Introduction:
Alrighty, I've been playing with the recently released new
Beta 2 of Opera Mini 4. One of the, if not best, web browser available for Windows Mobile devices. This is not the same as the Windows Mobile native application
Opera Mobile. Opera Mobile is nicer than Opera Mini in a few ways (supports tabs/downloading of files). But in most ways Opera Mini is superior (Much faster rendering engine, dynamic zoom, renders most web pages just like a desktop browser, and completely free). Hopefully this will change when Opera 9 comes out, but the current available version of Opera Mobile (8.65 Beta) is inferior in many ways to Opera Mini.
A New Java Midlet Manager (Jbed):
Opera Mini is designed to run on Java phones. Luckily HTC was kind enough to include a Java Midlet manager on the HTC Mogul, which runs Opera Mini quite nicely.
However, in the course of doing some research I found out that xda-developers.com forum member Cloudyfa has released Esmertec's Java Midlet Manager Jbed version 20070802.2.1, available
here. The Java Midlet manager built into the Mogul is Esmertec Jeodek. According to Windows Mobile expert Menneisyys, Jbed is much better (more info on Windows Mobile Java Midlets
here). This version installs fine on the Mogul (in main memory). Here's some pluses with using this new Java Midlet manager.
1.) Runs side by side with existing Midlet Manager (.exe name is different, it's "\windows\jbed.exe" instead of "\windows\jeodek.exe").
2.) Runs using the same Midlet install base as Jeodek. So anything installed in Jeodek is also installed in Jbed, and vice versa.
3.) Faster!
4.) Full screen (Opera Mini looks great in full screen)!
5.) Unlike Jeodek, properly runs the Google GMail Midlet, without certificate errors!
6.) Uses and obeys any proxies you have defined in your connection profile! (More info
here)
Installing Opera Mini:
1.) On your device open up Pocket Internet Explorer and navigate to
http://mini.opera.com/beta.
2.) Scroll down and tap on the "Download high memory version" link to start the install process.
Making a direct shortcut to Opera Mini (or any other Java Midlet)
Since Opera Mini is a Java Midlet application, one annoying aspect is that to run Opera Mini, you must first run the Java Midlet, tap on the "Applications" list item, then tap on the "Opera Mini 4 beta" item. Luckily, some industrious users out there have figured out how to create a shortcut that launches Opera Mini (or any other Java app) directly. Assuming you haven't installed any other Java apps, you need to create a shortcut file (e.g., opera.lnk) pointing to (
"\windows\jeodek.exe" -run s1_), or (
"\windows\jbed.exe -run s1_"), if using Jbed instead.
The magic portion is the number after the the letter "s" in the shortcut target. This is the list position of the Java Midlet in the Jeodek/Jbed application list. If you install Jeodek/Jbed as a fresh install (non Mogul users), and then directly install Opera Mini, just use the number "0" to refer to Opera Mini (
"\windows\jbed.exe -run s0_"). If you install another MIDlet (after Opera Mini), its index will become 1, then the next installed Midlet will have an index of 2, and so on.
Locating the number that corresponds to a Java Midlet
To find which number corresponds to an installed Java Midlet, navigate to the (
windows\appdb) folder. There should be some .jar files in there, with one of them being the Opera Mini jar file (or other Java Midlet you wish to target). Whatever the number is after the letter "s", is the number needed in your shortcut link. Only the first part of the file name of the midlet is needed, so lets say, in the appdb folder, you have "s0_suite.jar", for your shortcut target, leave out the suite.jar, and only put "s0_", so your shortcut should point to ("\windows\jbed.exe" -run s0_),
NOT ("\windows\jbed.exe" -run s0_suite.jar). A pre-made shortcut file can be found
here.
Creating/Modifying Shortcuts on Your Mobile Device
The following lists a couple of ways to create edit/create shortcuts with parameters on a mobile device.
1.) Use the excellent shareware application,
Resco Explorer (the method I personally use, and find the easiest).
