Google announced its own browser

[andrewducker]

In case you've missed the 15 other places announcing it, here's a cached link to the post - read the scanned comic, which is by Scott McCloud and explains the ideas behind it.

It's fascinating, and I'm very happy to have them enter the game - they're using WebKit, which is the tech underlying Safari, the Nokia S60 browser, Adobe AIR and Android, but they're building in some very interesting variations in design.

Hopefully this will split the web space even further - meaning that more stuff gets designed to the spec, and not to fit any one browser. I hope that they attract as much of an addon ecology as Firefox has. I won't be switching until they have AdBlock, GreaseMoney, FoxMarks, etc. equivalents, but that may not be that long...

Comments

[call-waiting.livejournal.com]

I read the comic with enthusiasm -- it's got things I've been wanting for quite a while now. The only thing that concerns me somewhat is the V8 javascript engine compiling to native code will likely limit the available platforms, or at least make it slower for them to port to eg. PPR and ARM. Unless it uses GNU Lightning or something.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/09/fresh-take-on-browser.html

Happy days!

[channelpenguin.livejournal.com]

so, you going to start learning how to code for it? because if it takes off, and if it works well, it may well be the final nail in the coffin for demand for Windows Forms programmers. Which is a shame cos we can already do all the fast interactive program stuff - which golly gosh yes, can also communicate over the web. I get so frustrated sometimes by the amount of (to my mind misguided) effort put into trying to make web apps act just like Winforms ones... I don't get it.

Ok, so that's just on Windows, but there's java Swing or whatever it's called (even if it is a little trickier/not quite so nice to use as I understand).

[andrewducker]

if it works well, it may well be the final nail in the coffin for demand for Windows Forms programmers.

It'll still be Javascript coding, which is _never_ going to be as easy to work in as WinForms. We are looking into our next-gen coding platform, but it's looking far more likely to be either Flash or Silverlight - available as either plugins for the web, or as standalone apps on the desktop. Tying ourselves into the kludge of dynamic typing and Asynchronous XML passing that is web-programming fills our lead geeks with horror, and rightly so.

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

I agree. I seem to remember there were similar discussions when XUL came out, and I can only think of three applications that use it for UI.

[cheekbones3.livejournal.com]

Page 13 appears to imply that the work of the Danes was very well rewarded. What's the Viking for Lebensraum?

[andrewducker]

Danegeld :->

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

It's a really impressive browser. Very fast and responsive even compared to Opera.

The thing I'm really not sure about is their all in one URL and Search bar: in Firefox and Opera I have about 20 search engines set up. There doesn't seem to be an easy way at this point to do something similar.

[andrewducker]

Yeah - not going to touch it myself for a few revisions. Especially not until it supports AdBlock!

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

It does, at least, block pop ups. Just not all of them :-)

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

I also miss the PicLens plugin, because it makes me feel like I'm in Minority Report.

Except, you know, looking for porn and not crime.

[andrewducker]

Speaking of "fast":
http://community.zdnet.co.uk/blog/0,1000000567,10009139o-2000331777b,00.htm

[johnbobshaun.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the start up time is also much better than Firefox and Opera. Biggest performance issue at the moment that I've seen is flash video. It doesn't seem to handle it very well at the moment.