Twotoasts.de - Midori

Database, delayed loading and dozens of shortcuts

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 03:01:24 +0200

Time for an exciting step ahead, databased backed bookmarks, which brings in completion of bookmarks in the location entry and search in the bookmark panel. On top of that we have dragging of bookmarks into and out of folders.

A new feature is Delayed Pages. If Midori crashes and you open it again, pages will be delayed/ suspended/ frozen and not fully opened until you reload them. This is handy if one website is problematic, so it won't crash or freeze immediately again. Also it accelerates startup because not all pages are loaded into memory at once. The feature can also be enabled by default in Preferences > General > When Midori starts > Show last tabs without loading.

Fans of Speed Dial will like the option at the top of the Speed Dial for larger thumbnails. Also you can now have as many shortcuts as you like.

Also worth mentioning are some performance optimisations during page load as well as optimisations in adblock including compatibility improvements.

Two new extensions are shipped by default: 'Minimize New Tabs' and 'Copy Addresses of Tabs'. Have a look in the Extensions panel and try them.

A little goodie that came in last minute is completion of multiple words, for example type "my cat" in the location, and it will match any visited pages or bookmarks with a name such as "my chubby cats" or "my box with cat toys".

So download midori v0.2.7 (745 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!

Midori Win32 Setup v0.2.6 (10,5 MB)
Midori Win32 Archive v0.2.6 (15,3 MB)

Frames, finity and fraction

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Mon, 24 May 2010 19:54:32 +0200

Due to a fairly common crasher related to frames which fail to load, I decided to do a quick follow-up release. There is also a build-fix for API documentation, which didn't work in the last release.

As it is my habbit to always have something small, that makes it worth upgrading in stabilizing releases, today I feature custom number of columns and number of shortcuts in the Speed Dial. I expect a few people with high-resolution screens should like that. Simply click one of the top left labels and type a number in the window shown then.

As depending on the icon theme, not everyone saw icons in error pages and the speed dial, I reworked the icon code. Now all icon themes should show 'edit' and 'remove' in Speed Dial shortcuts and icons in error pages.

So download midori v0.2.6 (696 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!

Midori Win32 Setup v0.2.6 (10,5 MB)
Midori Win32 Archive v0.2.6 (15,3 MB)

Validation, vending and Vala

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sun, 16 May 2010 23:19:58 +0200

Today is a good day for an exciting release. Raise your paws... or hands for celebration, Midori 0.2.5 is out of the door.

Notably visible validation of SSL certificates, which is reflected in yellow or red background in the location. There is more to come, but it is a good step ahead. See bug 168 for further details.

For Kiosk usage, support has been enhanced. The new command line switches --inactivity-reset and --blocked-uris can be used to reset the session after a period of inactivity and also to restrict the accessible websites to prevent misuse of the Kiosk interface. Feedback in bug 605 is very welcome.

I am happy to say that the Windows support has caught up with the latest changes and Midori builds perfectly for Windows again. Thanks to Peter who worked hard to resolve a number of portability issues and continually provided binaries, all we reached feature parity and all extensions run smoothly. And we even have a proper installer.

A fancy new feature, targetted at those who want to extend Midori, is Vala support for extensions. There are currently no vital parts implemented in Vala except one example extension, and some bits are likely missing, but you can already implement seriously good enhancements in Vala. So anyone interested is welcome to give it a try.

Mouse Gestures now support the right mouse button and this is the default binding. Many users requested this and should hopefully enjoy gesturing a lot in the future.

People who like to surf the web fullscreen may find themselves losing track of time. A solution for this is the new Status Clock extension, which renders a clock in the statusbar.

Subtly but notably the Speed Dial now supports opening shortcuts with number keys. Now speed dial is even more speedy.

The Network preferences have changed to easily switch between No proxy, Manual proxy server and Automatic detection. This helps usability and facilitiates temporary use of a proxy server.

So download midori v0.2.5 (688 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!

Windows Setup: Midori Win32 v0.2.5 (10,4 MB)

Build fixes, bookmark export and better privacy

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 22:54:28 +0100

This is a stabilization release, focussed on small improvements. Build errors with different GTK+ versions were fixed, accidental middle clicks don't search unless Alt + middle click is used and opening addresses from external applications in combination with multiple browser windows is fixed. Also the completion suggestion window won't overlap underlying windows.
As a small increase in privacy, the micro version and architecture are not anymore included in the identification string.
Bookmarks can now be exported, from the Bookmarks menu, to XBEL.
Scroll keys can now be specified in the Shortcuts extension, to use for instance Vim style keys for scrolling in web pages (which is now the default).

