Vivaldi as a Web browser

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SOFTWARE By Will Fastie If you’ve never heard of Vivaldi before, I’m not surprised. Although its use is growing, its share of the Web browser market l
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al-weene, ibe98765, Pagrus, lmacri, rc primak, Norio, OscarCP

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Frankly, I’ve never found a need to use more than one browser.  I have Firefox which suits me quite well.  YMMV

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

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Microfix

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I have found sites or times of the day, or even times of apparent outages, when one browser can’t get me logged into a site, but another browser can do the job. Usually this means that all Chromium-Blink based browsers have failed, so I resort to Firefox-Gecko. One or the other most often suceeds. Hence the need for em to keep two different browsers, based on different rendering engines, handy. True under Windows and under most Linux distros. I don’t own any Mac equipment.

-- rc primak

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Microfix, Pagrus, Kirsty, OscarCP

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rc primak, I suppose the answer about what’s it like with Macs depends on whom you ask.

In my case, for what I do, I have not had such outage problems with either Vivaldi or Chrome, except in rare occasions, but then only because the internet was down in my area, so the fault was not the browser’s. The same is true with Waterfox.

What I have had, though, is some Websites not allowing me to connect with them, or reluctantly allowing me, but with big warnings on reddish backgrounds telling me I really shouldn’t, unless I was using Chrome or Firefox. But that is the Website owners privilege and, again, this does not have a thing to do with any browser malfunction.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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rc primak

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rc primak wrote:

I have found sites or times of the day, or even times of apparent outages, when one browser can’t get me logged into a site, but another browser can do the job. Usually this means that all Chromium-Blink based browsers have failed, so I resort to Firefox-Gecko.

I start with Firefox, and have never hit that particular wall.  The only time I can’t connect with a site is when my internet connection is down.

Having never hit that particular wall, I’ve never seen the need for more than one browser.  YMMV

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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Microfix

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I have yet to find anything better than Firefox either, but I have been trying to get Vivaldi tuned up to replace Firefox anyway. Sadly, I have no faith in Firefox’s continued suitability, or even its continued existence. It’s dwindled down to a browser that has 3% of the market share as reported by Statcounter. Safari is six times higher in market share despite not being available on the largest platforms in each form factor (Android, at 72% on mobiles, and Windows, at 75% on PCs).

How long can Firefox continue in this way? About 90% of its revenue comes from its main “competitor,” Google. It’s not like Linux that has about the same percentage of the desktop market per Statcounter, but a much greater percentage of the server market, not to mention a lot of corporate money streaming in from the likes of IBM/RHEL, Intel, Canonical, and even Microsoft now. Google could effectively end Firefox any time it wanted to, and no one knows that more than Mozilla.

If that was not enough, there’s this obsession Mozilla has with removing features from Firefox. They’ve cut off some pretty big ones, but so far I have been able to work around their decisions. At some point, though, they will go too far… probably with the removal of support for userChrome.css. Both Vivaldi and Firefox need significant modification via .css to meet my requirements. Without that, I’m out.

Vivaldi is the only Chromium-based browser that even comes close. It still has a lot of rough edges that need to be smoothed out before I would choose it ahead of Firefox, as it now is, and I really hope I am not forced to move before that happens.

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Cybertooth, JohnDeaux, Kirsty

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rc primak wrote:

Usually this means that all Chromium-Blink based browsers have failed, so I resort to Firefox-Gecko

What that says to me is, your using the secondary browser to start with 🙂

I use firefox esr (gecko) as a primary and don’t have any issues with accessing a lot of sites sensitive or otherwise. Incognito Edge (webkit) is my silent failsafe that I’ve never needed to use online that updates itself.

 

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Will Fastie and Lance Whitney, thanks for your commentaries and the information on “Vivaldi.”

I have been using Vivaldi for some time now, along with Waterfox (“Current”) and Chrome — each for a different kind of browsing. (I also keep Firefox and have Safari, that came with the Mac, but rarely use these, as they are redundant with the other three.)

It has a good reputation and, so far, it has been useful to me and also free from strange problems.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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I use Vivaldi every day, along with FireFox.  I love the tab-stacking capability of V.  Thanks for tip about Edge Dev!  I use Edge but force it to clear all data each time I close it.  I’ll start doing that with the Dev version right away.

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OscarCP

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I have used Opera since the turn of the century, before they discontinued their own browser development and went with Chromium/Blink rendering platform. In the very early years there was a yearly charge, around $25 as I remember. I was hapopy to pay it because I was very much opposed Microsoft bundling Internet Explorer. Opera was a good substitute after MS torpedoed Netscape. For the last fifteen or so Opera has been free. Firefox, Chrome, Brave, Vivaldi, etc. are also free.

My question relates to the business case for free. There is an old saying that if the product is free then you are really the product and the company somehow profits from you. What I don’t see is how Opera or Vivaldi (or etc.) profit from me as a user.

