opera Opera announces 'gradual transition' to WebKit for desktop and mobi

[threetonesun]

I wonder, since they've mentioned Chromium, if they'll base the next Opera on that rather than WebKit2? It sounds to me like they're going to fork Chromium.

That's what I've read elsewhere as well.

[ViperAFK]

I wonder, since they've mentioned Chromium, if they'll base the next Opera on that rather than WebKit2? It sounds to me like they're going to fork Chromium.

Yeah, the way its worded does sound like that: "The company says there will be a "gradual transition" this year to WebKit and Chromium across desktop and mobile."

[Sandor]

Generally it's a good thing for the web itself to have consistent standards and consistent adherence to them. On the face of it having lots of different browsers all having "their say" on how things display and then adding their own proprietary nonsense on top makes everything more complicated and is far from ideal.

The issue is not having "one rendering engine" but who has a say on what that rendering engine does. WebKit itself is open source. If the companies involved and the standards authorities developed clear, solid standards and implemented them properly it wouldn't be a bad thing. At the moment things like CSS recommendations take years.

[ncc50446]

They just better keep the features that I like about Opera in the new Opera.

Mouse Gestures, Customization, Easy searching ('w keyword' to search Wiki), the much better Speed Dial and keep down the resources that Chrome seems to use..

Though really surprised by this move..But, I hope it's for the best...Time will tell

I just hope they don't fork Chrome, I hate Chrome...I don't hate WebKit, just Chrome...

[desired display name]

Uhm, check out this list about the css prefixes used by the different engines: http://peter.sh/experiments/vendor-prefixed-css-property-overview/ . -webkit is by far the most... exploited.

When I code I've always used Opera as a reference, _without_ prefixes, to get things right according to current standards.

Presto is fantastic. I hope Opera continues to be as fantastic using webkit

[ViperAFK]

Generally it's a good thing for the web itself to have consistent standards and consistent adherence to them. On the face of it having lots of different browsers all having "their say" on how things display and then adding their own proprietary nonsense on top makes everything more complicated and is far from ideal.

The issue is not having "one rendering engine" but who has a say on what that rendering engine does. WebKit itself is open source. If the companies involved and the standards authorities developed clear, solid standards and implemented them properly it wouldn't be a bad thing. At the moment things like CSS recommendations take years.

Standards are good, but everyone developing only for webkit and only using webkit specific prefixes and features is a bad, bad road to go down. Yes, it wouldn't be as bad as the ie6 days, since webkit is open source at least, but its still the opposite of proper "web standards"

[BajiRav]

FANTASTIC NEWS... my dream of unified web where we don't have to write 15 CSS lines and use polyfills for a single thing and tons of libraries to make stuff look the same across browsers is coming true.

Hopefully Mozilla joins Webkit train and finally we will have Microsoft forced to switch as well..

If this happens then we can truly start phasing out Flash as building for web will be beautiful. Not to mention that the tools we will get will be as good as Flash professional as there won't be compatibility issues due to unified rendering engine and spaghetti code for 5 different browsers. This fragmentation has been destroying web for a while now. And companies can contribute with cool features like Adobe is doing with CSS3 Shaders, Blend modes and so on and it can be quickly implemented on all browsers.

THEN, we can truly say open web and browsers offer now truly unified rendering and all the cool features Flash has now and that we can't (or have hard time) doing in HTML5/JS/CSS will be implemented in Webkit.

The dream.. is just a bit closer.

People like you got us into the "Best viewed in IE" mess and now you will get use back into "Best viewed on webkit Chrome" again. (try opening google reader on iPad and see my point).

That is bull**** because WebKit is open source.

and what does that have to do with open web standards?

V8 and Webkit based Chromium are simply the most advanced browser/VM today.. and instead of everyone peddling their own things they should all work on the same thing.

I thought the "same thing" was called w3c standards?

[Athernar]

Terrible choice. Webkit has probably the poorest standard of implementation of any of the current crop of engines. What is more laughable, is that people are foolish enough to think that Webkit being open source is enough to prevent lock-in. If you honestly think that this is the case, you obviously haven't ever observed politics at work in the OSS community.

People like you got us into the "Best viewed in IE" mess and now you will get use back into "Best viewed on webkit Chrome" again. (try opening google reader on iPad and see my point).

We're already there, and Google are encouraging it.

[syobon999]

FANTASTIC NEWS... my dream of unified web where we don't have to write 15 CSS lines and use polyfills for a single thing and tons of libraries to make stuff look the same across browsers is coming true.

Hopefully Mozilla joins Webkit train and finally we will have Microsoft forced to switch as well..

