New Chrome Beta Adds Themes, Speed, & HTML 5 Video

adeelarshad82 writes "Google developers are always working on and updating Chrome in three channels — Stable, Beta, and Developer — in increasing positions on the bleeding-edge scale. Today the company thought changes to the Beta channel warranted a post on the main Google Blog. The advances range from the superficial addition of themes for customizing the browser's window borders to even faster speed under the hood to internal support for HTML 5 tags such as <video> and 'web workers,' which allows the browser to divvy processing work among sub-threads."

Comments

Anonymous Coward

[Anonymous Coward]

Using it now, with a sexy theme! Woo!

Still no Adblock though

[Anonymous Coward]

When will google learn that plugins, especially something like adblock, is the killer feature they need to attract the "willing to switch" audience, a lot of whom are using firefox right now. I personally love Chrome for its speed and stability, used it for a week or so, but then switched right back to Firefox because I just didn't realise how it is to do many things in Firefox with extensions such as adblock, no script, autopager, del.icio.us integration etc.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Bashae]

Maybe you're asking a little too much from Google. Remember that a significant share of their revenue comes from web advertising...

Re:Still no Adblock though

[beelsebob]

Yes, when will google learn to add features that block their core business model to their platform for getting at said business.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Anonymous Coward]

There is an Adblock already for 3.0 beta version.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[noundi]

I think mainly people hate the flashing banners (usually made in flash) jumping around the screen. The way google advertises is to me rather harmless. I have no problems with advertisement, it finances many of my favourite services, but when you're forced to dig your way through the ads in order to get to the content someone failed horribly. As far as I know adblock doesn't filter google ads.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Anonymous Coward]

Privoxy is a great tool for filtering ads and other nasty things. Simply install it on your PC, then set it as your proxy server.

http://www.privoxy.org/

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Seth Kriticos]

Adblock is needed because of all those blinking and colourful flash ads that are all around. Googles ads are quite moderate and most people would not mind to see them, so your statement is false.

This would give a lot of people the motivation to switch to Chrome, which would be a gain for Google while not having big add revenue losses (actually they would gain add revenues, as the js cross site google ads would not be blocked any-more).

They're problem is probably, that this would raise anti-competitive questions they want to avoid, so this could only be done with an open plugin system (via trusted third party plugins).

Re:Still no Adblock though

[markkezner]

While plugins would be useful, I think you have the wrong idea about Google's motives with Chrome. Chrome is Google's bid to change the browser market to make it a better platform for their core business, web applications.

Google isn't as concerned with making Firefox users switch to chrome, because they are already using a (mostly) standards compliant browser. IE is the real target. This seems to explain why, if I browse to google.com in IE7, I'm greeted with an ad banner that invites me to give Chrome a try. Google does not do this if I browse with Firefox or Safari.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Blue Stone]

> Remember that a significant share of their revenue comes from web advertising...

No shit

Re:Still no Adblock though

[bunratty]

My impression is that AdBlock Plus for Firefox blocks all ads, or at least tries to block all ads. Chrome seems to block popup ads well, and if there were an extension that blocked just Flash ads that would be good enough for me. The simple text and non-animated graphic ads at the sides of web pages don't bother me.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Anonymous Coward]

What happened to Microsoft was a big lesson for some companies. MS did bad things and everybody on the internet started hating it. So new companies must be careful if they want to do evil. So this is the plan:

1) Invest money in good karma production in order to be able to do evil and not be hated.
2) Generate pseudo-good products
3) flood news sites with announcements
4) have paid fanboys praise $company
5) Generate a false public impression that the general consensus is that $company is good
6) keep doing evil
7) profit.

Google goes as far as hiring famous OSS persons and having them sit around and do nothing, in order to achieve that. Because really, imagine that with all this crap (blocking wget at the google search, youtube flash crap, web2.0 abuse, etc) google would be in a position even worse than MS if it wasn't for those pseudo-oss goodies that flood /. every other day...

Re:Still no Adblock though

[m0i]

www.adsweep.org
just add "--enable-extensions" to your chrome shortcut, then click the extension on the webpage and it will be active right away. now if some people could support the project..

Re:Still no Adblock though

[RocketScientist]

Agreed. If there was a flash block extension and an extension to un-animate animated GIFs and such I'd use chrome. I don't mind Google's ads. Until then, I'll make do with Firefox.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[idlemachine]

There is a lot of active work on extension support for Chrome, so I'm pretty sure Google realise how important this is to people. Despite SO many (still ongoing) claims that Google would make it technically impossible for an adblocking extension to work, one already exists, along with mouse gestures, and a start at integrating with delicious.

Yes, they're all still very rough around the edges, but that's what I'd expect from an extension system in development. Of course, their existence isn't enough to stop people from all kinds of speculative bullshit about Google's plans and motives, but hey, being a geek is all about ego-driven opinion and nada about facts, it seems.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[BlueKitties]

Adblockers were never intended to completely kill ads. Add blockers were intended to tell obnoxious advertisers to stop flooding a webpage with garbage. The idea is that, given enough people blocking bad ads, the makers will pipe down and stop flooding sites with ugly litter. Look at /. -- the ad system is so nice, I don't even feel the need to click "disable ads." I think Google folk probably know this, so I would not be surprised if we get a Chrome adblock soon.

(Then again, I've recently fallen in love with google after discovered Docs/Calender/Etc... ;p)

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Hadlock]

I just use flashblock. Doesn't break the page (creates appropriately sized boxes where the flash ads would be), and has a big play button in the middle in case I need to see it (youtube, for example). And you're not hurting anyone's non-annoying ad revenue.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[clone53421]

Yeah, but they have two options:

• Block everyone else's ads, and appear monopolistic
• Block all ads, including their own, and cut off their own revenue

Either one is rather undesirable from their point of view.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[noundi]

You're absolutely right. You know all these years of adblock usage has made me completely unaware of how much it actually filters.

Adblock off
Adblock on

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Kashgarinn]

"Remember that a significant share of their revenue comes from web advertising..."

- which is the reason why you shouldn't really want an advertising company to control how you look at the internet. Google was a search company, now it is an advertisement company, it gives you access to "free" services plus ads, similar to the "free" TV networks of olde (you know.. the guys who are a part of the **AA bad guys?)

by controlling the browser, they control how you watch the web, and they're not interested in removing ads.

I can predict that Google will be an excellent catalyst for the internet and internet services for many, many years, but people have to realize that they're doing this with the paradigm to increase ad-revenue and so ads, however annoying will never be blocked.

Ad-free-internet-which-generates-revenue isn't here yet for most HTML stuff. It's here for Itunes, and Amazon and poker sites, but information sadly never got away from the "should-be-free" stamp.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[fredjh]

And that's available for Chrome?

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Anonymous Coward]

If they actually blocked all ads that weren't Google's ads, then yes, that would look monopolistic.

But if they just blocked flash-based or animated ads, that would hardly be monopolistic, unless they also try to prevent other advertisers from using Google-style text-based adverts.

Nothing prevents other advertisers from stopping using flash adverts, and the web would be a better place, even for people without ad-blockers, if they did.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[uberjoe]

Chrome does have an adblock like software. Adsweep

Re:Still no Adblock though

[AP31R0N]

Chrome also seems to be a prototype/training platform for the Google OS.

Will Google get in trouble for blocking ads while showing theirs? Users might not mind so much, but advertisers and sites that thrive on ad revenue might.

i'm pleased that they are using the term beta more correctly with Chrome.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[bazonic]

Chrome is Google's bid to change the browser market to make it a better platform for their core business, web applications.

