Oh boy!  Yet another browser to test for.  What is wrong with these guys?

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/02/technology/02google.php

Page 1 of 2 (you can click for page 2 yourselves)

The browser war is back on.

This time, Microsoft's opponent is Google, a familiar foe.

On Tuesday, Google will release a free Web browser called Chrome that the company said would challenge Microsoft's Internet Explorer, as well as the Firefox browser.

In a curious twist, Google made its online announcement after its plans appeared as a digital "comic book" that was posted by Google Blogoscoped.com, a Web site that tracks the Internet search giant. Google said it had accidentally sent the comic book to the blog.

The browser is a universal doorway to the Internet, and the use of Internet software and services is rapidly growing. Increasingly, the browser is the gateway to the Web on cellphones and other mobile devices, widening the utility of the Web and Web advertising. Google, analysts say, cannot let Microsoft's dominant share of the browser market go without a direct challenge.

Google already competes with Microsoft in online search and Internet advertising. They both make operating software for cellphones. Google is increasingly competing with Microsoft head-on in software that handles basic productivity like word processing, spreadsheet, presentation and e-mail programs. Google has Web-based software in these markets that are low-cost or free alternatives to Microsoft's lucrative desktop software.

Despite the frequent clashes with Microsoft — including the role Google played in thwarting an attempted acquisition of Yahoo — Google has only come out on top in search and search advertising. But Google does not have to win the browser war. Strategically, opening yet another front against Microsoft forces it to divert resources to defend franchises.

Now, Chrome heightens the rivalry and marks a shift of course for Google, which has strongly backed Firefox, the open-source browser that has gained about a fifth of the market against the dominant Internet Explorer.

Google's browser project has been under way for more than a year, a person close to the company said.

In a brief statement, Microsoft welcomed the new entry and expressed confidence that people would prefer Explorer, which is on every Windows PC sold.

"The browser landscape is highly competitive," said Dean Hachamovitch, general manager of the Internet Explorer group. "But people will choose Internet Explorer 8 for the way it puts the services they want right at their fingertips, respects their personal choices about how they want to browse and, more than any other browsing technology, puts them in control of their personal data online."

Google has clashed with Microsoft before, saying it had designed IE to gain ground in search, a market where Google is the runaway leader.

After Microsoft introduced IE 7 in 2006, Google complained that the browser's search box favored Microsoft's search service. Microsoft responded and made modifications, and a US. judge overseeing the antitrust consent decree against Microsoft determined the browser design was not anticompetitive.

The first round of the browser wars in the 1990s led to a sweeping US. antitrust suit against Microsoft for the tactics it used to stifle competition from the commercial pioneer in browsing software, Netscape Communications. A US. appeals court ruled in 2001 that Microsoft had repeatedly violated the nation's antitrust laws. Microsoft later reached a settlement with the Bush administration, which included some sanctions but left the company free to bundle browsing software with Windows, which runs more than 90 percent of all personal computers.

Microsoft recently stepped up its own browser development efforts, given the increasing importance of the browser and signs that Firefox is nibbling at its lead. Microsoft released a new version, IE8, last week to generally favorable reviews.

Microsoft still holds 73 percent of the browser market, according to Net Applications, a research firm. The market share for Firefox has climbed to 19 percent, while Apple's Safari has 6 percent.

Chrome also puts Google in competition with an ally, Mozilla Corp., which manages the Firefox project. Just last week, Google renewed its deal with Mozilla. Under the arrangement, Google Search is the home page for Firefox and Google is its default search bar, and Google makes substantial payments to Mozilla. The agreement runs through November 2011.

Google's cooperation with Mozilla, however friendly, meant that it was ceding control of the Internet's vital gateway technology — and the dominant supplier of that technology is its rival, Microsoft.

Given the increasing importance of the browser and its widening competition with Microsoft, Google's entry into the market is not surprising, said John Lilly, chief executive of Mozilla.

"It would be more surprising to me if Google didn't do something in the browser space," Lilly said. "After all, Google is 100 percent on the Web."

http://www.google.com/chrome/

hmmmmmmm, tch! That's one more for the testing board. But it'll be a while before it hits mainstream. Just goes to show in this day and age, if you don't do your homework, someone else will.

Nice one! I just saw it this morning and I'm waiting to be the first one to try it out. I'm more concerned about the new features that google will throw into this one and of course I expect it to have passed the ACID test(s) completely so I've got no fear of Browser compatibility arising with google's chrome, but who knows.

yawa-ti-de, perhaps you do us the honor of writing a review for us after you test the features of Chrome. I for one would be interested to see it especially for scitech360.com.

Thanks and I'm off to download Chrome, see you  soon!

Will do, if I have the time

http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/

Crash proof. Tab oriented. Speed improvements. Smart UI with Google Search. Wow!

thanks.

