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Google's Amazing Browser Experiments
Barence writes "On the day that Microsoft launches Internet Explorer 8, Google has unveiled a new site that showcases the Javascript performance of its Chrome browser. Called Chrome Experiments, the site includes 19 extraordinary animated games and widgets that push the browser to its limits. One experiment, called Browser Ball allows you to 'throw' a bouncing ball from one browser window to the next. Google Gravity, on the other hand, collapses the normal Google homepage into a pile at the bottom of the screen. However, you can still enter search terms into the box and watch the results drop from the top of the browser window."
Why does this frecking site do not work in ie6...
Most of these work in Safari4, and some even on the iPhone. This kind of stuff, written entirely in HTML5 and javascript, is one of the things Apple is hoping will make the lack of flash on the iPhone a moot point.
Most exciting phrase in science: not "Eureka!" but "Hmm... That's funny..." -Asimov (abridged for \. limits)
.. run a Beowulf cluster of those applications and still be stable?
So I wonder who will send the other team a cake?
Yeah, that's fun. And it certainly *looks* cooler than my Adblock Plus, my Noscript, and my dozen other useful add-ons.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
I know we're all supposed to hate Microsoft, but come on.
Here's a story: On the day Microsoft releases IE 8 -- the most popular web browser in the world -- Slashdot doesn't mention it, but posts a trivial article about Google Chrome benchmarks.
That's what it's all about in the demoscene, right? People are in awe when they see what you can do in 64kB on a PC and what a 6502 can do with cycle-exact programming. Yet anyone interested more in results than in technical experiments will simply expand the platform and make these demos look like child's play, because that's what they are: An exercise in testing the limits of a very limited platform. HTML and the javascript browser API should never have become the basis of a UI standard. The privacy problems, performance deficiencies and the baroque API will haunt us for decades. Look ma, I'm using a 2GHz dual-core processor to simulate a couple of 2D balls bouncing around in almost fluid motion.
Ah, a classic hack... variations of this date back to the '70s. I wrote one around 1980, and I'm sure I wasn't the first. A few years back I was googling around and came across it:
rot.
This is a fixed version. There was one bug in the original... the timer to slow the update down didn't work, but since a high speed display back then was 9600 baud I'd never noticed.
So I can throw a ball from one browser window to another, so I can have the Google home page fall to the bottom of my screen in a heap....WHAT'S THE POINT?
Firefox and it's addons allow me to do anything that I want and more. Although I do like Google chrome I'm sticking with Firefox. They develop for the sake of improvement and not just for the sake of "look at me!!" like apparently Google does.
You know the duty free sales magazine in the back of every airline seat? This summary sounds like something out of it.
Google's Amazing Browser Experiments!
The World's Finest Robot Dog Bed!
The Perfect Toothbrush - That Can Think!
Sweden's Softest Bathrobes!
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
More of a POC at the moment, but at least there's hope.
Why does the Chrome Experiments link not go to the Chrome Experiments site but instead to a PC Pro article? That's just plain nuts. Sure link to the article but come on.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
This was reported on yesterday: http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/03/18/2128256
Here's my comment about real-time Chroma-Key replacement in Firefox.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
all of them, including the 3d ones, run well in firefox for me...haven't tried chrome. but chrome is just too feature-light to be useful at this point, regardless of how fast it may be...
Seriously though, what exactly is accomplished here? Their goal with Chrome was to get the other browser developers to accelerate their javascript parsers/engines, and that seems to have worked fine - all (most) of them are now rushing to announce new, accelerated versions. Why bother with more "we're still faster, catch us if you can!" teasing? Even the demos that they themselves commissioned don't do anything *useful* -- it's like you said, they max out the CPU. Great. Do you have an example of a real-world web application that does that? If not, I'd rather see that time spent getting a proper version for Linux, and extension support.
Entomologically speaking, the spider is not a bug, it's a feature.
greasemonkey, CustomizeGoogle, FlashBlock ...
What's the big deal, works fine on my reliable 5 year old Latitude D800.
Aha, I just tested this on my Mac and it's apparently gotten bit by a change in termcap/terminfo in the past 25 or so years... padding used to be handled by a number at the beginning of a capability, and now it's handled by a '$' inline sequence. The lameness filter is refusing to let me post the patch. Hey, it's source code, you goons. Sheesh.
google takes the apple route and goes "hey look at teh shiny!!!! wooooo!"
As opposed to what? Emulating Dell: "Hey look at the big clumsy gray slab!!! It's Microsoft Vista® enabled! WOOOOOOO!"
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
I experimented with Browser Ball in Chrome itself for a while and I found it very engaging. I think, it could help in teaching kids with learning disabilities to focus more. The way the ball path could be changed by repositioning new windows seems a fairly involved mental task with immediate results and a lot of cognitive delight. But, I must add that CPU usage was full throttle ... almost. Something still needs to be checked.
