Opera 9, A Fierce Competitor on the Browser Market

Lately, Microsoft has been touting Internet Explorer 7's awesome performances, the company promising that some of the users who have given up on Internet Explorer for Firefox will return to "their first love". But Mozilla Foundation is not wasting any time either, and the release of Firefox 1.5 is just a matter of time. But what is happening with Opera, the browser with a spectacular growth?

Recently, Opera has emerged on the market of free browsing solutions, and the range of features has to be complex and appealing. Some lucky users got their hands on Opera 9's Technology Preview versions, and their conclusions were positive, although the application's development stage is not too advanced.

This first version proved to be relatively stable, and Opera 9's main novelties are related to the integrated e-mail client, which will be IMAP compatible from now on. The rendering engine has gone through a reconstruction and optimization stage, resulting in a better layout, but also in a more fluid navigation.
Another detail worth mentioning is the better page loading time.

Users can now access a configuration menu by typing "opera:config" in the browser's address field. The specific Opera features, such as tabbing and the presence of the "garbage bin" which allows reopening pages that were previously accessed are still present.