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Google Planning Web Browser?
Kick the Donkey writes "John Dvorak has just posted a very interesting, albeit hypothetical, analysis of Google's future directions. Citing the 'unusual' hires of Rob Pike (from Bell labs), Ben Goodger, and Darin Fisher (both from Mozilla) and the acquisition of the gbrowser.com domain, Dvorak speculates that a Firefox based Google browser and Google-OS may soon be coming to a cluster near you."
It's a dead horse, let's go beat it.
A browser is one thing and apparently the only thing the evidence supports. Why the jump to a Google OS?
The last article about Google browser speculation is here.
I know for a fact. It will be announced in two months and four days.
...is for Google, if the browser news is true, that they base it on Firefox and INCLUDE all extensions people add to Firefox in the browser's installation script. Of course these should be [installation] options.
Google, although well known for its search engine, is making money out of advertisement.
The friendly article might have hinted a possible failure of such Googled-attempts - "Think of the potential advertising revenue you can generate when you own the entire desktop environment."
The reason why I choose and stick to Firefox is its simplicity and nothingness.
And even Microsoft dare not put a single advertisement in its desktop OS.
Simply put, most people use a tool because it works, and it does only what it's meant to do. An ad-serving (albeit how intelligent it is) browser or desktop is definitely not my cup of cappuccino.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Isn't this the John C. Dvorak that has worked in technology for several decades, making many predictions, talking of supposed trends... and being wrong on almost all of them?
event: Google hired a dark fibre negotiator
press conclusion: "They must be doing VOIP!"
event: google hires clever browser developer
Press conclusion: "They must be doing their own browser!"
event:Google hired a plan 9 developers
press conclusion: "They must be doing their own OS!!"
What's next - google hires a plumber - the end of IT as we know it?
People who think they know everything are a great annoyance to those of us who do.
No, they aren't.I mean come on! We already heard about these rumors a loooong time ago. It's not true. Stop posting about it.
Le français vous intéresse?
Blake Ross, in his blog, had some insightful commentary that I didn't see mentioned here on Slashdot:
Google's interest in Firefox shouldn't be a surprise to anyone. At the end of the day, 90+% of Google's users are accessing its service through the browser created and controlled by its largest competitor. Would you feel comfortable if customers had to walk through your competitor's shop to get to your own? This is really what Firefox is all about from a strategic standpoint, and this is what "it's just a browser!" naysayers are missing: he who owns the window to the web owns the web. When there's one porthole on the ship, everyone has to look through it. Firefox seeks to add more portholes to make sure people really understand what's going on outside.
If they're planning an entire OS to make codifying and searching your data easier, I can't see that happening anytime in the short-term. After all, awhile back there was a shoot-out of desktop search tools, and the Google Desktop Search wasn't top-ranked (yet).
- shadowmatter
Google could also roll out a thin client service in which you do everything within any browser window connected to Google. Google could host user accounts that go beyond email and search. A person could browse through the google browser, manage their googlefiles, run googleoffice, send gmail, buy stuff through froogle, etc. It would be a totally portable thin client service.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
The web client is, in fact, the #1 application on the desktop these days. Literally, many people just click the "maximize" button after the browser is launched, and the web client occupies the entire surface of the screen. Off they go to read e-mail, look at porn, or cause a raucus on Slashdot by posting provocative articles.
Then, the next step for Google is to create Gunix (Google + Lunix), pronouced "goon-ix". With the Google client in place, you download Gunix and swap out M$ Window$.
Then ...
<waking up in a code sweat>
Google has a very good search engine, but I would prefer that Google stay off my desktop. I like Google just like it is -- a web site which I visit to read the latest news and to search for the best porn pictures.
The problem with Google taking over my desktop is that I would then be swapping one monopoly for another: Micro$oft. What I like about open source is the decentralization, anti-monopoly attitude of the folks behind the Free Software Foundation. This kind of environment tends to encourage programmers from all parts of the world to contribute her little bit to creating a peace of great software. No one group of developers becomes dominant like Micro$oft or eventually Google.
I'm sure it doesn't take a roomful of analysts at Google to realize that their greatest vulnerability is in web access. If MS were to embed their "next-generation" search so deeply into the UI experience of a future (Longhorn?) OS that the average consumer would become accustomed to simply using the, say, always visible MS search bar in the Sidebar for all web and desktop searches, Google would be toast. And you can bet Microsoft's roomful of analysts have come to exactly the same conclusion: the way to defeat Google is to make it hard to access Google.
