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Chrome OS Can Now Run Android Apps With No Porting Required

Posted by timothy on from the that-could-be-big dept.

An anonymous reader writes On Thursday, Google launched "App Runtime for Chrome (Beta)" which allows Android apps to run on Chrome OS without the need for porting. At the moment, only Duolingo, Evernote, Sight Words, and Vine are available on the platform with the rest of the Play Store's offerings to come later. Google "built an entire Android stack into Chrome OS using Native Client" in order to achieve this.

6 of 133 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Wow by Teresita · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That makes my little Chromebox that much more awesome. Redmond be very afraid.

  2. Why not all apps at once? by bogaboga · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Google launched "App Runtime for Chrome (Beta)" which allows Android apps to run on Chrome OS without the need for porting. At the moment, only Duolingo, Evernote, Sight Words, and Vine are available on the platform with the rest of the Play Store's offerings to come later.

    I wonder why all apps aren't available at once. I understand this App Runtime for Chrome akin to the Java RunTime, which when installed, would have all Java applications available. What am I [mis]understanding?

    1. Re:Why not all apps at once? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Even if it were perfect, almost no ChromeOS devices have touchscreens and almost all Android devices do (especially if you count on the ones Google even slightly endorses, not the media-player-mystery-HDMI-dongle stuff). For applications that are basically hobbled by the touchscreen, a keyboard and mouse will be an improvement. For those that are enhanced by, or actively dependent on, it, that will be a bit of a mess no matter how perfect the runtime is.

      Unless those proportions change fairly markedly, it probably makes sense for them to start with some popular, mouse and keyboard friendly, applications that don't lean on native ARM blobs much or at all.

  3. Re:Is this the new emulator story for Android devs by BarbaraHudson · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Been there, done that. Show me a $100 tablet that's actually running Ice Cream Sandwich or Kit Kat... as opposed to all of the ones running Gingerbread with a skin hack to look like ICS/KK and displaying a bullshit version number in Setup.

    Neighbor just bought 2 today running Jelly Bean, which is newer than ICS. Dell Venue 7, $105.00 each. 2 gigs ram, 16 gigs storage, 2 (rather crappy) cams, but nice displays and long battery life.

    I doubt Dell went to the trouble to print up packaging with fake specs and get them stocked in stores ... so these are the real McCoy. Same as the 32 gig Kingston USB 2.0 stick I bought on sale this week for $15 that I'm installing Fedora 20 on for another laptop. There's some crazy loss-leaders out there if you look.

    --
    "Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
  4. Re:Android by wiredlogic · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They aren't being used by students because they need to be able to run general purpose software. They are bought by budget minded people who only need a web browser and web apps to use a computer which is the case for most non-technical people these days.

    --
    I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
  5. Never failed before by Sun · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I mean, OS/2 running Windows apps was a huge push forward for IBM. Wine completely changed the Linux desktop picture, and BSD's Linux binary compatibility made it an effective super set of Linux, to the point nobody bothers to install the later (not to mention the similar capability of SCO Unix: they wouldn't be where they are today without it).

    I hear that ChromOS is a nice platform and is doing well. I'm glad, in a "diversity is good" non-committed sort of way. I don't think this particular feature will change much.

    Shachar