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Posts Tagged ‘google chrome’

Ten reasons apps are better than bookmarks

Click to launch our tour of Google Chrome's first great apps

The Chrome Web Store is an interesting beast, in that many (maybe even most) of the apps are essentially unchanged from a typical website. This is especially noticeable for Google's own offerings, ranging from Gmail to Google Maps to Google Reader, but there's a pretty reasonable explanation for that: Those "sites" were always web apps. Until now, there just wasn't a central repository of them, but that's no reason to radically change the near-perfection that is Gmail just so the app looks different than gmail.com.

On the other hand, just because it makes sense doesn't mean it isn't a little boring. Of course Gmail and Google Maps are amazing, but it's much more interesting to look at the apps that are either dramatically redesigned or entirely new. You can keep on using your Gmail bookmark as usual--there's no particular reason to download an app, at least at this point. Once Google releases Chrome OS sometime next year, users of that new, browser-based OS will rely more on apps. But for now, your everyday Windows or Mac user of Chrome can restrict themselves to the more exciting apps in the Web Store. Check out our gallery above for ten of our early favorites.

Back in May, we reported that Google was working on an app store for web applications, dubbed the Chrome Web Store. Now we have further details on the project.

Google spoke to gaming press at the Game Developers Conference Europe, where it unveiled further details on the mechanics of the store and announced that it’s “most likely” expected to launch in October, gaming site 1Up.com reports.

The store resembles a web-based version of the iTunes App Store, and unsurprisingly, it will rely on Google Checkout to simplify app purchases. Google stressed how simple it will be for developers to build apps for the store: They simply need to create a web app, build a wrapper for it (icons and metadata), and upload it to the store. The app is then automatically approved and published.

One interesting change is that Google won’t be seeking revenue sharing when the store launches — instead, it’s charging a mere 5 percent processing fee. This is in stark contrast to the iTunes store, where Apple takes a 30 percent cut from every transaction. The move is likely meant to encourage developers to populate the store with their apps. At launch, the store will support both free and paid apps, free trials, subscriptions, and third-party in-app payment methods for microtransactions. In the first half of 2011, it will support currency other than the U.S. dollar and will get a built-in solution for in-app transactions.

Since the presentation was meant for gaming press, Google didn’t skimp on the games it showed off for the store. It showed off Plants vs. Zombies, and Lego Star Wars — both of which are built in Adobe Flash — and discussed the potential for HTML5 games, including the popular strategy game Freeciv.net. The presentation also briefly touched on the HTMl5 version of Quake 2 that some Google Web Toolkit developers ported.

A web app store may seem superfluous for most users — and as Wired’s Chris Anderson might argue, it’s probably contributing to the death of the web. But I don’t think it’s meant for general Chrome users. The web store will most likely sit at the heart of Google’s upcoming Chrome OS — a lightweight web-centric operating system meant for netbooks and tablets. Since Chrome OS won’t have much in the way of local applications, users will need a centralized location to find web-based apps.

Check out a video below of Google game developer advocate Mark DeLoura talking about the benefits of Chrome for gaming:

Tags: apps, chrome, Chrome OS, Chrome Web Store, Google Chrome, web app

Companies: Google

People: Mark DeLoura

Google launched a new feature today that helps users share links and data on the desktop Chrome Web browser with phones using the company’s Android operating system. This “Chrome to Phone” feature will allow users to, for example, send directions to the Android map application and to send phone numbers to their mobile address book.

Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra announced the feature at the Google I/O conference for developers in May, implicitly describing it as a one-up on Apple’s iPhone by saying, “That’s how you do a cloud-to-device API.” Today, Google revealed more details about Chrome to Phone at a press conference in San Francisco (where it also unveiled a feature called Voice Actions) and actually made the browser extension available.

As people perform more tasks in both their browsers and their phones, this kind of integration becomes more important — Mozilla, for example, developed an app for sharing content between its desktop browser and the iPhone. Since Google builds both the browser and the phone (or at least the mobile operating system in the phone) it can also build more interesting integrations than just sharing a link.

Tags: Android, Chrome to Phone, Google Chrome

Companies: Google

Google approved that company was working under new OS - Google Chrome OS. Many users and analytics were waiting for the new product from Google, especially for completely new OS.

Google Chrome OS is absolutely independent OS and has nothing in common with mobile Androis OS. Google Chrome OS is oriented to work in the Internet. It is based on Linux kernel. New OS can work with x86 and ARM processors. It is expected that Google Chrome OS will be set up on small netbooks. The firs sales are going to be in the second quater of 2010.

Engineers said that they wanted to develop very easy for understanding OS, stable where users can forget about malware and viruses. Today some screenshots of Google Chrome OS were published on the Internet. But originality is under suspicion.