Turbo anyone?
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Let me see if I understand this correctly…
It's the system first introduced by Opera, that proxies all your connections over a server at Opera, that compresses the data and sends it to your browser. Is that correct?
IMHO, it is useless.
1. From a privacy standpoint, it is undesirable, as it makes all your data go through a third party's server. What happens when some other party decides to root that server?
It involves trusting Vivaldi to competently run a service. It's a potential point of failure, but Opera Turbo/Off Road, for example, has never been compromised, that I'm aware of.
2. Technically, it should be unneeded, as any decent website already should have server side compression enabled. OK, a lot of sites still haven't enabled compression, but this is an incentive not to enable it.
It's not just about lossless compression. Much additional data-saving can be gotten by lowering JPEG quality.
3. From a routing standpoint, it just adds latency because you need to pass through the third party's server. And in case the compression server is out, a lot of people lose connectivity.
In many of the cases for which it would be used, there's already significant latency, so as long as it's done well, the addition is negligible. At times, I've used Opera Turbo for things like tethered connections, and the decreased time to download page assets definitely make pages load significantly faster overall, despite any increase in latency. As for what happens if the compression server is out, people can just click Turbo off.
4. From an economical standpoint, it's idiotic, as somebody else will pay for it and I can't see a profit possibility. It just drains resources from the Vivaldi developers that could be used to do other things.
It's a feature. Like bookmark synching or any other feature, it'd have to be judged on its estimated cost/benefit ratio (the benefit being it attracts additional users). Both Opera (Turbo/Off Road) and Google (Data Saver) have judged the costs to be worth it.
5. In the age of https everywhere, it's not the future, as you can't compress encrypted content, I believe. Besides, most, if not all secure sites already have server side compression.
It's true that in Chrome (with Data Saver turned on), and most current versions of Opera (with Turbo turned on), the proxy is not used for HTTPS connections – the sites are connected to directly, the same as if Data Saver/Turbo was turned off.
However, that doesn't have to be the case: In Opera Mini for Android, the proxy does act as an intermediary even for HTTPS. The proxy server acts as an HTTPS client itself, reading the secure page, compressing and reformatting it, and sending it from the proxy to the phone app over an encrypted connection secured with Opera's own keys. (Obviously, this involves trusting Opera's proxy server with all transmitted information.)
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It involves trusting Vivaldi to competently run a service. It's a potential point of failure, but Opera Turbo/Off Road, for example, has never been compromised, that I'm aware of.
Look up Eleonore exploit kit telnet…
It's only because Opera has a limited market share that this didn't grow into a commercially exploitable botnet with built-in high performance proxy.
Another problem is server side security. It allows anyone to try and brute force anything through Turbo servers, until the compression server's ip's get blocked. A script kiddie's wet dream, if you want. I'm just thinking about this one because today I had to look at some server logs and they were filled with scan errors, coming from bots and users looking for vulnerable WP installations. Some of those were coming from Turbo. They will be automatically blocked from now on, meaning legitimate users no longer can reach innocent websites. It just breaks stuff.
it's just yesteryear's solution to a problem that shouldn't be there if everyone (site owners and network providers) did their job in the first place.
I agree it would be nice in low bandwidth situations, but the sad truth is that most users will leave it on all the time.
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Isildur wrote: It involves trusting Vivaldi to competently run a service. It's a potential point of failure, but Opera Turbo/Off Road, for example, has never been compromised, that I'm aware of.
Look up Eleonore exploit kit telnet…
Googling "Eleonore exploit kit telnet", I see various posts related to the Eleanore exploit kit. I don't see any mention of Opera Turbo being compromised.
Telnet? Are you referring to the fact that the Eleanore kit probed for the telnet URL vulnerability (CVE-2004-0473/iDEFENSE Security Advisory 05.12.04) fixed all the way back in Opera 7.50 (in 2004), long before Opera Turbo was introduced in 2009?
It's only because Opera has a limited market share that this didn't grow into a commercially exploitable botnet with built-in high performance proxy.
Not sure what you're referring to. it sounds like you're referring to a particular incident, but all you mentioned was an exploit kit.
Also, running a botnet though a single proxy would negate the point of a botnet for things like DDoS attacks, so I don't know what you mean by a "botnet with built-in high performance proxy". There's no benefit I can think of for a botnet to funnel its requests through a proxy.
Another problem is server side security. It allows anyone to try and brute force anything through Turbo servers, until the compression server's ip's get blocked. A script kiddie's wet dream, if you want. I'm just thinking about this one because today I had to look at some server logs and they were filled with scan errors, coming from bots and users looking for vulnerable WP installations. Some of those were coming from Turbo. They will be automatically blocked from now on, meaning legitimate users no longer can reach innocent websites. It just breaks stuff.
it's just yesteryear's solution to a problem that shouldn't be there if everyone (site owners and network providers) did their job in the first place.
I don't know what it means to say that it's "yesteryear's solution" when a browser market leader like Chrome is still doing it. Also, whatever site owners "should do", users still have to deal with the Internet as it is. I'm not sure what you're referring to network providers for, unless you're complaining about the fact that not all residents of Earth have broadband yet.
