14 DAY TRIAL // When it first unveiled Opera Unite in mid-2009, Opera Software stressed the fact that it had positioned the plain vanilla Opera spin-off as a platform in itself, rather than as a simple browser. In this regard, the Norway-based browser maker released not just Opera Unite, but also the necessary development tools designed to enable devs to start building applications for its browser-web server hybrid. After Opera 10.10 graduated to Beta stage in October, the browser maker kicked off a contest set up to spark app development for the Opera Unite platform. The contest continues to be live, and the prizes might just be incentive enough to get developers going.
“Prizes will be awarded each week to the developer with the best application. The winner will be determined by a team of Opera employees. Up for grabs are gift certificates to online retailers equal the value of a Nintendo Wii or a brand new mobile phone,” Opera said.
The concept behind Opera Unite is to do away with third-parties when it comes down to sharing content - all third parties except Opera and Opera Unite servers, of course. In this regard, Opera Unite is a marriage between a browser and a web server. With Unite, users are able to stream music, share file and folders, host and permit access to picture galleries, and even to run a website locally.
Opera Unite makes running a webserver on the user’s local machine simple enough that the general public will be able to do so without any problems. But what’s even better is the fact that Opera Unite can be extended far beyond its default functionality. Out of the box, Unite comes with a set of applications including a media player, a photo sharing program, and a file sharing app, but there are other applications which could add functionality to the browser-server bundle, provided that developers find the platform to their liking. If not, the perspective of getting a prize for an Opera Unite app might nudge them in the right direction.
“Our panel of judges will determine the winner based on the following criteria: ease of use, clearly defined purpose, standards compliant, good looking. You submission should not include any of the following criteria: bugs, waste of resources, ugly code, code or content that violates any third parties rights or law,” Opera noted. Opera 10.10 Beta with Opera Unite Beta is available for download here.