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I tried new alpha version of Opera 10 ("Peregrine") and have few comments to it.

Speed
Well, this is the most "visible" feature - Opera 10 is much faster on GMail and Facebook where 9.x was really really slow. I appreciate it a lot. And 100/100 Acid3... Good work

New Features
The brand new autoupdate feature is also welcome. One of Firefox guys' argument was that Opera has no update manager. Times are changin'
Embeddable fonts are great too. I will probably use it in my new personal blog (not this one) design...
Spell check - another feature which was requested (and Firefox has it, of course). I don't use it but it may be really good for someone. I know that it was possible to use Aspell... I really like the thing I can use OO.org dictionaries (although I use MS Office).

Issues
It's an alpha, so it has few bugs. Some AJAX sites (bandzone.cz) don't work at all. I hope it will be fixed soon.
GUI lags - it sometimes takes a while to change the page title. And some texts (e.g. in feed notification) blink on mouseover...

No big deal - I use Opera 10a1 as my primary browser now (yes, I did my backup) and I'm relly looking forward to next release.

What shall (or should) Opera software do to be better? And how to get over 5% usage at least?

1. Simplified UI
Many users complain that Opera's UI is complicated. Too many buttons, non-native interface and so on. How to solve this?

Who needs fast forward/backward buttons? Or wand button? Are they really necessary? I think not. Normal (or BF) user needs only back, refresh/stop and maybe home buttons. Or Speed dial...

2. Native UI
Well, this one is not as necessary as the previous one. Browsers should be native. Although, Opera's native skin is more native than Firefox's default I think Opera shall use native UI on Window (and possibly on Linux or Mac; I know, it's difficult).

3. Small improvements

• favicons in new feeds dialog for better orientation
  
• scrolling in feeds menu if there are too many feeds and can't fit screen
  

And the last and most important - Opera needs better presentation. Like Firefox () Without ad campaigns Opera could not reach higher percentage share...

This was (probably) done by students who graduate this year (actually, for two weeks). And the car? It's the headmaster's one... covered by... a toilet paper







Good job

I'm using Opera every day for more than two years. Why? Let's go back in time. (Real time travelling in use )

It's the end of January, 2004. I've heard about Linux few months ago and now I first tried it! My first distro was daNix (czech one, built on Debian). The next month I downloaded Mandrake 10.1. I had to solve a problem with browser. In daNix I used Konqueror, but in Windows was Maxthon browser of my choice.

I can't remember when I first saw and used Opera, but it was certainly early 7th version. So I installed to my Mandrake. I was very surprised. And since that times I use Opera in Windows and also in Linux (after Mandrake it was Fedora Core 3, 4, 5 and 6, waiting for 7 )

Please, forgive me that tense mess-up, time travelling is still in development

P.S.: Get ready for the second part - the reasons

I was wondering how to start a new blog. I already heave one but it's completely in czech. And I want to improve my English...

Maybe you want to know something about me (undoubtedly ). I live in Czech Republic (in Europe) near the third biggest city Ostrava. While writing this post - next week I'll turn 18. I claim to be a webdesigner, coder (XHTML and CSS) and ASP (Active Server Pages, technology developed by Microsoft) programmer. I think it's enough (but you can find more in my profile).

I started using Opera about three years ago (but I also remember the 6th version) when I switched to Linux. I used Maxthon browser before... Since that time I user Opera every day and can't live without it