Google Releases Chrome For Android Beta 142
An anonymous reader writes "Today Google announced the availability of a beta version of its Chrome browser for Android. Unfortunately, it's limited to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) devices. Google is trying to keep Chrome fast and easy to use, and part of that involved redesigning tabs so they work more naturally with touchscreens. 'You can flip or swipe between an unlimited number of tabs using intuitive gestures, as if you're holding a deck of cards in the palm of your hands, each one a new window to the web.' They've also including synchronization functionality that allows you to move from desktop browsing to phone or tablet browsing and pick up right where you left off."
Didn't Android *always* have Chrome? (Score:4, Interesting)
When Google first announced Android, they stated it's web browser was based on WebKit with the V8 JavaScript engine, just like Chrome on the Desktop.
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Safari is WebKit based.
Is Safari Chrome?
A browser is a lot more than an HTML and Javascript engine.
Re:Didn't Android *always* have Chrome? (Score:5, Informative)
Safari = WebKit + SunSpider
Konqueror = WebKit + KJS
So, no... Safari is not Chrome.
However, do you care to explain what else is necessary to make something a browser besides some UI bits?
Re:Didn't Android *always* have Chrome? (Score:5, Funny)
Religious fanaticism. All the browsers have it.
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The most common feature. The most boring feature.
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I know a woman who does all of that (lots of upholstery too). Will she do ?
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The same sandboxing for a start, Android Webkit is a plain and simple port of Webkit, Chrome is more than that
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The same sandboxing for a start, Android Webkit is a plain and simple port of Webkit, Chrome is more than that
Unfortunately, Chrome for Android doesn't have sandboxing. Yet.
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"SunSpider" is a JavaScript benchmark. Safari's JavaScript engine is called Nitro (formerly SquirrelFish).
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Those "UI bits" are the important part. Besides "the UI bits" Safari and Chrome are identical except for Javascript engines.
The UI, memory management, bookmarks, syncing, tab/window handling, password management, addon management, APIs, etc, are all other critical parts of a browser that aren't included in "rendering engine or javascript engine."
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Konqueror = WebKit + KJS However, do you care to explain what else is necessary to make something a browser besides some UI bits?
Actually, Konqueror is KHTML. Rekonq is Webkit.
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Chrome = WebKit + V8
So any browser using webkit and v8 is Chrome?
Safari = WebKit + SunSpider
No, SunSpider is a benchmark.
Konqueror = WebKit + KJS
No, Konqueror is KHTML, not WebKit.
However, do you care to explain what else is necessary to make something a browser besides some UI bits?
Networking, UI, Storage, Plug-in Engine (inc. scripting), etc...
Re:Didn't Android *always* have Chrome? (Score:5, Informative)
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--
X's and O's for all my foes.
Re:Didn't Android *always* have Chrome? (Score:5, Informative)
No, the stock Android browser has never been Chrome. It has a completely different WebKit port, developed independently by a different group, with far worse support for newer web standards; is single-process; has a completely different UI stack (e.g. no omnibox); and doesn't have the same level of data syncing support.
The stock Android browser could be called "Chrome" only to the same degree that Safari could be called Chrome.
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As soon as I saw this article, I downloaded it on my touchpad running cm9 ICS alpha, as soon as I opened it and signed in on the welcome page, all my open tabs on the computer opened on my tablet. This is awesome!
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Then you're doing it wrong - Android browser already syncs Chrome bookmarks...
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with far worse support for newer web standards
Gingerbread's Web Browser also gets 100 on the Acid3 test.
is single-process
Chrome for Android also is single-process.
has a completely different UI stack
Different platforms *have* different UI stacks... As does Chrome for Android in comparison to Android as well as Chrome for Windows, Mac and Linux as stated in TFA.
doesn't have the same level of data syncing support.
Yes, this seems to be the only *real* distinction between Chrome and Android's Web Browser.
The stock Android browser could be called "Chrome" only to the same degree that Safari could be called Chrome.
Chrome and Safari are pretty different, as they are WebKit + very different stuff.
Chrome and Android's web browser are both WebKit + V8, in which there was
Re:Didn't Android *always* have Chrome? (Score:5, Informative)
Gingerbread's Web Browser also gets 100 on the Acid3 test.
That 100 isn't the whole story, if the rendering isn't also correct.
Acid3 is also a cherry-picked group of tests, some of which are still drafts, some of which have no real use in standard practice.
AND... most importantly, here - it doesn't test HTML 5. That's one of the big things Google is pushing with Chrome for Android, hardware-accelerated HTML 5 rendering and support.
