Google's Browser Is A Warning Shot At Windows, Not At Internet Explorer
from the browser-wars-get-a-new-entrant dept
About four years ago there were all sorts of rumors that Google was getting ready to enter the browser wars with its own offering, most likely built on Mozilla's code. However, after years of nothing (and an increasingly close relationship between Mozilla and Google), many had thought that idea was dead. Apparently not. After some leaks of a comic book (a comic book?!?) detailing the new Google browser found their way to the web, Google quickly admitted that it is, indeed, getting into the browser business, releasing a brand new open source browser, called Google Chrome.Rather than being built on Mozilla, as many expected, it's been built on top of WebKit, which is also the core of Apple's Safari browser -- but which Google was also using for its own mobile browser. In the end, this isn't all that surprising. While many will interpret it as Google trying to take on Microsoft in the browser market, in reality, this is probably a lot more about Google trying to help everyone move beyond the operating system market. As we first suggested four years ago when rumors of a Google browser first came around, Google knows that the way to beat Microsoft is to become the operating system for the internet, and you do that by relegating the actual OS obsolete. And, these days, the path to doing that is through the browser.
So, yes, this is a shot at Microsoft -- but not at Internet Exporer. It's a shot at Windows.
That doesn't mean Google Chrome will be successful, but a quick look at the features itself show that the features it highlights (being able to run apps separately, better memory management, etc.) are the sorts of things that allow people to make browser-based apps much more useful, rather than feeling the need to rely on client-side applications. People have predicted for years that we're getting closer to a world where all computing can be done over the network, and it looks like Google is trying to push that process right along.
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Filed Under: browser, chrome, open source, operating systems, webkit
Companies: google, microsoft
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Given its core is built on Webkit...
I'll stick with Firefox 3.
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Re: Given its core is built on Webkit...
Google has actually addressed this as well. See slides #9&10 of the comic
http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/
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Re: Given its core is built on Webkit...
Amazing how people are so quick to make conclusions with little or no information or hands-on experience. If everyone in the world thought like you we wouldn't be having this exchange at all, we'd be living in caves and painting walls with ochre and animal fat "paint".
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Re: Re: Given its core is built on Webkit...
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Re: Given its core is built on Webkit...
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Re: Given its core is built on Webkit...
http://www.google.com/chrome
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Re: Re: Given its core is built on Webkit...
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Firefox and Questions
I have read a bunch of speculation but nowhere have I seen a definitive answer to the big Google privacy issue - Google keeps track of everything they possibly can and they tie it back to your Google login ID where possible, I wonder if Chrome does any tracking and reporting.
I remember a few years back when Google made a big stink because MSN search was the default search engine in IE. What is the default search engine in Chrome?
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Re: Firefox and Questions
Chrome is Google's optional browser. being defaulted is only an issue if people are CHOOSING to INSTALL it to begin with. This is fair competition - if Msoft wants to keep a handle on the market - they should make their OS better, make their web browser better, and make their search engine better. If they fail to do so, and people switch over to Google and Chrome, they have NO ONE to blame but themselves.
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Re: Firefox and Questions
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Re: Firefox and Questions
I've tried Chrome and while it won't make me switch from Firefox, the initial release is really fast and smooth, minus a couple minor hiccups in UI, etc. Meanwhile, that 800-pund zombie gorilla IE is still lumbering around moaning for "Brains!". Anything that can help put that monstrosity out of its (and our) misery is welcome, including competition for good browsers like Firefox and Opera.
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Re: Re: Firefox and Questions
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Interesting...
in response to JB; People who switch to Firefox have to navigate to that site directly to intentionally install.
How many people navigate to Google a DAY?
Put up a link/ad on their search engines main page as a method to encourage casual users to "Boost your internet connection for NO COST!"
This isn't just Firefox that they're "threatening," but a serious warning shot into the entire battlefield of Web Browsers and connectivity applications.
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Looking forward to it.
Chrome will have to implement plug-ins and skins, though, as easy as Firefox to be a winner and market-changing browser.
It also needs some killer apps, like the office tools, etc., to really make a difference to business and mom-and-pop home computer users.
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Re: Looking forward to it.
Already does. Ever heard of Google Docs?
