The Opera browser has been around for quite some time now. In fact, Opera version 1 was released way back in 1994! Back then, the browser was available for Microsoft Windows only.
Opera was one of the earliest browsers to introduce features such as tabbed browsing, pop-up blocking, and integrated search. In the early 2000s, Opera gained popularity among tech enthusiasts and power users, particularly in Europe.
Later versions were made available for other operating systems such as macOS, Linux, and various mobile operating systems.
Since then, Opera has retained a small, but loyal following. It is the least used of the 5 major browsers. That said, Opera 12 sees a major update to the browser, both in terms of performance and compliance with standards such as HTML5. So it’s certainly worth a closer look!
As part of our ongoing commitment to MIDAS, the latest version of our browser-based scheduling app – as well as our upcoming MIDAS v4 release – is fully compatible with this new Opera release!
Last week, we posted about ensuring your server is ready for MIDAS v4. In doing so, we unveiled that this major update would utilize a new database system… but why this change?
MIDAS Database Evolution
First came CSV…
When development first started way back in 2005, MIDAS stored data in a series of “flat file” databases. These were essentially character-delimited data files (similar to the popular CSV (comma separated value) file format). As MIDAS developed and grew over the next couple years, this format for storing data become more and more restrictive to what we wanted to do with MIDAS. Consequently, an improved method for storing data was needed.
…followed by XML
A new database format was first introduced with MIDAS v3, in 2010, when we moved the data storage over to an XML based format. This offered a number of improvements, allowed for customizations, and was more “robust” than the previous “flat file” format
However, this XML based format does have some drawbacks. As the storage was still essentially file and disk based, the performance of MIDAS was dependent on the number and size of XML files MIDAS had to read from, process, and write to disk. Now, for the majority of our customers, this has never been an issue. However, for a very small number of customers – those with a very high number of venues/bookings/users, etc, – the file/disk based nature of the XML storage format, could impact on the speed and performance of MIDAS.
…and so that’s the primary reason why starting with MIDAS v4, we’ve moved over to a faster, and “industry-standard”, database format – MySQL.
Introducing MySQL
“If MySQL is so good, why hasn’t this been implemented sooner?” Well, when MIDAS was originally created over 7 years ago, MySQL was in its infancy! At that time, few servers ran MySQL by default, and there were very few web applications around that used it. In those days, if you wanted to add MySQL support to your website hosting account, it would likely be an expensive “add on”. For this reason, we initially took the decision not to rely on MySQL, as we wanted to make MIDAS as widely accessible as possible. This is why, for the last 7 years, you’ve only needed a web server running Perl to host MIDAS.
However, the Internet has come a long way in the last 7 years! These days, MySQL is common place. The vast majority of web servers/web hosting packages now have MySQL available and ready to use “out of the box”, and a very large number of websites and popular website software use MySQL databases.
When MIDAS v4 becomes available this Summer, if you wish to install/run this new version of our scheduling software on your own web server, MySQL 5.1 (or later) must be available. So check your server now, so you don’t miss out!
The Google Chrome team have today announced the release of Chrome 19 for Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.
As part of our ongoing commitment to MIDAS, the latest version of our scheduling software is also fully compatible with this new release of Google Chrome!
If you’re an existing Google Chrome user, you don’t need to do anything! One of the great things about Chrome (which other browsers are now starting to implement too!) is that it silently updates itself with no user interaction (other than a restart!) required. This ensures that you’re always using the most stable, secure and up-to-date version of Google Chrome!
We also test our web app in pre-release builds “developer” builds of Google Chrome! Testing in these builds (which right now are for Chrome 20!) helps us to identify as early as possible any potential incompatibilities. This means you can be sure that whenever a new version of Chrome (or any of the 5 major browsers) is released, MIDAS will be compatible with from the get-go!
In other Chrome-related news, rumors are currently brewing that a version of Chrome is in the works for iOS. So if you have an iPhone or an iPad, you may soon be able to use Google Chrome on your device!
Business Insider reports that Chrome could be released for iOS devices as soon as the end of June, but definitely sometime by the end of 2012. As yet, neither Apple nor Google have confirmed this report.
However, if the reports are true, this will undoubtedly be welcome news for iOS users, who so far have had little choice but to use the default browser on their iOS devices – Apple’s own “Safari” browser. Giving users the option to use a different browser is a big step forward – but so far it’s unknown if Apple will allow an iOS version of Chrome to actually be set as a “default” browser for the iPad/iPhone.
…and whilst we’re still on the subject of touch-enabled devices, such as the iPad, read about our upcoming improvements to support for touch screens
If you’ve been following our recent blog posts, you’ll know we have an exciting update coming to MIDAS! You may also have noticed from early screenshots we’ve already posted from this update that the default visual “theme” has also gone through some changes…..
The previous “Default” theme: (MIDAS v3)
The new “Default” theme: (MIDAS v4)
The new “Metro” inspired default theme that will ship with MIDAS v4 will feature slightly larger icons than previous themes – the reasons behind this are two-fold;
1) Larger Screen Resolutions
Firstly, screen resolutions are generally getting larger – for many years the most common screen resolution was 1024 x 768 pixels. A recent study found that currently the most common screen resolution in use is 1366 x 768. As people choose screens with higher and higher resolutions, graphical items appear comparatively “smaller” on screen.
2) Touch Screens
Secondly, touch screen devices (such as tablets and iPads) are now common place, and with the eagerly anticipated release of Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system later this year (which is very much geared towards touch screen devices), we expect the number of touch-enabled devices to increase dramatically.
If you’re familiar with touch screen devices, you’ll know it can sometimes be frustrating trying to accurately “tap” a very small target area on screen.
Microsoft have conducted extensive research on fingers and touch screens. They discovered that the average width of a human finger is 11mm. As targets for tapping get larger, the percentage of accidental missed taps drops off quickly. Therefore, ideally, a tap target should be at least 11mm (about 40px) in size.
“Add Bookings” icon (MIDAS v3) 30 x 30 pixels
“Add Bookings” icon (MIDAS v4) 40 x 40 pixels
In the previous “default” theme for MIDAS, the main toolbar icons were 30 x 30 pixels in size. In the new “default” theme, toolbar icons are now 40 x 40 pixels in size.
Notifications have also been made more prominent on toolbar icons for MIDAS v4:
Buttons in MIDAS v3
Buttons in MIDAS v4
We’ve also increased the size of other buttons and some text elements – all in an effort to make MIDAS more accessible to tablet, iPad, and other touch screen users, and those using higher resolution screens!
We hope you’ll like the new look for MIDAS v4, but if you don’t, no problem! – There will be a version of the previous MIDAS v3 default theme available for v4 as well!
Hot on last week’s rumors that Opera may soon be acquired by Facebook, the Opera Software team have today released Opera 12. This is available for Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.
The Google Chrome team have today 
