Ebusiness Blog

Keep in mind: Beta

Well, it’s a Beta, i.e. a not finished piece of software, a trial browser that Internet users can test, and give feedback to Google, in order to help the programmers release a stable version. Betas may crash, may have several bugs, that are to be corrected and features to be improved in order to obtain a stable and better version. After using this one, I must say it’s extremely stable for a beta.

Google Chrome is an open source code, 100% newly developed, it’s not based in any previous code or rendering motor.

The software installs fast and really easy, so why not giving it a try? It imports all your setting from your default browser: all your bookmarks and passwords.

I wasn’t surprised to see that the interface is minimalist, and it loads in a snap, as all Google’s products: very, very, very few design objects, like “no design at all”: nothing to distract you. Just a very effective tab-based browser. In Vista, the interface is black, and in Xp, it’s pale blue.

I took a couple of days to use it before I gave my veredict and there is something I must stress: it never crashed. Let’s talk about some of Chrome’s characteristics.

Browsing speed

It’s the faster browser available. I think this feature has been priorized by Google programmers, and they did it again. Chrome incorporates a new Javascript engine that accelerates all Javascript code pocessing, and the overall browsing speed.

Simplicity

Simple in design, configuration and usage. And powerful.

Tabs

Tab are the units, this browser is really based on tabs. And they’re independent units. The tabs are at the top: no title bar. Short and sweet.

Chrome has a “new tab” plus symbol, to open a new tab just clicking on it, like IE. And every time you open a new tab, you’ll get thumbnails of frequently visited websites. The tabs can be dragged and dropped to order them as you like, and if you drag one out of the actual window, it will open in a new one.

Every tab runs a separated process. This consumes more ram of the system, but if a tab crashes, the rest of the opened tabs will remain functioning. Probably if you’re a heavy tab opener, that opens more that 10 tabs together, then you’ll need increasing amounts of ram available, maybe much more than Firefox or IE. But this is not a fact. Let’s give the browser some testing time. Google knows what it takes to be a leader, and this browser is very innovative and ambitious.

Other features

Search, Address and History, share a single, top bar: the Omnibox. It delivers non-distracting in line autocompletion. Again: minimalism.

The download manager is totally integrated down the window, there is not another window for the download manager. This feature keeps things simpler and tidier. A big arrow picture drops to the bottom to show you that a download has begun.

Incognito mode: it allows you to browse websites without saving information about them in the history files (not even cookies). Great concept, that let you view pages that you don’t want other users to know about. I like that kind of intimacy

Pop-ups are sent to the bottom of the tab, and can be opened or closed later.

All these facts and much more detailed information can be read in comic form at Googlebooks > Chrome

I didn’t make it my default browser yet, but that wasn’t because I disliked it, but just because it’s a beta version, and does not have some necessary features, as plugins for example. Anyway, I highly recommend that every internet user gives it a try. It’s simple, nice and free.