Who uses bookmarks anyway?
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I don't have as many bookmarks as some people seem to have but I couldn't do without them, they're a necessity, and a bookmark manager too, the bookmark bar isn't the same, I've never got on with bookmark bars. Its another thing Opera Presto got right having a sidebar for bookmarks, that and bookmark nicknames. Opera notes has been a place I've used for temporary bookmarking while speeddial I like uncluttered. Not incorporating bookmarks into a browser has to be one of the most extraordinary decisions ever, to offer the option of bookmarks or not maybe to impose it just daft.
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I've got over two-hundred bookmarks and use them regularly. I really can't understand the mentality of Opera to do away with them, angering their current users and denying to future users something very useful.
I'm not a great fan of Firefox's Australis, although I don't hate it, but even those with an interest in "modernising" Firefox with this new Australis minimalism have kept bookmarks. Actually, one thing I'm impressed with is the current way that Australis utilises bookmarks via its new menu button. I'm using the latest Aurora build and have liked the new Menu (although I dislike the inability to move its button). The bookmark sidebar still exists, even if the button for it has been removed (you can utilise it via Ctrl+b or you can get it via the Bookmarks button in the menu button or from the traditional menu bar).
So, the upcoming Australis themed Firefox still has bookmarks and has actually improved on it in some instances (IMO). Why Opera seems to have a problem with them is anyone's guess. Also, they've said that they'll put them back, but it seems that they're dragging their feet. Maybe they think that people will soon forget if they drag their feet a little longer…
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Why Opera seems to have a problem with them is anyone's guess.
Because bookmarks are sooo 2012 …
SCNR
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On the desktop I try to be bookmark-free, meaning that if a website is important enough for me then I remember the URL and can quickly type it. On mobile devices (phones and tablets) I prefer keeping my most important sites bookmarked as I will access them several times a day and typing on mobile devices is, well, not as fast and comfortable as with a keyboard for me.
Quick-access screens like last used sites or most visited sites are ok, as well as the speed dial but I do not like to rely on them. -
I use bookmark only on desktop with folder's organization. On android smartfone i use opera classic with speed dial only.
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Well, usually I have hundreds of bookmarks I never visit again. Then I have problems cleaning that mess. And I'm afraid I will throw away something important and after some time there are some dead links. I think the diagnosis that classic bookmarks have some usability problems is correct, but I don't think Chromopera has the right answer.
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According to 'grep URL= bookmarks.adr | wc -l' I have over 4000 bookmarks in Opera 12. I usually search them using the address bar (which got less functional since Opera 12). I also have defined a lot of nicknames/shortcuts. I have bookmark bar with categorized drop-down menus. I never really used the speed dial.
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And I'm afraid I will throw away something important and after some time there are some dead links.
But even some dead links proved to be valuable:
I added my own description to every new bookmark since it was possible to do so - and lately i stumbled into a problem where I needed some "old" information. The bookmarked page was dead, not even the site existed any more, but thanks to the bookmark I was able to look up if the information still resided in the Google cache or in archive.org - which saved my day.Since then I do a regular check on my bookmarks and replace the original links with the links to the cached/saved pages if they exist, if a site can not be found there, I delete the bookmark.
PS: No, that did not reduce the number of my bookmarks significantly.
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Well, usually I have hundreds of bookmarks I never visit again. Then I have problems cleaning that mess. And I'm afraid I will throw away something important and after some time there are some dead links. I think the diagnosis that classic bookmarks have some usability problems is correct, but I don't think Chromopera has the right answer.
At one time I also had hundreds of bookmarks, many of which I seldom revisited and others that I later discovered were long dead and gone. I entirely agree that there is a problem with classic bookmarks and that the Blink version of Opera while not resolving that problem is at least making a novel attempt.
Our needs (and desires) are different and so one solution does not necessarily provide a workable one for everyone. In my case, I simply do not need more than a couple of dozen bookmarks, hence the Quick Access Bar (or the Speed Dial) is adequate for my needs.
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Some unrecognized "geniuses" thought they got a genius idea of reinventing the wheel. :woohoo: Microsoft goes for the 5-year-old users with its toy-like Windows 8 Tiles, so will Opera.