2.) Create the shortcut manually using any text editor. Shortcuts have the file extension ".lnk". So, for example, lets create a file in a text editor, and save it with the file name
OperaMini.lnk, the contents of the file should look similar to this :
Code:
28#"\windows\jbed.exe" -run s0_
28# means that the shortcut target, including the parameter (
-run s0_) is 28 characters.
Note: A forum user has reported that the freeware application, Total Commander does NOT create the shortcut properly.
After you have created/named the shortcut, all that is left to do is to place the shortcut file in your start menu (
\windows\start menu\programs) folder.
Skipping the Connection Permission Prompt (Only applies to JBed)
One of the only negatives of using Jbed, over Jeodek,
used to be that any time an application wanted to access to the Internet, Jbed would ask twice if you want to allow the action. It will also forget this permission next time you ran the application, so you would have to give permission every time you ran a Midlet that tried to access the Internet. Thanks to forum user g-funkster, a work around for this annoyance has been found!
1.) Copy the file
\windows\appdb\selector.utf to your PC (make sure backup this file first in case something goes wrong!)
2.) Remove read-only attribute
3.) Open the file with a hex editor, and find the line
Code:
domain=untrusted, \
Replace the text
untrusted with the text
tckmax. Add space characters between the x (in tckmax) and the comma (otherwise connection warnings or a nullpointerexception error may occur). The above line may appear multiple times in the "selector.utf" file, each corresponds to a different Java Midlet you have installed in JBed.
If hex editing is too blackhat for you, g-funkster has created a desktop application that can do this for you automatically! You can find it
here.
Personal Review:
The new beta of Opera Mini seems faster, more stable, has better image quality, fixes a bug where I kept loosing my cookies, and it renders pages more accurately.
Tips:
*One of the new features of Beta 2 is better image rending quality. By default, at least for me, this was off. To turn it on go to
Menu->Tools->Settings menu item, and check "Higher image quality". Then tap on the "Save" menu item, located in the lower left hand corner. There's a note on the settings page that says turning on the "Higher image Quality" option doubles the amount of transferred data, on EVDO networks I did not notice a speed difference, but I did notice that images do look a lot better now!
*Keyboard numbers 2, 8, 4, 6 for panning Up, Down, Left and Right, respectively.
*Keyboard number 5 for zoom in and zoom out.
*Keyboard * to go to full screen
Known Issues:
* No bold font in medium font setting, at least for me
* Some are still experiencing some cookie save issues, though for me they seemed solved in Jbed/Opera Mini 4 Beta 2.
Running Opera Mini in Landscape:
One of the setting options in Opera Mini is to run the application in "landscape". I recommend not using this setting. I find it's more reliable to set your windows mobile device screen in landscape orientation before launching Opera Mini rather than using Opera Mini's "landscape" mode. Opera Mini's version of "landscape" mode also awkwardly places Opera's menus on left side of the screen instead of at the bottom, as it does in portrait mode. Sliding the the Mogul's keyboard in and out tends to mess up the screen rendering/size of Opera Mini, forcing a restart of the application to fix it.
I find a lot of times that I want to run Opera Mini in landscape mode, but I don't want to have the keyboard slid out. And placing my screen in landscape orientation requires a bunch of taps and navigation that I find annoying. In response to this problem, I have created a
MortScript script that asks the user if they wish to rotate the screen to landscape mode before directly launching Opera Mini in the Esmertec's Jbed Java Midlet Manager. If you chose to run in Landscape mode, the script also reverts back to portrait mode after you exit Opera Mini. You can edit the script in any text editor to fit your needs. Place the script or a shortcut to the script on your start menu, to make launching Opera Mini in landscape mode as easy as two quick taps!
The script can be downloaded here:
RapidShare: 1-Click Webhosting
Other reading/references:
Changes since Beta 1.
Review of Opera Mini 4 Beta 2 by Windows Mobile expert Menneisyys
How to make a Java shortcut?.
EsmertecJbed 20070802
Sneak peek of Menneisyys forthcoming Midlet Manager Bible
MortScript 4.0 download page
MortScript example scripts
Windows CE Shortcuts
Link to g-funkster's "selector.utf" hex patcher (allows you to skip the allow connection prompt in Jbed)
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