I R Blogging

Google Chrome

Finally, Google has released a browser!

“I don’t really need a new browser, I finally have Firefox working exactly as I want it to” is going to be the first thought through many people’s minds and to be truthfully honest, I’m still kind of feeling that way now even after checking out the eye pleasing Google Chrome.

At first glance, this thing is simply beautiful, because it’s so beautifully simple. They removed all the clutter and open space that seems to built up around the buttons, helping to trim it down a lot. They also removed the menu bar up top and replaced it with two buttons beside the address/unified bar. This gives it a clean look.

The address bar has been turned into the unified bar, which allows you to type an address, search and also has suggestions. This is useful I guess, But Firefox does nearly the same thing and to be honest I don’t think I’ll be searching for “www.irbl” anytime soon. This feature may need a bit of tweaking.

One of the nicest parts about Chrome is that they’ve decided to move the tabs to the top of the page (giving it the old ‘At Ease’ look from former macs), which makes it really spiffy looking. You’re able to drag these around to order them how you like, and even drag them out to be open in a new window (though other than being able to see the web page tiny and being dragged around looking like a cool folder, I can’t see myself finding a real use for this). This simple rearranging of the tabs is the largest improvement I can see for most users.

Also, it seems they decided to rework how the browser functions. In simple terms: Each tab is it’s own program, within a program. For example: In the past when 1 tab would screw up and crash in Firefox or IE, the whole browser would crash. What Google claims is that if 1 tabs screws up in Chrome, you’ll be able to continue using the other tabs without any interruption and just the problematic tab will be closed. They’ve developed a task manager (nearly identical to that in Windows) for each tab. In fact, while writing this I got the oppertunity to put this to the test.

While having 3 tabs open (Wordpress Dashboard, Google Chrome Website and Worlds in Motion) I started to play one of the demonstration videos on the Chrome site. To my surprise, it decided to lag and freeze while trying to load the video. Thinking this would be of no concern, I tabbed back to the Dashboard and was shocked to see Chrome stop responding to my clicks completely. On top of having no control over my browser at all anymore (something Google claims does not happen) I was unable to pull up the Chrome Task Manager and was left here waiting to see if I was going to have to retype this review. After about 2 minutes of huffing, a pop-up showed saying the Google Chrome tab wasn’t responding, but went away again before I was able to select an option to fix the issue and Chrome fixed itself. Isn’t this what all other browsers do already? Chances are high that if a program stops working, eventually it usually rights itself. I was severely let down by the hopes Chrome would be different and actually hold true to the ‘invincible’ idea it let off.

A nice thing, though minor to say the least, is Chrome’s default start page when you open new tabs. It creates a map of your most visited sites based on your history, recent bookmarks, closed tabs and a search box. It’s simple and I know it’s been done a million times but it might be interesting to keep around for awhile before setting back to about:blank again.

A final note, I do notice that for spell check it seems to underline the words, but right clicking doesn’t give me a dictionary of suggested spellings. I hope this gets fixed because my spelling is atrocious. What will really show the power (or just hype) of chrome will be when developers start releasing plug-ins and perhaps themes. With the lead that Firefox seems to have however on Chrome in this aspect, it’s going to take some time for Google to actually become a competitor to those who already have things set up to meet standards. That said, I think I’ll give this a run at work (simple is good when you’re doing very little but doing it a lot) but until I see some progress made I’m going to stick with my loyal FF.