The Opera Browser for Symbian

The Opera browser is the leading HTML browser for Nokia Series 60 devices. Besides basic HTML markup content, Opera also supports Java-Script embedded in the pages. In many markets, Nokia 6600 phones are sold with Opera preinstalled. If your handset does not include Opera, you can purchase a copy from http://www.opera.com/ and install it yourself. The Opera browser requires a relatively large amount of free memory to run. On an older device, such as the Nokia 3650, you must exit most background programs before you can start Opera. You can press and hold the menu key to see a list of background programs and use the c key to exit them one by one.

If the Opera web browser's memory footprint is too large for your phone, you can try Dorisanother HTML browser for Nokia Series 60 phones. Doris is much lighter than Opera, and it runs on the early Nokia 7650 phones. However, compared with Opera, Doris has a limited set of features. You can download and purchase Doris from http://www.anygraaf.fi/browser/indexe.htm.

Opera develops its web browser for many operating systems, including Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD, OS/2, QNX, Symbian, and Windows Mobile. Since the Opera browser for Nokia Series 60 devices is based on the same core code as the award-winning Opera browser for PC and Mac computers, it can parse and render a great majority of HTML pages on the Internet, including sloppily formatted ones. Opera supports common browser features such as HTTP cookies, a cache for pages and images, Java-Script, HTTP proxy, HTTPS, and HTTP Basic authentication. It also supports full-screen browsing to make better use of the extremely limited screen real estate on a mobile phone. In full-screen mode, the soft-key labels at the bottom of the page are also hidden. But the left soft key is still mapped to the Options menu and the right soft key is mapped to Back or Stop, depending on whether the browser is currently loading a page.

Opera defines a set of hotkeys to allow quick access to features without going through the menu. For example, pressing 1 pops up a box for entering a new URL to load; 2 opens the bookmark page; 8 brings up the browser settings page; 9 pops up a box for entering a search phrase for a Google search; and * toggles full-screen mode on and off.

A key innovation in mobile versions of the Opera browser is its content layout management. When you turn on Small Screen Rendering (SSR) mode in the Options Display menu (or use the # hotkey to toggle it on and off), Opera will try to resize images and rearrange elements in the HTML page to make it fit into the width of the screen. You can still use the vertical scroll key to scroll the page. The pages in SSR mode will not necessarily follow the original visual design of the web site. But they are more useable and more effective on a small mobile phone screen. reens.

If you're a web developer, you might want to check how your page will look in Opera's SSR mode. Simply select the View Small screen menu option on a PC or Mac version of the Opera browser.

If you want to browse the page as its designers intended, you can turn off the small screen mode. In that case, the page is probably much wider than the screen. So, you need to scroll both horizontally and vertically to see the entire page.