(…)
They knew though, that nobody would abandon bookmarks and start using this slow "Speed Dial", so they must have forced them by removing bookmarks altogether (like nobody would stop using Start button and Programs menu in Windows, so Microsoft simply forced everybody).And here we have something from a Microsoft employee. Weak and really ridiculous excuses. You can expect this kind of stuff coming from Opera company in the future after the firing of the management or bankruptcy.
Apparently at Microsoft they are trying to reverse the calamitous results of the rule of the senile nerd Ballmer (this guys has been really mentally disturbed link; Windows 8 and the Snowden revelations were his undoing).
This comes after firing of Ballmer as Microsoft CEO and getting a new chief.Windows 8 designer: Why Microsoft forced Metro on us all
Microsoft designed its Metro, aka Modern, interface for "your computer-illiterate little sister, for grandpas who don't know how to use that computer 'dofangle' thingy, and for mom who just wants to look up apple pie recipes."
So why was Metro initially made the default with no option to boot to the desktop in Windows 8? Miller explained the thinking here:
The short answer is because casual users don't go exploring. If we made desktop the default as it has always been, and included a nice little start menu that felt like home, the casual users would never have migrated to their land of milk and honey. They would still occupy the desktop just as they always had, and we would have been stuck in square one. So we forced it upon them. We drove them to it with goads in their sides. In 8.1, we softened the points on the goads by giving users an option to boot directly to desktop.
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I used both bookmarks (over 1,000) and the speed dial tabs (40 at last check) extensively.
I have kept the last version of Opera 12 on my laptop. Reminds me of the great and mighty browser Opera used to be.
Now Opera is worthless, in my opinion, and I'll not be using them any longer.
(Posts this from his Opera 12 browser, for old time's sake before removing it. ) -
@jon:
Opera, my old company, is moving in a very different direction to what it used to do. One effect of that is the removal of bookmarks in the latest version of Opera. To me this is a blatant disrespect of the user base and an outrageous level of arrogance, but what do I know…
Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I am the only person in the world to use bookmarks... Do you use bookmarks? Share your experience.
No, Jon-sama. I'll explain about my bookmark using with the Opera: This was the best browser for me to do it because you can save with the name you desire the bookmark, you can use nickname to make easier to open a site or even a bookmark folder, you could organize the bookmarks in folders in many levels; I like the Stash function, serving as a "read it later" and saving the full content of the page, but even I would need something like the "description" option to write my own text of the bookmark and give to me more options to search this bookmark later.
When they changed it for Speed Dial, at least this sould have all the O12 bookmark manager options. It's ridiculous a browser doesn't offer a bookmarks import from other browsers excluding Opera.
Of course I use bookmarks. I have been collecting them for over 16 years!
I am close of it haha
@bv:
You know quite a bit about respect for users, which I think is why Opera was a success in the first place.
you said all +1
Only bookmarks.
It over 7500.I think this is my number too hehe
@JayL:
Dear Mr. von Tetzchner, dear Jon!
I really DO use bookmarks; literally more than 25.000 and all in Opera 12.16 on FreeBSD, Linux, OS X and Windows as well.
Back to bookmarks:
I've collected these thousands of bookmarks in some 18 years of Opera-usage as a first-time-user of Opera in 1996 with version 2.x, the first version ever released in Germany. I do have other browsers too but Opera up_to_12.16 is my main tool for working the web..
We have a bookmar winner
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I use Bookmarks and to some extent, the Speed Dial. Both are handy tools, especially bookmarks since I have nearly 3000 of them.
Mosaic had bookmarks, why did opera feel the need to get rid of them? What kind of idiots did they survey to come to the conclusion that bookmarks are not needed? I'm certain they did not survey their userbase at all.
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… What kind of idiots did they survey to come to the conclusion that bookmarks are not needed? I'm certain they did not survey their userbase at all.