(This could be related to the ICS requirement - GPU acceleration of UI elements)
Chrome for Android also is single-process.
Do you have a source? TFA says otherwise, official docs [google.com] say otherwise.
Yes, this seems to be the only *real* distinction between Chrome and Android's Web Browser.
Clearly you're ignorant on the subject, so please don't take offense if I continue to ignore your claims.
Now, I don't have an exhaustive list... But there are the things mentioned above, addition of the Omnibox, better developer tools, Incognito Mode, pre-loading and rendering pages as an option for don't/wifi only/always, no limit for number of tabs to have open, hardware accelerated rendering, redesigned UI that seems to be both better and more consistent with the desktop platform... Sandboxing isn't there yet, though they claim to be working on it.
Chrome and Android's web browser are both WebKit + V8, in which there was a fork from Chromium at Version 4, as outlined in the Google Android Commit Logs. Seems more as though Android's web browser has always been Chrome, with modifications to support mobile devices, from what was at the time a Current Chromium version (read: Chrome). Seems as though Google has simply made a more up-to-date build of their web browser available.
Chrome 4 was ages ago. At the time, sure, maybe the Android browser was Chrome 4 + enhancements for mobile devices - really don't care to go research the state of Chrome 4 and what Android Browser had then and what has been added since. But how well has the Android stock browser kept up with Chrome development?
There's some obvious, fundamental differences to how the two versions worked. They apparently was a fair amount of neutering done to make it work on the phone quickly and easily, or it was from such an early Chrome build that a lot of the features associated with Chrome weren't present yet.
That's a big part of this. They're working to keep both versions working off the same codebase. This will keep the Android browser more current going forward.
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Gingerbread's Web Browser also gets 100 on the Acid3 test.
Well that must mean it's 100% standards compliant then!
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It may not be, but I have to tell you that I was extremely impressed by it this week. I went to nj.com for the New Jersey Star-Ledger's list of Super Bowl Commercials. They had a list with YouTube links with a little commentary on each one. I loaded it on my Android tablet (Asus Transformer I) and we were watching the commercials full screen. Later, we tried to pull it up on the PS3 and it kept giving us an out-of-memory error.
Now, granted, on the tablet, we would have to restart the browser after about
GPU-accelerated AVC (Score:2)
I was amazed that when my beefy server was struggling this much to show the YouTube preview windows that the tablet had done so well.
It could be the case that the server didn't have a video card supporting AVC and thus had to decode AVC on a CPU core, while the DSP in the tablet supported AVC.
Occupy Fragmentation (Score:5, Interesting)
Android users who are able to run Chrome Beta (that is, who are running ICS) are literally the 1%, according to Google's platform pie charts:
http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-versions.html [android.com]
I prefer that they exploit the full power of their latest and greatest, but it's sad that only a mere 1% can access the latest and greatest :( (as of today, I'm sure this will change very quickly)
Shortsighted much? (Score:3, Informative)
They're not looking at who can run it today, but who will be able to run it in the future.
On a side note, I think it's a good thing that the app is not part of the core OS, (like Gmail was removed from the core OS a few versions ago) and can as such be updated separately.
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By part of the core OS I meant the open source portion of android, not GAPPs. Chrome is a part of the GAPPs package (maps, gmail etc)
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There's the android browser named "browser" (and the ICS version is pretty decent) that'll possibly/probably still be available. Besides, nook/kindle use their own browsers anyway.
They'll roll chrome in GAPPS and merge nice stuff from"browser" into it in time for the J release of android methinks.
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That's exactly what they're going to do... Chrome will be a part of GAPPs, and will get regular updates. Because of some of the advanced features, they had to decide to make it for Android 4.x+ only.
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It's only beta. If it is the typical Google beta, ICS will be obsolete by the time Chrome is out of beta.
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It's only beta. If it is the typical Google beta, ICS will be obsolete by the time Chrome is out of beta.
On the other hand a Google Beta is usually better than anyone else's Release 7.2.
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Most people will be able to run it within 2 years. This is enough time for a few early adopters to help with bug detection.
I say 2 years because most people end up stuck with phones the carrier doesn't waste development effort working on OS upgrades for - of course they'd rather people bought a new phone than be able to keep the one they already own current. I'm sure they felt it could be ICS only for simplicity's sake, and the problem would fix itself.
Most people, 2 years, how exactly? (Score:2)
Most people will be able to run it within 2 years.
Only if carriers were to stop selling Gingerbread (2.3) phones today. Otherwise, someone who buys a Gingerbread phone two weeks from today will still be under contract two years from today. Do you remember how long it took after the release of Eclair (2.1) it took for carriers to stop selling phones running Donut (1.6)?