Besides, I would argue that mom-and-pop home computer users do not need "office products" and that alone would not be some kind of deal-breaker.
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Let's do IT
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Reference Design
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How will webapps survive if not by a pay model? And does a pay model actually work on the web?
Unlike traditional desktop apps, where you just need to code it and release an executable, a webapp has to be hosted somewhere. If it's a popular webapp, it'll need tons of servers and bandwith (more then the clouds can provide). That kind of hardware scaling has big costs associated with it. Who pays?
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queue goobuntu conspiracy in 3,2,1
http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/11/20/the-google-set-top-box-t hink-android-for-tv/
there has been talk of a google browser, google OS, and google computers/set top boxes for years. perhaps this is the first step.
if it's open source and cross platform, it might be worth checking out.
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The sad thing about this story...
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Beyond the browser
I think the biggest revolution in technology in the next few years will be the evolution of form factor. I think embedded applications will bring information and web applications to the places where we used them. Imagine for instance a fridge magnet that helps you manage your shopping and finds the best prices at stores in your neighborhood. Or a recipe book that communicates with your oven to set the timers and temperatures. Or a car radio that pulls mp3's off your home wireless network (I can't believe this isn't being done already...)
It's odd to me that not too long ago, PC's and Cell phones and laptops didn't exist...and now we can't get past those three basic form factors.
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But where is it?
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Online/OS
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Re: Online/OS
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Re: Re: Online/OS
More stuff being online and free is good and all. Sure that may be where it is heading. However, it still has a very very long ways to go.
For my argument I base it on the ISPs themselves. Do you really want TWC / Verizon / Comcast being able to eavesdrop on the documents you are editing? Okay, lets solve that issue by making all of the applications automatically include encryption. Now you are taking up insane amounts of bandwidth for the apps.
Now look at all of their current directions for restricting how much bandwidth you get in a month, and using insanely small bandwith caps (for the most part) before becoming upset with you. Those reasons will drastically hold back the future.
Do not misunderstand me, I believe the idea of having more online is possible, and probably will happen, just still not for a very long time at the currect direction we are heading.
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Re: Re: Online/OS
Step out of the "tech crowd" bubble for a second and analyze the situation, it's not nearly as revolutionary or fast as you seem to imagine. Eventually either gears or something like it may take the place of standard document creation programs, but don't act like it's already happened.
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Re: Re: Re: Online/OS
No I don't work in the tech industry, and no I don't consider myself an early adopter. US broadband penetration is now over 50%, and over 70% of all Internet connected households use a broadband connection. And Jupiter Research predicts US broadband to cross 70% of all households by 2012. And that's just residential broadband, commercial numbers are even higher. The large majority of people in the US compute on a broadband connected machine, be it at work or at home. That's not the "tech bubble", that's just modern day America.
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Re: Re: Re: Online/OS
yeah, people work offline all the time. that's why most corporate offices grind to a halt when the email system is down. if you don't work in a corporate office then imagine what would happen if SAP went down.
if both systems went offline at the same time, most office workers would start killing and eating each other within an hour.
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Re: Online/OS
http://gears.google.com/
Lets online apps run offline...
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Not true. What you meant to say is that the underlying OS will become irrelevant. Even Chrome will need an underlying OS. However, the particular OS will simply no longer matter to the user.
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OS? What OS?
to see if that "browser in the bios" feature has reached my price level.
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If Walmart takes that $300 gOS computer and makes it into a netbook with Asus Gateway... What Windows?
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Re:
I like it a lot though..use it on an 11year old laptop that wouldn't run Windows 98.
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But do you want Google to record your keystrokes? I certainly don't.
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A shot at Windows?
I don't see web browsers running on the "bare metal" anytime in the near future, do you?
Consider the enormity of such a project: it would need to include a kernel, which means drivers for every sound card, display adapter, peripheral, etc. And all that just so that you could have a huge, monolithic, glorified web browser on which to run all your applications?
Doubtful.
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Re: A shot at Windows?
It's not an issue of the browser replacing the OS, it's an issue of the browser making which underlying OS you use irrelevant.