Anyone have a comment on the business case, not the technology itself?

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I switched from Firefox to Vivaldi a couple of months ago. I wanted a browser that gives me some things that Firefox does not have — like side-by-side vertical bookmarks and tabs panels so that I can easily move items between the two. I am impressed by how much control I have over the settings to configure it the way I want. Like others have mentioned, I also keep other browsers in the rare cases I need them; Microsoft Edge, Chrome, Firefox.

The more I use Vivaldi the more I like it. There is a learning curve to deal with, but it is worth it IMO.

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WSraysig: “Anyone have a comment on the business case, not the technology itself?”

And voila! I asked and Vivaldi spoke and answered:

https://vivaldi.com/blog/vivaldi-business-model/

Excerpt:

“Vivaldi generates revenue from partner deals with search engines. 

Every time you search using one of the pre-installed search engines, you’re helping us grow, one search at a time. Currently, we work with DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, Startpage, Yahoo!, Bing, Yandex and Neeva.

The only exception is Google – we don’t make money when you search with Google. However, we know that some of you use this search engine daily, so we include it in Vivaldi. 

If you need reasons to switch to a new search engine, take a look at why your choice of a search engine matters“

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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“I mention Blink because, even though most browsers based on Chromium refer to themselves as “Chromium-based,” it is more technically accurate to say that they are based upon Blink. Vivaldi uses Blink, as do Edge, Chrome, and Opera.”

They use Blink because they are Chromium-based.

The Chromium project (under Google’s patronage) puts out a product called Chromium, in source code form. They don’t compile it for end users themselves. It’s not meant to be a finished product as the Chromium team releases it, even though it is quite usable once compiled.

All of the Chromium-based browsers start with that Chromium source code each time a new version of Chromium is released. The devs of each of these browsers add in their own changes, whatever those may be, initially by means of diff (difference) source files, then modified and debugged as necessary to make it work.

Every one of those browsers is a modified version of Chromium, and contains considerably more Chromium code than just the Blink layout engine. It is correct to refer to them as Chromium-based.

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Ascaris wrote:

The Chromium project (under Google’s patronage) puts out a product called Chromium, in source code form. They don’t compile it for end users themselves.

There is a compiled Chromium browser.

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Yes, you are right, and I should have been more clear. For testing purposes, Chromium is compiled. It can’t be beta tested without compiling it.

Chromium is not offered as a finished product for people to use in compiled form, though. The goal of the project is to produce the debugged, nicely-working source code (for the purpose of being made into Chrome, from Google’s perspective), not to produce a browser (which is a compiled project). You can use the testing or daily builds as a daily driver, but that is not the intent of those builds.

 

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Does Vivaldi browser have the capability of syncing things like bookmarks, passwords, etc, between two computers, like FF can?

Thanks!

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LHiggins: “Does Vivaldi browser have the capability of syncing things like bookmarks, passwords, etc, between two computers, like FF can? “

https://help.vivaldi.com/desktop/tools/import-and-export-browser-data/

But for passwords, it looks that it depends on whether you have the passwords in a .csv file (*).

From/to another computer:

“To import data from a Vivaldi on another device, we recommend using the browser’s Sync feature. Continue reading to learn how to import data from other browser and from files on your computer, including alternative ways to transfer data between Vivaldi browsers.”

From another browser in the Same  computer:

“To import Bookmarks from another browser on the same computer or from an HTML file,

Go to the Vivaldi menu > File > Import from Applications or Files.
Select which browser you want to import bookmarks from;
Click Start Import.

Depending on the source browser, you can import other browser data, such as Passwords and History, at the same time as well.”

About passwords, it looks that depends on whether you have the passwords in a .csv file.  https://www.businessinsider.com/guides/tech/what-is-csv-file:

(*) “To import passwords from .csv file:

1. Go to <span class=”marker-pen”>vivaldi://flags</span> and search for #password-import;
2. Enable the experimental feature;
3. Restart the browser;
4. Type “chrome://settings/passwords” into the Address field;
5. Click on More actions (on the right from Saved Passwords);
6. Select Import;
7. Choose the .csv file with your passwords;
8. Click Open.”

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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LHiggins

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Hi Oscar,

Thanks for the reply. Very helpful! I looked at the link you sent and it does appear that Vivaldi has a sync feature. Plus thanks for the detailed way to transfer between Vivaldi and other browsers and between computers.

I am getting a new Windows 10 Pro Thinkpad laptop (literally on some slow boat from Lenovo’s overseas operation), but I was intrigued with the article about Vivaldi and thought that maybe I’d give it a try on my old laptop now, and then if I like it, I can get it on the new one someday when it finally arrives, and then sync the two.

I appreciate your help and reply! Thanks again!

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OscarCP wrote:

Vivaldi generates revenue from partner deals with search engines.

