(After a couple of failed attempts to get the screen shots in this blog so that others could see them, I hope I’ve got it right this time.  My apologies for making you lookers-on as I learn my job in public.) 

One of the handiest tricks up Maxthon’s sleeves is the Split View, which lets you examine two Web pages side by side on the same screen. It’s a great way to compare products being sold by different vendors or to display a blown-up portion of a page for close inspection while still displaying the entire page with all its pertinent information.

It’s handy, but it can also be tricky getting the correct pages to display side by side, especially if you’re trying to pluck them out of several pages on your Tab Bar. But here are some techniques to eliminate the confusion and get the most out of Split View.

1 Let’s say you start off with the screen shown above and its collection of pages in the Tab Bar: A Google search for images of dragons, an eBay page selling a green, glass tray, an enlarged photo of the same tray on a different page, a Maxthon Multi-Search for Gnu software, a Wikipedia article on art glass, and the home page of PC World magazine. The two pages you want to share your screen are the close-up of the tray and the Wiki piece so you can learn more about the tray.

2 When you click the Split View button on the Tool Bar–you can also use the feature by choosing it from the View menu or tapping the F10 key–whatever page is on the screen becomes the left side of the split. The right side is blank. Notice that the Tab Bar is split more or less in the middle by a Blank Page tab, circled in red in this screen shot.

3 Let’s start with that right side by putting the page from the Wikipedia on it. Position your arrow over the Wikipedia tab and click and hold the left mouse button. As soon as you do, the Wikipedia page will appear on the left half of the display, but it’s only temporary. Drag the tag to the right of on the Blank Page tab, as shown by the red arrows. The Wikipedia page moves from the left side of the screen to the right.

 4 To fill the left side with the photo of the glass tray you’re considering, click once anywhere in the left site–except on a link that would take you somewhere else. Then click on the tab for the page you want to appear to the left, in this case the eBay Item tab. The result will be what you see in the screen shot above. You can use this method to change the left side to any of the tabs still on the left side.

Smaller is better. One problem you may encounter when using a split screen is that neither half of the display is big enough to display the entire width of the pages you’re looking at. You get something like the following screen shot.

 You can drag the center dividing strip one way or the other to expose more of one of the pages, but that cuts off even more of the other page. A better solution–and one that lets you see the full width of both pages–is to use Maxthon’s Zoom function, found under the View menu. (You also can customize Maxthon by adding a Zoom button to the Tool Bar.) A zoom of 80 percent is a good starting point. Depending on your resolution and the size of your screen, you may need to zoom more or less than 80 percent. Whatever zoom factor fits your set-up, you’ll have to apply it individually to each side. A shortcut to return to the normal 100 percent is the key combination Ctrl+8.

 Maxthon — Seize the Web!