I'd like to point to this wii ad that has been on the internet for a while now:
http://www.youtube.com/experiencewii
It uses the gravity thingie.
Seriously though, what exactly is accomplished here?
First and foremost it's a marketing stunt. If you launch an "experiment" in any other browser than Google Chrome they warn you that it might not work (but allow you to "Roll the dice" and try.
Second, it shows that it's possible to do pretty things using the common web standards alone, without proprietary plugins like flash or silverlight.
I'd rather see that time spent getting a proper version for Linux, and extension support.
That's really close minded. The teams working on Chromium/Google Chrome are not the people behind these demos and the lack of Linux and extension support is being worked on - I'd rather wait a little longer than them becoming a major clusterfuck. Besides, these demos are really just a fun prove of concept.
All the experiments worked with Firefox, so I think their is a fair chance that Explorer 8 works,
Yeah, the gravity thing seems to work on Firefox 3 as well. Most of these things should work with a browser that is relatively standards compliant.
The gravity thing works in Firefox, but it is environment dependent. When I turned the monitor on it's side, nothing happened. You've got to have the monitor perfectly level.
Hrm, weird, seems to work for me when the monitor is on its side. Or even upside down for that matter...
What? You don't think we read Slashdot from space? Hey cool, I can see your house from here!
isn't this kinda old now?
http://www.youtube.com/experiencewii
I mean it worked in my firefox then...
There's been a lot of stories lately about new browser releases and how they have the fastest Javascript performance yet.
I asked why Javascript performance was such a big deal, and I didn't feel any answers I got were particularly convincing.
These experiments however have answered my question much more convincingly, the answer is not that existing applications need it but that future innovations in Javascript can achieve some pretty amazing things if Javascript implementations are efficient enough.
For those complaining that none of the examples do anything 'useful', check out this- a js animated sphere of your blog tags:
http://student.agh.edu.pl/~fatyga/repos/stratus/example.php
I wonder if javascript and html 5 can make Silverlight become as useless as video in flash made Windows Media Player. Javascript is pretty close if not already there to be able to replace .net, java and flash in most online applications. If enough sites appear thats useful or fun and demands a fast javascript engine this could erode IE marketshare at the same time as it erodes its developer community.
HTTP/1.1 400
Can't wait for viruses to start inserting that gravity JS code into random pages. Highjacking computers. Popping up messages saying "Pay us $20 and your pages will stop falling to the floor".
Seems that the grandparent of Chrome still can handle this ...
Is that Slashdot-worthy?
Can we have a story about that? I'll even provide photos and video.
And you could view that in ANY browser. Ain't THAT something?
My nose does what no browser could ever do. It is clearly superior.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
"Unfortunately, Google Chrome is not yet available for your operating system. This experiment may not run properly in your current browser."
Debian and FF (iceweasel).
And no, I'm not clicking on "Download Chrome" or something like that, I'm clicking on "launch experiment".
>Second, it shows that it's possible to do pretty things using the common web standards alone, without proprietary plugins like flash or silverlight.
THIS RIGHT HERE!
The whole point of this is to show that there is no need for stupid plugins like Flash and Silverlight.
When HTML5 comes around with support for Video and Audio, the experiments that depended on Flash can be amended to work with them.
When i saw these experiments, i cried manly tears of joy.
Let this be the beginning of the end!
To hell with plugins!
You know that OmniWeb is now free. Give it a try.
photosMy Photostream
I see what you mean, about the teams being separate, but think of the overall image this is projecting. Something along the lines of "yes, we know there are higher priorities for this project, but in the meantime we'll entertain you with these shiny toys". And for added value: "sure, that other browser can do *useful* things, but remember how we said we're faster? Well, we're saying it again. Guess what we're doing next week?".
By the way, I'm normally a big fan of what google does to push the infrastructure, specifically with web services and Gears. I'm complaining because this is very "stunt-like", something you'd expect from Apple.
Also, you can show off really amazing stuff if you include SVG as part of the package, but of course IE wouldn't be able to choke on the demos for our amusement, so it's excluded (I can't blame google for that one, their point was to show pages that *could* run on other browsers).
Entomologically speaking, the spider is not a bug, it's a feature.
I now submit to our new Slashdot Effect overlord and am humbled by the force that can bring a Google hosted site to it's Knees.
As a cross-platform UI standard that allows a mix of server-side and client-side code for server-hosted apps that nonetheless can run on high-latency links, Ajaxy HTML with the HTML5 extensions doesn't seem terrible. It certainly has much better performance than doing something equivalent in X11 over ssh, for example.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
...can't wait!
