digg this story
add to delicious
The folks over at Opera Mobile have updated the beta release of version 9.5 of their mobile browser.
Addressed is a bug that turned off notification sounds. And while Opera acknowledges that there are other bugs it's working on, they're not fixed in this release.
We have updated the beta1 with a fix for the (very annoying) bug that turned off the notification sounds. The notification bugfix was relatively trivial and had a low risk. We are aware of the other bugs and issues, but these aren't addressed in this update.
Also noted on Opera's blog is our how-to on moving the cache file off your device and on to your storage card. (Commence horn tootage!)
Keyboard problems persist: Aside from the "Out of Memory" errors, one of the other biggest gripes with the 9.5 beta has been with soft keyboards. Opera is aware of this and says the problem lies not with its software - or Windows Mobile for that matter - but with customized keyboards.
Opera supports the SIP architecture and the IME architecture, so Opera works fine with the default Microsoft keyboards. Unfortunately, many new devices have shiny keyboards that look nice, but do not comply to Microsoft's SIP [software-based input panel] and/or IME [input method editor] standard. Those keyboards work well on an edit control, but not with other applications that want to use user-input from a keyboard.
Basically, there are standards with which Opera Mobile works just fine, but some of these newfangled software keyboards just aren't playing nicely. Opera says it will work to make its browser more compatible with nonstandard keyboards, but that there are limits, which makes sense. Standards are set for a reason. Let's hope the keyboard programmers fix things on their end.
Get the Opera Mobile 9.5 beta 1 here, and let us know in the comments if your notification problems are fixed.
And if you haven't seen it yet, check out Dieter's hands-on video walk-through of Opera Mobile 9.5.
They keyboard excuse kind of smells like crap to me for a couple of reasons:
1) The behavior in the beta is changing the keyboard from any keyboard that isn't built in to the default keyboard. You can change the keyboard back in the browser and it will work just fine until you launch Opera again. If they're going to do that, at least restore the keyboard setting when Opera is exited or the keyboard is closed.
2) The version of the browser that ships with the Diamond will allow you to use some non-standard keyboards (I've tested Resco and TouchPal) without any issues.
I've given up on the official beta until the keyboard issue is fixed. I use my soft keyboard a little too much to have to deal with changing it back to TouchPal every time I launch and exit Opera.