Web applications are not their core business. Everything Google does - search, mobile data centers, Android, IPTV, Chrome, and yes, web apps, are all funnels and compliments to the thing that drives their cashflow - advertising. Everything they do is an effort to get a specific, targeted ad in front of your eyeballs. They do a lot of cool projects and experimenting, and from that other things will grow, but it all comes back to ads.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[ciderVisor]

4) have paid fanboys praise $company

???

Profit for Meeeeeeeee !

Re:Still no Adblock though

[nine-times]

Yeah, when you get down to it, Firefox is just Google's other unofficial browser. AFAIK an awful lot of Firefox's funding comes from Google anyway, and Firefox still uses Google by default. It doesn't hurt Google for users to have lots of options in browsers, just so long as they all use Google for their search bar.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Aquaseafoam]

Interestingly, you had longer load times with Adblock on than off.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[markkezner]

You are right, of course, about targeted ads being Google's real meat and potatoes. Their web applications (a category which, I think, includes Google Search) are a means to that end.

I thought that this would be obvious to most of the Slashdot crowd, so I didn't see the need to state it explicitly.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[bazonic]

You would think it is obvious but I have had the debate a few times recently with Slashdot-type people about what Google really is. It is a fascinating discussion.
 
If I am in an airport using my netbook with Chrome OS and the Chrome browser, checking gmail and Google Docs, and I log into Facebook on my Android phone (I use an iPhone, but play along), there will come a day when an ad will pop up, "hey bazonic, like that cougar in the blue dress sitting across the aisle from you? she works in technology too, a DB guru to be exact. wanna start a chat?" I look up and she's on her Android phone too.
 
Google will drive the Minority Report-type world were are entering. There will be a ton of useful things that come from that world. It's spooky to be sure, but it's going to interesting to watch.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Tubal-Cain]

That was Google's time. I just did the same search and got 0.37 seconds.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[bonch]

Adblock is needed because of all those blinking and colourful flash ads that are all around. Googles ads are quite moderate and most people would not mind to see them, so your statement is false.

Another Google fanboy pulling an erroneous conclusion out of thin air. You don't know what "most people" would want. It's common sense that ideally, people don't want ANY ads. It's no surprise that Chrome doesn't support it.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[bonch]

While plugins would be useful, I think you have the wrong idea about Google's motives with Chrome. Chrome is Google's bid to change the browser market to make it a better platform for their core business, web applications.

Chrome is an attempt to increase Google's advertising space, giving them more eyeballs by bringing people to their search engine and other services. In other words, it's an attempt to tie people to all their branded services, Microsoft-style, but people on Slashdot won't criticize them for it because there's a huge bias against Microsoft and in favor of Google.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[joelpt]

I think it's fair to say Google is aware of the demand for extensions, since the dev channel version of Chrome currently has support for it.
http://www.killertechtips.com/2009/05/13/download-sample-google-chrome-extensions/

Of course the extensions are still rather primitive, but they do work.

Ad blocker: http://adsweep.org or http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/46974
Flashblock: http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/46673
Delicious & Twitter: http://www.chromeplugins.org/extensions/lightweight-delicious-bookmarks-twitter-chritter-extensions-released/
Facebook: http://www.chromeplugins.org/extensions/facebook-notifications-facebook-shortcut-extensions/
Mouse gestures: http://www.chromeplugins.org/extensions/chrome-gestures-google-chrome-mouse-gestures-extension/

I should probably put this comment onto my clipboard pastelist, seeing as how the "no Adblock" comment is ubiquitous on virtually every blog post concerning Chrome on the web (closely followed by the uninformed "no Mac" and "no Linux" comments).

Of course, a quick Google search would have revealed all of this ...

Re:Still no Adblock though

[thetoadwarrior]

Why do you need to block ads? Most sites I visit don't have annoying ads. But then I don't visit porn sites (that's what file sharing is for), warez sites or anything else questionable and I don't visit the sort of sites were gullible AOL users are known to hang out. These sorts of places are prime areas to find lame ads.

Rather than bulking out your browser with add-ons to avoid these ads, try moving up evolutionary ladder and quit being a mouth breather. You'll find it's much better.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[BikeHelmet]

Maybe you're asking a little too much from Google. Remember that a significant share of their revenue comes from web advertising...

They could add an Adblock with the following criteria:

-Blocks flash ads.
-Blocks ads when they take up a large percentage of the page(say, over 10%)

This would eliminate ads on most other sites and search engines, without interfering with them.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Youngbull]

Chrome is an attempt to increase Google's advertising space, giving them more eyeballs by bringing people to their search engine and other services. In other words, it's an attempt to tie people to all their branded services, Microsoft-style, but people on Slashdot won't criticize them for it because there's a huge bias against Microsoft and in favor of Google.

Ehm.... and that chrome mostly got the security stuff right, is open source, is damn fast and has made versions for linux and Mac has nothing to do with slashdotters feeling at least indifferent to it (I mean there is enough of people that have whined about the lack of adblock, rss support, etc.)... Oh and by the way I do think that GPL is not a copyright licence (although it technically is) since it's main goal is to preserve the users right. read about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyleft

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Goaway]

Except they have explicitly mentioned AdBlock as something they want to support through their in-development extension system.

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Hadlock]

What's chrome?
 
That was the first thing that went through my head. Call me old and crotchity (at age 25) but I'm done with bleeding edge software (unless it's the only free version and I need it right NOW). I'm a little suprised Chrome doesn't have a FF extension compatibility layer built in from the get-go. I'll consider Chrome when they hit v1.5 or so and stop adding functionality and start working on stability (Firefox hit this stage around the 2.0 stage).

Re:Still no Adblock though

[lilmunkysguy]

Citation here: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10110247-2.html Technical details here (I think): http://dev.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/extensions/gleam-api

Re:Still no Adblock though

[Kingrames]

There's a version of SR Iron out there, which is basically the open version of Chrome. It has an ad-blocking option available to it. It functions much like an altered hosts file, blocking ad content for you. It's not the same, and feels more like hacking your own version of the browser than installing a mod, but hey! This is Slashdot!

Re:Still no Adblock though

[dirtyhippie]

Don't forget about google admanager, which is perfectly happy to serve third party ads that are flash, popups, etc. Google's text ads are not its only source of revenue.

Yes...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but does it run (on) Linux?

Re:Yes...

[ashraya]

Yes it does (Not the crappy wine one). There is a beta native version I use regularly, and on 32-bit it even does plugins (Flash)... However, I got myself a 64-bit comp these days, and it does not run plugins on that one... It feels much faster than Firefox on Linux...

Re:Yes...

[IBBoard]

Themes sound promising in terms of not having the ugly Chrome look standing out like a sore thumb against the rest of my GTK themed apps, but 64-bit is the killer. That plus the fact that they can't be bothered to make a simple RPM of it and only want to deliver a DEB. It's a shame, because I'd be interested to see how well it works and how much faster it is, especially on my quad core at work.

Re:Yes...

[Rhapsody Scarlet]

I would certainly image it does feel faster than Firefox on Linux x64. As per bug #489146, TraceMonkey is still not enabled on x64 Linux builds. This does make it feel rather sluggish on any page with serious amounts of JavaScript (i.e. any Slashdot story), and is something that really bugs me about the 3.5 release. I'm sure I'll really enjoy it someday, but not until I can actually use the biggest enhancement of the release.

Re:Yes...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes it does (Not the crappy wine one). There is a beta native version I use regularly

I, for one, do not believe Google would release anything in BETA.

Does it install in the right place?

[Midnight Thunder]

Has Google managed to get Chrome install in the "program files" director yet? The fact that it installs in "application settings" is the number one reason I can't install it.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[mrak_attack]

Installation to the "App Data" folder makes it possible to instill Chrome by users without Admin rights. For installation into Program Files you need admin rights or special permissions tweaking.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting - I never noticed that before. Thanks for sharing.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Anonymous Coward]

Huh, actually it's the reason you *should* be able to install it, as it makes it possible for users without administrator privileges to complete the install. Your network administrator messed up the settings, I suppose.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[lukas84]

Err, no. He probably made it impossible to run executables from non-trusted locations.

