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Google Announces Chrome OS, For Release Mid-2010
Zaiff Urgulbunger writes "After years of speculation, Google has announced Google Chrome OS, which should be available mid-2010. Initially targeting netbooks, its main selling points are speed, simplicity and security — which kind of implies that the current No.1 OS doesn't deliver in these areas! The Chrome OS will run on both x86 and ARM architectures, uses a Linux kernel with a new windowing system. According to Google, 'For application developers, the web is the platform. All web-based applications will automatically work and new applications can be written using your favorite web technologies. And of course, these apps will run not only on Google Chrome OS, but on any standards-based browser on Windows, Mac and Linux thereby giving developers the largest user base of any platform.' Google says that this new OS is separate from Android, as the latter was designed for mobile phones and set-top boxes, whereas Chrome OS is designed 'for people who spend most of their time on the web.'" The New York Times' coverage is worth reading, and there are stories popping up all over the web.
There is no mention of X anywhere, and hopefully there will be no X.
*fingers crossed*
GENERATION 25: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Chrome OS focusing on speed, simplicity and security does not imply Windows cannot deliver in these areas. It's just an alternative operating system, and has yet to prove itself. The summary sound rather, well, dumb.
I wouldn't run an OS from a company who's business is knowing your consumer preferences, but suit for yourself. I'm sure there's a positive side of this story too, but I let that to another user.
The web is not the OS. The web is...the web. I do NOT want everything to be a goddamn web app. Web apps work very well for certain applications, and Google has shown that they can push the limits with dynamic content, but that does not mean the web application is an appropriate model for every damned application. I don't like the Chrome browser and I don't need an OS named Chrome that is actually Linux with a lame web browser bolted on as the front end. Google does search very well, but I've hated most of their other stuff. (Google Earth is one exception) I expect no different from this.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
"All Web-based applications will automatically work and new applications can be written using your favorite Web technologies," the company said.
Depends on your definition of "automatically". From what I hear, there is this little prerequisite called "internet access".
Also, while it appears that many are finding the news of the new Google Chrome Linux OS a cause to celebrate, I would advise quiet optimism at best.
They are yet to release Chrome for anything other than Windows.
A complete Chrome OS may still be somewhere in the (rather) far future.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
And oh, anyone else notice the irony that the Chrome _browser_ for Linux seems largely like an afterthought right now? Still, way to go, Google.
I remember someone talking about this, citing the lack of standards when it comes to doing anything GUI-wise in linux which is slowing development. If this OS really does ditch X etc then Google have a clean slate on which to design the browser.
The challenge to Microsoft aside, this will be a wake-up call to Gnome/KDE. The
Well I hear you about Gnome. It seems like they have just run out of gas.
I think the problem with KDE is that they woke up too much. KDE 4 seems like a project where they have genuinely bit off more than they can chew. They got so caught up in the big picture and the big rewrite that they seem to have actually regressed at the details level. I've ripped Gnome and KDE's file dialogs on my own site... way behind the times.
This is my sig.
Chrome OS focusing on speed, simplicity and security does not imply Windows cannot deliver in these areas. It's just a still non existent operating system, and has yet to show anything other than a blog post about its future. The summary sound rather, well, dumb.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
How is this going to be different from other Linux distros and associated GUI revamp projects that have sprung up promising "we're going to be better than Windows! Really!" over the years?
Computers need to get better. People want to get to their email instantly, without wasting time waiting for their computers to boot and browsers to start up. They want their computers to always run as fast as when they first bought them.
They are trying to fill a niche of an OS that boots fast and is basically just a browser. This OS will have a desktop with some online favourites... and that might be just what you need on a NETbook..!
:-)
Gmail already looks like a standalone app on Windows with Google Chrome and Offline enabled, you get a nice icon on the desktop. And when you click it it loads in a second, instead of the several minutes my Outlook used to take to even be barely useable. The choice is clear, sluggish native apps are becoming obsolete, and lightweight online apps are becoming more and more reliable. And when you only use these kind of netapps, why bother installing a bloated OS. This might just be the next revolution in the netbook industry.
On a side note: I can't wait until a new OS finally achieves the startup times of the good old trusy Commodore 64.