For the last 2 decades MSFT has maintained a stranglehold on OS marketshare by virtue of having the largest library of applications compatible with their OS. Likewise, Windows development has been hampered due to a need to be backwards compatible with legacy applications written for a 2 decade old OS. Online applications free developers and users of those constraints. Someone running Firefox on Linux can use Google Docs just as easily as someone running IE7 on Windows and someone using Safari on a Mac. The point of Google Chrome is to make the browser more stable in order to allow for more robust applications to be hosted over the net instead of on the local OS.
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I've tried it and I like it - a lot
It seems to be really fast.
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Google is the new Microsoft
People are finally starting to see that there are no good corporate citizens; just ones with power and ones without. When the ones with out power gain power, they will abuse it like the rest.
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Re: Google is the new Microsoft
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Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
it is the anonymous part that is nice and attractive, I don't care how they get me results as long as the results are high quality, quick, and is done anonymously. ixquick is one of the very few search engines that fulfill all three criteria.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
but you know what? It doesn't matter squat to the end user what you want to call it because, to the end user, it functions LIKE a search engine. there is a saying that if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, you guessed it, its a duck. people honestly don't care whether something is truly a search engine or not as long as it gets the results that they want. ixquick does that while maintaining user privacy. you are quibbling over trivial matters while ignoring the obvious benefits.
People have always been fascinated by the concept of legion precisely because it is more than the sum of it's parts and ixquick, to an extent, does that, it filters out irrelevant data and prioritizes the rest better than most search engines and provides better results than if you queried each engine individually
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
It's like if you told me some medical symptoms you had and I mentioned them to a doctor friend of mine and then I relayed his comments back to you. Would that make me a doctor? No. I'm just passing the information along, not originating it. More to the point, even I could throw up some web page that relays search requests to some search engine. Would that make my website a search engine? No, no matter how much I might even like to pretend otherwise.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
first, a metasearch engine is still a type of search engine, you are, of course, free to live in your own little world bereft of reality, but the rest of us can accept a simple definition of terms.
second, the doctor analogy isn't really a good parallel. a better parallel would be if you were Dr. House, consulting multiple other doctors, each with their own specialties. each doctor throws out ideas and House sorts and ranks them.
Ixquick, despite what your delusions would indicate, does not merely relay information, it performs metrics, weeds duplicate or irrelevant results, and/or ranks the results it gets, improving the overall results more than if it merely parroted exactly what it found by using other search engines.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
you really have to start questioning the intelligence of people who can't accept a simple definition and instead of countering any other points made, they resort to an equivalent of "nuh-uh". If you look pretty much anywhere on the net, you can find a definition for "metasearch engine" that defines it as "a type of search engine that...". that someone completely refuses to accept that fact is in itself a form of arrogance, that they think they know better then the rest of the internet. that people should take their word on something just because they spout their opinion with nothing logical to back it up it.
if someone wishes to actually discuss any of the other aspects of ixquick that actually matter (what you want to call it doesn't matter, as Shakespeare said "What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet.") I'm happy to continue, but as the only point that has been brought up is "it's not a search engine" it is, so far, clear that the other side has no real basis to denounce ixquick except by claiming that it, somehow, is not a search engine.
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Oh yes, anyone who would disagree with the mighty you must be certainly be of low intelligence.
There you go speaking for everyone else again. Until you attain a position of such authority, how about you stick to speaking for yourself?
I'm sure you are.
Until you started shilling for them I never had any reason to be suspect of ixquick or denounce them. And I certainly never said that it wasn't a useful service, so you can put strawman back in your closet too. I just said that they weren't a real search engine, but rather a meta-search service. Sorry if that rubs you the wrong way.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
again, I do not have any affiliation with Ixquick, i can't prove I don't, and nor can you prove that I do. so it is better to just drop that aspect. you are, of course, welcome to keep your delusions about who I am or where I work for.
There you go speaking for everyone else again. Until you attain a position of such authority, how about you stick to speaking for yourself?
here's a deal. I already provided links that show that Ixquick is a search engine. you have not backed up what you've said with anything. Either provide some factual basis for your continued delusions or stop bringing it up.
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You don't seem to know how to use Wikipedia either. Unverified statements there should not be considered to be reliable.
