Google Chrome Beta - First Impressions
I’ve been following with interest the introduction of the new google browser - called Chrome.
When I saw it show up today for Beta release, I new I’d have to give it a test drive. I’m currently writing this blog using Chrome, instead of Flock, which I’d been using lately.
Getting Chrome
Chrome can be downloaded from http://www.Google.com/chrome/ It’s free, and the initial download is quick. Takes about 16MB.
Installing Chrome
Installing Chrome was just a little bit more trouble. My first install seemed to take forever, and then failed. My Comodo Firewall was blocking the install silently, and neither Comodo nor Chrome indicated any problem until the whole thing had failed. It was easy enough to put Comodo on “Learn” and restart the install, which this time only took a few minutes.
First Impressions
If simple is better, then this program absolutely rocks!
The New Google Browser Tabs
The screen is so clean as to border the ridiculous. Just go to the top line and type where you want to go. Type in an URL, or something close, and off you go. Type in some words, and the Google search patterns start offering suggestions, until you choose one or type your own. Hit enter and you’re off to the familiar Google search.
The “New Tab” is an instant Visual favorites. You favorites sites are shown in little boxes you’re sure to recognize. Just click and go.
Chrome's New Tab - instant Favorites
The New-Tab also works as an instant bookmarks page. You have a text list of RECENT bookmarks, a visual array of your most visited websites, and an option to pull up the rest of your bookmarks from a button in the top right of the page.
The pages load quickly and cleanly, even after visiting some notoriously painful sites.
I used it to write and manage posts for Wordpress, in ‘visual’ mode, which can cause headaches for lesser browsers, and Chrome passed with flying colors.
It’s hard not to like the simple, clean look, and easy functionality.
Minor Issues
Some things did get me to raise an eyebrow or two.
The download window, reminiscent of Firefox, popped up in a tiny box I almost missed. After expanding the separate window in the top right hand corner. I finally found the download. It was at the bottom of this hidden box. This is the experience you get if the webpage opens a new window before downloading - really ugly.
Under normal circumstances, the download creates an entry at the bottom of the page, and a big blue arrow appears shortly to guide you to seeing this download information:
Chrome Download indicator
It shows a status indicator, a history of your downloads, and an icon of the download type. My first instinct is to like it, but we’ll have to see for how long that lasts.
From the favorites page, I hovered over one of the images, and rightclicked to get my context menu. I chose to save image as, and got nowhere. No popup, nothing. That isn’t quite right
Right-clicking on a link does what I expect, open tab in new window/new tab choices, but with the added ‘open in new incognito window’ more about that later. The new tab/new window order is the opposite of Firefox, so I accidentally chose the wrong one several times.
Dynamic Tabs
Now how cool is this? Click a tab and drag it. Change the order of your tabs at will. Pull it off the tab bar and it creates its own window. I’m not sure how truly useful this is, but for cool factor, you’ve got to give it a 10.
Will I be reordering my tabs very often. I think not. But yanking one down and making it’s own windows seems to have a lot of value. I did, once or twice move my mouse while choosing tabs, and the movement at the top of the page caught me off guard.
“Incognito” mode
I mentioned right clicking a link and opening the link in an Incognito window. You can also go up to the little page icon beside the URL/Search string field, and create a new incognito window. You won’t be able to forget you’re in Incognito mode - you window looks decidedly sneaky.
Google Incognito Mode
Incognito windows create special URL sessions that are not tracked. Cookies are created, but no history of the event survives once the window is closed. Now THIS one I can see myself using, and I know some people who will be using this one a LOT.
When you first open your incognito window, a little blurb gives you some information about what Incognito is and isn’t.
I tried it out, and it was interesting to see how the activities in the Incognito windows didn’t show up anywere. I even searched the temp files. Nothing. Zilch. Nada. Again - coolness factor: 9 - usefullness factor: the big 10.
Safe Site Indicator
Green mean go. Red means stop.
Go to a page with valid security credentials, and you see a nice green https in front of the URL.
Green means go - This is a safe site
If the site credential are bad, you’ll get a nice warning page, with a bright red background. If you dare to follow through with the link, you’ll get a bright red https with a strike through showing you you’re on your own.
Are you sure you want to be here?
Final Thoughts
I haven’t tried any integration with any browser featurers, there’s no skinning, and of course it’s just Beta. But cool features abound.
It’s Google, and I’m sure there are tons of people eager to customize this to their hearts content. I don’t doubt that browser add-on creators will jump on the bandwagon soon.
I’m going to play with it for a while, and will update my impressions tomorrow evening, after I’ve really pounded on it for a while.
On day 1 of Beta (or so I believe), it works fine, looks clean, and I had no major hiccoughs. Haven’t stress tested it yet, but had fun with all the cool new features. And they are VERY cool. Pretty good first outing Google, kudos.
Leave a Comment
If you would like to make a comment, please fill out the form below.