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it's sad that only a mere 1% can access the latest and greatest
That 1% earned it. Are you some kind of communist?
Tax 'em (Score:3)
Tax those 1%-ers. Make 'em send in 30% of the bits.
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well.. it would be really great if that 1% could access it.. i have android 4.0.3, but i live in austria, so i'm still out of luck.. https://support.google.com/chrome/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2393487&p=market_countries [google.com]
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It's significantly less than 1% right now.
Firstly as has been pointed out elsewhere, the beta is only available in a restricted set of countries right now.
Secondly the beta doesn't currently support devices with MIPS CPUs, which counts out several low-cost Android tablets.
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Android users who are able to run Chrome Beta (that is, who are running ICS) are literally the 1%, according to Google's platform pie charts:
"Google's Android Update Alliance Is Already Dead" [pcmag.com]. Doesn't look like that 1% segment is going to expand all that fast either.
I'd been thinking about buy a Sprint Marquee, but LG's being quite squirrelly about whether it will ever get an upgrade to Ice Cream Sandwich.
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I'm curious, what does it need in ICS that is not in honeycomb? there are quite a few honeycomb tablets out there.
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But those stats don't count those who are running ICS unofficially are they? (Not being smart, I'm actually curious)
There's a lot of people running oscomic, CM9, and other AOSP builds on devices that don't have ICS.. such as me with my galaxy s gt-i9000
Beta (Score:1)
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The many Lords of the parthenon forbid that Google actually uses the term "beta" correctly unlike 99% of the software companies out there. Beta does not simply mean "pre-release".
"it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less."
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Is there an extensive history of android apps written for version X being ported back to version X?
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That's the amazing part of this story that no one seems to be picking up on.
Google actually produced a beta which, by intent or accident, seems to actually be restricted to a beta-sized community, and not their entire customer base.
It's unprecedented, and if they follow through by removing the "beta" tag before making the browser widely available, it'll be the Singularity!
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Just like Gmail, Google+ and a host of other Google services started out limited to a very small group... and then they expanded the beta to their entire user base later on.
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From what I can tell, it has more to do with the GPU-accelerated GUI and HTML5 rendering.
They could neuter it and backport it... maybe they will... but I'd guess they'll opt to leave Browser as "good enough" for those devices.
This really does behave like a browser, after all - not all features you expect from Chrome are implemented, there are some reports of crashes, etc. It certainly doesn't seem like it's prime-time Browser-replacing material yet.
My Phone Works (Score:1)
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Good for you? I don't think Google cares a whole hell of a lot.
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Beta is for when they want others to test it. That means they know it has bugs. Only those that want to help find the bugs should apply. Obviously this is not your cup of tea.
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The WebOS card metaphor lives on. (Score:3)
Now implement synergy, native cards for multitasking, unobtrusive notifications, and a gesture area with intuitive, consistent gestures throughout the OS and all applications.
CM9 + Chrome Beta = Zoom to the Future! (Score:5, Informative)
I've put this on my Galaxy Tab 10.1, which I recently updated to a developer release of CyanogenMod9 (The forthcoming ICS based Cyanogen). It really is nice. I can load up the full desktop version of Google+, which only sorta-kinda worked under the standard ICS browsers, and sorta-kinda worked differently under Firefox mobile, and it works 100%, no compromises. And doesn't feel much slower than my desktop either. That's great! The only annoyance is that it does seem to identify itself as a mobile browser, and I haven't yet found an option to change the user agent. No problem for sites like Wikipedia or G+ that give you a link to escape their mobile versions, but could be annoying elsewhere, since so many mobile sites are terrible. Surprising overside, since the stock browser in ICS includes an option to "request desktop site".
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Well, one thing what I loved on ICS browser was in Menu > Request desktop version. As tapping it and you got always a full site instead question of mobile version or automatically a mobile version.
CyanogeMod is great modification of Android, but they really should primarily offer a vanilla version first and THEN separated packages for modifications like root, CM7 power widgets, CM7 theme and own custom apps.
Doesn't support *all* ICS devices... (Score:4, Informative)
If it's not an official ROM, don't expect support. Running EncounterICS Beta 3 on a Droid X here. And like other users of unofficial ICS ROMs, it doesn't work. For me, the problem is that all web pages are blank. Being that us bleeding edge custom ROM users are used to being bug testers, this is good for the beta and hopefully will be fixed soon.
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Obviously it isn't consistent, but it works fine on my G2 running Andromadus.
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Oh come on! (Score:2)
4 is god knows how far away.
