Thoughts on Google Chrome

A couple of years ago, a friend of mine said "everything Google does is excellent". He was showing me Google Maps, which at that time, was revolutionary. Until then, I considered Google another search vendor of Yahoo and Alta Vista ilk. Shortly thereafter I signed up for Google Mail (remember when it was by invitation only), then Google Talk, and later Google Docs.

Although I like Google Docs a lot, using it made me realize that not everything from Google is excellent. And that sums up my opinion about Google's new browser, Chrome. While I like it, and am using it a lot, it's not excellent…yet.

I downloaded and installed Chrome shortly after it was made publicly available this week. Like everything that Google does, the download and installation was fast and automatic. Getting started is easy. Regardless of their claims, Chrome is really just another browser. But true to the Google brand, the browser excels at search. Sure the integrated address and search bar is nice, but IE and firefox let you search from the address bar too. The search feature I really like is the within a page; I like the way Chrome highlights hits on the scrollbar.

Two days is not a lot of time to work with a program, and being a new application in a mature market, Chrome is expected to have flaws. Here some of the issues that I found:

• Sites that perform browser sniffing don't render properly. Hotmail, for instance, only supports its' classic html mode. And our FogBugz issue tracking software refuses to run its' Wiki in Chrome.
  
• Facebook applications behave oddly, in particular I found that links and buttons, such as "Allow" or "Ignore" fail.
  
• Our web applications developed by my teams do not render well, but then they don't render well in FireFox either. We remain a Microsoft shop.
  
• Silverlight applications do not run in Chrome, so Google surfers can't see pictures of my family.
  
• There's no history list, at least not without typing the first few characters of a web site.
  
• There's no button to display a home page; well Ok, there's a setting but it's off by default.
  
• I can't (and maybe it's just me) get back to the frequent-page thumbnails without opening a new tab. I want to make this my home page.
  

I find it interesting that Google chose to enter the browser market. Do we need another browser? It's only been a couple of years since Internet Explorer was the only real player. If Chrome catches on there will be four; IE, Firefox, Safari, and Chrome (nah, I don't count Opera). Personally, I find myself gravitating to Chrome despite its' flaws and am considering making it my default browser. Although I use Internet Explorer a bit less I find that I never open Firefox anymore (I have Safari for Windows, but really, who uses that?); this after only two days with Chrome.

The competitive target of Chrome is Internet Explorer, and certainly the Chrome comic book takes shots at IE weaknesses. If my browsing patterns are common, though, then Firefox will suffer more. In the end, Firefox and Chrome may just duke it out for the (tiny but vocal) anti-Microsoft crowd. I heard a rumor that Google's entry into the browser space is a precursor to their entry into PDA's with Android. In much the same way that Apple leveraged Safari on the iPhone, Google will leverage Chrome. And on a tiny cell phone screen Chrome's quirkiness will be unimportant. The cell phone angle is intriguing, but Google's open platform approach will produce odd devices and applications that will seem crude when compared to Apple's cohesive offering. If nothing else, Google is making the software industry fun again.