14 DAY TRIAL // If you're an Opera fan and an early adopter, then you probably love Opera Next, the experimental builds Opera releases regularly that can be installed alongside the stable Opera builds, to get the best of both worlds.
But if you're using the Opera Next channel, chances are, you want the very latest, bleeding edge version as soon as it becomes available.
You may have noticed though that the automatic updater takes a while to kick in, sometimes even a day.
Opera has now explained why this happens, it's not a mishap on its part, rather, the builds that get pushed through the automatic updater are tested for a while to make sure that they at least work and don't break a user's configuration.
Opera tests this with real users, happy to be guinea pigs so they can get the latest update.
"We get many questions about why the builds we upload to this blog aren't immediately added to the auto-update system. This is quite understandable, since auto-update is such a convenient way to get the build," a post on the Opera Desktop Team's blog read.
"However, the very fact that it is automatically updated without any interaction from you, makes us want to make sure that the builds are somewhat usable before pushing them to auto-update – you do not want Opera to unexpectedly start crashing on all your favorite sites," it explained.
Opera broke down the whole process to explain exactly how it works. When a new experimental build is ready for release, like the first taste of Opera 12 revealed yesterday, the team first runs it internally to see if it works.
At the same time, a blog post announcing the impending release is being written. By the time the builds are uploaded, the post goes live. Users that want the bleeding edge, keep up with the blog and know within hours.
However, those builds are not pushed via the automated update system until some users get a chance to grab it themselves from the Opera servers and see if there aren't any major problems.
Opera Next was introduced during the Opera 11.5 development cycle. In essence, it's akin to Google Chrome's dev channel or Firefox Aurora, a separate channel where experimental builds can be released for eager users.
Opera for Windows is available for download here.
Opera for Mac is available for download here.
Opera for Linux is available for download here.