Seems very, very reasonable to me.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[TJamieson]

It also enables the seamless autoupdating for non-Admin users.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[The Moof]

I imagine trying to circumvent IT policies isn't winning anyone over in a corporate setting. It's probably doing the opposite. Crazy as it sounds, those IT restrictions are there for a reason, and we don't want people installing and running their own software.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Midnight Thunder]

Err, no. He probably made it impossible to run executables from non-trusted locations.

The exact reason is that while I have local admin rights, at the office and permission to install it, it conflicts with the rules for McAfee and for that I have don't have access or the permission to change its permissions. The settings for that are controlled by the company's security division and from previous experience getting water from a stone would be easier.

If Chrome installed in program files then I would not have these issues. The work around is simply to use SRWare Iron, which is probably not such a bad thing anyhow.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Blakey Rat]

A recent World of Warcraft patch moved the entire game into "AppData" as well, they claimed it was a "necessity" for Windows Vista 64-bit compatibility.

WOW *does* incorrectly keep Add-Ons in Program Files, so what was happening is that some Vista users (depending on their permissions) were getting their Add-Ons installed into the fake Program Files folder that Vista keeps around for retarded software written by retarded developers who don't understand permissions. The solution to their problem was to move *just* the Add-Ons folder to where it should have been all along, not the whole multi-GB game! Idiots.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[shutdown -p now]

It's not a circumvention of IT policies. Google is actually playing nice, and using the standard mechanisms provided by Windows to install per-user - which is also something that's encouraged (not as a sole way of installation, though). In any case, I'm not an admin, but I'd be surprised if you couldn't disable this via group policies or something similar.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[shutdown -p now]

The exact reason is that while I have local admin rights, at the office and permission to install it, it conflicts with the rules for McAfee and for that I have don't have access or the permission to change its permissions. The settings for that are controlled by the company's security division and from previous experience getting water from a stone would be easier.

Per-user applications are a Windows feature, and Google is doing it properly according to Windows development guidelines. If your security division is not aware of this, and have misconfigured your system so that this feature doesn't work (while machine-wide install does), then you only have them to blame. The software is working as intended (by both the application developer, and the OS developer).

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Anonymous Coward]

It also enables the seamless autoupdating for non-Admin users.

Yeah, I love it when trojans seamlessly update my web browser executable to grab my login info. It's so much more convenient than having to click "Accept" on a UAC prompt to let them do it.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Anonymous Coward]

I imagine trying to circumvent IT policies isn't winning anyone over in a corporate setting. It's probably doing the opposite. Crazy as it sounds, those IT restrictions are there for a reason, and we don't want people installing and running their own software.

If you want to prevent users from running software then you need to deny them from executing all binaries that aren't on a white list. In a Unix environment you can mount writable directories with "noexec". Pretending you're locking down your environment from rogue code because your users can't write to c:\Program Files is just bad security.

Google is writing software allowed by your current security policies. Change your policies or deal with it.

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[Goaway]

Apparently he didn't actually do that, if it installs and runs, yes?

Re:Does it install in the right place?

[geek]

God forbid users run "their own software"

I'd hate to work in your company if you're that anal about what users are doing in their USER space.

Still not a Chrome user

[BadAnalogyGuy]

The first thing that really got me about Chrome was how well it seemed to learn my browsing habits. At least, that was my first impression when I booted it up. The first view you get in Chrome is the "most visited websites" page or something like that. As a incognito porn site surfer, I was really taken aback and worried about privacy issues.

It took a long time in Firefox to fix the URL history functionality. It used to keep the URLs in some cache so that it could be called up right away when you started entering a URL into the address bar. Now, the URLs at least seem like they are gone forever when you delete them from your History.

IE still has this problem (in addition to completely retarded address bar behavior). In fact, if you delete the entire browsing history at once, the URLs themselves can never be deleted except by completely clearing the cache, but then that also deletes the "cover" sites that I visit to make it seem like my surfing is just innocuous browsing and not the hardcore porn viewing which it ostensibly is.

So if Chrome wants my patronage, I think the first thing it needs to do is convince me that my personal privacy is safe. That my URLs aren't going to be cached and exposed at some inopportune time, and that it isn't tracking them for me to helpfully find other related websites.

In this way, I've found Firefox to be the most accommodating browser on the market today. It does what I want and doesn't try to be smart about it. Funny how so many things in life work better that way.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[mdwh2]

IIRC, you can switch that off, and instead have a more usual homepage for new tabs.

and that it isn't tracking them for me to helpfully find other related websites.

All websites keep track of the websites you've visted - it's called a History. Do you have evidence that Chrome remembers sites, even after clearing the history or whatever?

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[ethebubbeth]

Just put chrome into Incognito Mode (ctrl+shift+n, or do it from the menu). That accomplishes the same thing as Mozilla Firefox in Private Browsing mode and should prevent it from storing history while you porn surf.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

1. start chrome
2. hit ctrl+shift+n
3. ??? (whatever it is you do)

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[BadAnalogyGuy]

I don't like the Private Browsing Mode of Firefox that much either since I want to leave some trace that I had used the browser, I just don't want to leave certain sites in the history.

also... s/ostensibly/invariably/;

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[craagz]

If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss Bank. - Woody Allen

Swiss banks use numbered accounts!

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[mumb0.jumb0]

As a incognito porn site surfer, I was really taken aback and worried about privacy issues.

Interesting choice of words. Chrome has an "incognito mode". From the blurb shown when you open the browser in that mode:

Pages that you view in this window won't appear in your browser history or search history, and they won't leave other traces, like cookies, on your computer after you close the incognito window. Any files that you download or bookmarks that you create will be preserved, however.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Get on the boat]

As a incognito porn site surfer, I was really taken aback and worried about privacy issues.

Wait ...what. You mentioned key word incognito, which IS the 'private' browsing mode in Chrome that doesn't keep history or cookies, etc. exactly as you wanted.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[BadAnalogyGuy]

That is actually very interesting and compelling.

I may have to give Chrome another chance. How does it handle porn sites with malicious javascript? I use NoScript in FF to protect against browser hijackings. Does Chrome have a problem there?

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[mdm-adph]

Then load up one window in Incognito mode, and another window that's not. I really don't know what you're complaining about. :\

If you're looking for absolute privacy, don't use the web. Otherwise, Incognito-mode is about as good as it gets (just remember to clear out your Flash cookies from time to time, the browser doesn't control those).

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Clarious]

But sometimes I want Chrome to remember login information & history so I browse it back later,. The sites I browse is in the 'gray' zone, it isn't porno or something despicable, but I still do not want other to know about it.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[karstux]

Well, first off Chrome is famous for its sandboxing concept. Each tab is a process in its own sandbox, so in theory, any compromisation of the browser stays contained. If it's pop up windows you worry about, these are confined to the tab that (attempts to) open them. So if a page opens a billion pop ups - just close that tab and it's all gone. Chrome even has its own task manager where you can kill processes on a per-page or plugin basis.

It's quite neat, really.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Frankenshteen]

Use the incognito window - sounds like a lot of folks at google must've had you in mind.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

Chrome works fine to browse in and rack up a "legit" set of sites visited. It does not (or has not in my case) cross with Incognito mode. If you close your Incognito windows and open a new one, the browsing history from the previous is gone. Also, incognito mode does not show those 9 "most viewed" sites option.

Interestingly enough, Google Toolbar now provides that same 9-panel service to IE (which is all we use where I work). Given enough time, the toolbar might be able to run Chrome inside IE, hah!

