Ubuntu Wiki

Instructions to install & configure Opera 8 in Ubuntu, based off [http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=40467 this Ubuntu Forum thread], updated for Opera 8.54.

Note that as of Opera 8.50, Opera is now ad-free and has no subscription/license fee! (You can pay for premium service if you like, though.)

Installing by downloading a .deb

Download the Latest Ubuntu Opera .deb

Opera provides .deb files specifically for Ubuntu. The generic .deb ones should work too.

Opera provides two basic types of installations, static and shared:

Static version: Opera has the Qt library built in. It's a larger download, and it doesn't use antialiased fonts on menus or the filechooser, and uses aliasing in the browser window and most other inferface elements.

Shared version: Opera uses the Qt installation on your system. It integrates with the system, using whatever antialiasing setting you have for other Qt applications.

Which is better? Try both if you like; it's easy to install and uninstall applications in Ubuntu.

Go to [http://www.opera.com/download/ Opera Download Site], choose your package, and pick a download mirror.

Or get the latest Unix/Linux Preview from [http://my.opera.com/desktopteam/blog/ Opera Preview and Betas]

Save the file to somewhere you can find it, like the Desktop or your home directory.

Installing Opera

Ubuntu 6.06 Dapper Drake

Locate the .deb package and double click on it to start the Gdebi .deb installer.

Ubuntu 5.10 Breezy Badger

Open a terminal and type:

sudo dpkg -i opera<Tab key>.deb

Note: Tab completion can be a major help with long, complex filenames. Provided you're in the correct directory, just typing "opera" and then hitting the Tab key where it says <Tab key> in the above command should get Ubuntu to finish the filename for you.

Opera will take a minute to install.

If you get messages about unmet dependencies type:

sudo apt-get -f install

apt will then install the missing packages.

Ubuntu-izing Opera (Completing the install)

Unlike many programs from Ubuntu's repositories, Opera will not add itself to Ubuntu's Application menu. That's easy to fix, though. We'll also get Opera to use Ubuntu's default file handler.

To add Opera to Ubuntu's Applications menu, use the Menu Editor. Right-click on the Application button, choose Edit Menus. In the Menu Editor, select the Internet sub-menu, then press the New Entry button.

In the New Entry window, put "Opera" for Name, "Web Browser" for Comment, "opera %u" for Command, and pick an Opera icon from /usr/share/icons/hicolor or elsewhere. Press OK to save this entry.

Opera will now be accessible from Applications-->Internet-->Opera.

To get Opera to work better with Ubuntu, we're going to make sure it uses gnome-open for file-handling. Open a Terminal and type:

mkdir ~/.opera
cat >> ~/.opera/filehandler.ini

Select the following text and paste it into your terminal by pressing Shift+Ins:

Opera Preferences version 2.0
; Do not edit this file while Opera is running
; This file is stored in UTF-8 encoding
[Settings]
Default File Handler=gnome-open ,1
Default Directory Handler=gnome-open ,1

Then press Ctrl+d.

Alternatives to the above - Install via apt-get

Add the following apt repository line (see [wiki:Repositories/Ubuntu Adding Other Repositories]):

deb http://deb.opera.com/opera/ stable non-free

After making these changes install the opera package (see InstallingSoftware).

All your dependencies will be taken care of and you won't need to create the desktop file described above. It's done automagically!

The other nice thing about this method is that you'll not have to worry about keeping up to date with future releases. It's done for you!

Gnome Skins for Opera

You may preview the skins linked below: [http://my.opera.com/community/customize/comments.dml?id=3255 GNOME Opera] [http://my.opera.com/community/customize/skins/info/?id=3465 Tango CL]

In Opera, select "Download" to install the skin.

Setting Opera as default browser

To set Opera as the system default browser and mailreader, follow these steps:

• Go to System -> Preferences -> Preferred Applications

• Under the Web Browser tab select "Custom" and, in the Command box, enter:

opera -newpage "%s"

• Under the Mail Reader tab select "Custom" and, in the Command box, enter:

opera -newmail "%s"

Start the browser

You can now start up the best browser known to mankind by going Application menu --> Internet --> Opera Web Browser.

Troubleshooting

Missing package

If you have choosen the qt-shared version, you need the libqt-mt package.

Ubuntu 6.06 Dapper Drake

[http://packages.ubuntu.com/dapper/libs/libqt3-mt#pdownload Download the package] for your architecture and double click the .deb to install.

=== Ubuntu 5.10 Breezy Badger ====

[http://packages.ubuntu.com/breezy/libs/libqt3-mt#pdownload Download the package] for your architecture and type in a terminal:

sudo dpkg -i <filename>

Rerun installation of Opera and the dependancy problems will be gone.

Operamotif problems

Add Multiverse sources and do

sudo apt-get install libmotif3 lesstif1 lesstif2 motif-clients

You might also want to try this:

cd /usr/lib; cp libXm.so.2 libXm.so.3

Java problems

If you start Opera from the console you may see the following error message if java doesn't work correctly:

ERROR: ld.so: object 'libjvm.so' from LD_PRELOAD cannot be preloaded: ignored.
ERROR: ld.so: object 'libawt.so' from LD_PRELOAD cannot be preloaded: ignored.

