or Safari runs into this issue, but with Internet Explorer 8 in wide release, you have to wonder…what will Microsoft do when they get to IE 10?

15 years of the Opera Web Browser

Hard to believe Opera has been around for 15 years. It’s only 14 since its first release, but 15 years ago two programmers started the project that became the Opera web browser.

I’ve been using Opera off and on for about 10 years. I think it was 1999 when a classmate showed me Opera 3.6, and how fast and small it was. (This was back when the installer fit on a floppy disk — and back when that actually made a difference.) I’ve followed it as they expanded from Windows onto Mac and Linux, onto high-end cell phones with Opera Mobile, and finally onto every Java-capable phone with Opera Mini. I’ve watched as they went from trialware to ad-supported to freeware business models. And while the desktop browser is no longer the speed demon it used to be, it’s been a consistent innovator in terms of both browser features and web capabilities.

So I’d just like to say: Happy 15th birthday, Opera! Just think, in a year, you’ll be old enough to drive!*

*In California, anyway. I think in Norway the driving age is 18.

Color-Switchin’ Coraline Apocalypse

Neil Gaiman remarked on his blog that images his agent emails from Germany end up with the colors inverted, and posts an example of a Coraline poster:

“…ah yes, I thought. That’s the sequel, all right. CORALINE APOCALYPSE”

I used to run into this with TIFF images when building websites. (No big surprise, given that there are a million variations on the TIFF format.) I think it was around 2000 or so that I was working on a website for a law firm, and they sent me their logo. The logo, as I received it, was yellow on light blue, so I built a site with black text on a white background for the main areas, and yellow on light blue (matching their logo) for the title, navigation, and borders.

I sent them a link to the test site. They looked at it, and said it was very nice, but could I try to match the color scheme on their logo instead?

It turned out that red and blue had gotten switched around (and possibly more, because I can’t remember how the yellow ended up in there), but anyway it was supposed to be white on light brown. I switched the channels, redid all the graphics and styles for the site, and they stuck with it for several years.

Back on the subject of Coraline, Gaiman adds in his post that the film has become “the second highest grossing stop-motion film ever” after Chicken Run. So why does it seem to be forgotten already? Just two months ago, commentators were falling all over themselves to say Coraline was the turning point for 3-D animation being part of the storytelling and not just a gimmick. Now everyone’s talking about how Monsters vs. Aliens is the turning point for 3-D animation being part of the storytelling and not just a gimmick.

Upgrading the Web: IE8 Released

Microsoft released Internet Explorer 8 yesterday, for Windows XP and Vista. So if you’re still running IE6 it’s once again time to think about upgrading. (Assuming, of course, that you’re not locked in by corporate policy or another piece of software.)

IE6 is now two versions behind the current release.

IE6 is almost 8 years old (it was released in 2001).

IE6 is lacking in many capabilities that all other modern web browsers have, in web technology, in security, and in features you can use.

You can read a review at Wired, a write-up from the IE team, or a summary of technical changes from WaSP.

Of course, Internet Explorer isn’t the only option out there. There’s Firefox, Opera, Chrome and a host of other alternative browsers that are worth checking out.

If you’re still running Windows 2000 or some other old version of Windows that can’t run IE7 or IE8, I’d absolutely recommend Firefox or Opera. Either will be much better than IE6, both will run on Windows 2000, and Opera will even run on Windows Me and Windows 98 (but you really ought to move to something more current than Windows Me.)

The web is still round

Line Items for 2009-02-11: G1 Web Browser

• WTF – Android web browser doesn’t support compression? Shouldn’t it squeeze all the bandwidth it can, esp. if you end up on an edge network? #
• Hmm, looks like the G1 just turns compression off when on cell networks for proxying. Network itself may do compression #

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Please Check This Site on Your Phone!

A quick request, if I may: If you have a web-capable cell phone, would you please try to view this blog in it and let me know how it appears? I’m testing some plugins that should optimize the page for desktop, low-end mobile, and high-end mobile devices.

