Google Chrome turns Ten

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ThinkingSapien

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The Chrome Web Browser turned 10 years old this past weekend.
Ten years ago Google launched its Chrome browser on September 1, 2008. The browser has since then underwent a lot of upgrades and updates to boast a sizeable chunk of the market.

At the time of the launch, Google Chrome was labeled as a ‘fresh take on the browser’ and the company believed it would add value for users and help drive innovation on the web. Quite rightly so, today there are more Chrome users, 60 percent as per the latest numbers, than any rival browser’s.

As The Verge reports, Google Chrome was originally launched as a Windows-only beta app before it was extended to support Linux and macOS a year later.

From being a sum of components from Apple’s WebKit rendering engine and Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome is now looking at a future of becoming a one whole platform in itself. It is already powering Chrome OS and Google is continuously releasing new apps and features to make it more efficient.
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Here the blue line is Internet Explorer’s market share while the green is Google Chrome’s share.

https://economictimes.indiatimes.co...ogle-chrome-turns-10/articleshow/65657983.cms

Google is also hinting at some surprise for this Tuesday, September 4th. Not quite related to this, but Google will be among the technology companies testifying before the Senate this Wednesday.
 
I remember trying Chrome pretty early on and hating it. It seemed really basic compared to my Firefox setup at the time and unintuitive compared to Firefox, and I didn’t expect it to become a serious contender to Firefox. Imagine my surprise when a few years later it became the most popular browser! I eventually gave in, tried it again, and have been using it as my main browser since, minus briefly trying Edge and Safari.

That said, I have to say that I feel Chrome became a bit too…prevalent…within Google’s own product line. For instance, I still don’t fully get why they turned to Chrome for a desktop OS rather than Android. Yes, I get that they wanted a more casual OS just for web-based stuff, but Apple was already offering something like that in the Macbook Air, and that at least gave a fully-featured OS. That’s also basically what a lot of people use their tablets for, which Android decided to go after anyways. It was just bizarre. And don’t get me started on Chromecast!

I don’t think it detracts from Chrome itself, though. It’s still a fantastic browser.

Edit: Oh yeah, I do have one serious complaint about Chrome’s current state: WHY DID GOOGLE GET RID OF CHROME APPS!!! (Yes, they said it was unpopular. I still liked them.)
 
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Since IE is no longer the main browser for Windows. It stands that usage would go down. I do not see Edge on that chart. My browser of choice. I do have Chrome. (still a resource but getting a tad better) But I prefer Edge.
 
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Stephen_C said:
Since IE is no longer the main browser for Windows. It stands that usage would go down. I do not see Edge on that chart.
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I’m never quite sure how Edge is being counted. There are some charts that view Edge as a continuation of IE. Its rendering engine first appeared as an option in Internet Explorer 11 (project Sparton). With updates to IE being discontinued at the same time Windows 10 was released with Edge I can see justification for that view.

My default browser is still edge. I use Chrome more as some of the web applications I need are only supported in Chrome.

I also use Chromium for some of the software projects 9n which I work and V8 (the Chrome/Chromium JavaScript engine). The documentation for it is awful, but it is of high utility.
ZMystiCat said:
For instance, I still don’t fully get why they turned to Chrome for a desktop OS rather than Android.
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Chromebooks have been getting support for Android applications. And there were some features for Chrome apps that have been discontinued. It’s to early to know if they are refining their feature set or doing an about face on Vhrome OS.
ZMystiCat said:
WHY DID GOOGLE GET RID OF CHROME APPS!!! (Yes, they said it was unpopular. I still liked them.)
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I like them too. They still exists, kind of. A developer cant package the apps and put them in the store for hosting any more. The developer must host the HTML app themself. That raised the bar for what a developer must maintain to have an app out there.
 
ThinkingSapien said:
Chromebooks have been getting support for Android applications.
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I know, and they’re also starting support for standard Linux applications. To me, though, that just makes it seem more like they should have started there. Maybe in retrospect they’re wishing that they had.
ThinkingSapien said:
The developer must host the HTML app themself.
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Which they could already do beforehand, and some companies like Microsoft did basically just put up links to their websites. But with the lack of apps, they also have cut support for things like the app launcher, which is what annoyed me the most.
 
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Now days I think close to 50% of browsing is done from a mobile device. With Windows phone being dead and never popular a Microsoft browser wasn’t much of an option.

One thing Internet Explorer had going for it was it was free. It’s earlier competitor, Netscape, had a price of 50 usd per computer. You could purchase it through the mail or buy it in some stores. Internet explorer also became a significant software component in Windows providing functionality for other applications (the file explorer was itself an instance of Internet Explorer and the Office applications used components from I.E. too). It was also a component used by third party developers. This was part of the reason that Microsoft simply could not remove the browser as request in the antitrust case.

The advantages brought from it being there and integrated into the OS was also a disadvantage. The process of software changes is more complex since they have to make sure that their changes dont have unintended effects on other software. There were bugs that had to be maintained instead of iradicated because third part products and sites would break if they fixed them. Chrome on the other hand sees rapid updates. I believe the desktop version is at about version 60 or 70 now.

Btw, for anyone interested Microsoft Edge Beta is available on Android. Here is the link.
play.google.com

Microsoft Edge: Web Browser​

d3c7f5d54680977242d60e01859dd0a939da7d87.jpeg

Web browser with speed, privacy, and security while you browse...
Free
 
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