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

You may not be as incognito as you think, if you're usually logged into slashdot, and you post about your porn habits.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[harmonise]

Just create a new Firefox profile for porn surfing. You can then run that profile with "firefox -p <profilename>".

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

Chrome is incapable of disabling javascript in any way that I could see.
It also doesn't have "Clear Recent History" - Ctrl Shift Delete - in case you forgot to go into private browsing mode. Firefox does. Btw, in Firefox 3.5 you no longer need an extension to get the awesome bar to behave like 2.0:
Edit -> Preferences, "Privacy" section, at the bottom for "when using the location bar, suggest:" choose "History" from the dropdown.
In about:config do the following
Change the value of browser.urlbar.matchBehavior to 3
Change the value of browser.urlbar.default.behavior to 17
Change the values of both browser.urlbar.match.url and
browser.urlbar.restrict.typed to empty strings

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

*Some* Swiss banks offer that as a premium service, and they're still associated with a name in the bank's records.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

none of these incognito and inprivate modes address the traces flash leaves in your user macromedia #SharedObjects folder

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[thetoadwarrior]

Don't look at child porn and you'll be fine.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[thetoadwarrior]

Then don't do everything in incognito mode.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[Anonymous Coward]

Firefox supports deleting individual history entries...just start typing the URL into the location bar and when it shows up in the auto-complete options below, scroll down to it and hit SHIFT+DELETE. I don't think Chrome supports this yet, but you can delete the browsing history for any one day by viewing the history page (CTRL+H) and choosing the day you want to delete.

These options combined with the private/incognito browsing modes should meet your needs.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[StellarFury]

You people are fucking parrots. The real solution is for Google to give people the option of disabling their retarded new tab page, as they should have from Day One.

Re:Still not a Chrome user

[thetoadwarrior]

It's open source so sort it out yourself since no one else is bothered about it.

Re:Idiot

[Anonymous Coward]

Ah I understand...
Looking at those flashing, blinking ads all day long would turn me into an angry frothing grumbler too...

Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[argent]

Or are they still putting them in the wrong place?

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[paziek]

How do you define "wrong"? I for one like it when new tab is opened next to the current one, instead of the last. Am I liking it wrong?

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[argent]

How do you define "wrong"?

Tabs go above the content that is part of the tab.

The address bar is not part of the tab.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[Anonymous Coward]

how is the address bar not part of the tab? It displays the url only for the current tab. By your logic, if I type an address into the bar, all my tabs should go to that site.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since each tab could possibly contain content belonging to different addresses, one could argue this point.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[cparker15]

Different != Wrong

In my opinion, it makes more sense for the address bar to be part of the tab, because the address of the page has a 1:1 relationship with the page you're viewing.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[argent]

There are several widgets on the address bar, none of which change in layout or behavior depending on which tab you're on, and only one of which changes its contents... and they're ALL "part of the tab"? Give mea break.

If you want to put your tabs somewhere weird, be my guest, but not giving me an option to put it back is a complete deal-killer for me. It drives me crazy. I quit using Opera when they started doing that, and I'm not going to bother even looking at Chrome until they fix it.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[shutdown -p now]

If you want to put your tabs somewhere weird, be my guest, but not giving me an option to put it back is a complete deal-killer for me. It drives me crazy. I quit using Opera when they started doing that

Just FYI, you can configure Opera to have tabs below address bar if you want. Go into Appearance, enable "Main Bar" - which is displayed above tabs - and then drag the address field (and Back/Forward, and whatever else you want there) onto it. Then hide the address bar completely.

By the way, I'm not sure what you mean by Opera "starting doing it", because Opera tabs were always positioned above the address bar by default. Everyone else followed it from there... Well, in much older versions (like Opera 6, IIRC), the tabs were actually positioned at the bottom, mimicking the taskbar.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[FrostDust]

There are several widgets on the address bar, none of which change in layout or behavior depending on which tab you're on, and only one of which changes its contents... and they're ALL "part of the tab"?

You can't understand that some people might see things differently than you? If you want to imagine the relations, look at a toolbar button as a "tool", and a tab as a "place". Then it's just a difference between if someone prefers picking a "tool", and then using it on a "place", or going to the "place" first, and picking a "tool" to use there.

If you want to put your tabs somewhere weird, be my guest, but not giving me an option to put it back is a complete deal-killer for me. It drives me crazy. I quit using Opera when they started doing that,

Opera may default differently than you'd like, but if you want to change it to "tabs below address bar", it's been doable since at least 2006.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[argent]

You can't understand that some people might see things differently than you?

Sure. That's why the position of the tabs should be an option.

As I already pointed out.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[Goaway]

Uh, pretty much all the widgets below the tab bar affect the current tab, and none of the others. Their placement makes perfect sense.

Re:Have they fixed the tabs yet?

[argent]

Quoting one of your fellow Chrome fans, "You can't understand that some people might see things differently than you?"

The stuff in the tab, for me, is "what changes when you change to a new tab". If it's in all the tabs, I don't want it in any of them.

Make it an option, I'll try Chrome. Force me to take it or leave it, I'll leave it.

Who needs a window manager

[IceFox]

After all of Ben's ranting about how inconstant Linux is I am sure glad they choose to turn on the silly blue boarder by default on Linux. Because now it really fits into every Linux desktop. Yah for branding. http://groups.google.com/group/chromium-dev/browse_thread/thread/b89ab99a0c848b89#

Smooth scrolling yet?

[psymastr]

Does it have smooth scrolling and adblock yet? If not then I can't move. Especially after the huge speedup in FF 3.5.

Re:Smooth scrolling yet?

[TREE]

How can you *stand* smooth scrolling? It's so slow!

It's one of the first things I turn off, in any app.

Re:Smooth scrolling yet?

[gardyloo]

Agreed. Smooth-scrolling feels mushy, like a 1977 Lincoln Continental.

Re:Smooth scrolling yet?

[H0p313ss]

How can you *stand* smooth scrolling? It's so slow!

Works on my machine(s)! (TM)

Re:Smooth scrolling yet?

[Joe Tie.]

No idea on the smooth scrolling, can't stand it myself. But adsweep, pretty similar to the adblock extension on firefox, was one of the very first functional 3rd party extensions created for chromium.

Re:Smooth scrolling yet?

[BikeHelmet]

I remember when my computer got locked up because of Smooth Scrolling.

It was years ago, in Win98. An IE window had an endless loop pumping out new lines, and the browser was trying to scroll to the bottom. It locked up explorer, so I had to reboot.

Thankfully that isn't possible in Win2k and up.

Re:Smooth scrolling yet?

[geek]

Privoxy does the trick with Chrome. It's not perfect but if you like the speed and minimalist interface, Privoxy solves the adblock issue.

I refuse to use a browser that phones home..

[KlaasVaak]

I'm just not going to give google more info about me by using their browser.

Re:I refuse to use a browser that phones home..

[Anonymous Coward]

Give SRware Iron a try. It's Google Chrome without the Google.

Re:I refuse to use a browser that phones home..

[LordLimecat]

You could use the chromium based SRWare Iron, which has that crap stripped out, allows adblocking, etc etc

Re:I refuse to use a browser that phones home..

[Anonymous Coward]

You can disable that. Also, using privoxy will greatly reduce the ads you see.

Re:I refuse to use a browser that phones home..

[KlaasVaak]

No you cannot. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Chrome#Usage_tracking

Re:I refuse to use a browser that phones home..

[curunir]

FWIW, at one of the sessions at Google I/O, a Chrome dev offered a reason for why they do that. From what he said, Chrome will use usage patterns from other Chrome users to pre-fetch DNS results of likely off-site links. For example, a Chrome user that views this story will likely have their browser find DNS results for googleblog.blogspot.com and www.appscout.com prior to clicking on either of those two links since a significant proportion of previous visitors will have clicked on those links. Of course, [insert joke about no one RTFA here].