I agree it would be nice in low bandwidth situations, but the sad truth is that most users will leave it on all the time.
Most users don't leave Opera Turbo or Google Data Saver on, to my knowledge, unless they find it benefiting them.
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5. In the age of https everywhere, it's not the future, as you can't compress encrypted content, I believe. Besides, most, if not all secure sites already have server side compression.
It's true that in Chrome (with Data Saver turned on), and most current versions of Opera (with Turbo turned on), the proxy is not used for HTTPS connections – the sites are connected to directly, the same as if Data Saver/Turbo was turned off.
However, that doesn't have to be the case: In Opera Mini for Android, the proxy does act as an intermediary even for HTTPS. The proxy server acts as an HTTPS client itself, reading the secure page, compressing and reformatting it, and sending it from the proxy to the phone app over an encrypted connection secured with Opera's own keys. (Obviously, this involves trusting Opera's proxy server with all transmitted information.)
This would defeat the entire purpose of HTTPS; A third party should not be decrypting the data being sent over SSL to/from a remote server. If a third party acts as an intermediate decrypting and re-encrypting the "secure" data you're sharing with another party, then it's not a secure connection to that website anymore. You might as well be sharing your credit card info in plain-text. If you're using any service that you even suspect tries to do this, It would be in your best interest to cease immediately.
According to Opera's FAQ, they do not engage in this shady practice: http://www.opera.com/help/mobile/android#secure
"At Opera, we take your privacy very seriously. If you browse a secure site, like your bank or email, Opera stays out of the way. Your sensitive data is sent directly between your device and the secure site."
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This would defeat the entire purpose of HTTPS; A third party should not be decrypting the data being sent over SSL to/from a remote server. If a third party acts as an intermediate decrypting and re-encrypting the "secure" data you're sharing with another party, then it's not a secure connection to that website anymore. You might as well be sharing your credit card info in plain-text. If you're using any service that you even suspect tries to do this, It would be in your best interest to cease immediately.
According to Opera's FAQ, they do not engage in this shady practice: http://www.opera.com/help/mobile/android#secure
"At Opera, we take your privacy very seriously. If you browse a secure site, like your bank or email, Opera stays out of the way. Your sensitive data is sent directly between your device and the secure site."
You found information on Opera Mobile for Android, not Opera Mini. Please read posts carefully before contradicting them. Opera Mini is not the same as Opera's main app for Android, Opera Mobile. Opera Mini is their browser for simpler phones and/or more extremely limited data connections, situations that require more extreme compression. (It originally was available just as a Java ME MIDP midlet, all the way back in 2005.)
It does not "defeat the entire purpose of HTTPS". HTTPS is for keeping data away from unauthorized eyes. You decide who is authorized. If you use Opera Mini, you're explicitly deciding to trust Opera.
From http://www.opera.com/turbo :
We take privacy very seriously, no matter how you are using our products.
Depending on the Opera product you are using, your connections to secure websites may either be made directly without using turbo compression, or they may be made via our turbo compression servers.
With most of our products, if you browse a secure site with turbo mode enabled, like your bank or email, we get out of the way. Your secure data is sent directly between your device and the site. With video, we can tell a site to change the bitrate that streams to your device, but we can't look at what you're streaming.
In Opera Mini for Android, our servers connect to secure websites and your device connects securely to our servers. Our servers make sure your device knows whether the website connection can be made securely or not. This is done solely to compress all of the content going to your device (including the secure content). Your privacy is still respected.
(emphasis added)
As long as Opera remains committed to acting responsibly, there is nothing inherently "shady" about this. It's simply how Opera Mini works. It is secure, so long as Opera operates their Mini service without any security breaches. If you don't trust Opera's servers to handle your private data, simply don't use Opera Mini.
It's the security equivalent of dialing into a server with RDP or VNC and using a browser at the remote server. You're OK as long as the server is secure and the admin is trustworthy.
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Let me see if I understand this correctly…
It's the system first introduced by Opera, that proxies all your connections over a server at Opera, that compresses the data and sends it to your browser. Is that correct?
IMHO, it is useless.
1. From a privacy standpoint, it is undesirable, as it makes all your data go through a third party's server. What happens when some other party decides to root that server?
It involves trusting Vivaldi to competently run a service. It's a potential point of failure, but Opera Turbo/Off Road, for example, has never been compromised, that I'm aware of.
2. Technically, it should be unneeded, as any decent website already should have server side compression enabled. OK, a lot of sites still haven't enabled compression, but this is an incentive not to enable it.
It's not just about lossless compression. Much additional data-saving can be gotten by lowering JPEG quality.
I understand that. But the author of the jpg might not be happy with his or her work being processed by a "general use" proxy. In some cases, it might render pics useless.
If pics on the page are an issue, you should build an intelligent "no pics" mode to turn the browser into a text only browser.
3. From a routing standpoint, it just adds latency because you need to pass through the third party's server. And in case the compression server is out, a lot of people lose connectivity.