They used an opt-out, auto-reporting method to collect samples of user settings and data, a reporting method that most (though not all) sophisticated users opted out of when it was offered, since those users usually also have higher privacy and iron-clad system-settings-concerns. Such users generally don't want browsers (or anything else) "phoning home" more than absolutely necessary in order to function, hence they almost universally opt out of such things. The result was a skewed survey that therefore tilted heavily toward those users who rarely, if ever, change anything (other than perhaps wallpaper) in the out-of-box settings of a browser, including the opt-outs - they are the mobile user generation, that have become quite used to minimal software settings and operation. If the survey failed to capture anything but such users, is it any wonder that only the minimalist user-type came to dominate the results?
My personal belief is that minimalist, mobile-trained users are probably indeed in the majority these days… but I also believe that the number of desktop browser users who heavily employ browser configurability and things like bookmarks was grossly undercounted by Opera's method of "surveying". In other words, their survey method had a conceptual flaw. This, IMO, was verified when Opera backed off and added back in some basic bookmark capability last summer because of the high level of outcry. However, many other features and settings whose usage by serious users was also under-counted by the flawed 'survey' continue to remain missing.
I also believe that Opera from the outset of the Blink migration decision was committed to a far more simplified, mobile-like interface and feature set, because that is what is most readily achievable from the rendering engine design to which they had chosen to migrate for other reasons. Their mindset would have been to start out with few features and rudimentary configurability, then use their "survey" to establish or verify which (if any) elements ought then to be designed into the new interface. In other words, if you've first adopted the viewpoint of a hammer, everything around you will be interpreted as a nail.
The backlash has been profound... unlike anything I've ever seen and much longer-lasting. And that covers the discontinuation or gross overhaul of a LOT of product lines over the years I've been alive. As far as desktop usage is concerned, it's hard to imagine how Opera could have misread its user base any more completely... except in terms that it was the habits of its mobile user base that it was seeking to use as a template for the desktop design, come hell or high water.
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When it was first announced that opera would be moving away from presto and toward the usage of webkit then blink as its rendering engine, many people were worried that they would change the whole browser. Then there were those who reassured these users that no surface changes would be made, only the underlying engine would change. Well, we can see what happened. If they had simply given me opera 12 but with webkit or blink, i'd be happy. These horrid changes are simply too much for me, in particular its lack of bookmarks. opera is up to version 20 now and still no bookmarks. I wonder just how they see their userbase.
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When it was first announced that opera would be moving away from presto and toward the usage of webkit then blink as its rendering engine, many people were worried that they would change the whole browser. Then there were those who reassured these users that no surface changes would be made, only the underlying engine would change. Well, we can see what happened. If they had simply given me opera 12 but with webkit or blink, i'd be happy. … I wonder just how they see their userbase.
How one must interface with certain elements of a particular rendering engine can sometimes impose limits on the ways things can be done and the flexibility of techniques available. In other words, some settings readily available using one engine may be incompatible with another, unless sometimes "heroic" coding and creativity can be brought to bear. "Changing" rendering engine types is a misnomer… rendering engines are not plug-ins. A new user interface must be fully designed as the patch-panel between the keyboard/mouse/display objectives/features being sought and the coding requirements imposed by the rendering engine... so these interfaces will not be alike for different engine types.
If changing rendering engines for a browser is not a "simple" drop-in process, it is particularly challenging when replacing an engine that itself was intentionally tweaked over the years to operate smoothly with the user interface concepts then being employed. A major informational error was made by both Opera and some outside writers in over-minimizing the impact of changing rendering engines, and that almost certainly over-minimized the impact that would necessarily occur to feature-sets and ways of doing things. That said, there is no doubt in my mind that any rendering engine can be made to provide almost any feature or adjustability element obtainable using a different rendering engine, given enough developmental effort and creativity - though there will remain some differences and limitations between the two feature implementations. The issue is the effort and costs of doing so.
As to how Opera sees their userbase, one must keep in mind that they (like any company) see their userbase through the lenses of corporate balance sheets and company-wide marketing strategies. That means a given user segment will not be necessarily viewed the same way by different company management or under different corporate strategies or cost regimes. What has happened at Opera ASA is that those elements have changed for whatever reasons, and the emphasis on crafting products to satisfy certain user segments has correspondingly shifted.
With regard to Opera ASA, it's simply the way things are now, and there's little or nothing any given user can do to change them. This is why, unpleased though I am with Opera's offerings of late, I advise users to learn to live with the situation as best they can. Either accept and live with Opera's new browser concept, stay with an increasingly obsolete Old Opera browser, or migrate somewhere else. All the frustrated user complaints in the world aren't going to change anything Opera is doing.
