Tech News

• 27Aug

  Google Chrome Labs

  Google Chrome No Comments
  Many Google Chrome features aren't enabled by default because they're not ready for primetime or they're too advanced. Unfortunately, you can't enable them from the interface and you have use command-line flags.
  
  A recent Chromium build added a new internal page that lets you enable some advanced features: about:labs.
  
  "Tabpose is currently the only lab on Mac, tabs-on-left the only lab on Windows. about:labs should not be visible on the stable channel. Labs that were enabled on the dev channel should not be enabled on the stable channel."
  
  
  
  Tabs-on-the-left is especially useful on widescreen monitors, while tabposé is a Mac-only feature that adds Exposé for tabs.
  
  Both features can also be enabled by adding command-line flags to a Chrome shortcut: --enable-vertical-tabs for side tabs and --enable-expose-for-tabs for tabposé. After enabling vertical tabs using the command-line flag, right-click on a tab and select "use side tabs".

  

  
  

  

  
• 25Aug

  Chrome Extensions Can Add New Items to the Context Menu

  Google Chrome No Comments
  Chromium's blog announced that extension developers can add custom actions to the context menu, now that this feature is available in Google Chrome 6 Beta.
  
  "The new context menu API allows extension developers to register menu items for all pages or for a subset of pages. Developers can also register menu items for specific operations, like right-clicking on an image or movie. For example, you could create an extension that makes it easy for users to share interesting images from images.google.com with their friends on Google Buzz."
  
  Here are 3 extensions that use the new APIs:
  
  * QR Code Generator, which generates a QR code from a web address (right-click on a link, select "Generate QR code" and use Barcode Scanner for Android or another application to scan the code).
  
  
  * Imgur Uploader, which uploads images to Imgur.
  
  * TweetRight, an extension that lets you share images, links, webpages and selected text on Twitter.
  
  You can try these extensions if you use Chrome 6 Beta, Chrome 6 Dev Channel, a Canary build or a recent Chromium build.
  
  Chrome 6 supports two other APIs for managing the browser's cookies and detecting when the computer's idle state changes, but there other interesting changes.
  
  { Thanks, Arpit. }

  

  
  

  

  
• 22Aug

  Google Chrome’s PDF Plugin Uses Foxit Software

  Google Chrome No Comments
  Google Chrome's built-in PDF plugin uses Foxit PDF SDK. As you can see from this page, there are many references to Foxit's SDK, which is a proprietary set of tools that allow applications to read or modify PDF files.
  
  
  "With the incredible small size (less than 2MB) and amazingly fast speed, Foxit PDF SDK (DLL) 2.0 is your absolute choice to develop your own PDF applications," suggests Foxit.
  
  Google decided to include two of the most popular plugins (Flash and PDF) in Google Chrome to make the browser more secure. The PDF plugin runs inside Chrome's sandbox so that vulnerabilities can no longer install malware on your computer. The Flash plugin is automatically updated by Google and it's likely that it will run inside Chrome's sandbox in the future. Google Chrome 5 already includes the Flash plugin, while the PDF plugin is available in Google Chrome 6 (dev, beta and soon in the stable channel).
  
  
  { Thanks, Tulchin. }

  

  
  

  

  
• 17Aug

  Chrome Web Store and Online Games

  Google Chrome No Comments
  1up.com reports that Google Chrome Web Store will be launched in October and online games will be one of its main attractions. "Set to launch this October, the store aims to make a proper marketplace for browser games -- one that solves a lot of the issues of games on the web today, from discovery to monetization."
  
  Google's game developer advocate, Mark DeLoura, thinks that it's difficult to find great online games, so Google Chrome Web Store tries to solve this problem by allowing users to rate games and write reviews. Chrome users will be able to install games, which adds shortcuts to the "new tab" page and grants additional permissions to the games. Not all games will be free, but Chrome users can buy games directly from the Web Store and pay using Google Checkout. Google's platform will support free trials and subscriptions, while developers will only pay a 5% processing fee for each transaction.
  
  
  Will users pay for web apps in Chrome's store? More than half of the Android apps are free and paid Android apps are only available in 13 countries because of Google Checkout's limitations. Android Market doesn't make it easy to find interesting new applications and doesn't recommend other applications based on the ones you've installed. Hopefully, Chrome Web Store will do a much better job than the Android Market.

  

  
  

  

  
• 09Aug

  System-Level Google Chrome Setup

  Google Chrome No Comments
  Google Chrome's setup installs the software only for the current user. This way, you don't need administrator rights to install Chrome. Until now, those who wanted to install Google Chrome for all the users of a computer had to use the Chrome build from Google Pack.
  
