Haavard

The new Opera Portal

Saturday, June 20, 2009 1:39:56 AM

Opera Portal is the default homepage in Opera, and has until now been somewhat under-used. This will change with the new version of the site which is currently being gradually rolled out.

We are starting with users in Norway (screenshot) and France. If you are in one of these countries, you can open portal.opera.com now and see the new site.

It will be rolled out to other markets in the coming weeks.

Opera Portal is important because it is the default homepage of millions of Opera users worldwide. The new Opera Portral is a content aggregation service which brings together news, sports, entertainment, social networking, movies, music, and other types of content onto a page that is customizable by you.

This is only the first stage. The future of Opera Portal will see more content partners, more social networking applications, more gaming content, and more, added over time.

For those of you who have access to the new Opera Portal, simply log in with your My Opera username and password, and start exploring and customizing to create your own portal. You can add your own feeds, read the news of your choice, update your Facebook and Twitter accounts, and so on, all on one page.

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Comments

Robert Jacobsenrobertj # Saturday, June 20, 2009 9:56:42 AM

It looks really slick and nice! Btw, where's your antialiasing?

Khaled KhalilKhaled-Khalil # Saturday, June 20, 2009 10:10:36 AM

but, wouldn't it be better if there is an international option for regions which doesn't (and probably will never) have its localized version ?
personally, i like the current simple portal more, however, i wont make either a homepage, i like it cleaner with speed-dials.
but on the otherside, it is pleasant to see that Opera is going on the web-service way, it can also benefit from merging some services with software, like using widgets on the portal, and with one click it could be untied or disengaged from the page and loaded as separate aplication, also syncronization could be played with well from the portal.
i am out of imagination, but i am sure there is a lot in labs and minds to be done.

Pierrera-mon # Saturday, June 20, 2009 11:48:18 AM

We are starting with users in Norway (screenshot) and France.

Greatly honored, thanks !
I've reported the news @opera-fr.com

@+
--
Pierre

Rafael Luikrafaelluik # Saturday, June 20, 2009 12:14:16 PM

At moment it's very ugly...

Charles SchlossChas4 # Saturday, June 20, 2009 2:49:29 PM

Anonymous # Saturday, June 20, 2009 5:55:53 PM

Anonymous writes: One of the first things I do when I install a fresh version of opera is right click the home-page icon and remove it from the toolbar. I set opera to resume my previous session when I start the browser and just show my speed dial when I open a new tab. This pattern leaves no room for a home page. I don't know why people use home pages instead of just putting a link on the speed dial, but I know that different people use browsers differently.

Haavardhaavard # Saturday, June 20, 2009 7:33:55 PM

The home button was removed for a while, but a lot of people seemed to want it back.

Robert Jacobsenrobertj # Saturday, June 20, 2009 8:14:42 PM

Originally posted by rafaelluik:

At moment it's very ugly...

Each person has a different taste. However, I've heard many complain that the page is a bit too colourful.

Charles SchlossChas4 # Saturday, June 20, 2009 8:20:28 PM

I know some people use User CSS on MyOpera what about on the new Opera Portal?

Daniel Aleksandersendaniel # Monday, June 22, 2009 10:28:19 AM

The new portal page is pretty exciting!

I like how you can simply turn off the ads.

AlongTheRoad # Monday, June 22, 2009 1:06:33 PM

hello there, thanks for the comments (that includes harsh critics, not that we're masochists but it helps as well as the praise !)

BohwaZbohwaz # Tuesday, June 23, 2009 5:00:47 PM

OpenID login, great! When will it be available on my.opera.com?

tomassplatch # Saturday, June 27, 2009 9:22:28 AM

I just tested the portal (works even outside Norway and France with Turbo enabled

although it doesn't seem to work with Facebook and Twitter). Apart from the color scheme (hope we will be able to change it) it is looking promising, I like the use of dynamic elements (drag and drop boxes) and ability to add custom RSSs.
Looking fwd to the full deployment!

edit: Usually I don't mind adds, but there are far too obtrusive in the new portal. Is it possible to change their placement?

AlongTheRoad # Tuesday, June 30, 2009 2:32:31 PM

Hi tomassplatch,

I'm currently reporting all feedback heard here and there, and this one has been mentioned a few times (the one about the ads, which should be movable).

Khaled KhalilKhaled-Khalil # Wednesday, July 1, 2009 3:09:51 PM

hi AlongTheRoad, what about the international version ? why one can't access it from outside France or Norway unless if he is using a french/norwegian (non-transparent) proxy (like opera turbo server like tomassplatch suggested).