From his whole presentation, I got the distinct impression that Chrome developers are almost blindly focused on performance, often to a fault. I do wish that Chrome gave you the ability to turn off some of these optimizations, but I can appreciate Google's attempts to make a browser that is as fast as can be. Given Chrome's current position as mainly a concept browser that's pushing other vendors to improve performance, I like that Chrome developers are trying anything and everything to make browsing faster. That doesn't mean that I'll use Chrome as my primary browser any time soon, but there's no denying that Firefox and Safari are better browsers today due in part to Chrome, so for that I'm happy.

NoScript and Adblock

[pzs]

I'm a not-very-happy Firefox user, since I find it has horrendous memory leaks. I can get it up to 2GB virtual memory in a morning's average browsing. Yes, I have tried the tips on the Mozilla site.

However, I have become addicted to a controlled web experience with NoScript and Adblock. I won't be switching to Chrome until I can get similar tools.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[pmontra]

However, I have become addicted to a controlled web experience with NoScript and Adblock. I won't be switching to Chrome until I can get similar tools.

Me too!

About the memory leaks, Firefox 3.0 solved that for me on Windows and I'm using a lot of extensions. I'm on Linux now so this might be totally different beast. Did you try disabling one extension per day and checking the level of your RAM after browsing all the day?

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Krneki]

How the hell can you get such memory leak? I'd consider myself a power Internet user, yet I never manage to get past 400Mb.

Tell me your secret.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Clarious]

In all 4 years I have been using Firefox, I have never seen it went pass 800MBs RAM, even with the heaviest browsing (about 70+ tabs), so I can't understand why people complains so much about it consuming too much ram :-/ Sure it consume quite a bit of ram with normal browsing (171MB with 10 tabs open on Linux right now) but I haven't seen any memory leak yet. I also tend to keep Firefox open for several days too.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[pzs]

I only use AdBlock and NoScript and there are no issues listed.

I do run a lot of windows, rather than tabs - usually half a dozen, some with sub-tabs, spread across many virtual desktops. Still, I've been running Firefox for about 4 or 5 hours today and it looks like this:

  3206 pzs 20 0 1132m 639m 28m R 1 8.1 92:38.58 firefox

which seems very high.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Anonymous Coward]

However, I have become addicted to a controlled web experience with NoScript and Adblock. I won't be switching to Chrome until I can get similar tools.

Then I don't think you will be using Chrome anytime soon. Javascript and ads are everything when talking about Google.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Noam.of.Doom]

I've had bad memory leaks using FF 3 under an Ubuntu x64, but 3.5 solved it all. The usage never tops 120~M these days, even after running the same instance for a week or so.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[pzs]

Man, there must be something seriously broken with my (vanilla Ubuntu) install. I regularly have to kill Firefox because it's causing my 8GB machine to hit the swap.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Tom9729]

What version of Firefox are you using?

I've experienced memory leaks in the past, but recently I've been using Firefox 3.5 (on Fedora 11) and Firefox doesn't get over a few hundred megabytes. That's with 7-8 tabs running for several weeks straight.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[imakemusic]

Two slashdot pages at once.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[buchner.johannes]

It would be a shame if those MBs of RAM would be lying around unused! If
the browser can cache something you might still need, why not store it on a
if-another-app-needs-the-space-I'll-free-it level?

Seriously, I only have problems when I use adobe flash.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[pzs]

Thanks for the tip. I'm using it now. We'll see how it goes.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Anonymous Coward]

you can try to tweak some stuff in about:config, for example browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can figure out how to use this let us know.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[PieSquared]

Hrm... I've got three slashdot pages open right now in two windows with a total of 15 extensions and I'm at 103MB memory. So... nope. There's something else going on.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[pmontra]

Oh I see. I'm running Firefox 3.5 like this (I'm on Linux too):

1213m 272m 43m R

and this is not a problem. The first figure 1213 MB includes also libraries shared with other programs. 272 MB is how much memory Firefox is using on its own. 639 MB for you, which is quite a lot but if you have a lot of tabs and windows it should be expected.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[maxume]

Sounds like it, I've apparently had FF 3.5 (on XP) open since July 19th. Peak private bytes are around 550 MB, and private bytes are currently around 340 MB. It has consumed 17 hours of CPU time (which is probably a more telling measure of 'use' than how long it has been open).

I have browser.sessionhistory.max_total_viewers set to 3, but I don't think that has a huge impact on memory use. I also have the safebrowsing features turned off.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[imakemusic]

Try enabling joke detection

:D

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Krneki]

lol

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[wilsoniya]

I can get it up to 2GB virtual memory in a morning's average browsing.

(emphasis mine)

Virtual memory has no real bearing on the quantity of physical ram occupied by an application. Virtual memory is a large, expandable, virtually contiguous slice of memory provided by your OS's memory manager. What you're looking for is resident memory. My current FF3.5 session is 'using' 973 MB virtual memory but in reality only 163 MB physical (resident).

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Anonymous Coward]

There is one thing that can make my firefox hit the swap on this 4GB ram 64bit system: adobe flash. There was, for example, one news ticker at asahi.com that made it go completely berserk every time it loaded.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[LordLimecat]

What plugins are you using? What addons? Those affect it, you know.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Achoi77]

the ff addons that I find to be the biggest culprit for memory leaks are Webdeveloper and Firebug.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[Archibald Buttle]

Back in the mists of time when I used to care about filtering out ads (I was on a dial-up connection) I'd run a Privoxy proxy server. Was very effective at ad blocking. Works with any browser, and runs on almost all OSs too.

Quick google search shows that Privoxy is still going strong.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[BikeHelmet]

Both of those addons leak memory like crazy.

A big part of that memory usage is probably caused by them. I bet you wouldn't leak to 2GB nearly as fast, if you disabled your addons. Mind you, your browsing experience would be degraded.

Re:NoScript and Adblock

[kamatsu]

Alot of tabs and windows in Chromium, which is less memory efficient than Firefox usually, is less ram than that. Way less.

I want a Mac beta of that

[Stephan Seidt]

Although I like them, I see no point in using alternative webkit-based browsers like Stainless or Shiira. I'd definitely give Chrome a try, though - their extra efforts really make it worth!

Re:I want a Mac beta of that

[Jugalator]

Yes, I may switch from Firefox for work (Windows) and home (Mac) if they only got the Mac version more mature. I can still not even drag my bookmarks on the bookmarks bar, and such basic things. Besides, I find the touchpad scrolling much more sluggish in Chrome for Mac than Firefox for Mac, for some reason. It's a bit annoying, because it's a wonderful browser on Windows.

Re:I want a Mac beta of that

[saddino]

The point of using (now and even after Chrome is released) Stainless is its nifty "parallel sessions" feature (i.e. log into the same site with different accounts simultaneously) -- something Chrome, FF and Safari don't have.

Re:I want a Mac beta of that

[Goaway]

http://www.google.com/chrome/intl/en/eula_dev.html?dl=mac

Themes.

[mdwntr]

I like to think that themes for individual applications died out in the nineties.

Re:Themes.

[Culture20]

I'm glad I'm not the only one that felt winamp needed to grow up and wear a suit and tie.

Re:Themes.

[Ant P.]

Nope - Windows is still going strong.

Try it yourself: can you think of five third-party win32 apps that actually use the standard UI? See if you can do the same for first-party ones without counting notepad...

Firefox

[Anonymous Coward]

I use Firefox and will never in my lifetime use a browser made by a data collector like Google.

Big deal

[Anonymous Coward]

Firefox 3.5 had this ages ago. Fawn over Google, Google, Google at the price of forgetting the achievements of others.