If this happens then we can truly start phasing out Flash as building for web will be beautiful. Not to mention that the tools we will get will be as good as Flash professional as there won't be compatibility issues due to unified rendering engine and spaghetti code for 5 different browsers. This fragmentation has been destroying web for a while now. And companies can contribute with cool features like Adobe is doing with CSS3 Shaders, Blend modes and so on and it can be quickly implemented on all browsers.

THEN, we can truly say open web and browsers offer now truly unified rendering and all the cool features Flash has now and that we can't (or have hard time) doing in HTML5/JS/CSS will be implemented in Webkit.

The dream.. is just a bit closer.

hahaha what a ******...

Having a bunch of different forks of webkit isn't going to be any more fun. Presto and Gecko both render better than Webkit in many situations. Webkit's only claim to greatness when it comes to rendering is speed, fewer rendering engines in use has and will result in less standards compliance.

If you're writing 15 lines of CSS to do one thing you're either:

Doing it wrong

Using vendor prefixed CSS which isn't actually finalised yet

Putting in CSS to override the different browser defaults which has nothing to do with the rending engine

So changing to webkit won't fix a lot except create another "Designed for X" period just like the IE6 days. The only way it can work with a single rendering engine is if it because a reference implementation of the spec - ie the rendering engine is the spec but that won't happen as different browsers will probably have different versions

[Sandor]

Standards are good, but everyone developing only for webkit and only using webkit specific prefixes and features is a bad, bad road to go down. Yes, it wouldn't be as bad as the ie6 days, since webkit is open source at least, but its still the opposite of proper "web standards"

How exactly is it the opposite of web standards?

*If* the engine follows standards then it's fine.

[ViperAFK]

How exactly is it the opposite of web standards?

*If* the engine follows standards then it's fine.

Webkit is not the web standards. Lazy developers doing things like exclusively using webkit specific css prefixes and/or webkit/chrome specific features can and will screw over other engines, even a "perfectly" standards complaint one, because these things aren't yet standards. And then there's chrome features like NaCl that could end up becoming the next activex.

A complete monoculture around webkit would *not* be fine, it would heavily encourage lazy developers. This kind of thing is already in pretty bad shape in the mobile space, a lot of mobile sites only serve webkit specific code, that doesn't work right on other browsers like firefox. We do NOT want this happening.

I'm not saying webkit is a bad engine, or that its not reasonably standards complaint. Webkit itself isn't really the problem, the biggest part of the problem would be with web developers themselves: http://www.webmonkey...he-web-you-are/

If an engine becomes ubiquitous, then developers take that as an opportunity to cut corners, and start developing with only that engine in mind, and its this kind of development that harms open web standards. This kind of development is not adhering to open web standards, its adhering to one specific rendering engine. Even if that engine is open source and reasonably standards complaint, you can see why this is not a good direction for the web to go in.

Lets look at opera as an example here. Opera's presto engine is one of the most standards-complaint engines around, yet opera users are still plagued with website compatibility issues, because of these kinds of developers!

[n_K]

"You, and all the other fearmongers like you do realise that the data Chrome sends back has nothing to do with Webkit... right? And exactly the same data gets sent back to Microsoft every time you opt into their requests to send usage stats. I've been using Chrome for 3 years and strangely enough I haven't had anything bad happen to me yet. Nobody's stolen all my money, nobody's hacked my PC, the feds haven't busted my back door in..."

There is a huge difference between opting-in and something that doesn't allow you to opt-out, at all. You CANNOT OPT OUT of chrome sending data out. Firefox asks if you want to opt in, as does IE/MS.

It's not about hacking your PC hacked.

Do you walk down the street shouting 'Hey guys I have $X in the bank, I regularly visit X sites and I always click on adverts for Lingerie'? It doesn't mean people can hack you, but you wouldn't do it none-the-less.

[Sandor]

Webkit is not the web standards. Lazy developers doing things like exclusively using webkit specific css prefixes and/or webkit/chrome specific features can and will screw over other engines, even a "perfectly" standards complaint one, because these things aren't yet standards. And then there's chrome features like NaCl that could end up becoming the next activex.

A complete monoculture around webkit would *not* be fine, it would heavily encourage lazy developers. This kind of thing is already in pretty bad shape in the mobile space, a lot of mobile sites only serve webkit specific code, that doesn't work right on other browsers like firefox. We do NOT want this happening.

I'm not saying webkit is a bad engine, or that its not reasonably standards complaint. Webkit itself isn't really the problem, the biggest part of the problem would be with web developers themselves: http://www.webmonkey...he-web-you-are/

If an engine becomes ubiquitous, then developers take that as an opportunity to cut corners, and start developing with only that engine in mind and , and its this kind of development harms the web. This kind of thing development is not adhering to open web standards.