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Well I'll get modded to hell for this, but can you briefly explain how to install ICS on your phone? I have a Galaxy S2. Thanks.
I feel bad for asking.
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Firefox mobile? (Score:5, Interesting)
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Hopefully Firefox mobile will get good enough that by then you wont want to switch ;-)
And I'm saying that because if we lose diversity on mobile the web will become very locked in again hehe.
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They did bookmark sync between Chrome and Android browser some time ago, so sync is not all there is to it.
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They did bookmark sync between Chrome and Android browser some time ago, so sync is not all there is to it.
Ah, that is good to know. The sync wasn't the only reason I used it on mobile. The easy tab switching along with some of the plug ins have made it a bit nicer than the stock android browser.
No proxy support (Score:3)
If you want to try that, be aware that it doesn't support HTTP proxying. Kind of an epic fail on Google's behalf, given that they have just added system-wide proxy setting in ICS after several years of users complaining about the lack of this.
Mobile browswer support? (Score:1)
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Really nothing more to say...
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http://www.webkit.org/coding/lgpl-license.html [webkit.org]
Really nothing more to say...
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Is the LGPL really this weak...?
The LGPL license permits proprietary code to be linked with licensed libraries. The resulting program can be distrubuted under any terms unless it is derivative work. I cite Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] so feel free to change it if you disagree with it. :)
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The source is linked to from the Chrome for Android developer FAQ; see http://code.google.com/chrome/mobile/docs/faq.html [google.com]
The actual tarball is at http://chromium-browser-source.commondatastorage.googleapis.com/chrome_android.v0.16.4130.199.tgz [googleapis.com] and contains ordinary, buildable source code, not binaries.
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More like a merge of the Palm WebOS UI with Chrome. If it is the same, It's actually pretty cool and not just pretentious BS advertising.
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What is this stupid obsession with Flash? Do you know that even Adobe has dropped all support and future plans for Flash on mobile devices?
Re:great start but (Score:5, Informative)
Until then, I either put flash on my android phone, or email myself a link to check out the site when I'm near a desktop computer.
Or until you update your phone (Score:3)
When the websites I routinely visit stop posting content in Flash, I won't want it on my mobile devices anymore.
Which should be shortly since Chrome on Android will not support Flash either.
With no mobile platform supporting Flash it makes a ton more sense to simply drop Flash everywhere and focus on HTML5 support, even for desktop use.
As it is there is pretty much nothing I have missed Flash for on an iPad. And I've greatly enjoyed the far longer battery life I get as a result.
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Which should be shortly since Chrome on Android will not support Flash either.
Citation, please?
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Which should be shortly since Chrome on Android will not support Flash either.
I didn't know that, and you unfortunately didn't provide a citation, but I think I've found the relevant news piece [arstechnica.com]. Thanks for bringing that up.
Excuse me for a moment while I do the victory dance. Good riddance, Flash!
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Its not an obsessions, I may not even like flash
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Don't forget the privacy-setting circumvention mode.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204880404577225380456599176.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories [wsj.com]
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Well its one thing when the iPhone 4S has the same amount of memory as all the other iPhones.
All ICS devices have at least 1 gigabyte of ram or more - most older android phones only have 512 megs - it makes a big difference.
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The Nexus S (which has ICS) and the Nexus S 4G (which soon will be getting it) only have 512Mb of memory and strangely enough...ICS runs great on it.
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ICS works great on the G2 with only 512MB - I'd say it is peppier than Gingerbread was. Now if only they either had a stable driver API or actually kept their drivers up-to-date or open-source...
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ICS and Chrome Beta run fine on it. Altough I have to admit i'd be overally happy with more RAM =)
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For a start, most (if not all) ICS phones guarantee some kind of spec pre-requisite, (512mb of ram, non-crappy cpu and gup, internal memory space) that I suppose will help delivering a good experience.
And second, and most importantly, every version of Android adds new features and ways to access them, who are you to say that chrome doesn't need them? If it turns out it doesn't, I'm quite sure an APK will turn out somewhere.
And you forget that google doesn't profit from android directly. There were no licenc
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Well, Siri works on the iPhone 4, you only need a 4S id to be granted access to the servers, so you remember it wrong (:
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So are all the people who trashed Apple for making Siri exclusive to the iPhone 4S going to trash Google for making Chrome exclusive to ICS devices?
Specific application requires specific OS functions that aren't available in earlier versions, pretty damn obvious and really not that hard to comprehend. Your flamebait fails.
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I don't care about Flash. I just want WebM+VP8 everywhere.
Flash would be easier on the cap (Score:2)