I'd really like to see some innovation there, much like OSX created an amazing GUI layer on top what is essentially Mach/BSD
The OS X GUI layer is essentially NeXTStep on a revised Display Postscript. It's slower and more resource intensive than X11, its graphics is targeted primarily at desktop usage. Where is the innovation?
X11 has been innovative from its inception, and it continues to be amazingly innovative today. For example, the kinds of visual effects Compiz delivers effortlessly and cleanly are much harder to achieve in OS X.
this will be a wake-up call to Gnome/KDE
What exactly do you think will be the "wake-up call"? Both Gnome and KDE have non-X11 backends, but people don't use them because there really is no benefit associated with getting rid of X11.
A non-X11 backend may make sense for Chrome OS because Chrome OS probably needs less functionality than X11 provides and it makes writing drivers easier. But in terms of innovation and functionality, X11 is second to none.
I really don't think they will replace X11. It's a stable and effective windowing system, and it also consumes low amount of resources (my N800 also runs one perfectly fine, and that's a 400MHz ARM with no GPU). It is also really powerful on appropriate hardware (with wine I can perfectly well play games of the newest generation without speed penalties). X11 is also quite uniform between Linux platforms. It also just provides the bare minimum to communicate with the hardware and display graphic primitives on the screen. The problem with X11 is that it is a very old design and an extreme pain to develop with directly because of the API 'aesthetics'.. but it would be much much harder to replace it with something from scratch. My guess is that Google will go on top of X11 and write a window manager (program that manages running windows, adds decorations, bars, icons etc..). Then tightly integrates this with their browser. Well, let's see what happens.
You mean like Flash, playing HD video or Google's own O3D and Google Earth?
Judging by Google's vague statements, it doesn't appear to be meant as a bare metal OS, but something you add on top of what you have. ICBW.
What were you reading that made you jump to that conclusion?
It seems pretty obvious that this will be Chrome on a new windowing system on a linux kernel, developed for use on netbooks. There's no need for a VM, and they don't plan on having people download this - it will be the preinstalled software for low-end netbooks.
This should have dramatically lower memory requirements than Windows XP, and it will run on non-x86 processors. This will allow for the development of much cheaper netbooks!
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
one thing I notice in your comment:
MSFT [google.com] and GOOG [google.com]
easy to see where google has the upper hand.
Speaking as a web developer, I think it sucks as a platform. HTML is not a very efficient way to generate output, supporting various DOM and Javascript implementations is a real pain and there are so many cases where a web application is not the best tool for the job.
That being said, I certainly do believe it's the best way to deliver information and applications to our customers, but most of our internal business processes and applications would be better to do without.
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
So?
Will someone please explain "capitalism" and "google is a public corporation" to this young man?
You are welcome on my lawn.
The software architecture is simple â" Google Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel."
This is what the world has been waiting for....
Finally, it's about time we moved on. X is dead, all hail Y !
Or is it finally Berlin ^H^H^H^H^H^H Fresco ??
Oh wait, X works fine after all and is being actively fixed.
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
Right, but If we call this new OS, the "Google" OS, then we have to go back and call every other Linux distribution, "GNU" OSs. I'm OK with that.
If Chrome OS is essentially a thin client OS build around a webbrowser... how is it any better than any other operating system?
Does it offer anything to make the web experience better than using Firefox on Linux or the Chrome browser on WinXP?
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
You wouldn't want this, you self-centered asshole. This OS is not intended for Linux zealots. Never was. It simply gives portable devices a web browser in the cheapest (reused kernel) and fastest (stripped down to run just a browser) way possible. There are people who would find this useful. You aren't one of them. I'm OK with that, and I know a lot of other people will be too.
They're offering it to OEMs (specifically notebook OEMs). It's the same strategy they're using with Android, which seems to be working OK so far.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
The only thing that interests me is how ebullient people are about something that they know nothing about, simply because it's got Google's name on it.
As Ted Dziuba put it, Google's very good at selling ads. Supporting actual customers? Not so much.
Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
I'm guessing it's more about how you said it than what you said. You are not inaccurate, well the "troll" part is an assumption and could be inaccurate, don't assume malice when ignorance is suitable, but the main points are correct. But phrasing something rudely as you did doesn't server to help anyone any better than a more polite phrasing, and in most cases it actually does a worse job.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
This is a Linux distro that can't run any non-google-SDK software. No X server wipes out being able to run most of the GUI software in the ecosystem. You locked to google. Why would I want this? Technical Linux people aren't going to want it.
and the technical linux people market is how many % of the market?
Normal users won't dare install any thing called an operating system. And everyone, will want to be able to run the apps they want, not only google approved ones. All this pain just for browser?
normal users will be getting it with a new machine, not installing it themselves. normal people already don't get to "run a lot of apps they want" depending on what machine they chose - buy a windows PC and you don't get iLife, for example. buy a Mac and you don't get to run ... most games :-)
Thing is, we don't want to be controlled, never have.
how did you think MS got to the market share it has now?
you're looking at it all wrong. ease & speed of adoption + demand is a LOT more important than "current market players". primary evidence being the iphone - before the iphone introduction, number of iphone apps was zero. look at how many there are now. just because there aren't really the kind of "web based apps" out there that can make you imagine what life would be like with a primarily web-based-app ecosystem doesn't mean there won't be, if Google can put enough machines out there in the hands of enough people.
Actually the more I think about it the more I am beginning to believe that it might not be so difficult to at least get people to try it.
:)
Google is everywhere; home pages, search bars, browsers, phones (more will come I'm sure) and has even become a synonym for the word "search". Google it and you'll see.
Alternatives to Windows do not exist for the average user because they are not common knowledge. If you say Linux to someone they are oblivious. If you explain it you loose them more. "So... it's like Windows then right?" And since they have it... why bother. Same thing with BSD or any other alternative. Google has the resources to put it out there. And if people are willing to try an OS because it is made by Google, then they have opened themselves up for alternatives. Thus becoming aware that they exist. And what's to say, they won't explore more if they feel that Google's Os isn't right for them?
We always say it's a preference. But the majority of average users don't have the luxury of preference. Windows is all they know.
sudo apt-get lost
Great. I'm sure current applications will be compatible, nothing will break, all the libs will support the compiles, and so on.
This is not to put down any effort to get rid of X11, rather, my guess that cross-operating system application porting will once again go to hell, cause conditional compiles, and much Zantac consumption.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Don't be fooled by the "it's mainly for web browsing spin"? It seemed pretty clear to me. Google's direction all along has been to move applications from the desktop to the web (which in many cases, in my opinion, is a stupid idea).
Google actually states: 'For application developers, the web is the platform. All web-based applications will automatically work and new applications can be written using your favorite web technologies. And of course, these apps will run not only on Google Chrome OS, but on any standards-based browser on Windows, Mac and Linux thereby giving developers the largest user base of any platform.'
Their comments about giving developers the largest user base of any platform are complete bullshit. Web developers already have that user base and not every application should be ported to run in a browser. At first, I cringed a little when I heard that they were getting pulled into an anti-trust investigation. Now I feel better about it. I have always had an uneasy feeling about an advertising company being able to gather and broker as much information about someone as they do. For Christ's sake, they archive, search, and use your EMAIL to develop more targeted ads. The idea that my entire OS could/would gather everything it could on me scares the crap out of me.
I realize I am sort of rambling, but I have two main points:
1) Not every app belongs on the web. In fact, most do not.
2) I am not comfortable with an advertising company being so in control of all of our private data. An earlier commenter pointed out what a big "win" this would be for corporations looking to deploy thin clients. How much of a "win" will it be to have Google searching, indexing, and archiving all of your company's sensitive documentation, all in the name of building better advertisements?
For years, we have been hearing about how you don't even need an OS any longer, and how a browser is enough. There is a queue of usual objections to this idea:
Well, for the first time, I believe that an internet-only OS is now possible. Most of these objections are dwindling. Peopel backup their files online anyway, so the fear of having someone else in control is going away. How many people have all their bills, passwords, etc. stored on a gmail server somewhere? 3G has made internet access almost ubiquitous, and web apps are getting a lot more sophisticated - enough that webmail is powerful enough for almost the most hard-core email users.
This may actually work now, whereas, even 2 years ago this would have seemed absurd.
Hate to point this out, but didn't somebody else already come up with an operating system that was tightly integrated with their web browser? That worked out so well for them!