It is tied to i386 somehow

[Ilgaz]

It is being x86 only means that it will never ship for ARM, Symbian. It is a show stopper for me since I heavily use smart phones, powerpc machines etc. for browsing.

I know the OS X developer and he is a nice person who doesn't drop PPC support for nothing. If it is not supported, it must have a reason. i386 ASM? Whatever. I don't want to rant too much about a browser which I can't use 3 of my 6 machines anyway.

Re:It is tied to i386 somehow

[kamatsu]

It's the v8 engine. If you use Nitro or something instead, your JS is slower but it works on all platforms - Android does this.

What's the video codec ?

[C0vardeAn0nim0]

are they supporting theora (like firefox) or just h.264 ? both would be great, of course.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[Locklin]

I just noticed the latest chromium update on Linux requires ffmpeg. It will be funny if Chromium/Linux supports all formats while Chrome only supports h.264 by default.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[JoeCool1986]

Supposedly both (check last paragraph)

Re:What's the video codec ?

[Piranhaa]

IIRC, Chrome will support both Ogg/Vorbis. Apple is only supporting h264 in Safari, while FFox will only support Ogg/Vorbis. When h264 gets added to a browser, royalties need to be paid (which is why Mozilla won't go that route). Google is happy to pay and Apple doesn't want Ogg/Vorbis because it doesn't support hardware decoding (same reason why iPhone doesn't support flash).

Re:What's the video codec ?

[nine-times]

Last I heard, Chrome was supposed to support both Theora and h264. I think it's the only browser doing that-- Firefox is Theora only, Safari is "whatever Quicktime supports" which doesn't include Theora unless you install the codec. I'm not sure what Opera is doing, though.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[quantic_oscillation7]

google buyed On2 the ones that give xiph.org the beginning of theora, so patents are not an issue, apple should use it!

Re:What's the video codec ?

[Tangent128]

Pretty sure they were going with Theora.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[donatzsky]

First, it's not Ogg/Vorbis but Ogg Vorbis. Second, Vorbis is the audio codec whereas (Ogg) Theora is the video codec.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Both. For <audio>, MP3 and OGG. To get audio/video working in Chromium, you may have to copy the ffmpeg binaries avcodec-52.dll, avformat-52.dll and avutil-50.dll to the install folder.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[Anonymous Coward]

They use FFMPEG so it supports most video codecs.

Re:What's the video codec ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm.. Did you at least understand the basis of his comment? Cause I did.

You perfectionist bastard

AdSweep != AdBlock+

[rshol]

Downloaded the latest Chrome Beta (3.0.195.4), installed AdSweep, failed to be impressed. AdSweep loads ads the first time you visit a page in a session then erases them, highly annoying. The biggest problem I had was that I failed to notice any speed difference between Chrome and Firefox 3.5.2 on the sites I visit. If anything my non-scientific observation was that with AdSweep loaded, Chrome was significantly slower than Firefox.

Re:AdSweep != AdBlock+

[lzap]

Well thats the way AdSweep works. The extensions API does not allow to hook up events before pages get rendered yet.

Re:AdSweep != AdBlock+

[Shihar]

If you want to notice a speed difference, go find a website with a lot of links to videos. Now open two dozen tabs with video behind them quickly. For me, running an older computer, Firefox chokes and dies. Chrome barely stutters.

For the 1000000 time use Srware IRON for adblock

[blahbooboo]

When will google learn that plugins, especially something like adblock, is the killer feature they need to attract the "willing to switch" audience, a lot of whom are using firefox right now. I personally love Chrome for its speed and stability, used it for a week or so, but then switched right back to Firefox because I just didn't realise how it is to do many things in Firefox with extensions such as adblock, no script, autopager, del.icio.us integration etc.

Oh here we go again! :)

SRWare Iron is the same browser as Google Chrome except it has all the privacy concerns removed.

IT ALSO HAS ADBLOCK SUPPORT.

SRWare Iron - http://www.srware.net/en/software_srware_iron.php ADBLOCKER SUPPORT: "11.10.2008: Adblocker integrated in Iron

The wish of many users comes true: We integrated an Adblocker in Iron! With a filterlist so nearly all online-advertising can be blocked. A working list can bedownloaded here and just has to be copied to the Iron folder (e.g: C:\Program Files\SRWare Iron\). Note: You must first get the latest version of Iron you can find under "Downloads". So Iron is the first Chromium based webbrowser worldwide which has an adblocker included."

Here is the link to download the latest adblock.ini file http://www.srware.net/downloads/adblock.ini

See my post above Srware iron

[blahbooboo]

Fun fun fun. lol. I love always telling people about Srware Iron. It's awesome.

Re:Idiot

[silent_artichoke]

AC was laughing so hard on the floor, he got dyslexia in his ROFL!

Use SRWare Iron for AdBlock

[bunratty]

If you want Adblock, I think I heard somewhere that SRWare Iron supports it.

I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

I hate the flashing banners, pop ups, pop unders, and distracting flash animations etc as much as anyone. But I do not mind the content providers making a little money selling my eye ball time, if the ads are not distracting and if the ad load is not too much.

In the non-cyber world, we all accept ads in the magazines and newspapers, realizing the subsidy they provide to the mags and papers. Same way here.

I wish there is a way to set my browser agent to tell the websites something like:

Will accept text ads.

Will reject all animations gif, flash or javascript.

Will allow 20% of screen real estate to ads.

Content load time not less than 0.33 times ad load time.

Currently looking for ads with keywords : digital camera, DVD cases/sleeves, air tickets to India

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[nine-times]

Yeah, I'd like to set something like that in my browser, not just for my own ad-blocking, but I almost want to notify the websites: I am blocking your ads because they're big, slow-loading flash ads. Give me static images or text and I won't block them.

Or what I almost, not really but *almost* want to be able to do is do it on a per-site basis. To be able to send the message to one website, "I'll accept animated GIFs because your site is awesome, but I won't load Flash files for any reason," and tell another website, "Meh, you kind of rot but I just happened across your site by accident. No ad revenue for you." Of course, it would require a lot of work to set that up, even if I had the opportunity to do it.

And yes, I suppose I could send website emails, but I'd just be one nutjob sending an email, and I wouldn't think it'd do much. What I mean is, it'd be nice if we could all register our frustration in a simple, quick way that would be quantifiable to webmasters, maybe it would improve the situation. Like if someone could look at a set of numbers and say, "Look, if we use Flash, then 40% of our visitors will just block all of our ads, but if we use static images that only take up 14% of the display area, then only 20% will block those images," then maybe websites would actually be less annoying about ads.

Sorry if I'm just pushing us off-topic.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[jeti]

My setup comes pretty close:

1. Install Firefox
2. Install the FlashBlock addon (https://addons.mozilla.org/de/firefox/addon/433)
3. Type about:config in the address bar and set image.animation_mode to once (you have to type the value in)

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[Tubal-Cain]

Give me static images or text and I won't block them.

Adding @@|$image to your Adblock rules will allow image ads through on all sites. For specific sites, enter a URL before the $.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[nine-times]

Thanks for the tip. My wish, however, was to be able to block ads in such a way that could signal to the person getting the ad revenue:

1. That I'm blocking their ads
2. Which ads I'm blocking
3. Why I'm blocking them
4. Under which circumstances my settings would automatically stop blocking them

The big idea here would be to make the system a two-way negotiation rather than a one-way push. The person making revenue from ad placement could then say, "Huh, not only am I not getting click-throughs, but when I put up Flash ads, people retaliate by even blocking my text ads. This is bad for business. No more Flash ads for me."