A big reason I use Bing, despite taking a lot of ribbing for it.

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Ascaris wrote:

They use Blink because they are Chromium-based.

Quite so.

Ascaris wrote:

… and contains considerably more Chromium code than just the Blink layout engine

There is a significant difference between using Blink as the layer between your browser implementation and Chromium, and writing your code to talk directly to the Chromium engine. That’s the point of an abstraction layer.

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Chromium is not the engine, though. Blink is the engine, the backend. Chromium is the blink engine plus the frontend, which is the rest of the stuff that makes a browser, including the default Chromium UI. Google takes that Chromium code and modifies it further (with closed source bits) to produce the Chrome browser, making it a sibling of Vivaldi, Edge, and Brave, who also take the Chromium code and modify it as they see fit.

The primary differences between Vivaldi and Chromium are in the frontend, as the Chromium UI is extended and added to by the Vivaldi devs. You can see that quite a lot of the Chromium code is still there, though. The chrome://flags UI, for example, is still present (though changed to vivaldi:), and most of them still work (like the one for turning off smooth scrolling). Some of the flags change how the backend works, but the UI for the flags itself is part of the Chromium frontend. The same is true for all the other chrome:// pseudo-URLs, and also the developer tools, which are identical in Chromium and Vivaldi. These are carried over directly from Chromium, as part of the frontend.

In common FOSS terminology, Vivaldi is a downstream derivative of Chromium, in the same way that Ubuntu is a downstream derivative of Debian, and Mint is a downstream derivative of Ubuntu. A downstream product starts with the code from the upstream and applies whatever changes they wish to that.

Google uses the same development schema with AOSP (Android Open Source Project), which is upstream of the released product, Android. There are third-party derivatives of AOSP too, like LineageOS (formerly CyanogenMod).

 

 

 

 

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JohnDeaux

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Since we’re comparing web browsers, might someone be able to weigh in on Brave?  I know it’s Chromium-based, and am 99% sure I switched from FF because of an article on this site touting its superior privacy.  Is that no longer the case?

 

Tks

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RVAUser: Here is what a survey of several browsers, including Brave, by PC Magazine came up with:

https://www.pcmag.com/picks/stop-trackers-dead-the-best-private-browsers

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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RVAUser, windbg

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Vivaldi has become one of my main browsers in recent weeks. One thing that I’m impressed with is that they seem to be responsive to user feedback.

Every so often, they’ll offer a little survey for the user to rate new features; a couple of months ago, they introduced a new option when right-clicking on a link, to go straight to the new tab instead of simply opening the link in a new tab without going to it automatically. Because they placed this menu option precisely where the historical default option was, I kept getting detoured from the tab I was on; most of the time I simply want to open the new tab and then get to it after finishing with the current page.

The worst part of this annoying new feature was that they had also eliminated any way to change the right-click behavior or menu, so the bottom line was that I had to dispense with years of muscle memory and remember to click on the second right-click option instead of the first. As they were the only browser doing this, on top of everything else I had to keep in mind which browser I was in and how it behaved differently from the rest in this particular respect.

So the next time Vivaldi popped up their feedback survey, I gave them a piece of my mind. Now in the latest version, it looks like they’ve reverted to the standard behavior and the option to open in a new tab + go to it is completely gone.

 

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I was a Opera user for years, until it got gutted into an absurd joke.

Pasting the name Vivaldi on it and trying to put it back to it’s former glory has not taken the stain away in my mind.  Maybe someday . . .

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I mostly use old FF ESR (because of support for TabMix Plus extension) and Chrome when that doesn’t work.  Sometimes I’ll use Edge.  I also have Waterfox modern and classic.  I’ve heard that Palemoon is back and might try that again.

Edge has the worst spellchecking!

I wish Microsoft would have busted Chrome for sticking their tabs in the Windows titlebar.  That’s not kosher and Google shouldn’t have been allowed to violate design standards.

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Fred, Cybertooth

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ibe98765 wrote:

that Palemoon is back and might try that again.

I am using PaleMoon regularly, and I think it’s good, but still returning to Firefox ESR with privacy addons, it’s just a habit I guess.

* _ ... _ *

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Steve D wrote:

Pasting the name Vivaldi on it …

My understanding is that Vivaldi started from scratch. Opera got away from von Tetzchner,  so Vivaldi was a return to his first principles.

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ibe98765 wrote:

I wish Microsoft would have busted Chrome for sticking their tabs in the Windows titlebar.

The original Windows title bar has morphed into something else, not just in browsers but in virtually all apps.

I don’t think that move was entirely unreasonable. Having the title bar was a handy tool for a long time, but the current thinking is that using all that space for just the title was wasteful. So we are seeing the creep of “features” into the top bar.

It’s disconcerting with some apps (especially those that overload the space) but my overall take on the change is positive.

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