All Linux distributions have a Linux kernel, by definition. Most have X. But there's a decent number that skip without KDE and GNOME. There are at least half a dozen competent window managers that are not nearly as feature-rich as KDE or GNOME but great for running on hardware that would choke on the more resource-intensive pair.
I don't mean to denigrate the hard work done by the KDE and GNOME teams. They were decent a decade ago and are excellent today. But one of the territories where Microsoft's grip is weak is cheaper hardware. I think it's intelligent for Google's OS to tackle this first. I also think it's a place where KDE and GNOME have the least to offer.
Just note how they take the kernel, but avoid to contribute to the GUi arena.
Sounds to me like they're contributing a whole new lightweight OSS GUI layer.
I do agree that their model is all about promoting their non-free software (the proprietary stuff they run on their servers). But on the other hand they're doing nothing to prevent people from writing competing web apps.
The Linux kernel and basic related utilities should be set under the Afero GPL v3 license ASAP!
I'm not sure how that would help. We don't hear of many modifications to the kernel or basic utils, being hoarded by the people who write them and run them on their servers.
Lots of comments here are (rightly) skeptical that individuals will download a new OS.
And yet...
My dad has a Windows laptop that's suffering from inexplicable slowdown syndrome -- my meagre Windows skills couldn't fix it (full defrag, adware and virus scan) and the only solution I can think of is a full Windows reinstall.
He might be wary of a live USB drive of an ordinary Linux distro (even though it would be perfect).
But something with the warm and fuzzy feeling of Google's blessing, even if all it gives him is a fast boot and a browser; that might be enough.
so tivo is a linux distribution?
By any rational definition, yes it is.
The main thing Google has going for them in this is the same one that Microsoft has going for them:
When someone asks 'where do I get an application to write my important documents? spreadsheets? email?', Google can say 'We have that for you', just like Microsoft does, instead of saying 'You can go here, here, there, over there, or somewhere around there to get that'. People like the answers to be simple, and Google is famous for being simple.
Further, since Google claims to be making the browser the focus of the OS, the interface will already be familiar to most of the users, even if the window dressing is a little different from what they're accustomed to (and really, isn't that the case for most users with Microsoft trying to push XP off the side of the road?).
I don't think this will be the end of the road for Microsoft, but I certainly think it has the chance at being more successful in the Netbook space than Linux has been so far.
-PainKilleR-[CE]
I can't fathom why apple chose to create another windowing system rather than use X. I can't fathom why Chrome OS would not use X. X is frikken awesome. Nothing else does what it does and it does everything others do. And it's free. Why the hell not use it? Just to be less featureful?
...
It did work quite well for them. Got them to over 90% browser market share. Now if Google Search starts working slower for the other players we have a new shiny antitrust suit on the works.
Cheers!
Google has one thing that Canonical and Ubuntu even red had doesnt, broad household name recognition
i wage a holy war against the apostrophe.
If it's just a browser drone, then why not use something still slimmer? It doesn't take much in a kernel to run a single application, in fact 64K ought to do it with room to spare-- save rendering jpgs and video.
Bah--- they're not going to support much at a zero cost anyway. It's a community-support ecosystem at best, and trying to teach mom at worst.
This is why it will fail: in reality, it's stupid as you describe it compared to Ubuntu, Xandros, and even wiggy Linux or even Android builds. There is no value as you describe it, unless it's the prospect of throw-away netbooks, and the world has a recycling problem as it is.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
one man's 'clunky' interface is another man's 'horrible, broken, unmaintainable, must-be-rewritten-from-scratch' interface. The reality is that its almost always good enough for its purpose assuming you are prepared to work with it and not assume that everything needs to be 'fixed' by changing them to your preferred programming model.
"But in terms of innovation and functionality, X11 is second to none."
But the main driving force behind network transparency was the particular ecosystem that X was developed for: Centralized processing and relatively dumb terminals. Once computing power is decentralized, you're left with a system that unnecessarily couples networking and windowing.
Imagine the stereotypical average user actually having any comprehension of what you're talking about. If the average user was that computer-savvy, Windows users wouldn't get routinely p0wned to begin with.
Let q be a radix > 1. I am in ur base-q, killing 10 d00ds.
