Opera unveils iPad-only browser
'Coast' washes away the back button
Email delivery: 4 steps to get more email to the inbox
Opera has released a browser designed specifically for the iPad.
'Coast' dispenses with a 'back' button, an omission Opera argues is sensible because a touch-enabled device shouldn't need one when a leftwards swipe can do the job.
“Websites and apps today invite you to interact in new ways, but browser design for tablets has not pushed to liberate itself from the influence it has experienced from its computer and mobile phone cousins," says Opera's head of the Coast project Huib Kleinhout, in a canned statement. “On a tablet, browsers felt outdated, and that bothered me.”
Coast addresses this by removing most of the user interface so that web pages fill all of the iPad's screen, even the bits where an address bar would usually appear. Bookmarks get the tiled treatment so they're big and mashable, not a line of text. Tabs? Fuggedaboutit. Coast offers one window to rule them all.
Coast is free, requires iOS 6.0 and can only be downloaded by folks aged 17 or over, according to its App store listing.
There's no word on whether Coast is also being prepped for Android fondleslabs. ®
