My impression was that it had a faster Javascript engine, and it has spurred on other browsers. It's a market threat (users might switch), and an engineering goad (hey, it's possible - why can't you do it?) That serves Google's purpose as much as getting market share themselves.
Another aspect is blue sky: what webapps would become possible if the installed-based of javascript was an order of magnitude faster? What's good for webapps is good for google.
Rumour has it that Google wants to ditch X. If that is the case, no other GUIed nix software will run without a rewrite.*
Not exactly: few modern GUI applications are written to use Xlib directly. If Google ditched X for a new window system and then ported GTK+, Qt, and a few other widget toolkits to their window system, a lot of software would run with relatively few changes.
Re:Fake Steve Jobs on Chrome OS
by Raphael_Amiard on Thursday July 09, 2009 @04:15AM
(#695462)
"and then ported GTK+, Qt, and a few other widget toolkits to their window system"
Wich is obviously done in an afternoon :)
Of course not. It takes an entire weekend. ;)
Seriously now, is hard but doable. They could start by hiring the SkyOS guy: http://skyos.org/?q=node/650
Re:Fake Steve Jobs on Chrome OS
by shiranaihito on Thursday July 09, 2009 @09:32AM
(#695805)
Yes, and so that everything Just Works :p
I use Chrome to the point that I fire-up FF only when I need certain addons such as web developer, etc. FF is great but it cannot match the speed of Chrome.
Chrome is my main browser and I even switched back to Windows from Linux just so I could enjoy the incredible speed increase. Web browsing is one of my primary computer activities, so an OS that boots up quickly and uses the fastest browser would be greatly welcomed.
"Web browsing is one of my primary computer activities, so an OS that boots up quickly and uses the fastest browser would be greatly welcomed."
This precisely characterizes the intended market for Chrome OS.
All of those criticisms apply to Safari 4, tho.
...which is why Safari is also not very popular in the mainstream.*
* http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/05/since-march-internet-ex...
That it lacks features and there's no market for it? ...
Ditching X and breaking legacy support for existing apps does have the added benefit of forcing developers to accept a standardized look & feel and maybe rethink their GUI layouts. If Google imposes some strict UI design guidelines and offers a good UI toolkit they may be able to really raise the bar on OSS UI design for ChromeOS.
I have never had issues with Firefox, I don't care one bit about Javascript speed and honestly Chrome is underfeatured to the point where I think I'm using NCSA Mosaic. I gave it a shot. I was back to Firefox before lunch.
I see there is a hype there, but I just don't get it. The post is clearly hyperbole and overly sarcastic, but to me and stuff which matters to me, Chrome actually is shit. I'm not buying it, even though it's free. I might even go for MSIE before Chrome.
For the same reason, a OS where Chrome is the only browser* would be 100% DOA on my hardware.
* Rumour has it that Google wants to ditch X. If that is the case, no other GUIed *nix software will run without a rewrite.