In many of the cases for which it would be used, there's already significant latency, so as long as it's done well, the addition is negligible. At times, I've used Opera Turbo for things like tethered connections, and the decreased time to download page assets definitely make pages load significantly faster overall, despite any increase in latency. As for what happens if the compression server is out, people can just click Turbo off.
OK, I agree.
4. From an economical standpoint, it's idiotic, as somebody else will pay for it and I can't see a profit possibility. It just drains resources from the Vivaldi developers that could be used to do other things.
It's a feature. Like bookmark synching or any other feature, it'd have to be judged on its estimated cost/benefit ratio (the benefit being it attracts additional users). Both Opera (Turbo/Off Road) and Google (Data Saver) have judged the costs to be worth it.
Google's not the best example. They have a boatload of money to burn. And Opera didn't do to well, overall. They had to follow Chrome, to reduce cost.
5. In the age of https everywhere, it's not the future, as you can't compress encrypted content, I believe. Besides, most, if not all secure sites already have server side compression.
It's true that in Chrome (with Data Saver turned on), and most current versions of Opera (with Turbo turned on), the proxy is not used for HTTPS connections – the sites are connected to directly, the same as if Data Saver/Turbo was turned off.
However, that doesn't have to be the case: In Opera Mini for Android, the proxy does act as an intermediary even for HTTPS. The proxy server acts as an HTTPS client itself, reading the secure page, compressing and reformatting it, and sending it from the proxy to the phone app over an encrypted connection secured with Opera's own keys. (Obviously, this involves trusting Opera's proxy server with all transmitted information.)
Proxying https is a perversion. It shouldn't even be possible, technically. But hey, that's just me.
But you're right, the main thing is trust. And people will trust anything, as long as it's convenient…
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There is another (free) solution, for now over Opera's and Google's services.
It's Skyzip
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Hi there…
I'm confused... does Vivaldi has Turbo or not?
For me this is an indispensable feature on a browser, that's why I'm constantly switching between Opera and Yandex...So, has, will?
Thx..
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It has already been requested in the Feature Requests thread and in this thread.
It's not a frequent request as many users are on broadband these days, but it's clearly important for those on slow connections or who pay for bandwidth.
It would require significant investment in server space, which in my opinion won't happen until Vivaldi is well established and successful. I would expect to wait a year or two at least before this happens.
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I think the highest cost would be:
- in time spent in coding and debugging, at first
- in bandwidth requirement and in maintenance, secondly
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The servers would probably cost less then 20K
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Turbo is the reason why I still use Opera 12 on my notebook with Windows 10.
Pleeeeeaaaaase implement it.
newscpq
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Turbo is the reason why I still use Opera 12…
The latest versions of Opera has turbo… You can use that in the meanwhile.... And don't forget, there's Yandex which uses the same technology and it's great too...
I would like to play with Vivaldi, but without turbo it's a no go for me at moment... -
The latest versions of Opera has turbo… You can use that in the meanwhile
But you can't disable javascript, image loading, css processing with keyboard shortcuts, or F12
Opera 12 reduces the contents to the bone -
The latest versions of Opera has turbo… You can use that in the meanwhile
But you can't disable javascript, image loading, css processing with keyboard shortcuts, or F12
Opera 12 reduces the contents to the boneI use this: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/quickblock/jlkpnekpomdbobkdokohimfcbgcpldfp
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Yes! Please!!!! At home, I wouldn't need it, but at my school, everyone brings their personal devices (myself included), and the traffic can take an immense toll on the wifi speed. Sometimes I have to switch to opera to get onto websites more quickly. Also, I use its VPN to get past the school's firewall (shhh don't tell). But there are a lot of features that are in opera and/or chrome that I really want such as bookmark syncing, popout video, and chrome pdf viewer so I can print google slides without downloading a pdf. Please implement some of these features soon so I know that this browser is actually worth using over chrome and opera.
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@pewm-pewm said in Turbo anyone?:
popout video, and chrome pdf
I'm not sure what you mean about popout video, but Vivaldi definitely has the Chromium PDF viewer. I view PDFs in Vivaldi all the time.
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@Isildur Popout video is a very popular feature in opera that allows you to create small video only windows that will stay on top of everything else. I know it has chromium pdf viewer, but I said chrome pdf viewer. I can view pdfs; what I really meant was probably google cloud print, as @dLeon said above. But I definitely do agree that bookmark sync needs to be added in. Also, one more thing I forgot to mention: built-in search by image functionality like in chrome. I don't know how. Maybe just code it so it automatically copies the image URL and then searches it in whichever search engine you set to be the default for images.
And although I would LOVE to see bookmark sync first, I understand that Vivaldi doesn't have the kind of money to spend on servers for our bookmarks at the moment, but they could at least work on some other cool features like popout video. -
@pewm-pewm: We're closer to sync than you imagine, I think. And some people's kewl features (popout video) are other people's (my, for instance) useless gimmicks. It set my teeth on edge when Opera first released their version, and the mention of it still does.