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The Dark Furie

The Mountain Must Come To Me

Tuesday, 24. April 2007, 00:20:51

,

An idea for improved functionality in Opera Mini.

Why oh why oh why doesn't Opera Mini support widgets? It'd be so simple to implement into the system. I'm a big fan of delivered content. Sure, Opera Mini is without a doubt the very best mobile web browser I've ever used. It's fast, usually reliable and secure. But the fact remains that when I want to know something I have to manually search for it, which is why I want widgets.

I've got a couple of widget clients on my phone at the moment as well as a built in RSS feed reader. Widsets, Bluepulse, Plusmo, Mobizines, Mobispine and Jitter (jitter is just a mobile twitter client but it counts as a widget) are being used at the moment but each of them has problems. Widsets only has a few widgets that do what they're meant to. Bluepulse and Plusmo are both extraordinarily slow despite having well designed widgets. Mobispine and Mobizines are basically RSS readers with better graphics and not much available content. One problem with all of them is that links automatically use the phone's in built browser.

I'd love to have widget clients like these built into Opera Mini as standard. I like to read a joke or quote of the day while having my morning coffee. My first smoke of the day is much better while reading the news and my horoscope. But I really hate having to look these trivial things up and I don't like having to have so many different applications cluttering up my memory stick.

So I envision a new version of Opera Mini that opens into a 9x9 grid as the start page. The cursor starts on the centre space of the grid where Opera Mini as we know it lies. Surrounding that are up to 8 widgets that I either pick from a categorised list, or make myself using a simple built-in tool (select feed URL, choose colour scheme, name widget, done). These could be newsfeeds or any other regularly delivered content. They would use my phone's normal web access and bypass the Opera Mini servers to update while constantly running in the background (with settings allowing automatic or manual refreshes) while Opera Mini is open. Using a Switch command added to the menu I could switch between my widgets and normal Opera Mini browsing just by pressing a button. And any links on articles received by these widgets could be opened by Opera Mini not the normal phone browser.

Anyone else out there think this is not only a good idea but a perfectly plausible one as well? Oh well, maybe in version 3.2 then. After all, the developers told Opera Watch they had something very special planned for the next version of Opera Mini. We can only hope.

One More For The RoadVote For Kim

Comments

dantesoft 3. May 2007, 17:56

Widgets without Javascript interaction are not widgets. And Opera Mini has none.

I suspect the new OM version to have phone file access for saving/loading pages on phones that allow Java midlets this privilege. But I can only hope for a chat module.

Furie 3. May 2007, 18:24

I'm more after a core program that envelops Opera Mini, rather than full widgets. Just something like Zen Zui to run with Opera Mini being the default browser used for links. Of course, due to the limitations of java apps, it'd have to be built into Opera Mini to start with.

Accessing the file system would be nice, that's for sure, but a lot of people reckon it's not possible due to catering for so many different phones. It'd save me using the built in Netscape browser to upload pictures anyway.

AzureTimm 4. May 2007, 00:46

I?........ Can't........ Upload......... ANYTHING! I hate it when I capture a nice photo and just tuck it somewhere in my folders instead of being able to upload it... Netscape? Is it built-in or downloadable java app?

Regards, a boy unable to upload anything with Nokia 6020, Timm.

AzureTimm 4. May 2007, 00:49

Hey, you have so many votes! I only get 9 votes in two months.......

Furie 4. May 2007, 08:55

It's my phone's built in browser. Since I discovered Opera Mini I stopped using it. On a whim I tried uploading pictures here using it, when OM wouldn't let me. It worked! :D

AzureTimm 4. May 2007, 09:04

Why... Did... You... Have... So... Many... Votes......?

Furie 4. May 2007, 09:32

People tend to be either coke people or pepsi people, and given a choice they'll declare their love. :lol: I dunno. You get more hits, I get more votes. Doesn't make sense eh?

AzureTimm 4. May 2007, 09:51

... Dunno. What's your total hit now?

Furie 4. May 2007, 10:08

Exactly 2340 at the moment. Not many people've been visiting recently :frown: Only had three visitors overnight. Think I need to post more. Think I'll have a test day today. :D

sudevan 9. July 2007, 11:34

if we polute-

air,fire,space,earth,water
how childrens will survive?

PARTYON 1. January 2008, 15:22

hello is there any way of clearing the cache in opera mini 4. pl or is it automatic

Furie 1. January 2008, 18:15

Try pressing # then 5 then select yes. It'll clear your history and cache out. For cookies you'll have to go online via the settings menu that can be found in tools.

qlue 7. January 2009, 15:36

Still waiting for your widgets Mik? :left:.
Maybe in Operamini 5?

Furie 7. January 2009, 16:04

Still waiting. awww Why wont Opera Mini and Widsets have a drunken night of fun? :cry:

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