Please look at the main page and at least one post, then leave a comment below (still on the phone if you can) with the following:

• What phone are you using? (RAZR, iPhone, etc. Specific model if you know it)
• Can you load the site at all? (If not, what error do you get?)
• Does it look like..
  1. The desktop version of the site (photo banner across top, full sidebar, complete posts on front page)
  2. A bare-bones page (plain background, mostly text, headlines only on main page, “Powered by Wordpress. WordPress Mobile Edition” listed at the bottom of the page)
  3. A sleeker-looking list (grayish background, each post headline in a white rectangle, calendar image next to each headline, headlines on main page that expand to excerpts, dark banner across top, “Powered by WordPress with WPtouch” listed in footer)
• Are you using the built-in web browser, or something you installed (Opera Mini, for example)?
• Did anything not work?

If you can’t post a comment, please try one of the following:

• Bring up the site on your computer to leave the comment.
• Send me a Twitter direct message to @KelsonV.
• Email me at kelson - [at] - pobox - [dot] - com.

I’m mainly trying to make sure that the detection code is working right, since I’ve got 3 different plugins (WPTouch, WordPress Mobile Edition and WP Super Cache) working together to manage it.

Thanks in advance!

Line Items for 2008-12-13: AltBrowser, San Diego

• Finally updated http://altbrowser.net – now I get to sleep. Tomorrow: company Christmas party #
• Old Town San Diego. Nowhere will you find a more wretched hive of…oh, wait, that’s somewhere else. #
• 1 hour 20 min to San Diego – not bad. #
• Coffee! Mexican mocha in the drizzle. And Highlander Grog for later. #
• View from hotel (if it works) [Edit: Link gone, but check this post for the same view the next morning] #
• Now imagine that open area FULL of people lining up to get in to Hall H at Comic Con. #

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Alternative Browser Alliance Update

Just a quick note: I finally got around to updating the Alternative Browser Alliance website. Not the full rewrite that I was planning to do two months ago, but at least it’s now current on things like Google Chrome, Firebug, Dragonfly, etc.

I’ve also released that site under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license, which should simplify matters for translations.

Finally, as a compromise between a full blog and little notes on the home page, I added another Twitter account, AltBrowser, where I’ll post not just site updates but random bits of news, comments, tips, etc. related to the topic.  I don’t have time to maintain yet another blog.  And I’m not convinced the net needs one.

I still hope to do that major rewrite, but this should bring it mostly up-to-date.

Line Items for 2008-12-12: HTML Validators

• W3C Validators in trouble: apparently running the tools is hideously expensive and they’re low on funds. http://tinyurl.com/6lz5q3 #
• I usually use the WDG Offline Validator as a first line, but the W3C’s tools is incredibly useful. http://tinyurl.com/6lxbre #

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Line Items for 2008-12-04: Tech People

• Opera 10 alpha w/ 3 most-requested features: Inline spellcheck, auto-update, HTML Email http://tinyurl.com/6zew2f #
• Argh. I don’t understand how tech people can be such neophobes sometimes! #
• Especially the attitude that “I have no use for it, so no one else could possibly use it, and how dare they waste time producing it!” #
• Been using Gwibber&Twitux on Linux boxes. Gwibber’s nicer, but I’ve got 2 accts. Solution:Twhirl. Only problem: Air’s still in beta here. #

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Opera Mini on Android

Now there’s timing: Just two days after I bought a G1, Opera has released a beta of Opera Mini for the Android platform. You can find it in the Communications section of the Android Marketplace. Amazingly enough, on its first day out, it’s already #2 by popularity.

For the most part I’m happy with the built-in browser, except as I mentioned for sites that don’t translate well to the small screen. Sometimes panning & zooming isn’t the best solution, but that’s the only solution on the default browser as near as I can tell. Opera Mini gives you the option of choosing a “Mobile view” which will reformat the page.

