Opera Unite Introduces Browser-Based Web Server
Many companies these days are focused on developing applications that run online within “the cloud” a.k.a. Software as a Service (SaaS); Opera today introduces what appears to be a P2P development platform that promotes running applications locally and using the Opera browser as a web server. Opera Unite is a new technology from Opera that claims to “radically extend what you are able to do online.”
Out of the box Opera Unite has a standard set of applications which give users the ability to share files, photos, media, and chat with friends. These applications are not meant to be the core functionality of Opera Unite, but rather simple examples of what can be developed using the Unite API. “The key to Opera Unite is that it enables a whole new class of social software on the Web, applications that benefit from two or more people being online at the same time. And, with Opera Unite, these people can all connect directly without needing middlemen who control third-party servers,” says Lawrence Eng, product analyst at Opera.
The Unite platform also promotes the ability to create collaborative applications such as wikis, shared documents and spreadsheets, which are not hosted in the cloud.
An introduction to Opera Unite available on the Opera Developer Community attempts to explain how everything works, but many have security concerns with users turning their home computers into web servers.