Deep pockets versus deeper pockets. Google's market cap is $125b and Microsoft's is $200b. Not long ago, the gap was larger. Falling PC sales have taken a bite out of Microsoft's revenue. They recently had their first down quarter in their history.
Microsoft still makes 4X the money Google does, though. In 2008, Microsoft earned $17b in net income compared to Google's $4b. Now, $4b is nothing to dismiss, especially when you're using and writing entirely free and open source software, but still, if Google has deep pockets, Microsoft's are even deeper.
See: MSFT and GOOG
.
Google is probably the only company in the world that can generate excitement about a new OS, and making an open platform will encourage software developers to write apps for it. Hasn't that been one of the big complaints, the lack of software for Linux?
Many have tried taking down Microsoft. All have failed. Perhaps Google is finally the David to slay Microsoft's Goliath. Perhaps not. Exciting times, these are.
Microsoft is going after Google's windpipe (search revenue) by releasing bing and now Google goes after Microsoft's windpipe (OS or more importantly OS . hegemony). Exciting times indeed.
While I suspect that the assumption that the application model is going to be dominated by browser-rendered apps, I doubt they'll go "single window". I can very easily see something where Chrome is the only user-facing truly native application, but where, just as with desktop Chrome on conventional OS's, they fully support multiple windows, dragging tabs out to do make new windows (or dragging tabs in to collapse multiple windows into one), etc.
For netbooks, single-window might be sufficient, but it seems from the coverage very clear that Google sees netbooks just as a stepping stone, so I doubt very much that they are aiming this in a way that it will be just barely good enough for netbooks, and not suitable for anything else.
Back when telephones were new, no-one quite knew what they were for. One company came up with a music service. This was before radio, so the idea of piping music to your home was radical. This may seem absurd to us now, but it isn't: radio went the other way. It is entirely possible that we could have built a world where we listened to high-fidelity music by phone, and spoke to our friends by radio. Even in the early 20th century the phone companies didn't get it: they ran campaigns trying dissuade housewives from chatting over the phone, believing that the technology was for Important business use (a few brief, high-cost calls instead of lots of cheap long ones).
I remember when people though computers were giant calculators. Then the computer became personal: it could do your books, teach the kids arithmetic, and keep track of your recipes. (Though why anyone you would want to keep their recipes in a computer was never clear). The hardware companies tried to sell to everyone, but they weren't quite sure how to do it: the truth is, most people had no real need for a computer.
Computer technology isn't personal anymore. It's social. The PC is a phone, not a calculator. That's why everyone needs one. That's what driving development of the technology. Ours is not the only possible path: computers could have remained high-cost devices for use by individuals to produce things or do business. But that was the path not taken. This changes what computers are.
To you, desktop applications may seem superior on the basis of their technical merits. Fair enough. Hollywood seems to see computers and the net as a new broadcast medium, like television, for which the current infrastructure has significant technical failings (privacy, QoS). In their case I hope their vision is never realized. But for many people, these visions are irrelevant. No matter the quality or polish of the applications, no matter the convenience of video-on-demand, for them the technology is technically inferior if it does not fully support communication and social activity. For them - and for me - the cobbled together infrastructure of the Web is far superior - technically superior - because for us it is above all a medium for communication.
Actually, I fear it might NOT be GNU/Chrome. Since they are already creating a new windowing system, what's to say they won't drop the GNU core altogether? After all Android is in top of Linux without any GNU toolchain.
This, ladies and gentlemen, would be the first real fracturation of Linux: one on top of GNU and one on top of ChromeOS.
This is potentially dangerous for Linux.
AC
I don't see how MS Windows' windowing system could be described as a "client/server architecture". Could you elaborate?
Microsoft is welcome to port IE to Linux.
Where is the proof ? I checked git repository of
DirectFB and didn't find any google reference.
Except for the "open source" part. (Yes, I know that parts of OS X are open, but Google's going to do the whole stack.)
Put identity in the browser.
I think I'd be cautious and preserve any interface indefinitely. That being said I'd also be cautious about exposing an interface in the first place for exactly that reason.
The current trend for refactoring, where people spend most of their time rewriting code they've already written once and usally manage break compatibility to boot seems to me to be disasterous.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;