Vivaldi 1.3: Find out what is new
Vivaldi 1.3, a new version of the up and coming web browser, is now available for download and as an automatic update for all supported operating systems.
If you are new to Vivaldi, we suggest you check out or Vivaldi web browser review, and our reviews of Vivaldi 1.1 and Vivaldi 1.2 released earlier this year.
Vivaldi 1.3 ships with new features which we have sneak peeked at already as they were integrated in development versions of the browser prior to becoming available in release versions of it.
Vivaldi 1.3
New Theme capabilities
One focus of Vivaldi is customization. This includes giving users control over various browser features, arguably more control than the majority of Chromium-based browsers offer, but also more options when it comes to themes.
Vivaldi 1.3 ships with additional themes that users can switch to, and better options to customize themes. You may create themes directly in the browser.
- Load vivaldi://settings/themes/ to get started.
To create a new theme click on the plus icon after selecting the theme that you want copied. This creates a new theme that you may rename and customize.
The following customization options are provided:
- Change the background, foreground, highlight and accent color. Changes take effect immediately for easy previewing.
- Apply accent color to window.
- Accent color from active page.
- Transparent tabs
- Corner Rounding.
Check out our initial review of Vivaldi's theme capabilities in version 1.3 here.
Mouse Gestures
Vivaldi 1.3 supports more than 90 browser actions that are either mapped to mouse gestures by default, or can be mapped to mouse gestures by you.
- Load vivaldi://settings/mouse/ to open the mouse settings.
You may enable or disable mouse gestures on this page, add the Alt-Key modifier to it, and preview any existing mouse gesture as well.
New mouse gestures are created with a click on the plus icon. You select a command first, e.g. new window or open extensions, and draw the gesture in the second step.
Vivaldi records the gesture and a click on save gesture adds it to the mouse gesture repertoire of the browser.
Privacy
Vivaldi supported quite a few privacy settings already. The new version of the web browser gives you control over WebRTC, and here specifically if IP addresses are leaked to sites you connect to.
- Load vivaldi://settings/privacy/ to open the privacy setings.
To disable the WebRTC broadcasting of IP addresses, uncheck the "broadcast IP for best WebRTC performance" preference on the privacy page.
Tip: while you are at it, go through the other privacy settings on the page and adjust them according to your requirements.
Other changes
If you have used Vivaldi before, you may have experienced that the settings page opens rather slowly and with delay. This has been fixed apparently, as there is no lag anymore at least on a test machine when opening the settings.
Search got a new setting as well. Vivaldi supported search suggestions when typing in the address field for some time. The new feature limits suggestions in the address bar, so that suggestions are only displayed when you use search engine nicknames (keywords).
Vivaldi optimized the browser for Linux users by addressing Linux-specific issues. This includes a fix for Tab Hibernation -- works now -- and support for "some" proprietary media embedded in HTML5 content.
Support H.264, AAC and MP3 on OpenSUSE and Slackware if suitable libraries are available: Use libs from chromium-ffmpeg and AlienBob's Chromium packageSupport
Other features of interest include:
- Middle-clicking on navigational elements (back, forward, home) opens the site in a background tab.
- Performance improvements across the board.
- Alt-Enter and Ctrl-Shift-V work in search field now.
- Speed Dial can be set as the homepage.
You find all changes listed on the official Vivaldi blog post announcing the new release. Existing Vivaldi users may check for updates by selecting Vivaldi > Help > Check for updates. Downloads are also provided on the Vivaldi website.
Now You: What is your take on Vivaldi's progress so far?
Doesn’t Windows 8 know that www. or http:// are passe ?
Well it is a bit difficulty to distinguish between name.com domains and files for instance.
I know a service made by google that is similar to Google bookmarks.
http://www.google.com/saved
@Ashwin–Thankful you delighted my comment; who knows how many “gamers” would have disagreed!
@Martin
The comments section under this very article (3 comments) is identical to the comments section found under the following article:
https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/15/netflix-is-testing-game-streaming-on-tvs-and-computers/
Not sure what the issue is, but have seen this issue under some other articles recently but did not report it back then.
Omg a badge!!!
Some tangible reward lmao.
It sucks that redditors are going to love the fuck out of it too.
With the cloud, there is no such thing as unlimited storage or privacy. Stop relying on these tech scums. Purchase your own hardware and develop your own solutions.
This is a certified reddit cringe moment. Hilarious how the article’s author tries to dress it up like it’s anything more than a png for doing the reddit corporation’s moderation work for free (or for bribes from companies and political groups)
Almost al unlmited services have a real limit.
And this comment is written on the dropbox article from August 25, 2023.
First comment > @ilev said on August 4, 2012 at 7:53 pm
For the God’s sake, fix the comments soon please! :[
Yes. Please. Fix the comments.
With Google Chrome, it’s only been 1,500 for some time now.
Anyone who wants to force me in such a way into buying something that I can get elsewhere for free will certainly never see a single dime from my side. I don’t even know how stupid their marketing department is to impose these limits on users instead of offering a valuable product to the paying faction. But they don’t. Even if you pay, you get something that is also available for free elsewhere.
The algorithm has also become less and less savvy in terms of e.g. English/German translations. It used to be that the bot could sort of sense what you were trying to say and put it into different colloquialisms, which was even fun because it was like, “I know what you’re trying to say here, how about…” Now it’s in parts too stupid to translate the simplest sentences correctly, and the suggestions it makes are at times as moronic as those made by Google Translations.
If this is a deep-learning AI that learns from users’ translations and the phrases they choose most often – which, by the way, is a valuable, moneys worthwhile contribution of every free user to this project: They invest their time and texts, thereby providing the necessary data for the AI to do the thing as nicely as they brag about it in the first place – alas, the more unprofessional users discovered the translator, the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, the greater the aggregate of linguistically illiterate users has become, and the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, as it now learns the drivel of every Tom, Dick and Harry out there, which is why I now get their Mickey Mouse language as suggestions: the inane language of people who can barely spell the alphabet, it seems.
And as a thank you for our time and effort in helping them and their AI learn, they’ve lowered the limit from what was once 5,000 to now 1,500…? A big “fuck off” from here for that! Not a brass farthing from me for this attitude and behaviour, not in a hundred years.
When will you put an end to the mess in the comments?
Ghacks comments have been broken for too long. What article did you see this comment on? Reply below. If we get to 20 different articles we should all stop using the site in protest.
I posted this on [https://www.ghacks.net/2023/09/28/reddit-enforces-user-activity-tracking-on-site-to-push-advertising-revenue/] so please reply if you see it on a different article.
Comment redirected me to [https://www.ghacks.net/2012/08/04/add-search-the-internet-to-the-windows-start-menu/] which seems to be the ‘real’ article it is attached to
Comment redirected me to [https://www.ghacks.net/2012/08/04/add-search-the-internet-to-the-windows-start-menu/] which seems to be the ‘real’ article it is attached to
Article Title: Reddit enforces user activity tracking on site to push advertising revenue
Article URL: https://www.ghacks.net/2023/09/28/reddit-enforces-user-activity-tracking-on-site-to-push-advertising-revenue/
No surprises here. This is just the beginning really. I cannot see a valid reason as to why anyone would continue to use the platform anymore when there are enough alternatives fill that void.
I’m not sure if there is a point in commenting given that comments seem to appear under random posts now, but I’ll try… this comment is for https://www.ghacks.net/2023/09/28/reddit-enforces-user-activity-tracking-on-site-to-push-advertising-revenue/
My temporary “solution”, if you can call it that, is to use a VPN (Mullvad in my case) to sign up for and access Reddit via a European connection. I’m doing that with pretty much everything now, at least until the rest of the world catches up with GDPR. I don’t think GDPR is a magical privacy solution but it’s at least a first step.