  Google has recently added a more straightforward location for a system-level setup: http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html?msi=true. The MSI installer only works in Windows, it currently installs the latest Dev Channel build and it seems to be targeted toward enterprise users.
  
  "The current user-level installation experience doesn't require elevation (installing at system-level does), and most users don't know or care about system-level installs. That said, it would probably be a good idea to have some links on the download pages that say 'click here for a system-level install or MSI', so interested/advanced users could find it easily as part of the normal download install flow," explained Glenn Wilson, a Google Chrome engineer. The link to the MSI installer will probably be added to Chrome's download page in the near future.
  
  

  

  
  

  

  
• 03Aug

  Yet Another Chromium Updater

  Google Chrome No Comments
  One of the drawbacks of using Chromium, the open source browser that powers Google Chrome, is that you have to manually update the software. Google offers three channels for early releases: beta, dev and Canary, but you still have to wait up to a week to try the latest features.
  
  Fortunately, it's not very difficult to write a script that downloads the latest Chromium build every 6 hours or every day and then installs it. For example, the URL of the most recent Windows build that passed all the tests is: http://build.chromium.org/buildbot/continuous/LATEST/mini_installer.exe.
  
  Chromium Updater is a Windows application that makes it easier to update Chromium. You can change the update interval, switch to the snapshot channel, which includes the Chromium builds that didn't pass all the tests, use the built-in Flash and PDF plug-ins from an existing Chrome installation. Some of the text from the setup wizard is in German, but the application is in English.
  
  
  It's important to note that Chromium builds are likely to be buggier and less stable than Google Chrome builds. Chromium also lacks some features that are available in Google Chrome: the built-in Flash and PDF plug-ins, support for H.264 videos, Google branding, automatic updates.
  
  { via Google Chrome Help Forum }

  

  
  

  

  
• 04May

  10 Things to Try in Google Chrome 5 Beta

  Google Chrome No Comments
  If you're using the stable version of Google Chrome, the latest beta release (Google Chrome 5.0.375.29 for Windows, Mac and Linux) will be a pleasant surprise. Here are 10 things you should try after installing Chrome 5 beta:
  
  1. Google Chrome remembers zoom settings for each domain. Go to http://www.nytimes.com, zoom using Ctrl+ or Ctrl-, close the tab and reopen it.
  
  2. Remove individual items from the history. Go to the History tab (Ctrl+H), click on "Edit items", select the pages you want to remove and click on "Remove selected pages".
  
  3. The new bookmark manager is an HTML page that opens in a new tab. It looks better than the previous manager and it has the advantage that extensions will be able to add new features.
  
  
  4. Google Chrome can synchronize themes and preferences, in addition to bookmarks.
  
  
  5. Google Chrome includes Adobe's Flash plug-in, so you no longer have to install it or worry about keeping it up to date. Open a site that uses Flash, right-click on a Flash object and select "About Adobe Flash". You should see the message "You have version 10,1,53,22 installed".
  
  6. Disable individual plug-ins. Go to chrome://plugins/ and disable the plug-ins you don't need. You can disable Google Gears, Adobe Flash, Google Update or any other plug-in installed on your computer.
  
  7. Extensions in incognito mode. Chrome disables all extensions in incognito mode, but you can manually enable some of them from the Extensions page.
  
  8. Native geolocation. The previous Chrome versions used the Google Gears implementation, but Google Chrome now supports HTML5 geolocation, so that more web applications can easily find your location. Go to Google Maps, click on the small circle above the Street View logo and you'll see an infobar: "maps.google.com wants to track your location".
  
  "If you allow Google Chrome to share your location with a site, the browser will send local network information to Google Location Services to get an estimate of your location. The browser can then share your location with the requesting site. The local network information used by Google Location Services to estimate your location includes information about visible WiFi access points, including their signal strength; information about your local router; your computer's IP address," explains Google.
  
  9. Manual translation. Now you can disable the auto-translation feature and still be able to use the built-in translator. Even if you disable the Google Translate integration from Settings/Under the hood, you can still right-click on a page and select "Translate to English".
  
  10. Reorder extension buttons. You can change the order of the buttons installed by Google Chrome extensions using drag & drop and even hide some of the buttons.
  
  
  Bonus enterprise feature. Google Chrome now supports Integrated Windows Authentication. If you have access to an intranet site that uses Microsoft IIS and requires NTLM authentication, open it in Chrome 5. This is one of the most requested Chrome features, after the support for Core Animation NPAPI, extensions and a bookmark manager.
  
  For those who are wondering, Google Chrome 5.0.375.29 is the latest beta and the latest dev release for Windows, Mac and Linux. This page shows the most recent two releases for all Chrome flavors.