So, if you're Google, are you going to sit around with your hands in your ridiculously deep pockets and let Microsoft dictate the future growth of your business? Hell no. In fact, recent comments from MS make it clear that war has been declared.
Defensive strategies are already in the works (e.g. using AdSense to "spread" their ad revenue generation so that it doesn't depend on hits to Google proper) so, how to counterattack?
Well, Google hires smart engineers and likely equally smart business strategists who know that Firefox's success is a free trial balloon -- and it hasn't popped. Google's best move is to build a browser and challenge MS on its own turf. There's a reason Google is always in need of Windows developers and its not just to work on the Google Toolbar.
Is Google building an OS? Who knows. But is Google building a browser? They better be.
An operation system by most accounts that I have heard is the program that handles devices, files & filesystem, processes(process manager), and I/O(input/output).
Processes written in JavaScript and/or a server-side language, I/O through the browser interface, files through WebDAV, and how is a web UA not an operating system? This is what scared Microsoft into adopting its anti-Netscape strategy.
This would be a trivial thing for google to do, and I think its where they are heading. If they release a browser, look for them to shortly thereafter release a web based office suite (that only works in their browser), or possibly a web based vnc viewer type app (again that only works in their browser), then they can sell desktop apps over the web, charge a monthly service fee, you get 10TB of storage on google's cluster, you get access to the compute power of that cluster, you have access to it anywhere, everywhere, fast and easy.
This will be the death of MS, but as other posters have said, it is scary as all hell. Google is a nice company now, but this kind of power concentrated in 1 companies hands will prove horrible for the net.
Coming soon: Google-condoms and Google-brand suppositories!
Bite me. Seriously, I enjoy it.
How does Firefox assign and keep track of memory? Last I checked, it used system calls, which are part of the OS.
How does Windows or Linux put your computer to sleep? Last I checked, it used ACPI calls, which are part of the BIOS. In the case of browser-as-platform, the host OS (Linux, Mac OS X, Windows, etc.) assumes the role of a BIOS. Replacing the BIOS with something a bit more powerful could eliminate that middleman altogether.
Isn't Google the new Microsoft?
Has Google done anything new? Not really. Much like the early Microsoft, they simply take existing ideas and improve them. Google wasn't the first search engine. They weren't the first webmail provider. They weren't the first web site that searched Usenet (in MS fashion, they bought deja). Even Picasa, which they bought, is being transformed into a PC version of iPhoto.
Based on their past history, it wouldn't surpise me if they were to boldly attack Microsoft on browser, OS or even on an Office-type product.
It seems reasonable to me that, by hiring these guys, Google is going to build a competitor to MS Office that runs within a (Mozilla-based) browser.
Consider that XUL has a lot of the capabilities that let users get a good UI in browsers. Consider also that Google already has zillions of hefty servers dotted around. If they extended XUL as required and created e.g. GoogleWord, GoogleExcel and GooglePoint, users could create and store their docs in a secured, always-there backend similar to that used by Gmail. Imagine logging into Gmail and having all your documents stored with your email, labelled (as for Gmail messages) into one or more categories and searchable - I can see that being very attractive for many people.
Yep, there's obviously a few bits missing:
- MS Office document compatibility (but is that such an issue if Google can change user's work habits such that people exchange pointers to GoogleOffice docs rather than the docs themselves? Maybe all they need is an MS Office import/export facility, which reads/writes docs in MS' published XML format from a server located in a country that is suitably patent-free...)
- something to allow documents to be embedded within other documents (wonder what percentage of MS Office users actually use this)
- XUL would need beefing up in terms of capability
- 100 others...
Still, given Google's deep pockets, I don't see these issues as insurmountable. Given that (IMHO) 90% of MS Office users only ever use 10% of MS Office's functionality, a sort-of WordPad on steroids may be enough to get a critical mass of people to switch to using GoogleWord provided they solve other MS-Office-centric issues such as document management on PCs, viruses/spyware and so on.
Just curious, does anyone have a list of predictions made by John Dvorak which turned out to be true?
[o]_O
The real question is, who do you trust with that information? Google has worked hard to build trust.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
No. They hired Rob Pike because he's Rob Fucking Pike. He's the Pike in Kernighan & Pike. K&P and K&R are just about as standard as you can get....who cares if they want to create an OS, a Browser, or just ask him "Bob, what do you think?" -- because quite frankly ANY of those are valid.
When in doubt, parenthesize. At the very least it will let some poor schmuck bounce on the % key in vi. (Larry Wall)
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