Google spins out happy-clappy autofill Chrome 6 beta
It’s been a bumper beta 24 hours here on the brewing-browsers El Reg desk, after Google shoved out a Chrome 6.0.472.33 build yesterday. A developer build of Chrome 6 has been available since June, and now Google has effectively promoted most of that code to beta status for Windows, Mac and Linux fans. But there are exceptions. …
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YAWN
In 10 months Chrome has gone through versions 3.0, 4.0, 4.1, 5.0 and now 6.0.
At this rate it'll be on v12 by the time they add a bookmark icon to the toolbar and v15 by the time we can disable the download bar. Who knows, by v22 we might even be able to set the size of the cache!
And yet
It's taken MS 15 years to get to IE 9, and it's still not as good as Chrome.
Which would you prefer?
Snailz
Why, because it's slow and bloated? I prefer speed and efficiency. Yes, that would be Chrome.
Bookmark icon?
Hmm, so what's that little star icon I've been using for at least a year do then...?
Bookmarks
"At this rate it'll be on v12 by the time they add a bookmark icon to the toolbar "
There's already a bookmark icon, next to the URL, which can be clicked for an immediate bookmark or dragged to the toolbar or to a bookmark folder on the toolbar. The bookmark manager, similarly to some other browsers, is a whole 2 clicks away. What wonderous extras, pray tell, were you wanting with another bookmark icon on the toolbar ?
Comedy Milestone
The rhyming of 'trouser' with 'browser' may turn out to be a milestone in technology puns. I will always remember where I was when I first read it
Meh, what does this do that Opera does not already do (better).
Nothing....
Not complain...
...when big bad Microsoft won't let them play with their toys.
To answer your question: technically, nothing
But you've got to hand it to Google for the headline grabbing and marketing. Once we get video, JS and canvas out the way I guess the bragging will be about drag and drop and local storage. Support for the new form widgets and time elements would be much more useful.
On the negative - Chrome is very greedy. I'm trialling <video> which to play nice with the as many browsers as possible is
<video>
<source type="video/mp4"> # Safari on iPad "bug" means mp4 first
<source type="video/webm"> Opera and Chome
<source type="video/ogv"> Firefox
<object...> # fallblack Flash or WMV
<a href="">Download link</a>
</object>
</source>
Encoding issues aside the interesting thing is that Chrome will start downloading all video files not just the first it knows how to handle. Embarrassing bandwidth battering fail from the chocolate factory.
Great tag line, Kelly!
Ooh, I know
It supports AdBlock, for one. Also, it doesn't come with a small but voluble cadre of annoying fanboys.
ADBlock+ in Opera
You know Opera has a perfectly fine content blocker right? It's far more flexible that AdBlock+
PDF reader?
Why add a PDF reader? I already have one, thanks. Quit the bloat already.
<pointless car analogy>If I install a new car radio, I don't expect it to include a cigarette lighter</pointless car analogy>
PDF reader
Do they really need to throw in a separate PDF reader?
Can't they just redirect http://www.example.com/test.pdf to
http://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://www.example.com/test.pdf ?
Simple :)
No
It might work on static pdfs, but it's not going to work or be acceptable for dynamic or protected pdfs. For example do I really want Google to see the contents of my bank statement? I think not.
Their PDF reader
is very fast, though fairly basic. Additionally, the extension that redirects the user to user the Google Viewer for whatever reason slows v8 down an order of magnitude (and this bug is still not patched).
Also, what about PDF files in LAN or some sites requiring login? I think their reader is actually a better idea than integrating flash with the browser.
No?
If you don't want Google to read the contents of your bank statement, then don't use Chrome.
Simple as that.
XML
How about Chrome developers stop dicking around and allow reading XML files locally?
A lot of JavaScripts are broken because they disallow it (in the belief of increased security).
The canary build
Is actually pretty stable. I've been using it for all my browsing since it was released, and only had a couple of tabs crash. Looking at my history stats, I typically view ~300 pages a day, so stability should be acceptable to most people.
As long as that is cleared up -
“For your security, any personal information stored in Chrome is safely stored and kept private until a user chooses to share the information with a website. Additionally, your credit card information is never saved without first asking you explicitly,”
Well, that certainly is as good as it gets...
I cannot help but have my mind alter this story as I read it.
"stored in Chrome is safely stored and kept private until a" street view vehicle passes it by for upload, statistical analysis, padded with ads and stored privately back on your computer.
I am guessing that is google's definition of private.
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