updates Meet the browser: Vivaldi Next

[BooBerry]

Snapshot 1.2.479.8 - More keyboard shortcuts and a small update to 1.1

[BooBerry]

In other news, we also pushed out an update to our stable stream for Vivaldi 1.1 users earlier today. Just a few updates to keep you all secure. If you did not catch it in the update message, the changelog for 1.1.453.59 is here.

Enjoy the weekend!

[BooBerry]

Snapshot 1.2.485.14 - Bugfixes following a short week

 

Changelog

• [Regression] Edited URL cleared when switching tabs (VB-17741)
• [Regression] Bookmark URL is not updated when focusing bookmarks (VB-17422)
• [Mac] When OSX system settings that Vivaldi uses are changed, preferences should update without requiring a browser restart (VB-11123)
• Fixed Ctrl+1-8 to also select the currently selected item in the tab stack and Ctrl+9 to select last tab
• Fix for keeping focus when using single keys to switch tabs
• Hibernation of tabs only works once
• Clicking a search item in typed history tries to open URL instead of searching (VB-17515)
• Added X to delete typed history directly from URL dropdown
• Close Other Unselected Tabs is Broken (VB-17572)
• Upgraded Chromium to 51.0.2704.54

Known issues

• Caret is often missing when focusing text fields

[Boo Berry]

I've been giving this 1.2 series of snapshots a test. The bookmark issues are still there, however once I manually resort and fix everything it's fine after that. They also added a setting to get rid of the speed dial tab from showing. The only thing that bothers me is I can't add and get the --start-maximized Chrome switch working, which is very annoying when Vivaldi's window opens windowed instead of maximized.

 

It's showing promise.

[BooBerry]

Snapshot 1.2.490.3 - Clearer download progress

Changelog

• [Regression] Caret is often missing when focusing text fields (VB-17416)
• [Regression] Touch events on websites not working (VB-14943)
• [Regression] Reload button is not activated on very fast loading pages (VB-17507)
• [Regression] Search in settings does not always work (VB-17891)
• [Regression] Keyboard shortcuts don't warn you that they are already in use (VB-17804)
• [Regression] Wrong target is picked when navigating floating elements with Spatial Navigation (VB-17774)
• [Mac] Cannot make Facebook video calls (VB-17503)
• Include remaining time in download panel entry (VB-13720)
• Clicking 'x' in URL field drop down does not remove typed history item (VB-17881)
• Unable to open bookmarks without name (VB-14992)
• Middle click on a bookmark bar folder does not open all the bookmarks inside it (VB-17780)
• Searching email address via address bar does not work correctly (VB-17789)
• Trash folder misaligned (VB-17798)

Known issues

• Up and Down arrow keys can also move panel item selection
• Tabs resize too soon on closing

 

[BooBerry]

Snapshot 1.2.490.27 - Closing in on a 1.2 stable release

 

 

Changelog

• [Regression] Tabs resize too soon on closing (VB-17379)
• [Regression] Impossible to navigate to a insecure site from a Speed Dial tab (VB-17841)
• [Regression] Missing bookmarks on panel after sorting by address (VB-17940)
• [Regression] Up and Down arrow keys can also move panel item selection (VB-17925)
• [Regression] A ghost bookmark is added to tree when you leave the bookmark editor before completion (VB-17423)
• [Regression] JavaScript dialogs do not have keyboard focus (VB-17288)
• [Regression] Tiling button is not updated when tab stack looses focus (VB-17534)
• [Regression] Shows the wrong title going back to Start page (VB-17898)
• [Regression] [Windows] Middle click broken on bookmark folders (VB-17894)
• [Windows] Standalone install overwrites some values of default Vivaldi in registry (VB-12600)
• [Linux] Hibernate tab selection should be hidden from menus: since it is not yet working on Linux (VB-17820)
• Can't search via paste and go context menu (VB-17626)
• Upgrade Chromium to 51.0.2704.65

[Jose_49]

Holy cow! These guys are fast!!

[Ruti]

2 hours ago, Jose_49 said:

Holy cow! These guys are fast!!

Go VIvaldi!, i Vilieve in you!