  

  
  

  

  
• 23Apr

  Two Beautiful Ads for Google Chrome

  Google Chrome No Comments
  Even if you don't like Google Chrome, you have to admit that the ads promoting Google's browser are well-crafted. Take, for example, this ad for Google Chrome extensions, which promotes a modern technology using old-fashioned cinematic tricks.
  
  "In keeping with the rustic feel of the ad, the music used is Fats Waller's (Do You Intend to Put an End to) A Sweet Beginning? To keep the explanation simple, ad agency BBH New York has used rudimentary mechanical images, such as a bird popping out of a cuckoo clock and tweeting in the corner of a computer screen and a hamster running in a wheel to drag actual bookmarks between two computers," reports The Guardian.
  
  
  A second ad promotes the built-in translation feature launched in Google Chrome 4.1. "Both [films] are un-tech-like product demos, showing the work and genius going on behind creating something that is essentially very simple to use," explained Pelle Sjoenell, the executive creative director at BBH.
  
  
  { Thanks, François. }

  

  
  

  

  
• 16Apr

  Google Cloud Print

  Google Chrome, Google Chrome OS, Mobile No Comments
  Google found an interesting solution for printing documents in Chrome OS. Instead of preloading the drivers for the most popular printers, Chrome OS will use an online service for printing: Google Cloud Print.
  

  In Google Chrome OS, all applications are web apps. Therefore, in designing the printing experience for Google Chrome OS, we want to make sure printing from web apps is as natural as printing from traditional native apps is today. Additionally, with the proliferation of web-connected mobile devices such as those running Google Chrome OS and other mobile operating systems, we don't believe it is feasible to build and maintain complex print subsystems and print drivers for each platform. In fact, even the print subsystems and drivers on existing PC operating systems leave a lot of room for improvement.
  
  Our goal is to build a printing experience that enables any app (web, desktop, or mobile) on any device to print to any printer anywhere in the world. This goal is accomplished through the use of a cloud print service. Apps no longer rely on the local operating system (and drivers) to print. Instead, apps (whether they be a native desktop/mobile app or a web app) use Google Cloud Print to submit and manage print jobs. Google Cloud Print is then responsible for sending the print job to the appropriate printer, with the particular options the user selected, and providing job status to the app.

  
  The only problem is that no printer supports Google Cloud Print and that's why Google revealed some details about the service's interfaces, hoping that printer manufacturers will update their software and support it. If a printer doesn't support Google's service, you'll need a proxy software for the computer where the printer is installed. Google says that the proxy software will be bundled with Google Chrome.
  
  Google wants to associate your printers with a Google account and manage them the same way as you manage Google Docs documents, so you can share them with other people. Web applications can use APIs to customize the printing options and change the user interface displayed when you start printing a document.
  
  "We believe cloud printing has tremendous benefits for end users and for the industry and is essential, given the rapid shift toward cloud-based applications and data storage. We also believe that the only way that the benefits of cloud printing can be realized is if the protocols are open, freely implementable, and, when possible, based on existing industry standards. We expect there to be multiple cloud print services, and users should have a choice in which services they use and which printers they can connect to a service. Stay tuned for more details. We are confident that cloud-aware printers will soon be a reality," suggests Google.
  
  It may seem that Google's solution is complicated and difficult to implement: we need an open standard for cloud printing, cloud-aware printers and users need to associate printers with an online service. Instead of sending the printing job directly to the printer, you'll send it to the online service, which forwards it to the printer. Despite all these hurdles, Google Cloud Print allows you to print documents from a mobile phone, tablet, notebook or any other mobile device. You'll be able to print files from an Android phone or tablet, from a Chrome OS computer, from any computer that runs Google Chrome and from other devices that will support Google Cloud Print.
  
  

  

  
  

  

  
• 15Apr

  Eric Schmidt on Chrome OS

  Google Chrome, Google Chrome OS No Comments
  At Google Atmosphere, a CIO event about cloud computing held in London, Eric Schmidt explained why Chrome OS is meaningful:
  
  "The promise of Chrome and Chrome OS is that the devices that you give to your employees will have a 2-second boot time, will be completely disposable and the price will be incredibly low."
  
  Chrome OS computers will no longer be personal because it doesn't matter which computer you use. After logging to your Google account, Chrome OS will retrieve your bookmarks, themes, settings, web history from Google's servers. Your data is stored in a central location and you can access it from all your devices.
  
  Computers will boot almost instantly, so you no longer have to wait. They'll be cheap, easy to replace and to maintain.
  
  You can already use Chrome on your computer, but a Chrome OS computer is optimized for running a browser, doesn't have extraneous software and it's inherently more secure.
  
  

  

  
  

  

  

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