Unfortunately, there's no way for this to work. I would guess that as soon as the browser said, "I'm blocking your ads," most sites would say, "Well then I'm not sending you anymore content." Still, ad-blocking is a reality, and website might actually be well served to know what their audience's threshold is before they start blocking ads.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[Tubal-Cain]

Adblock outright prevents downloading of the ads it blocks, doesn't it? At the very least, they may notice that nobody's downloading their animated --BEEEEEEEEEEP--.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[trawg]

As the owner/operator of several ad-supported websites, I wholeheartedly support such as scheme - providing you allow us the right to block your access to my service completely if I detect you're not willing to accept the level of ads that I feel are needed to support our site, or provide you with a reduced service by levels as your ad acceptance parameters decrease.

For example, if you decide you don't want any animated ads, I'd probably counter that by not letting you access any of our video content.

Obviously it would be trivial to workaround at the user end - I'm just pointing out that such a scheme should be give-and-take on both parts. Users obviously have all the control - they can block (most) ads, they can simply stop visiting sites, etc. But I'd like to try and find a happy medium.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[jesset77]

Haha, "you can't watch my video content without shit flickering off to the sides" is a happy medium now? What content feature will you turn off if users don't want to see the goatse porn shock ads?

I think the point here is that no users appreciate garish, distracting, confusing, sometimes fraudulent ads. (No really, this is an antivirus warning dialog in this 468x80 ad space! And it's wobbling and flashing!) It detracts from the content. It hurts the reputation of the site that hosts it. Only confused old ladies click on it, and then only because they can't tell the content from the ad.

Why would you defend this on your site? Are you a sadist? You get paid for making your users uncomfortable and unhappy instead of by facilitating product conversions? Nobody voluntarily spends their money on the company with the eyeraping ad. The companies who rely on toxic advertising are desperate and about to go out of business, replaced by new companies who find themselves in similar straights. If you base your content delivery model on such shifting sand, you must be within a year or two behind them, and you do not have my pity.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[Phoghat]

Magazines and Newspapers? What's that?

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[Anonymous Coward]

Will reject all animations gif, flash or javascript.

Unfortunately, Google's text ads require Javascript.
They also serve image and Flash based ads (through Adsense and Doubleclick)

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[trawg]

If you base your content delivery model on such shifting sand, you must be within a year or two behind them, and you do not have my pity.

I don't want it. I just don't want you coming to my site on your terms. If you don't want to view the ads, then don't block them - because you consume resources and cost us money and we get nothing. Just don't come to our site at all, and then we're both happy.

If you do visit a site that does have ads but has content that you really want, just accept that it's part of the unwritten social contract between you and the site operator that you might, occasionally, have to suffer the grand indignity of having an animated ad occasionally flicker into your sphere of awareness. Pretty small price to pay.

And if you're not prepared to pay it, well, there's a whole bunch of other websites out there.

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[jesset77]

I don't want it. I just don't want you coming to my site on your terms

This is a hot topic right now. Many content providers hope to float their expenses solely on the back of advertising dollars, and rely completely on advertising networks that do little to match the aesthetic or sensibility of an advertisement to the needs of any of the publishers' readerships.

The pattern is, Joe has a website and creates content. Maybe it's a blog, maybe it's an aggregator like /. is. Joe tries to put his website in the black by putting ads on his site. Perhaps at first, Joe vetos the annoying ads, but soon he learns that A> this requires paying attention to the ads, which costs Joe time he doesn't have, and B> this cuts into his bottom line. So he eventually allows virtually all ads though, and continues tacking on more ad networks until there are no more to add. Joe is still in the red, but has starry eyed visions of making ends meet just around the corner as his readership tanks. The last thing that Joe wants is to introduce any alternate profit models or put his eggs in more than one basket. For example, premium memberships which allow access to stories earlier than free membership, a community of commenters creating content for free and driving traffic and participation, such efforts would be fools errands and sound a little bit too much like work.

If you don't want to view the ads, then don't block them - because you consume resources and cost us money and we get nothing.

To Joe, every visitor with an AdBlocker is eating away at his profits. After all, (example numbers, YMMV) the hosting account is $20/mo for the first gigabit of transfer and $5 per gigabit thereafter, and Joe invests $2,000 per month in fixed cost generating and maintaining the content. That adds up to $2020/mo if transfer stays under a gigabit, which could baloon to $2025/mo if a ton of Adblocker readers hit the site!

Of course an AdBlocker user cannot click on the ads, but the worst part is that they never drive cross traffic either. When ad AdBlocker user sees an article he likes, he never just sends a link to his friends who lack AdBlock. Instead, AdBlocker users just sit on the same page hitting refresh constantly while cackling at the money the publisher is losing, penny by penny.

Users obviously have all the control - they can block (most) ads, they can simply stop visiting sites

One thing people don't often consider is that the internet is a great equalizer. The user and the webserver are on equal footing and have equal power. You do not have to allow those who block ads to see your website, you can use similar filtering features to keep them out and make an arms race of it.

Just like AdBlockers identify images of certain size, from certain domains, and urls that match certain regex as advertisements and block them (with the false-positive side-effects of sometimes blocking or mangling content), you can put your ads in Iframes and load the content asynchronously, contingent on the advertisement payload being delivered before the user gets to see the goods.

You will also incur false positives of innocent readers getting shafted, but that's OK, right? Just like RIAA and James Murdoch are teaching us, You don't make money by delivering content to people who play by your rules, you make money by causing misery for whoever takes too many napkins.

Remember, your most important revenue streams are spreading FUD, making people feel guilty, and optionally implementing DRM and expanding bureaucracy. You are not in the business of providing content to the people who want it, that would be silly. The only way to make money is to maximize bleeding, suffering, and eye raping.

Remember, the world is rife with people who want to patronize your content, and some will even fork cash over to you. It is your responsibility to deploy

Re:I am willing to accept unobstrusice ads

[trawg]

Many content providers hope to float their expenses solely on the back of advertising dollars, and rely completely on advertising networks that do little to match the aesthetic or sensibility of an advertisement to the needs of any of the publishers' readerships.

Many content providers already are doing this. Like us. And we have done for almost ten years.

Instead, AdBlocker users just sit on the same page hitting refresh constantly while cackling at the money the publisher is losing, penny by penny.

This is a gross exaggeration, and a bit of strawman that diverts from the real issue - that people with adblock are completely, blissfully ignorant and uncaring about the effects of installing and running that software.

Remember, your most important revenue streams are spreading FUD, making people feel guilty, and optionally implementing DRM and expanding bureaucracy.

Heh, you're accusing me of spreading FUD? You're talking down to me like I'm some self-righteous asshole for wanting people to come to our site and not block ads. If your life is so busy and your eyeball time so important that you can't justify a couple ads, then maybe you shouldn't even be on the Internet at all!

Remember, the world is rife with people who want to patronize your content, and some will even fork cash over to you. It is your responsibility to deploy convoluted signup systems [uie.com] to make it difficult to complete a transaction or to remain signed in, and to blend your navigational elements into the advertisements so that your readers drive a click through each time they try to access page 2 out of 20 in your 500 word article.

We operate one of the very few file download sites in the world that requires no signup, no user accounts, no massive huge ads, etc.

We move more than 30TB a month (at least) on average to users all over the world, for free.

Our goal is to keep doing that. We pride ourselves on our user experience. We feel that ads are a small price to pay for users to be able to download the latest gaming files (which are often under high demand at release) quickly and easily.

Our current plans are to offer a subscription-based service to give people the /choice/ to get rid of ads. I don't expect a lot of people to take it, but we want to offer the choice - so when I'm having discussions like this with people like you, I can say "well, here's the alternative to ad-supported services".

Again, I hope you do steer clear from my wares. As you have demonstrated, you sound like the sort of person that would gleefully come to our site with ads blocked and download the latest 2 gigabyte demo without the slightest feeling of guilt.