Edited May 28, 2016 by Ruti

[+Zlip792 MVC]

Snapshot 1.2 (with Release Candidate 1 status)

 

Changelog

 

    [Regression] [Panels] Drag and drop does not move to the marker position but rather, one item below (VB-18085)
    [Regression] [Panels] Bookmarks behind edit box are not rendered when it closes (VB-18009)
    [Regression] [Panels] When clicking a folder, the arrow does not update (VB-18072)
    [Regression] [Quick Commands] Opening bookmarks doesn't respect the "Open Pages in New tab" QC option (VB-17432)
    [Regression] No image and show cached image modes are reset after tab switch (VB-18050)
    [Regression] Too low contrast for links that enable plugins (VB-17652)
    [Regression] [Linux] HTML5 proprietary media does not work in Vivaldi 1.2 under Ubuntu with chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra 49.0.2623.X or 50.0.2661.X (VB-18052)
    [Linux] Browser crashes when using menu to attempt to hibernate tabs: disabled, since it does not work yet (VB-17820)
    [Mac] Remove 'Automatically download and install …' checkbox in updater: removed, since it does not work (VB-18117)
    Updated translations

 

Blog post - https://vivaldi.net/en-US/teamblog/119-snapshot-1-2-490-32-vivaldi-1-2rc1

[+Frank B. Subscriber²]

Vivaldi 1.2 has been released.

[Boo Berry]

That was quick.

 

I've been testing Vivaldi more lately, and I've noticed it has a performance regression when compared to Google Chrome. In Chrome 51 I can open 25+ tabs at the same time and I can switch between the tabs/websites without any lag or momentary freezing. In Vivaldi's case (based upon the same Chromium version), I open the same 25+ tabs and the browser basically locks up until most of the pages are loaded (at which point there's a noticeable performance issue with lagging).

 

Sure hope they address that.

[BooBerry]

Snapshot 1.3.501.6 - Customizable UI themes

 

 

 

 

Themes

New users will find a set of themes to choose from on the Welcome page, old users should have a look in the new Themes Settings section.

By taking programmatic control of the colors we can manipulate how they contrast during runtime. If you are visually impaired, or like me occasionally work in poor lighting conditions, enforcing minimum contrast can make Vivaldi more comfortable to use. That can also be found in the Themes section.

Other Notable Changes

• Page color is now cached more aggressively, which should lead to less flicker when navigating on the same domain
• Unified design of Startpage Background Image, Theme Previews and Welcome page items
• The keyboard shortcut for toggling UI color is repurposed to select "Next Theme"
• Added setting to not fade out-of-focus windows
• Added per-theme setting to control UI corner rounding
• Select settings moved into each theme:
  • Accent Color from Active Page
  • Accent Color on Window
  • Transparent Tabs

 

Creation Tips

As my colleague Atle keeps chanting "With great power comes great responsibility". Creating a tasteful workhorse theme can take some practice. A good way to get started is to use our Light or Dark theme as a base, then add color to taste. Being conservative with the background and foreground colors is a good idea, and then you're allowed to go all out for the highlight and accent colors.

Please share screenshots of your creations!

First Step

Keep in mind that we are not done with interface customization—we are just getting started. As with any baby step there is a bit of risk. Our entire design has been rewritten to support CSS variables, and with that there is quite a big regression risk. Your help in finding visual defects is especially appreciated this time.

 

Changelog

• Add support for customisable UI themes (VB-12726)
• [Extensions] Join Chrome by joaoapps.com crashes Vivaldi upon installation (VB-18010)
• [Keyboard] Make Alt[+Shift]+Enter work in searchfield
• [Keyboard] Ctrl+Shift+P only works in print preview (VB-3765)
• [Keyboard] Ctrl+Shift+V (Paste and Go) doesn't work in search field (VB-5650)
• [Linux] Certificate details fall of screen if URL bar is at the bottom (VB-15464)
• [Mac] Unable to use keyboard symbols on keyboard cheat sheet search (VB-7635)
• [Mac][Spatial Navigation] ⌘+Enter does not open a link in a new background tab page (VB-14865)
• [Regression] Focus on URL when restoring the window is lost (VB-13336)
• Ctrl+Enter autocomplete fails with addresses with hyphens or dots (VB-13114)

Wrong decoding and encoding when editing in the URL bar (VB-18021) Delete key doesn't delete the end of the URL in address bar when typing (VB-18126) Missed protocol when copy links with port number from the address field (VB-14281) Page zoom prevents viewing full image (VB-4581) Insert Note into editable fields (VB-7411)

[Jose_49]

4 hours ago, Lyraull said:

Snapshot 1.3.501.6 - Customizable UI themes

 

 

 

 

Themes

New users will find a set of themes to choose from on the Welcome page, old users should have a look in the new Themes Settings section.

By taking programmatic control of the colors we can manipulate how they contrast during runtime. If you are visually impaired, or like me occasionally work in poor lighting conditions, enforcing minimum contrast can make Vivaldi more comfortable to use. That can also be found in the Themes section.

