Today, Tuesday 6th May 2008, Opera released the first alpha (alpha 1) of their new web developer tool, named as Opera Dragonfly. This tool is a competing one to Firefox’s Firebug.

Features:

=> Support for Dragonfly in Opera 9.5 beta 2
=> Reach breaking point step by step
=> Redefine your style.
=> Spot your errors
=> Debug the DOM
=> Development for JavaScript debugger and CSS/DOM inspector (Screenshots and more info here!) http://dev.opera.com/tools/
=> Debug your phone or TV
=> Think open and free
=> Always up to date

Future Enhancements for Alpha 2:

=> Improved handling of threads in the JavaScript debugger
=> Inline CSS editing
=> Infrastructure for localization
=> Improved remote debugging

For a complete detail and explanation, head on Opera’s main site for precise news from the developers: Opera Dragonfly on the prowl!

Opera browser 12-year history

Here’s a small vid to give you a picture of Opera’s history and journey till now..

I will soon try both of these softwares and give you my pe rsonal opinion and possibly with my own video or screenshots.. Till then, happy reading and testing!

While checking my email late night, I got a request to write something about “how internet works”. This reaction resulted from my previous article on Uses And Limitations Of The Internet - At Glance

This email was from a Mauritian and I was amazed since I rarely find any Mauritian interacting on my blog considering that I’m a Mauritian too. I thank “this guy” for his time and consideration to contact me and I hope to get more requests about topics to write about.

From the information that I read from the email, I guess I will go straight into technical details.. So, here we go for a small explanation on our subject:

NOTE: As you can see from the picture above, each arrow are numbered. This is important since they denote ordered steps as detailed below:

Consider for instance that you want to access the site http://wakish.info which resides on a server, just as any website or object that you want to access on the net.

1) The Browser, for example firefox, (from your pc - aka client pc) contacts a DNS Server to get the required IP address of the domain name wakish.info
(recall that all address names are stored as numbers (IP). These numbers are given names for humans to be able to read and remember them)

2) The DNS Server* searches for the IP address and returns it back to your browser

3) The Browser can then contact the Web Server where wakish.info resides to get access to that website

4) The Web Server, in turn, locates the requested page of wakish.info on its storage space

5) Once found, the Web Server returns the web page to the browser

6) The browser assembles the response and displays the page in a human readable format so that you can undertand it

Additional Remark:
* The DNS system in its own, forms a network of its alikes. So, if one DNS server does not know how to translate a particular domain name, it asks another one and so on, until the correct IP address is returned

That’s it Feel to add and comment on what I have been explaining above..

What’s Next:

=> Upload your own image on the Internet, can you?
=> Domain transfer, did you know how this is actually done?
=> robots.txt - why it this simple file still so widely used?
=> Website Customization: What can you do to improve the layout of your blog or website?
=> How Do Search Engines Work - Web Crawlers / Web Spiders

Today while going to work, I was sitting behind two university students. I guess they were in their first year, seeing them revising pretty obvious things, apparently for a class test. (but I was like them too in my first year )
I heard one of them saying: “did you search for the uses and limitations of the Internet.. damm, we can be assessed today..”
So, I tried to figure out the answer in my mind, but then I said to myself why not blog about it tonight itself. So, let’s briefly find an answer to our two “uni friends” examinable question.

Uses Of The Internet

1) Information Resource.

Anyone, anywhere, can use the Internet as an informative resource since it is packed with so many many many articles about almost any topics.

2) Education Resource.

I guess you figured this out: our “two friends” can find an answer to their question online if they haven’t find the solution. But most importantly, they can immediately google for this information right from the university lab (which I bet they did). So, the Internet can be a very handy and instant educative platform for any student from any machine with an internet connectivity.

3) Online Magazines and Newspapers

Nowadays, you don’t really need to buy a newspaper or magazine due to their online availability.

4) Online Shopping and Commerce (E-Commerce)

This is pretty obvious too, you can buy and sell online. A very big advantage of E-Commerce is that you can target a wider audience as compared to a business which is local to a country.

5) Online Communication

How can we possibly forget this one? Internet is a crucial medium for communication and interaction. Examples are blogging (you are reading this from a blog), forum or communities, chat rooms, social platforms like myspace, facebook..etc, instant messaging like msn or yahoo messenger chat, Email, and so many other forms of communication available.

6) Sharing of views and opinions about anything.

A concrete example is me, Wakish, sharing my own perception and experience about “the uses and limitations of the internet” which you are reading right now. Another example might be YOU, the reader, contributing more to what I’m saying by commenting in the form below..

7) Sharing of softwares, music, ebooks and other products

This is pretty much clear.

8.) Advertising and Promotion of items and products.

Internet has become a very powerful advertising medium..infact it’s a craze these days.. Everyone everywhere has something to advertise online, including me (it’s the mantra..)

9) Video Conferencing and Remote Desktop

These two have undergone a whole new and beneficial dimension, especially for business and companies (If you want an explanation on these two concepts, let me know - I’ll be glad to try to come up with something to please you )

10) *You Say What?*
Common, this is supposed to be you and me discussing, so let us hear some more uses from you!

Limitations Of Internet

1) The quality of information resources might not always be reliable and accurate.

Of course, with so many many websites and webmasters claiming to be an expert in almost anything, we are ending up with stuffs like “learn how to earn online with a 13 year old“. While I don’t blame such approaches, their integrity and experience about the subject is definetly questionable.

2) Searching of information can be very tedious. (It IS definetly time consuming)

Let’s a take an example, just google for the word “money“, you will see 10 pages full of resources (That’s only with google, now there are yahoo, msn..etc). So finding what you are exactly looking for, might take you some hours of browsing..

3) Internet is definetly not 100% secure.

We cannot neglect things like identity theft, a pc being compromised by a cracker or your email account being compromised..etc
( Thought: may be you could think about the possible solutions for this situation )

4) *Say Your Part*
What have I left out or wrongly said? Let me hear you..

Linux Unzip Commands

Other useful Linux Commands