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Google Chrome, the Google Browser
Philipp Lenssen writes "Google announced their very own browser project called Google Chrome — an announcement in the form of a comic book drawn by Scott McCloud, no less. Google says Google Chrome will be open source, include a new JavaScript virtual machine, include the Google Gears add-on by default, and put the tabs above the address bar (not below), among other things. I've also uploaded Google's comic book with all the details (details given from Google's perspective, anyway... let's see how this holds up). While Google provided the URL www.google.com/chrome there's nothing up there yet."
I imagine the first question on everyone's mind will be, "Why do we need a new web browser?" To which I imagine the truthful answer is: "We don't. At least not for technical reasons."
I believe what Google is looking to accomplish is to trade on their brand name in an attempt to further dislodge Internet Explorer.
Remember when AOL purchased Netscape? AOL didn't care about the browser in the slightest. They wanted Netscape for the brand name. To the vast majority of users, Netscape was the Internet.
Google has since taken that place. Google is the Internet to many people. So much so that Google has felt compelled to to prevent the genericizing of their mark.
In this particular case, however, the strength of their mark works to Google's advantage. They have already convinced millions of users to install their desktop software. If they can further convince millions of users to install and use their browser, they can cause enough of a disruption to finally remove IE's leadership in the browser market. Especially given the solid work already done by FireFox, Opera, and Safari. With only another 10% marketshare loss on the whole, even the most stubborn websites will be forced to support third party browsers. And once they support third party browser, it will be very little time before the technological superiority of the alternative browsers causes them to add special features not available for Internet Explorer users.
It will be Netscape vs. Internet Explorer all over again. Except that instead of two giants fighting it out, it will be Microsoft against everyone else. And when everyone else happens to be giants in their own right, Microsoft's prospects will start looking rather grim.
In effect, this move is a blow aimed squarly at Redmond. Not for the purposes of truth, justice, and the freedom of all mankind; as I'm sure many will imagine. Rather, for the purpose of hitting back at Microsoft for their attempts to leverage their monopoly in promoting MSN Search over Google. The only difference is that Google Search is a good product and it is entrenched. Internet Explorer hasn't been a good product since Microsoft stopped developing it nearly 8 years ago (piss-poor upgrades pretending to be standards-compliant not withstanding), and its entrenchments are slowly falling to competition.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I wonder how this will affect Google's relationship with the Mozilla foundation? IIRC, Google is one of Mozilla's primary sources of funding, as they pay for the rights to be the default search engine on Firefox.
'Every story, if continued long enough, ends in death.' --Ernest Hemingway
So uh, what's special about "tabs above the address bar (not below)"? I happen prefer my tabs on the bottom, and Opera provides an option for that. Come to think of it, I believe the default in Opera is for the tab bar to be placed above the address bar. I'm certain Firefox's tab bar placement can be changed, as well (through plugins or not).
It seems like a very odd feature to point out...javascript VM, open source, and TABS ON TOP!! Huh?
For what it's worth, the 404 error page being served on http://www.google.com/chrome is not their standard one - their standard one is to search for the whole url from the looks of things?
Did anyone else notice the number of current or former Firefox developers name-checked in that comic? Ben Goodger was the Firefox project lead until recently. The most significant part of this news may be that Google is pulling people off Firefox development (assuming they were contributing to Firefox while working there) and getting them to write a new browser. Still, Firefox is working pretty well and their financial future is secure for the next few years - thanks to wads of cash from Google - so we need not be too worried.
Apart from that, my verdict is 'show us the code'. Announcements of future plans and vapourware are not really interesting, even when it's Google.
-- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
I've always liked Webkit, but am not as big a fan of Safari since it doesn't have the extensibility and flexibility of Firefox - so I'm going to follow this project closely. There may be some side stories to keep an eye on:
- What will this do to Firefox? If Google Chrome is successful, I suspect it'll be at Firefox's expense rather than IE - at least in the near term.
- What will this mean for Google's add-ons for other browsers? They talk specifically about the "Gears" developers' dissatisfaction with the way current browsers work as a primary motivator for this project. So does this mean Google's tools on browsers other than Chrome are going to become unwanted step-children? That's could hurt the other browsers (if Chrome is popular), but it could also turn around and bite Google.
- What about the Mac (and Linux)? This is important to me, anyway. Google's Mac support is stellar in some areas and poor in others. Will Chrome's development on platforms other than Windows stay apace of its progress on Windows? Maybe the comic answers this, but I haven't managed to get all the way through it yet. I'm on page 10 and *still* there's no mention of any villian.
#DeleteChrome
Based on Page 4, Google is designing the browser as if it were an operating system. This is something that I commented on previously in the discussion of Microsoft's approach to IE8. Going from shared memory to protected memory was a big step for multitasking on the desktop, and since web applications are more and more complex, the same move needs to be made with browser design.
If IE8 and "Google Chrome" are moving in this direction, what will we see from Safari and Firefox? Safari 4 betas give no indication of a fundamental re-architecting. Firefox 4 is still at least a year away, and so far no one in that community has been publicly talking about this kind of redesign. And Opera... who knows?