Other Notable Changes

• Page color is now cached more aggressively, which should lead to less flicker when navigating on the same domain
• Unified design of Startpage Background Image, Theme Previews and Welcome page items
• The keyboard shortcut for toggling UI color is repurposed to select "Next Theme"
• Added setting to not fade out-of-focus windows
• Added per-theme setting to control UI corner rounding
• Select settings moved into each theme:
  • Accent Color from Active Page
  • Accent Color on Window
  • Transparent Tabs

 

Creation Tips

As my colleague Atle keeps chanting "With great power comes great responsibility". Creating a tasteful workhorse theme can take some practice. A good way to get started is to use our Light or Dark theme as a base, then add color to taste. Being conservative with the background and foreground colors is a good idea, and then you're allowed to go all out for the highlight and accent colors.

Please share screenshots of your creations!

First Step

Keep in mind that we are not done with interface customization—we are just getting started. As with any baby step there is a bit of risk. Our entire design has been rewritten to support CSS variables, and with that there is quite a big regression risk. Your help in finding visual defects is especially appreciated this time.

 

Changelog

• Add support for customisable UI themes (VB-12726)
• [Extensions] Join Chrome by joaoapps.com crashes Vivaldi upon installation (VB-18010)
• [Keyboard] Make Alt[+Shift]+Enter work in searchfield
• [Keyboard] Ctrl+Shift+P only works in print preview (VB-3765)
• [Keyboard] Ctrl+Shift+V (Paste and Go) doesn't work in search field (VB-5650)
• [Linux] Certificate details fall of screen if URL bar is at the bottom (VB-15464)
• [Mac] Unable to use keyboard symbols on keyboard cheat sheet search (VB-7635)
• [Mac][Spatial Navigation] ⌘+Enter does not open a link in a new background tab page (VB-14865)
• [Regression] Focus on URL when restoring the window is lost (VB-13336)
• Ctrl+Enter autocomplete fails with addresses with hyphens or dots (VB-13114)

Wrong decoding and encoding when editing in the URL bar (VB-18021) Delete key doesn't delete the end of the URL in address bar when typing (VB-18126) Missed protocol when copy links with port number from the address field (VB-14281) Page zoom prevents viewing full image (VB-4581) Insert Note into editable fields (VB-7411)

Hooooooooooooolyyyyyyy cowwwwwwww (mooooooo) 

Yesterday was 1.2 final release, right?! 

 

Hats my off my people! This is so freaking awesome! The Theme switcher is definitely a much welcomed feature!!! 

[Boo Berry]

Now add back a way to reorder extension buttons by dragging them and fix that performance issue I noted above, and all should be well!

[Jim K Global Moderator]

So, I just downloaded this browser into my Windows 10 Insider Preview VM...

 

While I was impressed with its feature set/customization ... what actually blew me away was reading the wiki article on it ... which says it was initially released on April 6, 2016 (aside from betas/tech previews).  That blew me away...and I laughed a bit considering it is more feature rich than the older Edge.  Anyway, I can honestly see this browser becoming a strong Chrome competitor as it matures and becomes more optimized.  It doesn't seem as "snappy" as Chrome ... though I'm sure that'll come.  Job well done by the Vivaldi team!  I'll be watching this with great interest.  Seems like a nice mash up of Chrome and Opera.

[Yogurth]

On 6/5/2016 at 5:45 PM, jjkusaf said:

So, I just downloaded this browser into my Windows 10 Insider Preview VM...

 

While I was impressed with its feature set/customization ... what actually blew me away was reading the wiki article on it ... which says it was initially released on April 6, 2016 (aside from betas/tech previews).  That blew me away...and I laughed a bit considering it is more feature rich than the older Edge.  Anyway, I can honestly see this browser becoming a strong Chrome competitor as it matures and becomes more optimized.  It doesn't seem as "snappy" as Chrome ... though I'm sure that'll come.  Job well done by the Vivaldi team!  I'll be watching this with great interest.  Seems like a nice mash up of Chrome and Opera.

While I'd love that the devs were so fast, i must point out that the Preview snapshots have been released regularly for a bit more that a year Even so, compared to Edge development, this browser is Parsecs ahead.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

2 hours ago, Yogurth said:

While I'd love that the devs were so fast, i must point out that the Preview snapshots have been released regularly for a bit more that a year Even so, compared to Edge development, this browser is Parsecs ahead.

Yea, I omitted the tech previews since Vivaldi and Edge were released (tech preview wise) January of last year.  Stable release wise ... this Vivaldi browser is pretty awesome.

 

[Yogurth]

1 hour ago, jjkusaf said:

Yea, I omitted the tech previews since Vivaldi and Edge were released (tech preview wise) January of last year.  Stable release wise ... this Vivaldi browser is pretty awesome.

 

I concur

[George P Global Moderator]

It helps your development time when you don't have to write the rendering engine over.  And you're not using newer APIs, and in most cases, waiting for APIs to be written.    If Vivaldi had to fork it's own engine and basically gut it and start over I doubt you'd be seeing this type of release speed.