Portable Firefox works on my locked down WinXP corp PC.
Badly done lockdown. Active Directory allows disabling every executable not on specific paths. Heck, it even allows you to run only selected ones and only when hashes match.
Compared to FF, in Chrome those games do work better, that is, immensely more smoothly.
I must say, after seeing all the experiments, I think Microsoft has something to fear about. The browser can completely become the OS, now. I now do believe you can develop complex applications and suites - on the web. I don't know how soon, but I know for sure it will happen one day, that it will be irrelevant what OS you have, Linux, WinXP or MacOSX.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
And most of them work just fine in Opera 9.64, despite the scary warnings.
And the ones that don't, it seems to be because Opera deliberately disallows that sort of action (e.g. the pages knowing where they are on screen in relation to other pages).
ah man, the google gravity one is awesome fun!
I don't get it... javascript games and demos have been around for a while (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=javascript+games). Firefox renders these perfectly well and minefield renders them faster than Chrome. There is nothing new here, its just a publicity stunt.
Fast Federal Court and I.T.C. updates
I'm complaining because this is very "stunt-like", something you'd expect from Apple.
Agreed. But on the other hand, they do have a new and superior browser in terms of standards, efficiency and security that needs promoting and browser speed is the best leverage at this moment. Benchmarks alone tell Average Joe very little because he either doesn't understand or care for them but now he can really feel the difference and see why a speedy browser is good.
you can show off really amazing stuff if you include SVG as part of the package
This is true, but IMO the <canvas> is more suitable for animations or interaction while SVG is better for still images.
Even if you have an open source browser engine, if it doesn't run on an open source OS, e.g. Linux or BSD then it is worthless.
I am never going to boot Windows just to check the performance of Chrome. And even when I have Xen or VMware running both OSes (though with Wine its becoming less and less important to be able to run windows) I'm still not going to use a browser which does not run natively on an open source OS.
That is the sound of a hundred thousand firewall maintainers pulling their hair out, of a hundred thousand company connections having their bandwidth sucked up, of a hundred thousand managers wondering what happened to their deadlines...
Karma Whoring for Fun and Profit.
This is just Javascript. Javascript's been around for ~15 years. Do you see a rash of viruses (and no, ads don't count) "hijacking" webpages with annoying Javascript and demanding money now? No? Then this won't change that.
"Mind, as manifested by the capacity to make choices, is to some extent present in every electron." -Freeman Dyson
I spent 20 minutes fooling around with the various experiments in Safari 4 and I am BLOWN AWAY.
This is the future of the web. Do you hear me? When you consider "Gravity" you can easily get a sense of how designers might enable users to, for example, create a drag-and-drop, cut-and-paste custom interface for any web page they might load.
Users could also easily add content/widgets/paid apps, you name it.
Who knew HTML 5 would be so . . . different than 4 strict?
blog
You know how Microsoft sometimes releases new hardware or trivial software updates/upgrades to distract people from the announcements of competitors?
This release is no different, except. What Google demonstrates in these "experiments" has rendered IE 8 meaningless. You might think this is an exaggeration, but the leaps and bounds of this small set of demos means Microsoft is going to have a hard row to hoe for having failed to adopt and implement true cross-platform standards.
This story is not about hate for Microsoft. This story is about the beauty of standards with a side plot of Microsoft's continuing and increasing irrelevance.
blog
Problem solved.
BIOS password protected, disable boot from anywhere but the internal disk.
Where are you guys working???
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
This stuff looks nice, but how about doing experiments which do not require my cores to go both to 100%? I mean it's a damn Athlon 64 X2, a ball moving around should not require this...
So far, this website has only shown me that javascript can use my computer cpu fully. Yeah, great. How about a low cpu requirement demonstration? THAT would impress me.
Stupidity is the root of all evil.
The Google gravity reminds me of the interesting Wario ad for wii that was on youtube a while back.
http://www.youtube.com/experiencewii
I'm a Linux sysadmin. If they pulled that shit on me I'd just rip the damn PC open and replace the hard drive. And if they wanted to fire me for it, well, they couldn't, because I'd have quit before that.
But seriously, where do you work where they do that kind of moronic shit?
High security environment or what?
Try the new beta version. The text displays properly there.
[...] I'd rather see that time spent getting a proper version for Linux, and extension support.
Yeah but pissing off the people that caused me so much extra work redesigning websites to work with IEs brokenness (by releasing something better on their release day), that comes a pretty close second for me ...
We have two workstations, one is PCI compliant, connected to the production network and runs RHEL 5. The other supposedly runs Windows XP and its assorted collection of required junk (Norton ....), but I just installed F10 and run (rarely) the gaming OS within a VM.