I'm not saying webkit "is" the standard. My point is if there was a singular engine which accurately followed standards (and the standards themselves were developed and decided upon faster and integrated) then life, as a web designer/developer, would be sweet. You'd also precisely avoid the scenario you painted about lazy developers writing code that only works in one browser/engine. Instead you'd have one consistent base to work off at the core. It would either work or it wouldn't. At the moment there are disparate engines, versions thereof, and browsers that implement their own prefixes and don't even agree on rendering simple stuff like borders or input buttons. This is a mess that needs fixed and has needed fixed forever.

In much the same way "HTML" is basically one standard that has gradually progressed over the years, having one standardised engine that renders it the same isn't to be written off lightly. I could care less if it was webkit or trident or presto or anything else that became that.

A big part of the problem is the sluggish nature of developing solid HTML and CSS standards. Often it takes a decade for something to solidify. HTML5 itself isn't even "standard" yet because of the treacle pace.

[Boz]

Uhm, check out this list about the css prefixes used by the different engines: http://peter.sh/expe...perty-overview/ . -webkit is by far the most... exploited.

When I code I've always used Opera as a reference, _without_ prefixes, to get things right according to current standards.

Presto is fantastic. I hope Opera continues to be as fantastic using webkit

It's not exploited.. if you notice all browsers running on webkit support those prefixes

Google Chrome, Chromium, Apple Safari

Webkit prefixes are a consequence of quick innovation and brining new features that are needed and that make lives easier for designers and developers.

Now all these will be available on Opera as well..

So first column with support for those things will be

Chrome, Chromium, Safari and Opera.

Webkit based browsers support all web standards + additional features because they are able to innovate quickly and adopt to the needs of developers.

Saying how we need to just follow standards would make us wait for new features for another decade. I don't understand how that can be good.

This is also why Adobe is joining up with Google too and Chromium crowd. They are building stuff like CSS3 shaders, blend modes and other cool stuff and making it available to everyone. Unfortunately this will only work in Webkit based browsers since Mozilla and IE are the only remaining browsers that are lagging with innovation in every aspect.

[PreKe]

Not great news. The less competition the more we end up with sub-standard standards implementation and propriety hacks. As much as i currently love WebKit, it's well on it's way to becoming the next IE6.

It's a nightmare without choice, not a dream.

Are all of you saying things like this using Opera as your only browser?

I feel if Opera switches to WebKit, that's even less of a reason to use it, since it won't render any differently from Safari or Chrome, and I thought one of the appeals of Opera was its own rendering engine.

Rendering differently was a reason to use Opera? Really? I thought it was the UI and features...

[Mr. Gibs]

Webkit prefixes are a consequence of quick innovation and brining new features that are needed and that make lives easier for designers and developers.

Reallllly now :rolleyes:

I'm sure you were one of the people who was all for Microsoft when they tried to make their own version of the web so other browsers wouldn't work right?

I'm sure you were also one of the people who was praising MS for being the only web engine back in the 90s and you were so so pleased with IE6. Because if WebKit became the only engine, the exact same thing would happen. Companies (even if its opensource) are not going to bother improving stuff when there's no competition and no need for it.

[PreKe]

I'm going to borrow a quite from a user called "kibwen" on Hacker News because I think it's a pretty good response.

You're committing an error here. Say you find a bug in Webkit. You patch it, but Apple declines to accept it upstream. You fork the project. Now how do you get your fork into the hands of your users? Unless you're secretly Google in disguise, you're SOL.

Why would you fork Webkit over a single bug? And why does he first talk about Apple, then Google? Are they cooperating to make Webkit evil? And what about Nokia, RIM, and all the others who are adding fixes to Webkit all the time? Are they also part of this evil cabal which wants to block all your fixes?

[Boz]

Having a bunch of different forks of webkit isn't going to be any more fun. Presto and Gecko both render better than Webkit in many situations. Webkit's only claim to greatness when it comes to rendering is speed, fewer rendering engines in use has and will result in less standards compliance.

This is nonsense for several reasons..

1. First, we have proof.. as in REAL LIFE EXPERIENCE that webkit browsers on mobile iOS/Android work MUCH better and developing for mobile web is far easier than for desktop due to almost no fragmentation. Yes, Apple introduced a couple of unique webkit prefixes on Safari for mobile but those are really not a big deal as you don't have to use them. They extend functionality and give some thing for iOS platform. You can still completely avoid using them and have the same code running on both Android and iOS.

So this whole "forking" notion is completely ridiculous. Everyone who joins Chromium/Webkit wouldn't really make it wildly incompatible because it's not in anyone's interest. That's why they switch to Webkit.

2. Webkit/Chromium support web standards better than any of the other browsers

So I don't know what the hell are people talking about "This site works with IE only" nonsense.

If everyone would join webkit there would be no need for that at all. We have THAT scenario now because of the incredible fragmentation among browsers.