To fix this, correct the Java path under Tools -> Preferences -> Advanced Tab -> Content -> Java options. It should look similar to this:

/usr/lib/j2re1.5-sun/lib/i386/

Your actual java runtime version could be different from this one. Changes will not take effect until the browser is restarted.

Use [http://www.java.com/en/download/help/testvm.xml] to test your Java Virtual Machine (JVM).

You need to have Java installed for this. See [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/RestrictedFormats?highlight=%28restricted%29] to find out how to do that.

General Plugin Problems

In order for Opera to see a plugin, the plugin must be in Opera's plugin path. You can add directories to the plugin path with Tools -> Preferences -> Advanced -> Content -> Plugin Options. Add the desired directories and click Find Plugins. You may have to restart Opera to enable the plugin.

Some common plugin .so files:

[http://www.opera.com/linux/docs/plugins/install/ Opera's Linux Plugin Page.]

Flash problems

The Macromedia Flash player uses OSS to output sound, thus if something else is using sound, or /dev/dsp doesn't exist, there will be no sound. One fix is to start opera with a sound daemon wrapper, so that sounds sent to /dev/dsp will be caught by the sound daemon instead. Install either arts or esd-clients:

sudo apt-get install arts

or

sudo apt-get install esd-clients

Start opera with the corresponding wrapper:

esddsp opera

or

artsdsp opera

If you use KDE, arts is the default sound daemon, esd is the default for GNOME. Both can be run concurrently:

artsdsp esd &

or

esddsp artswrapper &

Acroread Plugin Problems

The acroread plugin does not work by default in Opera, as of version 8.x. You must edit the Opera startup script for it to work. Use your favorite editor to open the opera startup script:

sudo gedit /usr/bin/opera

Replace the lines

OPERA_LD_PRELOAD="${LD_PRELOAD}"
export OPERA_LD_PRELOAD

with

LD_PRELOAD="libXm.so.2:${LD_PRELOAD}"
export LD_PRELOAD
OPERA_LD_PRELOAD="${LD_PRELOAD}"
export OPERA_LD_PRELOAD

Start Opera and open a pdf. When it asks you what to do, click the Change button next to the Opens With. A file type association dialog should popup; choose the plugin option at the bottom (nppdf.so should be an option).

Opera Segmentation Fault and Java crash with static version problem

If your Opera browser started to segfault, or you are using the static version and having problems with java, do the following:

1. Edit the ~/.opera/pluginpath.ini, and change the lines to this

[Paths]
/usr/lib/opera/plugins=1
/usr/lib/mozilla/plugins=0
/usr/lib/netscape/plugins-libc6=0

2. Create a symlink from /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/libflashplayer.so to /usr/lib/opera/plugins/libflashplayer.so

3. Check your ~/.opera/javapath.txt, when using blackdown java, it should be /usr/lib/j2se/1.4/jre/lib/i386

Solution from rwf, based on [http://my.opera.com/community/forums/topic.dml?id=108820&t=1130281303&page=1 this forum thread].

Dapper Dependency Problems

If you get a dependency error when installing opera in dapper like this

dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of opera:
 opera depends on xlib6g (>= 3.3.6) | xlibs; however:
  Package xlib6g is not installed.
  Package xlibs is not installed.
dpkg: error processing opera (--install):
 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
Errors were encountered while processing:
 opera

1. Download the xlibs package from [http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/x/xorg/xlibs_6.8.2-77_all.deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/x/xorg/xlibs_6.8.2-77_all.deb]

wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/x/xorg/xlibs_6.8.2-77_all.deb

2. Install it with dpkg

sudo dpkg -i xlibs_6.8.2-77_all.deb

3. Install Opera using the [https://wiki.ubuntu.com/OperaBrowser#head-d3fc157abca89472846ed502ebbc26de36d616d1 instructions above] or using the [http://snapshot.opera.com snapshot releases]

For the snapshot release, download the correct etch deb which will be something like opera_9.0-20060206.6-shared-qt_en_etch_<arch>.deb, then

sudo dpkg -i opera_9.0-<Tab key>.deb

Solution from Xian, based on [http://my.opera.com/community/forums/topic.dml?id=126093 this forum thread].

• Under the Mail Reader tab select "Custom" and, in the Command box, enter:

opera -newmail "%s"

Install Weekly Build

The most recent weekly snapshot has support for the most recent Mozilla plugins, including Mplayer, and does not depend on Motif. Mplayer must be compiled with --enable-x

• Download weekly build from [http://my.opera.com/desktopteam/] and follow instructions for installing snapshot release (see above).

• To locate libxpcom.so on your system and softlink it to /usr/lib

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/mozilla-firefox/libxpcom.so /usr/lib/libxpcom.so

Credits

Credits for the GNOME skin: [http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=370428 mneptok]

CategoryDocumentation