Why do you come to our site? Because we don't require signup or monthly fees. The entire download process through our site (if you end up on it through google or whatever) is two clicks, and then you're downloading.

We're free, because we support our service through advertising. I think that, compared to 99% of the sites of the Internet, our advertising is relatively low-key and tasteful. Our advertisers are high quality - big government organisations, banks, etc - not the latest "free systems check!" shit you'll see on so many other sites.

At the end of the day, all the people that work on this site are heavy Internet users. We know what sucks and what doesn't, and we take pains to make our site not suck.

Re:mod down

[Anonymous Coward]

WTF?!

Google

[Mr_Plattz]

Chrome has an interesting dilemma.

Cost benefit for speed vs Ads.

Everyone *does* want to use it, heck, I can open 14 Chrome windows and have boobs in my face before FF even decides it wants to open. But the fact that it wants to show you every add on every dodgie internet site trying to make a quick buck, means I can wait an extra few milliseconds.

Obviously one cannot look negatively on GOOG for *not* having an ad-blocker, but at the same time they must accept it kills there user-base.

Re:Google

[Goaway]

There are ad blockers for Chrome: http://www.adsweep.org/

Chrome 3 Theora decoder FAIL

[David Gerard]

Chrome 3 will include a Theora decoder ... a known broken and crappy one from an old FFmpeg build that can't cope with Thusnelda-encoded files, i.e. the close-to-H.264-quality encoder that Xiph and Mozilla have been working on.

They know about the bug ... but can't be bothered fixing it.

So sites with lots of Theora video will have to browser-sniff and suggest Firefox 3.5 to those with Chrome.

How to snatch defeat from the jaws of cluefulness ...

(note also that Chris DiBona mysteriously vanished from the WHATWG list after his FUD was refuted. It would be interesting to hear why.)

Chrome OS being Linux based, where's the Linux ver

[Locutus]

it does seem strange that all this talk of Chrome OS and yet they're still pushing Chrome to Windows users first. Either these are two very different projects or Google is going to have to do much work getting these two groups synced up for the Chrome OS release.

LoB

Chrome reaches 100 on Acid, Great Sunspider score

[CodeShark]

Having passed all of the different Acid Tests with a perfect score on the latest JavaScript oriented Acid test.

My thumbnail look at Sunspider scores shows about a 20% overall speedup over the latest Firefox beta, but Firefox wins in enough of the individual tests that I expect BOTH to improve quite a bit, that is if the fastest times on each are used, even Chrome's time would be 20% better.

I really start to like Chromium

[miffo.swe]

I run Chromium, the Linux port of Google Chrome since a couple of weeks. At first it was barely usable but things has started to pickup fast. Its dead fast on my eeepc 901 and on my normal workstations at work and at home. Over time i have really started to like Chromium, even more so than Firefox.

Ive also ran some on Windows with the normal Google Chrome and its even more stunning comparing IE8 and Google Chrome. The differences in speed and "up in your face!, here i am!, look at me!" are stunning. While IE8 is all over you trying to stear you towards Windows Live Google Chrome just stays the hell out of my way. Speedwise the difference is enormous on all sites.

If Google releases a real Google Chrome for Linux i suspect both Firefox and Konqueror is in for a ride. Not that they are bad in any way, rather that Google Chrome is so darn good already.

Themes...

[koro666]

It seems "themes" or "branding" is the new fad these days. Is it so hard to just leave the window frame's look to be managed by the window manager, as it should?

I like my apps to look consistent. In fact, I usually take matters in my own hands when they insist on not doing it.

Re:Themes...

[Goaway]

"New fad these days"?

Is it 1995 again or something? Why didn't anybody tell me?

Re:Chrome OS being Linux based, where's the Linux

[FrostDust]

Here's the Linux version: http://dev.chromium.org/getting-involved/dev-channel#TOC-Linux

Except the difference between print vs online ads

[TravisO]

is that you don't get flashing / talking / music / girls in bikinis / speeding gophers / outright lies in your newspaper or magazine.

Imho online advertising did this to themselves, they were as annoying and eye catching as possible (and I mean that in the worst possible way) that people learned to HATE online advertising. I don't mind Google text ads and such, or even banners, but the flashing, animation and sound is the one spoiled apple that ruins the whole barrel.

Re:For the 1000000 time use Srware IRON for adbloc

[Anonymous Coward]

It comes nowhere near AdblockPlus. I don't use Iron extensively but I doubt that this catches many ads. It's just a simple list of strings (not even regexes) that are matched against URLs. No DOM selectors (let alone a GUI for them), no "hide this object/image/iframe", no Flash/Java blocking, no whitelist, no interactivity, no subscription mechanism.

I've also found Adsweep, but it's abandonware and it doesn't install on my Chromium 3.

@font-face?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see any web fonts in Chromium 3. Isn't it supposed to support them since 2.0.something? Webkit certainly does.

Re:@font-face?

[noahisaac]

Word. I've been waiting for so many years for real typography on the web. Firefox just got support for @font-face, IE and Safari have had it for quite a while, and Opera support is forthcoming. If webkit supports it, why doesn't Chrome? Maybe google ditched this feature for some extra rendering speed? Please add it in, Google! We need real typography on the web!

Currently unavailable for bleeding edge users

[vrmlguy]

When I went to the Themes page, I got this message: "We're sorry, but themes are available for Google Chrome 3.0.195.3 and above only.: The funny thing is, the about box says I'm running 3.0.195.4!

Adsweep

[Francis]

There is an adblock alternative for Chrome though - http://www.adsweep.org/

I'm using it now - it's not quite as good as adblock, but it's pretty effective. If you want to use the new Chrome Beta, you can use the new extension framework. If you want to stick to the stable chrome distribution, you can use the user script version.

I've been happy enough with it that I've switched from Firefox to Chrome as my primary browser.

The thing I miss most about adblock was giving me the option to selectively allow certain sites to serve me ads. Some sites I visit serve non-intrusive ads, and I'd like them to be able to make a little money off of my clicks.

Switched to Chrome on my netbook

[AaronW]

I have switched to Chrome on my netbook rather than use Firefox. Although I miss some of the Firefox add-ons like ad-block, autopager, etc. I find Chrome much more efficient in terms of screen real-estate and to be faster. I wish other applications would take the approach to allow smaller widgets to better use screen real-estate.

Re:Chrome OS being Linux based, where's the Linux

[selven]

Chrome is Google's attempt to get more people off IE and onto a standards-compliant browser that Google can run their web apps on. Notice how Google advertises Chrome on their sites to IE users but not Firefox users. OSX and Linux have no IE users (except maybe 5 people running it under Wine for whatever reason), so Google has no incentive to put Chrome on OSX or Linux. Despite all this, Linux has a functional, stable beta version on Linux (that I use every day).

Still to fix

[dugeen]

They still haven't fixed the missing System box under Windows, there still isn't a 'don't spawn multiple threads' preference and it still secretly installs a scheduled task that runs Google Update.

I don't give a damn unless it's the New Tab Page.

[StellarFury]

Wake me up when they give you an option to get rid of the "New Tab" page, and I'll switch. That was the Chrome dealbreaker for me. When I open a new tab, I either want the webpage I want to load in it, or about:blank to load in it. I don't need flashing lights and pretty thumbnails, and I especially don't want my browsing history to show up in it.

Re:Chrome OS being Linux based, where's the Linux

[Locutus]

um, except they say they will be coming out with the Chrome OS which is Chrome on top of Linux. "That" is the incentive I was talking about and why it's strange they still are releasing beta's for Windows first.

Interesting that they do advertise Chrome to IE users though. Then again, it's their site and service and I really don't think people using Chrome or anything else other than IE is a bad thing.

LoB