I've been looking for the Chrome download for most of the morning and haven't been able to find a working link google.com/chrome returns a 404 HTTP Response, any lead?

am also wetin to download it, i use safari, too apple browser, nice but to much of browser, close up everything, and he doesn't recover lost browsers, unlike firefox

@castrol

u rnt alone. I can't find it. Now bear in mind that as at the time I am writiing, those guys in california aren't awake yet, technically, so we shall see. In the meantime, if not already, enjoy the google chrome comic book:
http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/index.html

I have downloaded chrome and i'm using it right now. I must admit that it does beat internet explorer in terms of speed. Internet Explorer is still undoubtedly the slowest browser of all time. In comparison to Firefox however, i think its still too early for me to decide which one is faster. All in all, its a pretty dope browser, cool graphics and u dont get a million and one toolbars installed by default which I think is very neat.

I use Mozilla Firefox, and it's by far the best browser. Internet Explorer makes my computer go slow But I want to see this new "Google Chrome", I may switch browsers again.

Mozilla is very good. But this Opera 9.51 is off the hinges.

opera or safari are faster than firefox to me. internet explorer is just annoying, it took them ages just to get tabs lol.

The Google Browser installer is deceptive.  It masquerades as a 475kb download but it's larger than that. 

The problem with Opera is that the shortcuts are different from IE and firefox.  Otherwise it's really fast, too.

I prefer and use opera mainly because of the speed dials.

But its not the best as per compatibility e.g the shortcuts for posting and previewing on nairaland dont work with opera.

Chrome is decent, clean look yet very fast and compatible. Firefox is going to have to give way to this one for me. I cant find the menu though

The Google Browser installer is deceptive. It masquerades as a 475kb download but it's larger than that.

I knew immediately that the installation would be web-based. Google cannot create that kind of small thing and expect it to compete.

Boy o boy am feeling this goggle's chrome. Freaking fast. . 

I'm using it right now and so far, I'm impressed.
I definitely prefer it to Firefox 3.
Typically I use Safari, but if Chrome continues to impress, I might just switch. Besides, it looks great with Vista.

Not a bad browser but it has some problems.

In the meantime, it still need some works to be done.

One feature I like here is that it enable you to turn the websites you visit to an application short cut on the Desktop, Start Menu, or Quick Launch Bar

I'm still gon' be chilling with Firefox.

Believe me I love my firefox, been using it for almost 5 years now, but this Google thing is like FIRE, heck its like browsing at the speed of thought. Completely shocking. If I hated IE, I hate it even more now.

It imported my shortcuts and all, even the feel is VERY similar to Firefox, so the transition is nearly seamless. I am definitely going to give it a try for now.

I just hope it doesn't have plug-in issues like the firefox of old.

I'll be viewing my 'regulars' to see how it works with them.

well, firefox is still the most secure web browser! Firefox any day any moment

The chrome is amazingly fast, and quite sleek. It has frozen a few times already (while viewing facebook) but it's still a beta, but so far so good.

i am a big fan of firefox,so far i am kind of impressed by google chrome, we ve got to to give them credit.

Some on should pls inform me on how to download both the fire fox and the Chrome.Thanks

tundysho:

Some on should please inform me on how to download both the fire fox and the Chrome.Thanks

Firefox: http://www.mozilla-europe.org/en/firefox/

Chrome: http://www.google.com/chrome

I would go with Chrome though,

I am currently giving it a test run, and al i can say is, it is faster than most browsers I have used in recent times.

I got the browser a couple of minutes after it was launched and noticed one thing. Google built it with the pages in mind not necessarily the users viewing the pages.

http://9jasite.com/2008/09/02/google-chrome-my-first-impression/

Reload All Tabs is missing - important for a situation when your connection goes awry.
Lots of options missing considered crucial to browsers (the people, not the software)

Reload all tabs? Lol. Apparently, they were not thinking about the Nigerian market.

Anyway, the thing I like about it is that it's plenty fast. And very responsive. I'm not too excited about it but I'm pretty impressed so far.

I know I'm old school but what happened to good old Internet Explorer?

not just the nigerian market, imagine reading the homepage of smashingmagazine or browsing your friend's delicious bookmarks, or persuing digg homepage, you right click and open up to 18 tabs (after all, the browser is memory efficient - so no worries). something happens and your connection disconnects. all pages show up as "page unavailable". then you have to refresh.

also, you can close a series of tabs and get them restored when you come back to the browser

.

The tech world is spinning outta proportion and i am loving it!

Its awesome, I'm using it now. I especially love the task manager, and the ability to ISOLATE what's dragging the browser/cpu. There's nothing more annoying than having to crash the entire browser (full of opened tabs BTW) because of some flash plugin ONE page.

But honestly though its really just a nice hybrid of all the best features of the current existing browsers. Cant wait for them to create add-ons and seal the deal.