So download midori v0.2.4 (630 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Completion, performance and image blocking

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 13:34:11 +0100

Here we are after an elongated release cycle. The reason for that is notably the refactoring of the completion functionality. The suggestion popup was rewritten to hugely improve completion performance, Startup performance could also be improved a lot. The History panel gained a search entry so it is possible to search the entire history easily.
The panel layout was simplified, with icons without labels on the bottom to save space and make it look a bit leaner.
Adblock gained 'Block image' and 'Block link' menu items, which make it possible to easily block individual images that you don't want to see.
There is a special page 'about:version' now to make it easier to see in what configuration Midori is running.
A new preference 'Preferred languages' should be good news for people speaking multiple languages.
Window raising behaviour was improved, which is important for users with multiple workspaces. Midori will no longer pull existing windows towards the current workspace just to open a new window.
Attaching of the web inspector to the browser window works much better. It is now also always enabled.
The address entry has a 'Paste and proceed' menu item in the context menu now. There is also a 'Close other tabs' menu item when right-clicking on tab labels now.
The cookie manager now allows selecting and deleting multiple cookies at once, which makes removing undesirable items much more convenient.
A number of improvements towards relocatability went in which are needed for Win32. And file existence checks are more portable and faster now.

So download midori v0.2.3 (625 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Bookmarks, bright paint and build fixes

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 23:11:58 +0100

Time for Midori 0.2.2.

Bookmarks can be imported from Opera, Arora, Kazehakase, Epiphany and other browser using XBEL. The XBEL support was improved in terms of performance and compatibility with other applications.

Colourful Tabs now work in combination with the Tab Panel. Delete Private data includes Web Cache which it didn't before. And if you have a small screen or mobile device, Open panels in separate windows can be useful. Correct ordering of History and Trash were fixed. The Shortcuts dialogue display issues were fixed.

The options 'Show in toolbar' and 'Open as web app' were implemented for bookmarks. So you can selectively decide what bookmarks or folders to have in the bookmarkbar. And if you mark them as 'web app' bookmarks open in a separate process.

Several improvements related to portability and compatibility were applied, for Hildon and Win32. Build fixes for certain Glib and GTK+ versions were applied. libnotify is now a build-time dependency.

Incidentally Midori is available for the N900 in testing repositories, albeit it still needs some work, and Midori for Win32 may be updated soon once problems with extensions are sorted out.

So download midori v0.2.2 (590 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Web Cache, Weird Hotkeys, Window Opening

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 00:30:46 +0100

We are approaching version 0.2.1. A great lot of polishing went into this release. Mouse gestures are fixed, linking with gold is supported, the navigation toolbar is hidden in fullscreen and the preference dialogue was tweaked a little.
You may notice that opening of new windows is incredibly fast and startup of Midori is faster. Hotkeys involving Tab or single characters are supported now. Terminating Midori with Unix signals won't trigger the crash dialogue anymore (a real crash will).
We have a Web Cache extension and a Tab History list now, both incredibly nice additions. Also form history was improved, it works with forms where it didn't before and saves values to disk so it works after closing Midori in-between.
Here and there lots of changes are coming towards Hildon/ Fremantle support. It is not yet completely done but you may see a proper Midori on the N900 with the next release.

So download midori v0.2.1 (580 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Element blocking, form history and kinetic scrolling

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 03:04:55 +0200

Fasten your seatbelts, Midori 0.2.0 is there. Adblock was improved a lot, it works with any WebKitGTK+ version, has an improved interface, reads AdblockPlus/ Easylist filters and supports element blocking now. Thanks to a contributed scrolling widget we have kinetic drag scrolling, enabled on touchscreen devices (gtk-touchscreen-mode. Two new extensions, namely DNS prefetching and form history, could just be the very reason for those who don't use Midori yet, to switch. Smaller issues were also improved, such as more icons of web pages are recognized, mailto: links work as expected and when switching a tab back and forth Midori remembers what you were typing.

So download midori v0.2.0 (556 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Better Adblock, better feed panel, better tab panel and defrosting

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 01:30:23 +0200

So... this update brings great things like saving HTTP logins, much better address completion, a fixed news feed icon, improvements of the feed panel extension, and an update of the tab panel extension.

With WebKitGTK+ there is Undo/ Redo support now. And a revamped Adblock extension that loads adlbock plus/ easylist files, and unlike the previous version actually works wonderfully.

Last but not least the freezing is fixed that could occur when opening multiple windows.

So download midori v0.1.10 (531 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

The hated popup, javascript issues and tab panel improvements

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 22:41:35 +0200

This version of Midori is a bit of a follow up and improval of the
previous one. There's a notable bug that breaks user styles, user scripts and the Netscape plugin panel in 0.1.8, this is fixed now.

The bookmark popup below the addressbar was an experiment in terms of usability. It is often hard to guess beforehand what works and what doesn't. A lot of users expressed how they disliked the popup, and I have to agree, it isn't as nice as it looked after using it for a longer time. So it's gone for good.l

The tab panel extension was improved, it has close icons now, ellipsizes titles, tooltips and you can hide the panel operating controls now to make it really space efficient. I personally like to work on it incrementally, and see how it improves my tab usage a lot over ordinary tabs. Any power user should try it out, and you are welcome to say how you like it.
A related feature, useful for heavy tab users who prefer actual tabs, is minimizing tabs. If you keep certain tabs open, you can now turn them into small icons.

