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Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

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Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#61

Post by michael_h »

pgm8705 wrote: post #54
newscracker wrote: post #46

After the recent Chrome debacles, I removed it from my systems (not that I was using it much before). On iOS, my go to browser is Firefox Focus, a single tab browser that you treat as a private tab and erase quickly when you're done. It comes with a built in ad blocker too. Next in line for my use are Brave and Firefox. They're different, have good interfaces, and support multiple tabs. Last on my list is Safari. The…

What are your main problems with Safari?

"A problem occurred with this webpage so it was reloaded"

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#62

Post by draw_down »

I tried using it for a bit but I find the UI confusing and annoying. It puts a big button right over top the content when you scroll up, and tapping the button puts you into a mode with no obvious exit. Switching tabs is hard and weird. I couldn’t seriously use this, but then again I have never liked Opera browsers generally.

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#63

Post by cpeterso »

newscracker wrote: post #44
dhimes wrote: post #37

Anybody else trying Firefox Focus on iPhone? It seems pretty nice but I haven't used it much yet.

Firefox Focus has been my go to browser on iOS since the time it launched. The premise is a single tab, which you use and then erase all data from once you're done. As it says, rinse and repeat! If you want multiple tabs, this is not the browser for you (though Firefox iOS could be). I use Firefox Focus more than any other app, including for browsing and reading through HN comments. It's got a good ad blocker (though…

Once I started using Firefox Focus, I was surprised at how rarely I actually needed to browse the web un-anonymously. I don't need to be logged in to search, use Wikipedia, or read news online.

Focus is perfect for bite-sized browsing. Read and then throw the session away.

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#64

Post by kccqzy »

Sujan wrote: post #23
pilif wrote: post #14

On iOS, there can’t really be an alternative to Safari because there is no way to change the default browser system wide. No matter how careful you are, eventually some app somewhere will open an URL, causing Safari to open, but now that it’s not your default browser, all your login state, your favorites and, heck, even just the familiar UI will be missing. No. Until iOS allows setting a default browser, there is no…

Could it be possible to reuse the ad blocker functionality Apple allows on Safari by building an app/extension/however that works to catch all loaded URLs in Safari and replace them with an "Open in #preferred_browser#" link perhaps?

Content blockers can't do that.

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#65

Post by ryanmarsh »

I would love to use other browsers on iOS, including Brave, but I can’t.

All the browsers on iOS suffer from one fatal flaw, they crash, often. As I have been told this may have something to do with the OS’s health & safety precautions by killing apps that run away with CPU or RAM use. I don’t know that for certain and I haven’t tried to dig into it further.

Here’s a simple test, find a site that grinds safari to a near standstill, then try that site in Chrome/Edge/Brave on iOS. Chances are it will crash them.

I’d really love to see a healthy ecosystem of browser rendering engines on iOS as well. I understand and have benefited from the walled garden that is iOS but I’d really like Apple to figure this out. Isn’t it ironic how Microsoft got in trouble for anti-competitive practices against Netscape but Apple can block other rendering engines?

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#66

Post by Sujan »

kccqzy wrote: post #64
Sujan wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could it be possible to reuse the ad blocker functionality Apple allows on Safari by building an app/extension/however that works to catch all loaded URLs in Safari and replace them with an "Open in #preferred_browser#" link perhaps?

Content blockers can't do that.

Shame.

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#67

Post by thanatropism »

cpeterso wrote: post #63
newscracker wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Firefox Focus has been my go to browser on iOS since the time it launched. The premise is a single tab, which you use and then erase all data from once you're done. As it says, rinse and repeat! If you want multiple tabs, this is not the browser for you (though Firefox iOS could be). I use Firefox Focus more than any other app, including for browsing and reading through HN comments. It's got a good ad blocker (though…

Once I started using Firefox Focus, I was surprised at how rarely I actually needed to browse the web un-anonymously. I don't need to be logged in to search, use Wikipedia, or read news online. Focus is perfect for bite-sized browsing. Read and then throw the session away.

Requires iOS 11. I don't want to update my iPhone SE -- it's fine as it is and I don't need it slower; I made that mistake with a previous iPhone.

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#68

Post by bgdam »

ericlewis wrote: post #48
newscracker wrote: post #46

After the recent Chrome debacles, I removed it from my systems (not that I was using it much before). On iOS, my go to browser is Firefox Focus, a single tab browser that you treat as a private tab and erase quickly when you're done. It comes with a built in ad blocker too. Next in line for my use are Brave and Firefox. They're different, have good interfaces, and support multiple tabs. Last on my list is Safari. The…

It is unlikely to have another JS engine. But the JS engine is exposed for WKWebViews, where creating a shim layer could work perfectly fine for many extensions.

The issue is not the technical capability. It has been possible to inject javascript into web views in ios since ios 6 (at the least). The problem is that Apple App Store terms state that your app cannot download arbitrary pieces of code from the internet and run it, which is exactly what extensions are. The rule was relaxed recently, to allow for things like teaching programming apps for the iPad pro, but not for browsers.

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#69

Post by titusjohnson »

ryanmarsh wrote: post #65

I would love to use other browsers on iOS, including Brave, but I can’t. All the browsers on iOS suffer from one fatal flaw, they crash, often. As I have been told this may have something to do with the OS’s health & safety precautions by killing apps that run away with CPU or RAM use. I don’t know that for certain and I haven’t tried to dig into it further. Here’s a simple test, find a site that grinds safari to a n…

Ironic? No, not at all. Why would it?

Re: Opera Touch is a solid alternative to Safari on the iPhone

#70

Post by Someone »

oblio wrote: post #29
signal11 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As Apple don’t have a market monopoly, antitrust provisions (similar to what Microsoft was hit with) won’t necessarily apply.

There should be something similar to POSIX for mobile operating systems, basically forcing open systems (if not Open Source), at least for companies that have anything to do with the government.

”something similar to POSIX” wouldn’t work. POSIX systems can have proprietary APIs in addition to POSIX that provide functionality that POSIX doesn’t support/partially supports/supports badly.
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