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rendering engines are not plug-ins.
… some multi engine browser developers might see that otherwise.
The main problem with Opera was, that they did not only switch the the HTML engine but seemed to embrace the whole chomium hog.
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I use three ways to keep links:
(1) Speed-Dial:
For frequently used sites.(2) Sessions:
If I research a topic and want to continue later, I save all the open tabs as a session. I think of this as "temporary bookmarks".(3) Bookmarks:
Mostly for archiving purposes. Like others have already said, many of my bookmarks are never opened again. But I want to keep all of them, just in case I need them in the future. It happened a few times to me that I found some sites using a different computer and thus didn't keep the bookmarks. Later, on my own computer, I had a hard time to find the sites again, because I didn't remember how they were called and how I had found them.However, I'm pretty sure Opera is right that 90% of its users don't use bookmarks at all. I have seen too many bookmark bars on Windows computers, only gathering spam links installed by malware. Most people I know use only very few sites regularly: Facebook, Webmail, Google. Some even don't use mail regularly. (Who needs mail if he has Facebook? Thinking about it, it is perfectly understandable that Opera got rid of mail, too …)
I absolutely understand that Opera had to decide if they want to keep a product tailored for only a few oldschool users like us or target today's average user. While I'm still using Opera 12.16 as my main browser (Linux), fortunately there's some choice. I have played a bit with Luakit and like it so far. Maybe I would have never tried it out without Opera's change? And of course I have some hope about what Jon and his team are working on. In any case: Thanks Opera for all the great years, and thanks Jon and all others involved for keeping the spirit alive!
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[hide]Of course, I use bookmarks on all my browsers I use. The main problem is to share my bookmarks on all browsers absent to waste my time and energy. Incuriously how the technique offers it own solution for storing bookmarks (Speed Dial, Bookmark bar) the most common problem is how I can share my bookmarks with other devices. Only in less years you have two or more devices in daily usage and on all it you want your bookmarks. Sure enough you can take for each browser you use your own bookmark set divided in separately items per browser. So I do it presently. But simpler is it to have one bookmark set for all. What for solution might possible to answer the question here right. I think the best is to store your bookmarks in a cloud and synchronize with an Add-on, which is available for several browser engines. Now my bookmark collection in the cloud will use a care and organisation. This is the benefit for a well thought cloud software and for an commonly Add-on which this allowed via several devices. Of course, I hope for the opportunity to encrypt my bookmark collection in the cloud (to my own risk in case I forget my password), but the cloud give me, of course, the hint making a backup on my desktop with download option.
On Opera Browser (Vers 20 it really well) I have in use Speed Dial separate and in container and I use the new Opera bookmark bar with file folder and I use an extension for bookmarks. I have seen using Chrome Browser it is useful to use a Speed Dial extension (via Chrome Store). Any bookmarks you use every day and so one has it at hand.[/hide]
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From what I can gather, Opera have chosen their direction based on feedback directly from the browser.
In theory this should have shown a true gauge of the real use.However the logic in this breaks when you;
a) hide the bookmarks and other useful items by default.
b) only get feed-back from a few random users that were asked during a clean install.
c) know that all knowledgeable users say NO to software talking to home without good reason.Considering these facts, you and I know that the only feedback Opera got, was from people that need help to use their PC.
Point-and-clickers, that think a browser is a window for facebook and youtube.
The people that never use a right-click, or notice a program has menus (now well hidden).
The new "cleaner" GUIs may not distract people, but they are breeding a more ignorant generation of users.Opera was always the chosen browser of the people that expected more from the net.
You could tell that from using the old forums, and the comments on many plugin pages.
In the future the Opera forum and extensions catalogue will just be full of screaming people, claiming that Opera or the plugin just broke their PC.
Who wants to develop in that atmosphere ?All astute/educated/knowledgeable users rely on bookmarks/favourites because they know that a search engine will not show you everything or can even find everything.
If you rely on Google you only get GoogleNet, not the internet.Fairly safe to say, I use bookmarks.