 

That said, I expect Edge development to speed up once it's post-AU update and all the new OS/System APIs are final.

[Jim K Global Moderator]

1 hour ago, George P said:

It helps your development time when you don't have to write the rendering engine over.  And you're not using newer APIs, and in most cases, waiting for APIs to be written.    If Vivaldi had to fork it's own engine and basically gut it and start over I doubt you'd be seeing this type of release speed.

 

That said, I expect Edge development to speed up once it's post-AU update and all the new OS/System APIs are final.

For the sake of turning this into some Edge vs Vivaldi debate ...

 

How many Microsoft employees are working on Edge...surely it is more than the ~20 developers or so Vivaldi has?  If not, I guess Microsoft doesn't see Edge as a high priority.  You can't have a team working the EdgeHTML while others work on features (though they made time so you can draw on pages...lol).  They've been gutting and redoing the EdgeHTML (from Trident) since 2014.  There are a bunch of features that users want in Edge that aren't actually related to the rendering engine.  

 

Regarding the bold.  That really isn't enough.  You can't possibly please users by saying that new features will come next release or maybe in a year...with Google and Mozilla (and now Vivaldi) improving their browsers every month...across multiple platforms.

 

Anyway, you have to admit what this small team at Vivaldi is doing is fairly remarkable.  

 

That is all I have to say about it ... because ... well Edge isn't really relevant to this topic (or in general).

[adrynalyne]

57 minutes ago, jjkusaf said:

For the sake of turning this into some Edge vs Vivaldi debate ...

 

How many Microsoft employees are working on Edge...surely it is more than the ~20 developers or so Vivaldi has?  If not, I guess Microsoft doesn't see Edge as a high priority.  You can't have a team working the EdgeHTML while others work on features (though they made time so you can draw on pages...lol).  They've been gutting and redoing the EdgeHTML (from Trident) since 2014.  There are a bunch of features that users want in Edge that aren't actually related to the rendering engine.  

 

Regarding the bold.  That really isn't enough.  You can't possibly please users by saying that new features will come next release or maybe in a year...with Google and Mozilla (and now Vivaldi) improving their browsers every month...across multiple platforms.

 

Anyway, you have to admit what this small team at Vivaldi is doing is fairly remarkable.  

 

That is all I have to say about it ... because ... well Edge isn't really relevant to this topic (or in general).

I like Vivaldi but let's not mistake it as anything else than Chrome with a new body kit. 

 

Defeloper tools are the same as Chrome, Extensions come from the Chrome store. I'm sure there is more. 

 

Edge is is something else altogether and because of that it's going to take a lot more work to catch up to the competition. 

[Jim K Global Moderator]

3 minutes ago, adrynalyne said:

I like Vivaldi but let's not mistake it as anything else than Chrome with a new body kit. 

 

Defeloper tools are the same as Chrome, Extensions come from the Chrome store. I'm sure there is more. 

 

Edge is is something else altogether and because of that it's going to take a lot more work to catch up to the competition. 

"That is all I have to say about it ... because ... well Edge isn't really relevant to this topic (or in general)."

 

 

Once again...didn't want to derail this topic.  Edge is great if you like a featureless browser on one platform.

[rcm]

I've tried Vivaldi a few times since its official release and although it's got a few interesting features, I'm not overly impressed with it. The UI feels a bit sluggish compared to other Chromium offshoots and the Dev tools being in a separate window drives me mad (although I read it's on their todo list). The speed issue could be to do with the ui language which I think I read somewhere was Javascript based.

[adrynalyne]

4 minutes ago, rcm said:

I've tried Vivaldi a few times since its official release and although it's got a few interesting features, I'm not overly impressed with it. The UI feels a bit sluggish compared to other Chromium offshoots and the Dev tools being in a separate window drives me mad (although I read it's on their todo list). The speed issue could be to do with the ui language which I think I read somewhere was Javascript based.

I actually prefer dev tools in their own window. 

[Jim K Global Moderator]

7 minutes ago, rcm said:

I've tried Vivaldi a few times since its official release and although it's got a few interesting features, I'm not overly impressed with it. The UI feels a bit sluggish compared to other Chromium offshoots and the Dev tools being in a separate window drives me mad (although I read it's on their todo list). The speed issue could be to do with the ui language which I think I read somewhere was Javascript based.

It is still a bit rough around the edges ... the UI can get (as you put it) ... sluggish at times.  Looking forward to future releases as they optimize things.  Also not a big fan of the bookmarks (can not right click to delete ... it'll just take you to the link).  Lots of customizations though ... some of which I'm still going through.  I've started to use it more and more on my notebook ... though it hasn't fully replaced Chrome yet....and probably won't until Sync comes (which it is)