Steven Pratt
I had no problems downloading Chrome but found it fell well short of a browser that I would use on a daily basis. The simplistic display failed to display any images from numerous websites and despite going to many sites and repeating some it failed to show my most visited. Using it reminded me of the “Awefull Bar” in Firefox 3 before I fixed it.I did not change any settings, it was exactly as it comes. I think after finding that it failed miserably as a browser the only option that I was looking for was the “Uninstall” button !
To me it falls miles short of Firefox 3 in many ways especially useability. It might offer lots but finding them is a problem and as it appears to fail to display any form of image then it is a waste of time.
Looks pretty cool. I’m downloading it now. Thanks for the link!
I had issues as well. No java and no way to get it working. Some ugly image issues. Not quite ready for prime time in my book. I’ll be interested to see how long before there’s an update - tomorrow maybe?
@John L - Your results are so different from mine. I’ve got it running on three machines now, and have yet to have an image issue. Which makes sense since this is based on the same rendering engine that Safari uses. I do understand that the javascript is all new, but the javascript I’ve tried works excellent as well.
@Allan - Yes, no Java but supposedly Java and Flash plugins are supposed to work. No toolbar extensions or anything like that are available from what I’m reading. I use Flock day to day for all the extensions, and this supplies just the opposite.
With that said, it seems to load as fast or faster than Firefox 3, uses very few resources, and has the feeling of being very fast and efficient. Not sure why many people are having serious issues with the html and image rendering - just doesn’t make too much sense.
Chrome is working amazingly well but just bookmarks ,I cant import from IE. is there place where i can find that folder and copy myself. like in IE. Good Effort and they will rock browser world like search world.
I’m also having issues pulling across my favourites. Any help in finding the folder to copy them too would be gratefully received!
i appreciate your incite.
I can’t use Chrome at work because of the info that appears in the new tabs. Even though the frequently visited websites are visited before I start work, during lunch and after I clock out, there they are for all to see. It would create a potentially embarrassing situation if ALL of the most visited sites were not work related.
Even worse… Most of my most frequently visited websites revolve around politics and religion. I have extreme views on both subjects and I try my best to keep that sort of thing private.
I know that I can open a new “incognito” window but then all the cookies get erased and it’s a pain to log into everything, every time, etc…
It would be my very strong preference to disable the personal info presented on the new tabs. The personal info display makes Chrome more of a professional hazard than anything.
A note to the previous comment about your browsing information staying visible…
Check the writeup on the following site to learn how to create multiple user profiles for Chrome. With this, you can set up a not-safe-for-work profile that you can user for your regular browsing, and another work-safe profile for use at other times.
http://www.labnol.org/software/create-family-profiles-in-google-chrome/4394/
Also… regarding earlier comments about Java not working…
http://www.google.com/support/chrome/bin/answer.py?answer=95282&query=java&topic=&type=
As far as Java working, you don’t have to go any farther than the blog entry after this one to find the solution.
THIS SITE ROX EVERY TYM FAST ,CLEAN AND SAFE ONLY FOLLOW CHROME AND IE FCUK MOZZILLA I AGREE DAT MOZZILLA GIVE GOOD THEMES AND PLUGINS BUT
CHROME IS CHROME GOT DAT ! !
Well I liked chrome when I first tried it. Everything went smoothly. But comodo firewall caused a hiccup. When I created a new tab, comodo warned that chrome is trying to launch another instance of chrome. I allowed it and selected to treat it as an isolated application (that’s the mistake i think i made). From then onwards everytime i launched chrome it failed to display any page whatsoever. I tried reinstalling but to no avail. Please help me out!!
Unfortunatly Chrome’s Incognito mode isn’t really private. It keeps so-called “flash cookies” even after leaving the Incognito mode. So every website can still keep track on you using this technique. And other users of your computer can see where you have been surfed too.
There are some really cool memory things as well as some web developer tools with this browser. It is still beta but looks to be a step in the right direction.
http://mixeduperic.com/Windows/Software/google-chrome-managing-memory-and-cpu-usage.html
Work offline in Google chrome?
How to see opened web page in work offline mode in Google Chromeas we do with File in
Internet Explorer. I searched everywhere for two days;failed miserably.If you can help please!
Regards,
R P Sharma
Work offline in Google chrome?
How to see opened web page in work offline mode in Google Chromeas we do with File in
Internet Explorer. I searched everywhere for two days;failed miserably.If you can help please on email: sharrp@gmail.com
R P Sharma
@R P Sharma
Currently it looks like Chrome does not have an offline browse mode.
Over at A Blog For Small Things: http://www.offlineblog.net/2008/09/a-to-do-list-for-google-chrome-team/ they’ve been discussing this weakness among others.
Maybe in the next release…
My little problem is with the offline mode! just can’t seem to work offline!…but you’ve got the history intact.. with it consuming space and everything!!