Briareos H on 5/9/2008 at 16:15
Open source means that the program can be forked freely and legally into a version that removes any exchange of data with the Google servers.
They don't want to bend the standards to their will, because that's what IE did and it didn't work. They want the standards to be enforced and used in the fastest, most consistent and most comfortable way so that their apps will work everywhere and for everyone, increasing their visibility yet again.
Quote:
The more web traffic that flows through their apps and their servers, the more they have to sell.
Absolutely, but your assumption that google needs their browser to become dominant for this to happen is wrong. Chrome's appeal to Google is NOT the fact that more data gets sent to them when you type something in the bar, it is the fact that with JIT JS compiling, secure and faster data processing and threading, simple and effective UI and all these technologies available for every browser to integrate, more people will be willing to use online applications such as GMail and Google Docs.
Anyway, my opinion about the app itself is that it's really robust, fast and clever. I have many gripes with the UI (middle click behaviour, warning windows, shortcuts, bookmarks, download manager) but for a first release, this is a rock solid browser with awesome ideas. Plus the analysis and inspecting tools are just fantastic for a developer. I'm eager to see how they will pull out the very tricky plugin aspect.
Schattentänzer on 5/9/2008 at 16:23
The difference is the strategy behind it. If I close my source, I do so because I want to gain an advantage and keep it that way. If others can nick my tech, this advantage is void.
Google says -even explictly- that they want others to adapt their tech. Hence the primary goal is to enforce a standard (as you said, although they're using the backdoor), not to dominate the browser market. Their focus is on getting on the desktop.
Edit: Briareos was faster
TBE on 5/9/2008 at 16:23
Quote Posted by gunsmoke
BTW, there IS a Home Page button.
Now you can INNOCENTLY hit that home page button with that ONE free hand, right Jay?
*Click* (
http://www.footballerswives.tv/) Home :D j/k
heywood on 5/9/2008 at 17:29
Quote Posted by Briareos H
Open source means that the program can be forked freely and legally into a version that removes any exchange of data with the Google servers.
There's no need for a code fork to prevent that exchange, as you can turn it off in the browser. But either way, you lose the incremental search/suggestion feature integrated into the address bar. That's what they want people to become dependent on, not the browser app itself.
I still don't think the old open vs. closed source arguments apply because Google is not in the business of selling software. Their application code doesn't have intrinsic value as a product that has to be protected by closing the source. The Google apps are just a means to get people to use Google services & servers.
Quote:
Absolutely, but your assumption that google needs their browser to become dominant for this to happen is wrong. Chrome's appeal to Google is NOT the fact that more data gets sent to them when you type something in the bar, it is the fact that with JIT JS compiling, secure and faster data processing and threading, simple and effective UI and all these technologies available for every browser to integrate, more people will be willing to use online applications such as GMail and Google Docs.
You're basically saying that Chrome is a tech demo, which I don't believe. I don't think there's any way they would have invested all that development on a major app that they didn't intend to dominate the market with.
At the present time, browser support for their apps is pretty much a non-issue. And Google has been working with existing browser developers all along. They don't need their own browser if they are just going to continue adhering to web standards. They need it if they're going to diverge from those standards. It's the old embrace & extend strategy. If I'm right, we'll eventually start seeing new or updated Google apps & services which only work right on Chrome.
Quote Posted by Schattentänzer
The difference is the strategy behind it. If I close my source, I do so because I want to gain an advantage and keep it that way. If others can nick my tech, this advantage is void.
Google says -even explictly- that they want others to adapt their tech. Hence the primary goal is to enforce a standard (as you said, although they're using the backdoor), not to dominate the browser market. Their focus is on getting on the desktop.
The desktop is so 20th century. The browser is the application platform of the future, and that's what Google is aiming to monopolize.
jay pettitt on 5/9/2008 at 17:45
Quote Posted by Taffer_Boy_Elvis
Now you can INNOCENTLY hit that home page button with that ONE free hand, right Jay?
*Click* (
http://www.footballerswives.tv/) Home :D j/k
Yes, I'm enjoying my time with Chrome much more now thankyou :thumb:
The_Raven on 5/9/2008 at 17:52
Quote Posted by heywood
The desktop is so 20th century. The browser is the application platform of the future, and that's what Google is aiming to monopolize.
People keep saying this; but until broadband has reached a state where the data bandwidth rivals the speed and size of the standard hard disk, then I really don't see it happening anytime soon. Not only that, but operating systems and virtualization will have to come quite a ways for cloud computing to really replace traditional desktop applications.
Mingan on 5/9/2008 at 18:11
Quote Posted by doctorfrog
Is it that they are funding it, or just giving them little spiffs every time someone uses the Firefox or Opera search bar to search Google?
Opera has a referral deal with Google, which means they get pennies each time you use the search bar with Google. The same pretty much applies to Firefox, though you also get the Google as default homepage and they get to temp hire Mozilla's web devs when needed.
Yakoob on 5/9/2008 at 18:48
Quote Posted by Angel Dust
And it seems like Chrome doesn't have the quirks ala IE that you have to watch out for. The web designers were I work, I'm a web developer too but much more back end stuff than design, have been mucking around with it the last few days and are quite pleased with how it handles alot of their sites etc.
To chip in - a website I am designing that uses a lot of php (server-side), templating and java script code runs and looks perfectly in chrome thus far.
Quote Posted by The_Raven
People keep saying this; but until broadband has reached a state where the data bandwidth rivals the speed and size of the standard hard disk, then I really don't see it happening anytime soon. Not only that, but operating systems and virtualization will have to come quite a ways for cloud computing to really replace traditional desktop applications.
Not really. WebApps usually requrie much less space than your standard desktop apps, especially considering a lot of the work is done on the server and not the client, so there is no need for bandwidth as good as HDD read speeds. Unless you mean video games, but I don't think google's aiming at that right now.
heywood on 5/9/2008 at 20:17
Quote Posted by The_Raven
People keep saying this; but until broadband has reached a state where the data bandwidth rivals the speed and size of the standard hard disk, then I really don't see it happening anytime soon. Not only that, but operating systems and virtualization will have to come quite a ways for cloud computing to really replace traditional desktop applications.
The "business logic" of the application doesn't necessarily reside on the server. A general rule of thumb is that data intensive logic is implemented on the server side but computationally (e.g. graphically) intensive logic is implemented on the client side. The virtualization is provided by the browser and JVM.
That's the direction I see everybody heading to. Even stodgy industries like financial services and defense have been moving from the old desktop app + database server paradigm to the new browser app + web service paradigm for at least 5 years now. And they usually lag behind in adopting new software technologies.
I think Google Earth might be good yardstick for measuring the transition from desktop apps to web apps. It started life as a pure Windows desktop app, and it requires a lot of computing resources including 3D hardware acceleration, so it's not a natural candidate for making a web app. But it's also one of Google's flagship apps, and Google has already made it web-embeddable through browser plugins. If they ever release Earth as a real cross-platform web app, that will indicate to me that the days of old desktop apps are over.
The_Raven on 5/9/2008 at 23:41
I still don't see cloud computing replacing desktop applications completely; especially, when it comes to resource intensive applications.