The Rise and Fall of Online Community
Actually, the opposite should be true. Memory won't "leak" from tab to tab. When the tab gets closed, it's memory gets returned to the OS pool by hook or by crook. Only the UI itself should leak memory over the lifetime of the browser.
Yeah, plus rumour has it Gecko's api is baroque in the extreme. Anyway, given Google's deal with Firefox (the default search engine stuff), it's nice to see they've made their decision on what appears to be purely technical terms, rather than political ones.
Pardon me, but I'm a bit stunned that anyone might think this is the real reason Google might make a browser.
Cuz, I mean, we all remember how well it worked for Netscape. Don't we?
First, this happened to the world's most popular browser, as it grew to include a kitchen sink. Then, a little over a year later, AOL happened to Netscape. Mere days later, it was revealed what AOL's real intentions were. They later disbanded what was left of Netscape. And today, nobody gives a shit about AOL's $4,200,000,000.00 start page. (I've intentionally omitted the parts about "source code" and "JWZ," as they don't seem relevant to the point.)
Really: If this history shows us anything, it is that the web portal game is a joke. Tying it into software (and thus making it even less universal) just makes it even more laughable.
Kid-proof tablet..
If you've been dreaming of a multi-process browser for ages, you could start using IE8 on Windows! It lets you configure how many processes you want, from one process for all tabs+plugins through to a separate process for each tab/plugin. (And the "frame" running in a separate frame). http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2008/07/28/ie8-and-reliability.aspx
Ha, there's a tiny slashdot window on page 22. I recognize all the other windows except for "October" in the top right frame. Anyone have an idea of what that is?
Javascript doesn't allow arbitrary memory access, so there isn't any concept of an address space to share or separate.
You don't seem to understand how the concept of shared memory applies to interpreted languages. The "shared memory address space" in this instance is the aggregated discontinuous address space formed from all non-local variables and data areas in the program.
You don't need native hardware-level shared memory exposed in a system to suffer all of the same concurrency problems under multiprogramming and multiprocessing. In fact, there are a few more problems to add to the list when you're using a software VM, because so few of the VM primitives are naturally atomic.
The parent's point (that part of it) was accurate.
We very much needed a *technically* better browser for a multicore world in which individual pages are not to be trusted and must be sandboxed with MMU-guaranteed isolation, which means separate O/S processes. It looks like Chrome might be the first major browser based on such a proper design.
All their moves are remarkably coherent for the amount of activty/discussion they provoke. I think some of the people around google (investors) are a little wonky, but the major moves seem to be consistantly towards a handful of goals:
-Divorce the application market from the platform. To the extent of making their applications more desirable (with ad placement). Thus preventing users from offline software. I worry about this goal as it also is encouraging software subscription models.. The alleged chrome aims to bring these 'gadgets' to browsers to allow richer content than the current standards provide. Without the process of trying to ratify standards, just putting it out there and saying 'standardized or not, here it is under a license that lets other browsers copy it'. Firefox will probaably embrace it, though MS will push silverlight for all its worth.
-Get everyone looking at ads they charge for, and correlating whatever data they can to make it targeted (search related, location related in maps). Android is a recent example, a move essentially to get people looking at the internet more, and undoubtedly to provide ad-revenure-influenced POI in their GPS capabilities.
-Help the general state of internet-based commerce. I don't know much about google checkout, but at least google is making sure they have a controlling stake in the game. In part, they directly profit, but more importantly, they have the capacity encourage secure online payment strategies to more arbitrary vendors. Google Chrome (if real) would play into this based on the comic. A lot of emphasis on sandbox and isolation. Hopefully, meaningfully more secure, but at the least instilling consumer confidence in online commerce in the face of media discussion of online commerce and identity theft.
-Trying not to look like a big, scary company as they do this. They realize their product is the attention of the users. They must keep the users from being mad, which means free services of quality. The more they succeed, the more data they inherently have access to, and the more privacy concerns they face. For the time being, they haven't been too overt in doing evil, as they know how tenuous their position is. Google came from nowhere, and is currently a funnel for revnue and investing. Google always must know the next anybody is waiting for their chance to usurp when the masses declare google either stagnant or evil.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Actually, this is spot on.
IE8's privacy/porn/whatever mode is not a feature for users, it's an attack on targeted online advertising, a market that Microsoft just can't seem to get a big enough slice of (I mean, they spent $2bil just so they could get ads on non-US Facebook, try to tell me that online ads aren't a major focus of MS).
In response, Google has two goals: protect their online advertising and f*** MS. Which is exactly what Google Chrome does: a browser where they can better control/measure ad blocking, and an opportunity to cut deeper into IE's market share.
As a side note, the release of IE8 is going to be a big problem for MS: there's a potential that tons of pages developed incorrectly for IE (such as those using conditional comments that target all IE versions rather than just 7 and lower) will look incorrect in IE8. Also, most web stats (at non-tech sites) are showing 25+% of visits coming from IE6. People who use IE are either stuck with what their corp. IT does, or just don't care about new versions of IE.
These problems make the opportunity for Google Chrome to grab market share that much better.
Does that mean that their relationship with Mozilla will be ending?
2. Does it run on Linux?
3. Does it support Plugins?
4. Does it phone home and notify Google of important statistics, like what web pages I view, what ads I click, what products I buy, etc.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".