Well – maybe not a brat, but I’m spoilt. I was thinking about what it is about Opera that I enjoy so much; it has many features, it is responsive and fast, it is standards compliant and renders pages as they should (mostly – as all other browsers it has some bugs) can be installed on a usb pen, and it is developed constantly. It’s not alone though – I’ve used Firefox exclusively, too, and it shares much of the same good points. It doesn’t have the same features as standards, but it has plug-ins which gives the same. There is the whole Mozilla Suite too, Netscape 8 combines both Firefox and IE with both rendering engines – and still I prefer Opera.
So what is it about this browser that makes me prefer it? Am I able to explain it in other words than the three “I just do”? Well – I’m going to give it a try, at least.
Let me start by writing off Internet Explorer. It may be quick to start up – unsurprisingly when thinking about the integration with Windows – but that’s about it. It can be extended with toolbars, even shells (or whatever you want to call them) to give tabbed browsing and such – but underneath is IE with its weaknesses. The strength of IE is the installed userbase, and that many pages are built to make IE look good because of all its users.
That fact is by some thought of as the weakness of other browsers, which support the standards as they are defined, as opposed to how IE does it at the time. More and more however designers who know their trade are beginning to make web pages and solutions by the standards (and thus all the browsers that support them) and then a hack – if necessary – to make things work in IE. Not necessarily to work just as good, though; sometimes IE users are getting an inferior experience.
So to give me the best experience, a modern browser is needed.
Modern browsers mean browsers like the Mozilla Suite, Firefox and Opera. I never did enjoy Mozilla that much, but both Firefox and Opera are nice acquaintances. The latest Netscape I haven’t tried at all, but I’m not tempted by its double rendering engine, even if it means problem free use of problematic web sites. The real fight is between Firefox and Opera, when it comes to my use.
By itself Firefox isn’t much – it needs to be extended by various extensions. This is needed because I’ve come to expect additional features to make the time spent better and more useful. Excluding time spent to find the right extensions, how is the experience? It’s… Nice. Too often though, there are things in which way the extensions work – or doesn’t work – that can be a bit annoying. On the plus side, there are some really great extensions, though.
Opera can’t be extended in the same way as Firefox, but makes up for it by including many really nice features as standard. It includes these in a way that doesn’t make it feel bloated – instead, the total experience can be described be the word “smooth”. It really is a smooth experience, and the reason some extensions that gives Firefox the same functionality can be annoying, is that Opera does it all without a hiccup. For the features that both offer, Opera gives me personally the best experience – Opera just does it better!
Oh, and Opera is fast. A lean, mean, browsing machine. It’s just a pleasure to use when surfing. Troublesome web pages? Fewer and fewer – and with user javascript, much can be rectified. And the experience can be heightened, too. Firefox is close, but not quite there, in my experience.
So Opera has the overall edge. It’s not perfect, but it’s the one browser that comes closest – and it serves it all fast and with grace. Therefore, I’m spoilt.