It’s a bit rough around the edges (but then it is still a beta). In particular, the touch screen sometimes works for following links, and sometimes I have to use the track ball. Also text entry is a bit inconsistent: when you navigate to a URL, you can finish by hitting Enter, but when you fill in a single-line form field (say, a username), Enter takes you to a new line. You have to hit the Menu button to get an OK/Cancel dialog. And passwords remain completely visible, rather than obfuscating to dots one character at a time.

Of course it’s always good to have alternatives, plus it’s got the mobile display option and it’s blazing fast. It was designed to deliver performance over slower networks, after all (by compressing the heck out of everything at a proxy), so on the 3G network it just screams.

The New Browser Switch Campaigns

Rather than looking at campaigns for specific browsers, I’m looking at a class of campaigns that are either promoting a group of browsers, or advocating against the current dominant player: Internet Explorer.

Browse Happy — the classic.

• Goal: Move users away from Internet Explorer.
• Target Audience: IE users.
• Promotes: Firefox.  Also Safari, Opera, and… um… Mozilla.  Hmm, someone needs to update that.
• Pitch: IE is dangerous.
• Method: Banners

Alternative Browser Alliance

• Goal: Keep multiple standards-compliant browsers viable.
• Target Audience: All users
• Promotes: Opera, Firefox, Safari.  Also Flock, SeaMonkey, K-Meleon, Camino,etc.
• Pitch: Competition is good for everyone.  See what’s out there.
• Method: Banners

End 6!

• Goal: Move people off of IE6
• Target Audience: IE6 users
• Promotes: Firefox, Opera, Safari, Flock, IE7
• Pitch: IE6 is outdated, buggy, and unsafe.  Use something modern instead.
• Method: Overlay for IE6 visitors

Save the Developers

• Goal: Move people off of IE6
• Target Audience: IE6 users
• Promotes: IE7, Firefox, Safari, Opera
• Pitch: Coding for IE6 is a pain.  Stop putting us through that.
• Method: Animated drop-down at top of page for IE6 visitors

(Yeah, I’m catching up on old draft posts.)

Dillo Web Browser Updated at Last: 2.0 Release

After several years of inactivity and a quiet relaunch earlier this year, the Dillo web browser has finally released Dillo 2.0.

The open-source project started in 1999 with the goal of creating a small, fast, highly efficient graphical web browser that could run well even on low-end hardware and software. It’s a UNIX application, and runs on Linux, BSD, Solaris, etc. Things stagnated when it became clear that GTK1 was going to vanish, and GTK2 would not fit the project goals, and eventually the browser was ported to the Fast Light Toolkit (FLTK).

If you’ve used Dillo before, some of the improvements in this release are multiple character set support (the old versions were Latin-1–only), tabbed browsing, HTTP compression, anti-aliasing, improved rendering and UI, and smaller(!) memory usage.

It does have its limitations, and a few major items stand out as missing when compared to other modern browsers:

• No CSS stylesheet support.
• No scripting.
• No plug-ins.
• Limited SSL support.

That said, it’s useful to keep around on an older system, or for situations where speed is more important than rendering, or to test how a website works without styles, scripts, and plugins.

I started building RPMs of Dillo for my own use back in 2002, and became the official RPM packager for the project the following year. I’ve posted Dillo RPM packages for Fedora 9, RHEL 3, RHEL 4, and RHEL 5. Other distros will have to wait until I get my build system out of storage or figure out how to convince mock to let me build two packages together.

Suggestions Wanted: Alternative Browser Alliance Relaunch

You may have seen my website, the Alternative Browser Alliance. I put it together in 2005, when flame wars between Opera users and Firefox users were at their height, to show that we shared a common goal: opening the web. The most popular page on the site is a list of web browsers, which is linked as a resource from a number of sites and also gets a steady stream of traffic from people searching for alternative browsers.

Of course, things have changed a lot since 2005, so I’m planning an overhaul of the whole site. Read the rest of this entry »