It was hardly a matter of a blog post on the official Google blog about the release of Google Chrome Beta to get noticed. That was it. And the rest of the work was done for free by the hoards of bloggers, internet marketing experts, forum members and mailers. The intention of Google to get its browser hooked to users got its due that easily. My post too does talk on Google Chrome but I don’t intend to rant on it or praise it or even compare it with the competitors. Is it really competing enough? That might be a question to ponder about but lets for a moment bask in the glory of the success of Chrome’s beta launch. Hey, its by Google, mate.

Future Smackdown

I am not pretty sure behind the motive of the launch however. It might have got something to do with the browser wars in particular. You see, when the giants are busy fighting a dwarf can easily run away with the bounty. If the saying is anywhere close to truth then Google Chrome just might be the next big thing we have to wait and watch. What makes me say this you might wonder. Well, Internet Explorer is busy getting decked up for its version 8 release which Microsoft must be really pushing in with its best efforts. On the other hand Firefox has had a majestic release of its version 3.0. So where does Google Chrome fit in here? Remember, they say its in beta! Gmail was too!

Google Chrome has already been stated to possess best features of Firefox and other browsers. Bloggers have been ranting about this, the most. That is true since Google Chrome may not support plugins and themes feature as of now, on which Firefox has found its enormous success. But the first question to put up front is, is Google Chrome really just another browser or a desktop application which connects to the internet. Well both say the same thing but the mention of a different memory processing model for Chrome is something which you have to consider. Google won’t be silly to reinvent the wheel. It just might be a futuristic vision of Google which we are currently witnessing on a miniature scale. Google Suggest, Maps or GMail must ring the bells as I mention this.

People may crib and rant about Google Chrome but it hasn’t hampered the success of launch down even by a pint. In fact Google has made a smart move to get as many feedbacks as possible since it has made Chrome right from scratch. Now its motive would definitely be to do a write up once again and make a surprise launch with power packed features in the next version. I can see people waiting with baited breath keeping a hawks eye on every single move Google does.

In For a Tough Competition?

Google Chrome has been launched amidst Adobe Flex going mainstream with its enterprise presence and while Silverlight is being pushed into your face. You must have some or the other time come across Flex and Silverlight applications which left your mouth wide open to see the magic they do. Can a browser reduce these giant’s market share? Why do I ask?

If you carefully notice Chrome has heavily emphasized that it is going to support the standards of web technologies like CSS, Javascript, HTML5. This means that Google Chrome would be a perfect foundation for web developers who always have been frustrated with browser dependencies when working with these web technologies. By using Chrome you might really enjoy developing a web application. This translates to more web developers being happy, more usage of standard features of Javascript, CSS and HTML, more usage of open technologies viz. Ajax, XML, JSON, leading to more usage of free tools & less use of propreitary products.

All this means, more market share for open source and Google already has set its base up front with a plethora of tools. You name it, Google Gears, GWT, Google App Engine, Google Analytics, Google Maps etc for the web developers. More standards attribute to better web applications and all which is supported by Chrome inherently. The survival of Flex or Silverlight will be a debatable issue henceforth if Google Chrome manages to captilize on its intentions.

This sounds a huge success to Google Chrome. If this falls in line, then Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari, Opera will be competing with Chrome rather than with themselves. Google will rise to the top and rule the universe. All of this is a distant dream for me and I don’t want to sound preachy now. You do the analysis as I will wait for a surprise in the next version of Google Chrome. It might just be the next big thing, you may never know!

The things I admire in the current release of Google Chrome :

1. Full screen interface
2. Draggable tabs to windows and back into tabs
3. Neater display of history links and thumbnails of recent visits

Testing Google Chrome

The thing you might be wondering at the moment is how to distinguish Chrome from the rest of the browsers. As Google mentions, Chrome sports a different memory management model which implements each tab as a whole new process instead of a thread. On opening a tab you would notice that the task manager would have a new process listed. In order to try out Chrome’s ability with this regards you should try opening a Javascript heavy page first in browsers such as Firefox and Internet Explorer.

Heavy Javascript attributes to browser hanging which is considered often as a painful process since all the tabs hang and the browser itself has to be killed to stop the loading. As far as Chrome goes, this nature would be handled in a completely different manner since you can now directly kill a tab process from the task manager without affecting the other open tabs.

While the above concept is not much useful for the casual surfer, it will be a must for web application users in times to come, since the advent of Web 2.0 has in fact spruced up the usage of Ajax which in turn has made the web application heavy for processing. Such a model would have been required any time in near future, but with Chrome stepping the right foot at the right time you can relax down a bit now. If you are a staunch Ajax developer then Chrome surely would come to your rescue.