The menu button that's visible when you hide the menubar had an annoying flaw, it wouldn't let you access the Tools, like editing the toolbar, configure your shortcuts or the Delete private data dialogue. So now these items show up in the menu. If you like to reduce screen real estate, go and hide your menubar today.

Being careful with private data is easier because there's a new tick mark in the dialogue in Tools > Delete private data, that tells Midori to delete the chosen information when quitting.
Another nice addition is that navigation history is preserved in newly opened tabs now.

So download midori v0.1.9 (504 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Menubarless, extended and also on Windows

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 23:25:23 +0200

Heya,

it is once again update time for Midori. Performance of working with multiple windows was
improved. The download dialogue and the Transfer panel were enhanced. An annoying bug
was fixed that rendered Mouse Gestures virtually unusable.

Alt +n now does switch to the n-th tab as asked for by several users. Also a common question
was single instance support, we now have a socket based implementation if libunique is not
available on the system. Another popular question in its own right was using Midori with no
menubar, for which now there is a menu button that appears upon hiding the menubar and
provides features missing from the context menu.
Through two new extensions finally keyboard shortcuts can be edited comfortably and a
toolbar editor makes customizing the toolbar layout a walk in the park.

This is notably the first release that is supported on Win32. A lot of improvements to the build
system and miscellaneous tweaks to handle Win32 specific aspects were implemented. It isn't
quite perfect yet but certainly very usable.

So download midori v0.1.8 (500 kB) (MD5) (ChangeLog) already!
Win32 Binaries: midori Win32 v0.1.8 (7,3 MB)

Colourful optimizations

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 23:23:13 +0100

This version of Midori has a focus on optimizations below the hood. The most important point here is that from now on, you need at least WebKitGTK+ 1.1.1, GTK+ 2.10, Glib 2.16 and libsoup 2.25.2. Lots of tricks to maintain compatibility were dropped. Supporting ancient versions of WebKit became increasingly hard, and various optimizations are in place already. The internal source view was also dropped, and the default text editor is used, or whatever you chose in the preferences. As for a really exciting feature, downloading of files works if you have WebKitGTK+ 1.1.3, including a sidepanel and progress bars inside the statusbar. As a goodie I added an extension called Colourful Tabs, which took me less than two hours to write and is quite nice for that.

So download midori v0.1.5 already!

Follow up with a stablish focus

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 22:04:05 +0100

This is a less spectacular but still important release with a focus on small improvements and bug fixes. For instance automatic inline find can be disabled, bookmarks can be moved to different folders and bookmark folders can be opened in tabs. You can edit the selection in the completion dropdown as you select it and the history panel uses your local date format (as a tip for friends of the ISO date format, try LC_TIME=en_DK.utf8). Blanks don't "load" anymore and you will only see one HTTP authentication dialogue with a recent WebKit, not two.

On a related matter, WebKitGTK+ 1.1.1 was also released today, so do download it from http://cafe.minaslivre.org/webkit/webkit-1.1.1.tar.gz as well (MD5: d3a5d7233beab310e9d3e5568fae49a1).

So download midori v0.1.4 already!

Mouse gestures, maemo and more

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 00:03:04 +0100

Lots of niceties again, something there for everyone I'm sure of it. For
one a preference toggles full image zoom, you can graphically add and
remove items from the toolbar, there is a plugin panel, the sidepanel
can be moved to the right side and international domain names are supported.
Among the highlights are Mouse Gestures, implemented as an extension,
integration with Maemo if you're on a mobile device, finally support for
bookmark folders and last but not least Find as you type, much like
Mozilla browsers do it.

Thanks a lot to contributors, and testers, a number of significant
improvements happened within the last day and hours before the release.

So download midori v0.1.3 already!

Save your cookies for later

nospam@example.com (Christian Dywan) — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 00:55:46 +0100

Time for an update after another too long release cycle. Let's see what
we should highlight of the changes...
Bookmarklets work now, that is you can use javascript: in bookmarks and
the address entry. New windows opened from web pages actually are opened
finally, in the form of new tabs, cookies can be stored on disk if you
are using a recent libsoup with WebKit and Midori.
And hey, changes to preferences or bookmarks are saved dynamically as
they are changed by you - regardless of crashes your configuration is
kept. Which brings me to the also new (optional) crash dialog that now
pops up if Midori crashed and you reopen it. It allows you to modify
preferences or discard your last open pages, which is useful if for
instance a script crashed and disabling scripts may prevent Midori from
going down again right after having started.
Last but not least, starting up Midori with a long history is much, much
faster now. There is still a delay but it's comparatively small.

So download midori v0.1.2 already!