Promises Plated in Chrome

[Rob Williams]

With the recent announcement of Google's Chrome OS, open source zealots everywhere have been licking their lips raw and playing their trumpets loud. But is another big corporation going to be a good thing for OSS? We take a trip down memory lane and look for whether Google can (or wants to) buck the old trends.

You can read Brett's latest editorial right here and discuss it here!

 

[Kougar]

I've seen all manner of responses to Google's announcement of their Chrome OS... but again, I have to stress that from what technical info that's been given Chrome isn't going to be a real OS, just a bare minimum "sandbox" for the Chrome browser to run inside. If Anandtech got their info right then the only thing this OS can do is run Chrome, no other programs or extras are allowed.

If it can't be run inside the browser then it won't be run... which makes a bit of sense given that most of Google's apps, everything from Gmail to Office to Google Chat already run inside the browser, even the search box doubles as a complex calculator. Therefore, the only data Google would be privy to is the exact same data they would be privy to as if the user was running Chrome as their desktop browser and already using these apps.

Of course the info I'm basing this on could be wrong, but supposedly they got it directly from Google and I've yet to see anyone showing evidence otherwise.

 

[Rob Williams]

If Anandtech got their info right then the only thing this OS can do is run Chrome, no other programs or extras are allowed.

If that's the case, I have to question... what on earth takes them that long to develop if all it is, is a browser inside of a Linux kernel? I'm not even a developer, but given the tools and basic knowledge of the Linux kernel, I think I could build almost the same thing in a week (you know, if Chrome currently worked under Linux).

It could be the latter part that's the reason... Chrome just doesn't work under Linux right now (but it's getting there). Still seems unlikely that it would take 10 months to get all of this done.

 

[Kougar]

Well, going by the blog post they were stripping the Linux kernel to the barest of minimums, for the obvious reason of what it's going to be running and running on. It would take awhile to figure out how far they can strip it down without compromising its ability to work on both x86 and ARM processors in all manner of system configurations. And as you well pointed out, Chrome doesn't work in Linux beyond the barest minimum of functionality but they do have an alpha build available for download.