Fuddland

Okay, not me specifically. Via Design Detector it is revealed that the BBC Online Web Development team have been advised to not even bother to test their sites in Opera [or the Mac-based Safari], instead deciding that if they try and code as closely as they can to W3C standards, that should be good enough for it to work.

Of course, that’s the dream—not to mention the whole point of having standards—but still, it’s a shame they don’t even test their pages in some of the lesser-used [but superior!] browsers. If they did, perhaps they’d have as much trouble as I’ve had trying to get their “Audio on Demand” and “Listen Live” features to work without having to open up the full, bloated Real Player or—and this was the really bugbear—having to resort to using IE.

It turned out that the problem was with Real Player—specifically the plugin .dll files that it provides. A three-page forum thread, featuring some highly cheesed-off users, finally revealed the workaround: replace the library files in the Opera/Plugins directory with earlier versions. This appears to work seemlessly with the latest release of Real Player.

Now all that remains is to convince Egg to stop using the IE-only ActiveX for their Money Manager and I’ll never be forced to use another browser again.

#1

bsag | 2004 / 04 / 11 – 16:53

I’ve had problems with the streams too (on Safari). This is particularly annoying as I often record programmes using the excellent Audio Hijack, and store them as MP3s to listen to later. Lately, the streams fail totally, stop after a few minutes, or are appalling quality. It’s really annoying, and I wish that they used standard MP3 streams in the first place, which anyone could then listen to on any platform.

I hear that they are going to move to Windows Media Player—something that fills me with horror.

#2

David | 2004 / 04 / 11 – 17:14

Re #1: They have started to provide downloadable, DRM-free MP3 versions of programmes in their “Listen Again” archives; well, I say “started”—the Reith Lectures are the only programmes offered at the moment, but hopefully this scheme will be expanded to the majority of their output.

I heard about the Windows Media Player thing too, but I thought they were to offer a WMP stream alongside their existing Real Player streams—as you say, why they don’t just opt for a universal MP3 stream is a mystery to me.

#3

Phil | 2004 / 04 / 11 – 22:38

I just wish the BBC would stop using streams in favour of anything which isn’t completely shit. I refuse to install Real, it’s just too shit to comprehend.

#4

Phil | 2004 / 04 / 11 – 22:41

But on the subject of sites not working in Opera, I still have to resort to using the shite that is IE fairly regularly. The online banking for one of my credit cards (Capital One) doesn’t support Opera at all. Dabs don’t support Opera either. A couple of other ecommerce sites I’ve used recently (but not often enough to remember) don’t work either. I tend to use IE for all ecommerce sites these days, and only use Opera for them when I forget and then am pleasently surprised when they do work.

#5

David | 2004 / 04 / 12 – 00:19

Re #3: Heh, yeah, I’m not happy with having to use a particular application either [I know there are unofficial alternatives out there, I’ve not checked them out as yet but I’m dubious the plugin functions will work with Opera]. As soon as I install Real Player I disable all of its “features” that pop up messages or send data back to Real; I’m probably foolish in thinking that some data doesn’t get collected though. But you say you don’t even have it installed—do you just never listen to BBC Online stuff?

Re #4: I’ve definitely used Opera when buying things from Dabs in the past, so I’m not sure why it hasn’t worked for you. And I’m surprised you cave so easily and resort to IE—I’d have expected you to fire off an email or two to Capital One complaining about their lack of alternative browser support. Getting soft in your old age, Phil? ;)

#6

Phil | 2004 / 04 / 12 – 08:22

When I try to buy stuff on Dabs with Opera, when I click to add stuff to my basket it just keeps telling me my basket is empty <shrug>. I even tried it again last week when I purchased my new DVD burner.

No, I don’t listen to any BBC Online content simply because it is RealPlayer only and I refuse to install the bloatware/spyware that is RealPlayer. :o)

(it’s bad enough having to install the bloatware that is Windoze, but with no *real* viable alternative I have little choice. That, of course, is an entirely different discussion altogether!)

#7

David | 2004 / 04 / 13 – 01:42

Re #6: That’s very strange. I just tried adding something to my basket in Dabs and it accepted it no problems. Have you got cookies disabled? [Press F12 to access Quick Preferences.]

#8

Tom Coates | 2004 / 04 / 13 – 20:32

You should find that this version of Real doesn’t install the spyware etc. It’s a version specifically made for the BBC that meets their strict guidelines on what kind of uses information can be put to and how it should be used. It should work just as well…

#9

Phil | 2004 / 04 / 13 – 22:42

Yup, cookies enabled.
I’ve just tried on my home machine and it does work in Opera, so I don’t know why my install is any different. I wonder if it’s a version thing. I have 7.23 here.

#10

David | 2004 / 04 / 14 – 09:13

Re #8: Thanks for that, Tom, I didn’t know the BBC had their own version to download. It does appear that that BBC page hasn’t been updated in a while—the instructions for Opera are not pertinent to versions 7.x.

For now, I’m going to stick with Real Player 10 and the fix described in my entry, mostly because this latest version of Real Player introduces the facilty to pause live streams—TiVo for radio! :)

#11

Phil | 2004 / 04 / 15 – 13:25

I found out why my Opera install at work wasn’t allowing me to use the dabs web site shopping basket. Although I had cookies turned on, I had set the third party cookies to “accept only cookies set to the server itself”, rather than just accept them all.

#12

David | 2004 / 04 / 15 – 13:30

Re #11: Ah, good to know. :)

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