FastForward, Rewind added to Opera

Norway’s alternative browser firm Opera
Software
on Friday released two new upgrade versions — Opera 7.10 for
Windows and Opera 7.10 for Linux Beta — that promise navigation via new
“FastForward” and “Rewind” buttons on the toolbar.

The Opera 7 browser, which
has been dogged by security
issues
in recent months, has also been fitted with new features like
Notes and Slideshow to speed up browser-based research and the viewing of
photo files.

Adding to the power browsing
capabilities in earlier beta releases, the company said the two new
“FastForward” and “Rewind” buttons would allow the user to “sit back and let
the browser anticipate where they would like to go next.” The two new
buttons are illustrated by two arrows each, either going back or
forward.

The “Slideshow” addition displays photo files on the Web in slideshow
format and can be personalized by users to view a full-screen on a black
background via a presentation tool called “OperaShow”.

To speed up researching, Opera has added “Notes” to allow users to jot
down a note in conjunction with a Web page. The note can then be dragged to
an e-mail or stored for future reference.

Also new in the Opera 7.10 releases is “Cookie Manager” which lets users
keep track of cookies in the browser.

Opera has been busy adding user-friendly quirks as part of its strategy
to grab market share from Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, Netscape and
Mozilla browsers. Both new releases will feature Opera 7’s “Wand” password
manager, the M2 e-mail and news client and quirks like mouse gestures,
keyboard
shortcuts, Hotclick translation, zooming and integrated search.

The company has also speeded up the development of the Opera for Linux
beta, moving from Opera 6.12 to Opera 7.10 to bring it closer to the Windows
version. The latest Opera for Linux release will add, for the first time,
the M2 e-mail client and the accompanying spam filter, POP3, IMAP,and ESMTP
support.

“Thanks to the interoperability of the Opera core, the Opera 7.10 for
Windows and Linux browser versions we are releasing today have the same
features,” says Jon S. von Tetzchner.

“In the future, the Opera browser
will look increasingly the same across the different platforms thanks
to this interoperability, so that users, schools, universities and
businesses who truly want to be cross-platform can enjoy the same Opera
features on all major operating systems.”

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