back to article Chrome OS is not dead, insists Google veep in charge of Chrome OS

The Google exec running both Android and Chrome has tried to pour cold water on the story that Mountain View is merging its mobile platforms. Hiroshi Lockheimer, senior vice president of Android, Chrome OS and Chromecast, has tweeted: There’s a ton of momentum for Chromebooks and we are very committed to Chrome OS. I just …

  1. This post has been deleted by its author

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    What makes more logical sense is that android run-times etc will be included in ChromeOS so that you can run android apps. I suspect this might be the case however we won't know for a bit yet so it's a guessing game.

    1. Your alien overlord - fear me

      Different underlying operating systems. You'll have trouble putting a secure Android OS onto an insecure Chrome OS.

      Chrome OS is to promote Google cloud so you'll need an always-on unlimited internet connection. And if you can afford that from UK 4G operators, you can afford either a decent laptop or tablet.

  3. Philip Storry

    Let's be honest here - the WSJ is not a particularly technical publication.

    So when someone from Google said "we've been working for a couple of years to merge them", they heard "only one product will survive".

    When in actual fact, the Google representative probably meant "we've been working on getting ARC (Android Runtime for Chrome) for two years, and in 2017 we think a Chromebook will be able to run Android apps so well it'll really blur the boundaries".

    WSJ in "knows nothing and doesn't do research" shocker!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      +1

      The Murdoch press is not famed for it's factual accuracy.

      1. cd

        Mudrock.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      WSJ in "knows nothing and doesn't do research" shocker!

      Lets not forget WSJ is part of the Turdoch empire, famed for its high journalistic standards, for example at the News of the World.

      We can't the old buzzard croak? I'm going to crack open a beer in celebration when he does.

    3. Spiracle

      Providing a common kernel and Chrome browser application would have pretty much the same effect as merging the OSs - they've been doing some work towards this with Chrome Custom Tabs and the like already.

      If they produce a desktop style launcher and overlapping window manager for Android then that could be their consumer laptop OS of choice, benefiting from the brand transfer from phones and tablets. ChromeOS could march on in the education sector as 'Google Schoolbook' or something similar.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "Android and ChromeOS are poles apart on security, with the former a target of malware writers, the latter less so."

    Well, you can pretty much tell how successful a platform is by whether malware writers bother to target it. I think that's more a comment on market share than on platform security.

  5. DrXym

    There shouldn't have been a need to merge

    It's weird there were two different OSes to begin with. I suspect that Google like most large companies ended up with two in-house teams with similar but incompatible ideas for low cost devices and didn't have the guts to strategically pick one over the other.

    Android is great for tablets but its mouse and keyboard support can be generously described as perfunctory. If Google had concentrated on fixing that and putting in a desktop mode then there wouldn't have been a need for ChromeOS. Android would have served both purposes.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    yawn

    Honestly, I don't know about Android being the "target of malware writers". Seriously, how many times has anyone here had to clean up a malware infested phone/tablet? In real life.

    And I don't mean the apps that require more permissions than what they should need - since the owner actually agreed to allow that.

    Compare that to a laptop/desktop, even with AV.

    The trouble with Android isn't the fact that it's insecure by design (it isn't), but the fact that once a vulnerability is found, the damn things don't get updated - and they're not locked in to only installing apps from a single source.

    1. DrXym

      Re: yawn

      I bet the large majority of people who get infected with malware are idiots who got their apps from warez sites and the like.

  7. lotus49

    Chrome OS would be missed (at least by me)

    My employer (FTSE 100 for which I am the CISO) is likely to roll out Google Desktop (particularly email, calendar, Drive) in the near future so I have been evaluating Chrome OS as part of the future road map.

    It takes a bit of getting used to but Chrome OS has some real advantages in terms of OS verification at boot and simple management. I would be very disappointed if it were to be killed off.

    Chrome OS use has ramped up slowly but it fits neatly with Google's cloudy strategy. Being able to run Android programs would be useful but killing it off entirely would be a shame.

    1. Paul Crawford Silver badge

      Re: Chrome OS would be missed (at least by me)

      For certain user groups Chrome OS is pretty good. Given that a lot of folk only really need web & email, plus some basic calendar, document edit & spreadsheet support its got them and locked down so you have to try spectacularly hard to screw it up.

      Of course, the Google spying is not nice[1], and if you want much else its kind of barren, but for the price and security its hard to beat.

      1. Given our glorious leaders want to spy on our every on-line activity anyway, having Google whore you from advertiser to advertiser is probably less of a risk if you don't conform to the norms of the day/party in charge :(

  8. Stevie

    Bah!

    "I merely meant to say that Chrome OS stands out like a shaft of gold when all around is darkness"

    1. sabroni Silver badge
      Happy

      Re: Bah!

      That's beautiful man!

    2. hplasm
      Happy

      Re: Bah!

      "Er, it's one of Wilde's!"

  9. thomas k

    ... exec in charge of ...

    They're always the last to know, poor things.

  10. zebm

    Reading this on my Acer C720

    Great for browsing the web (though I constantly have the plugins tab opened so I can re-enable Flash when on BBC IPlayer) except when you open up a few heavyweight tabs and the machine grinds to a halt. I do trivial content creation and occasionally re-enable developer mode to play with a Linux distribution - not too keen on remote desktopping to the cloud.

    Not too sure about wanting to run Android apps as I imagine permission management is going to be a problem - it currently is on my phone.

    1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

      Re: Reading this on my Acer C720

      Even better on the Samsung. How many ARM executable viruses are there ?

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    If Google has been merging ChromeOS and Android for 2 years, they must have reasons... since the tech is all crap, we're talking about business/logistic strategy. I can imagine a few:

    1. Chrome OS was a hedge on "HTML5 webapps are the future". Seemed like a good bet in 2008-09 but it hasn't panned out so well.

    2. Consolidation. Having two in-house Linux flavors leads to confusion, bugs, fiefdoms, and... expense.

    3. ChromeOS (along with CoreOS) is based on Gentoo which is maintained by a bunch of yahoos who probably don't have Google's corporate interests at heart. Systemd could be a sticking point: AFAIK Google went all-in on systemd, but in Gentoo it's optional, non-default, unloved, not exactly "fully supported"... which means Google's probably got a ton of package mods that get whacked by every other upstream update. What a pain in the ass. <Points and yells "systemd losers... HA-hah!">

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