Whatever your build for webkit based browsers on desktop works the same on all of them. It's beautiful.

I'm sure you were one of the people who was all for Microsoft when they tried to make their own version of the web so other browsers wouldn't work right?

You do understand that there is a HUGE difference between Microsoft and their proprietary browser they wanted to use to control the web and the open source browser that is one of the best web standards compliant browsers and is used by multiple companies making browsers.

In what world is this the same.

[Mr. Gibs]

So I don't know what the hell are people talking about "This site works with IE only" nonsense.

If everyone would join webkit there would be no need for that at all. We have THAT scenario now because of the incredible fragmentation among browsers.

So prefixes don't cause fragmentation huh?

And stop using HTML5Test, it's been proved time and time and time again that it actually doesn't test anything. It also doesn't even follow the standard and checks for things that aren't part of the standard.

So this whole "forking" notion is completely ridiculous. Everyone who joins Chromium/Webkit wouldn't really make it wildly incompatible because it's not in anyone's interest. That's why they switch to Webkit.

Really now? How exactly are they going to differentiate their browsers then?

If all the browsers were the same, why would you choose chromium over safari (for example)?

You do understand that there is a HUGE difference between Microsoft and their proprietary browser they wanted to use to control the web and the open source browser that is one of the best web standards compliant browsers and is used by multiple companies making browsers.

In what world is this the same.

Um you should read on.

Companies (even if its opensource) are not going to bother improving stuff when there's no competition and no need for it.

Competition drives innovation. MS improves their browser because they know others are out there. Google improves Chrome because they know other browsers exist. If all browsers were the same, used the same engine, they have no need to do anything.

[Boz]

So prefixes don't cause fragmentation huh?

No prefixes alone don't make fragmentation.. they don't work on IE and Mozilla.. which is their problem.. I personally want fast innovation on the web that will allow W3C to come up with web standards and have those standards quickly implemented in browsers and not wait for a decade to solidify. That's what everyone being on Webkit/Chromium would give us. Faster evolution of web.

If IE and Mozilla joined webkit initiative like Google, Apple and Opera now have there would be very very little fragmentation.. of course, it wouldn't be flawless there would be slight differences, but nowhere near the way it is now where everyone does whatever the hell they want. And this is not an opinion.. WE CAN ALREADY see it on mobile.

It's obvious why people who are against this (namely MS and Mozilla at this point) are against it. It's because it would mean they would have to compete in browser market based on the actual functionality of the browser and not reinventing the wheel with new version of their browser that causes huge damage to the web.

It would in fact make them irrelevant and they wouldn't be able to dominate anything.. This would eventually end Mozilla, so I understand why everyone from Mozilla is all up in arms over this. But hey, their browser has been sucking for a long time now. I stopped using it years ago.

[PreKe]

Webkit/Chromium support web standards better than any of the other browsers

You can't make a claim like this based on a flawed test like that.

For one, it allows Maxthon to cheat because all the browser needs to do is report a feature as being present. It doesn't test that the feature actually works. Also, the scores are assigned according to what the owner of the site likes (and he is probably a Chrome user).

[Mr. Gibs]

No prefixes alone don't make fragmentation.. they don't work on IE and Mozilla.. which is their problem..

A chrome prefix doesn't work on Safari and Opera. A Safari prefix doesn't work on Chrome and Opera. An Opera prefix won't work on either.

You said it yourself Apple added some safari only prefixes into iOS. What's stopping other browser makers from doing the same thing? They have to differentiate their browsers somehow and if they all use the same engine, that makes it a lot harder.

but nowhere near the way it is now where everyone does whatever the hell they want.

Prefixes also allow people to do w/e the hell they want.

Your logic is pathetic Boz.

[PreKe]

No prefixes alone don't make fragmentation.. they don't work on IE and Mozilla.. which is their problem..

No, that's Webkit's problem for not using them properly, and not dropping them when the spec is finalized.

[ViperAFK]

It would be nice if the w3c didn't move so slowly, but relying heavily on prefixes and expecting every browser to use webkit is a very poor way to "fix" this. The logic makes no sense.

[Mr. Gibs]

It would be nice if the w3c didn't move so slowly, but relying heavily on prefixes and expecting every browser to use webkit is a very poor way to "fix" this. The logic makes no sense.

Of course it doesn't but it is Boz. If it involves webkit or Google, they're always right and it's always the best thing in the world. Anyone who says otherwise is dumb :rolleyes:

Instead what we should do is completely just roll over and let Google control our lives and be our God.

I like how his logic is Chrome's V8/Webkit engine are the best in the world so everyone should use it. There was a time when Microsoft's trident engine was the best in the world, why didn't everyone use it then? There was a time when Gecko was the best, everyone should have used it then too :rolleyes: