Submitted by “Opera has released an alpha build of Opera Next 11.50. As the name implies, this new release is a separate version of the cross-platform Opera browser. It’s designed to allow users to install the latest developmental version of Opera alongside the current stable version, allowing users to road-test the latest new features without risking their current, stable installation.”
I downloaded and tried Opera next, it works pretty good. I like it, I prefer the new speed dial page, its works well and extensions can extend it, though the only extensions that take advantage of it are from opera as of now. The total number of extensions is slowly working its way up, there are still holes compared to firefox or even chrome but its getting better. Its very fast based on the highly scientific, open all my sites and see how fast they get to a usable state test.
And best of all for me, my pet flash bug is fixed, I can pause flash video in opera now. That single bug drove me away from the last stable version of opera into chromes waiting arms.
Edited 2011-05-04 22:38 UTC
Opera always allowed multiple independent installations. I have several different versions of Opera installed on the same PC without any issues. The only difference I can see with Opera Next is that it defaults to a different installation folder rather than assuming that I want to upgrade.
As for the new version, I find it very hard to work up any enthusiasm for new features when some really annoying bugs have hung around for years now. To me using Opera is still a frustrating experience thanks to the glitches and annoyances. I wish the developers would spend more time bug squashing rather than packing in extra features and eye candy.
True that. Opera is rather notorious for building a new feature, getting it about 90% complete, and then moving on to the next thing. (The voice feature in Windows is a prime example of this; it was never really finished.)