back to article 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 …

COMMENTS

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    WTF?

    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!

    1. James Hughes 1

      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?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Thumb Up

        YAWN

        Firefox.

        1. Matthew Anderson

          Snailz

          Why, because it's slow and bloated? I prefer speed and efficiency. Yes, that would be Chrome.

    2. Pete Spicer
      Thumb Down

      Bookmark icon?

      Hmm, so what's that little star icon I've been using for at least a year do then...?

      1. Tim Parker
        Thumb Up

        Bookmarks..

        Ah ha - seems you have beaten me too it :)

    3. Tim Parker
      Stop

      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 ?

  2. Rosco

    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

  3. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Meh, what does this do that Opera does not already do (better).

    Nothing....

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Down

      Not complain...

      ...when big bad Microsoft won't let them play with their toys.

    2. Charlie Clark Silver badge
      Megaphone

      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!

    3. Tom Maddox Silver badge
      Stop

      Ooh, I know

      It supports AdBlock, for one. Also, it doesn't come with a small but voluble cadre of annoying fanboys.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        FAIL

        ADBlock+ in Opera

        You know Opera has a perfectly fine content blocker right? It's far more flexible that AdBlock+

  4. SlabMan

    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>

  5. mittfh

    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 :)

    1. DrXym

      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.

      1. Keith 21
        Big Brother

        No?

        If you don't want Google to read the contents of your bank statement, then don't use Chrome.

        Simple as that.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Go

      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.

  6. Sithlord
    FAIL

    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).

  7. xenny

    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.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    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...

  9. Shane Kent
    Joke

    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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