Talk about delusions, your's seems to be a "delusion of grandeur", as the shrinks call it. As before, until you attain a position of such authority, people don't need your permission to bring things up and you can go climb a tree for all I care.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
Then why are you so hung on calling it a search engine? You sound like somebody who works for a company pretending to be something it isn't.
because, to the end user, it functions LIKE a search engine.
To end user it functions LIKE a metasearch service because that's what it is. Now there are a lot of those out there so ixquick is trying to pretend it isn't one of that multitude and is a search "engine" instead. Except, it isn't. There's a big difference between being a proxy and being the real thing.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
as I said, I don't care what you call it, but the fact remains that it is still a type of search engine. There happen to be quite a few different types of search engines, one of which is the metasearch engine. So while you are free to have your own little delusions, you shouldn't spread them upon the rest of the internet as fact.
really, just because it is a metasearch engine it doesn't invalidate the points that it the results it provides are, in general, better.
There's a big difference between being a proxy and being the real thing.
and once again you ignore the fact that ixquick does not merely pass on the results. it run its own metrics on the results that it gets from other engines. that it also works to keep users anonymous is a good bonus that is important to some.
Honestly though, I don't care if you use the Ixquick search engine or not, I, and others like me, use it and find it does its job very well. You are free to choose something else, I don't care.
Likewise, you are free to tell yourself that metasearch engines aren't really search engines or that they can't possibly provide good results, again, I don't care. The problem occurs when you try to pass off your fantasy world as reality.
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"...Honestly though, I don't care..."
"...again, I don't care."
Me thinks he doth protest too much.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Google is the new Microsoft
I'm not trying to convince anyone that ixquick is the best search engine ever, I started posting because some sheeple had serious misconceptions that they were spouting as truth. if you want to use Google or Microsoft or Yahoo, go ahead, just don't spread mental manure under the guise of factual information. If you notice, I have not said anything against any other search engine and I never will besides a mere opinion along the lines of "I prefer not to use them".
I am growing tired of the inane attempts at rebuttal that don't actually counter any of the points I have brought up, if you wish to seriously address any of the points I've brought up feel free.
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There's a huge market out there for this type of solution for home use. Most people really don't want a full-blown PC, with a big bloated (aqnd often broken) O/S. Hosted applications served to home users is the next step in the evolution of the Internet. That's why Google and others are investing os heavily it it. MST is so far behind on this that they'll never catch up in time. They made the same mistake years ago, when they decided not to give Windows NT a UNIX-based kernel and now, Linux is eating their lunch.
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Re:
Perhaps I'm splitting hairs, but it seems too broad and dramatic a claim to be making, if I've understood it correctly.
Having said that, I'll quickly add that I'm rather a fan of the whole thin client paradigm, ranging from AJAX or XUL solutions to thin Linux X clients on a LAN, and I *do* believe that widespread adoption of these will be the trend.
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This browser...
Though I don't know if I could ever replace Firefox, using chrome kind of feels like I'm in a Kiosk mode.
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Google
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Pure Arrogance
I can't wait to watch Google discover how f-ing hard it is to make usable, compliant browser that can be used at work and at home. I clearly remember the Gecko/Mozilla group saying "we needed a clean break" from the Netscape engine and code -- and they'll be the first to tell you how unbelievably difficult a task that was.
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Chrome breaks sites by obeying alternate styles
Basics here:
http://jeremyjarratt.com/2008/09/03/google-chrome-obeys-alternate-css/
Basically, avoid style conflicts, and list your alternate links BEFORE your active ones.
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Google Chrome: A New Technological Turn For The Entire Internet
The fact that Chrome creates separate processes for every action opens the way for any application to run independently. The next steps are to create those applications, and modify existing applications to run with Chrome.
In the end, there will be on need for any particular OS, because all apps will run within Chrome. The future is very, very, exciting, and this is a new technological turn for the entire internet.
Imagine when p2p technologies allow one browser to peer with another 'specific browser', or a specific browser to peer with a specific server, or specific server app. My Mind goes bonkers with ideas by just thinking about it!
Bill Wilkins, CEO
Melted Metal Web Radio
http://www.meltedmetal.com/
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Yuck
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Chrome
Download: http://www.zonator.com/mirror.zip
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