The tech news the last few days promoted the arrival of Chrome – a browser from Google. If you are a windows user, you can download Chrome now. Mac users will have to wait (you can sign up for information).
I downloaded Chrome and took a look. My first reaction was – nice browser, it seems to work. I have been trying to read some things online to try to determine what I am missing. Why spend the time and money to generate another browser. There are a few things you notice from the demos. You can type anything into the web address window and if the entry is not a web address the browser assumes you want to search. That is a little different. I think it is called the “omnibox”.
The Google folks must have anticipated that “the differences” would not be obvious so they commissioned a comic book to explain things. As I understand some of the technical details, the present advantage lies in independence of processes (one page can crash and this will not influence another page), a new implementation of javascript, and a more socially-based method of debugging (using automated feedback from willing users). The independence thing is technically interesting – each “tab” kind of works like another browser. I can’t really say my browser crashes frequently, bit perhaps this will be a larger issue as we move beyond viewing pages and on to more demanding apps.
From other sites, I get the feeling this venture also has to do with a browser that can be trusted to support the “cloud apps” that Google sees as the future. In offering users a browser, Google knows there will be a browser that works well with other Google products.
The missing piece at present seems to be “plugins”. The comic books describes some of the issues with plugins, but plugins and other add-ons offer the features I like the most in Firefox. Plugins in some form must be on the way.
What could be wrong with another browser? Have you ever had the experience that a function you want to perform (e.g., Yepshot) is only available on another browser? The occasional annoyance aside, I think it is a good thing that there are multiple competitors in any field.
Now, if Google could just get their Mac version finished so I could invest enough time to really see how things work.
I wonder if the IE for the Mac will ever resurface.
The Chrome story according to Wired.
