Category Archives: Vivaldi

Patches and updates, Security, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.15.1147.64: security fixes

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Vivaldi is based on the open source Chromium browser engine. When Chromium gets security updates, Vivaldi’s developers have to ‘backport’ those changes to Vivaldi, or leave Vivaldi users exposed to known security threats.

The Vivaldi developers do a good job of staying on top of this, and sometimes release a new version of Vivaldi in which the only changes are security fixes backported from Chromium. Vivaldi 1.15.1147.64 is the most recent example of this.

You can check your verison of Vivaldi by clicking the menu button at the top left of the browser, then selecting Help > About. If you’re not running the latest version, Vivaldi should offer to update itself.

Patches and updates, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.14 released

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Vivaldi 1.14 includes improvements for several existing features: vertical reading for Reader Mode, Markdown support in Notes, rearrangeable panels, and re-orderable search engines. Several dozen bugs are also addressed in the new version. There are no new security fixes in Vivaldi 1.14.

Somewhere along the line — possibly in this release — Vivaldi’s weird bookmark editor (the one in the bookmark sidebar) was finally made usable. It’s still weird, but at least now it works in a way that makes sense.

The release notes for Vivaldi 1.14 have additional details.

Patches and updates, Security, Vivaldi

Spectre/Meltdown fixes for Vivaldi

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A Vivaldi update described as ‘minor’ includes mitigations for the Spectre and Meltdown vulnerabilities. The changes are intended to make exploiting Spectre and Meltdown much more difficult in the context of Vivaldi itself. Other browser makers have released — or are working on — similar updates.

The announcement for Vivaldi 1.13.1008.44 is light on details, and there’s no link to a change log. The new version number isn’t even mentioned.

Patches and updates, Security, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.13.1008.40

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The latest version of Vivaldi includes some security fixes from a newer version of the Chromium browser engine, so this is an important update.

Other changes in Vivaldi 1.13.1008.40 are almost all regressions, meaning that they are fixes for things that were previously fixed but broke again in recent updates. The frequency of these regression issues in Vivaldi is troubling, as it seems to indicate some sloppiness in the development process.

The announcement for Vivaldi 1.13.1008.40 makes no mention of the new version number, and fails to link to anything like a change log. It’s unclear whether these omissions were intentional, or just mistakes.

Patches and updates, Security, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.13.1008.36

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Vivaldi’s new version announcements seem to be getting worse. Version 1.13.1008.36 was released a few days ago as another ‘Minor update to Vivaldi 1.13’, but details are scant: the new version number is never actually mentioned, and there’s no reference to any release notes.

The announcement does at least provide a brief list of the new version’s changes, which consist of a few bug fixes and an update to the Chromium engine that includes security fixes.

Given that there are security fixes in this release, Vivaldi users should probably upgrade as soon as possible. You can do that by clicking the browser’s ‘V’ menu at the top left, then Help > Check for Updates.

Patches and updates, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.13 released

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A new version of alternative web browser Vivaldi improves window and tab handling, and includes a new window management sidebar panel. Download management is also improved: downloads can now be resumed after interruption. Bookmark handling is slightly improved, although in my opinion there’s still more work to be done in that area.

A variety of bugs were fixed in Vivaldi 1.13 as well. This Vivaldi blog post lists all the significant changes in Vivaldi 1.13.

Vivaldi remains an excellent alternative to the more popular browsers. Although it has some quirks, it also has features not found in other browsers, such as tab stacking. If you’re looking for a different browser, Vivaldi is worth checking out.

Patches and updates, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.12: bug fixes and some useful improvements

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In response to frequent requests from users, the folks who make Vivaldi have finally added an Image Properties feature to the browser. Right-click an image on a web page and select ‘Image Properties’ to display a dialog showing the image’s URL, dimensions, binary size, and more.

Download management is somewhat easier in Vivaldi 1.12: the list of downloaded files can now be sorted by type, name, size, date added, date finished, and address. There’s a new panel at the bottom of the download sidebar that shows the details for a selected download.

Vivaldi’s Accent Color feature changes the browser’s colour scheme to match the web site currently being viewed. I personally find this kind of thing distracting, but there’s no accounting for taste. If you use this feature, you’ll be happy to know that Vivaldi now has a setting that determines the intensity of the accent color effect.

Vivaldi 1.12 includes fixes for about fifty bugs from earlier versions. None of the changes appear to be related to security. You can see all the details in the release announcement.

Patches and updates, Vivaldi

Vivaldi 1.11

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The latest version of Vivaldi includes numerous bug fixes, as well as useful improvements to Reader Mode, and a setting for disabling animated GIFs. It also sports a new icon.

None of the bug fixes in Vivaldi 1.11 are related to security, so this isn’t a particularly urgent update. To update Vivaldi, click its menu icon, then Help > Check for updates...