Opera Developer News

Mobile analyst Peter Paul Koch recently wrote,

Opera once more overtakes Safari. It's clear now that Android's untrammeled growth has ended, and that the race for first position will continue to be between Opera and Safari.

So now's the time to download the Opera mobile browsers and test your sites.

Opera Mobile 12 for Android and Symbian

Just because a device is small enough to fit in your pocket, it doesn't mean it can't have a powerful browser. Opera Mobile 12 is packed with HTML5 goodness:

• Ragnarök, our HTML5 parser, for better web apps and increased compatibility with websites.
• ECMAScript 5.1 for those who are too damn groovy for JavaScript.
• Orientation Support
• For Android only, support for camera use in the browser using the same, newer, getUserMedia syntax as Opera desktop Labs.
• CSS3 radial gradients and the fabled -o-double-rainbow.
• CORS (cross-origin resource sharing).
• For Android only, hardware-accelerated WebGL for all things 3D and web. With WebGL on mobile, it'll be even easier to make and distribute games that work cross-platform.

Keen standards-spotters can check out our Web specifications support in Opera products.

Loads of webapp wowzers for the browsers in your trousers!

Demos? You want demos? Try our new Shiny Demos in Opera Mobile 12 or any capable browsers (no 1998-era browser-sniffing here, thank you).

Testing Opera Mobile

In the early stages of a project, when you're constantly tweaking viewports and media queries, it can slow you down to continually deploy a site, then check on a phone. To help you, we've packaged up the Opera Mobile codebase into a desktop app for Windows, Linux and Mac, so you can test locally. It's called Opera Mobile Emulator. (Note that the Opera Mobile 12 emulator will be released in the coming weeks)

For sophisticated debugging, we have true remote debugging with Opera Dragonfly that allows you to inspect the DOM, change the CSS and set breakpoints in your device browser, from your desktop.

Patrick H. Lauke, Product Manager for Opera Dragonfly, explains more.

Have a look at opera.com/developer/tools for an overview of our developer tools – and if that's not enough, we also have 'The Developer Briefcase' and other neat Opera extensions for developers.

Opera Mini Next

Be sure to check out your site in Opera Mini, and experience it as many of your users will.

Opera Mini now has a Next channel, where the latest improvements will land on in advance of an official release. In this case, those improvements include the "Home Screen" for social network integration next to Speed Dial for feature phones, and hardware-accelerated scrolling with revamped Speed Dial for smartphones.

You should also read our Opera Mini: web content authoring guidelines.

Opera Mini 7 for iOS

Opera Mini 7 Final for iOS is in the Appstore today. We've added support for file uploads, and more than nine Speed Dials.

Gimme, gimme, gimme

Grab your Opera Mini Next for Java, Android, Blackberry and S60 from m.opera.com/next, and Opera Mobile 12 for Android and Symbian from m.opera.com. Opera Mini 7 for iOS is available from the Appstore.