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Google Chrome goes stable for Mac and Linux

George T — Tue, 25 May 2010 20:47:29 +0000

The web browser is undeniably the most important piece of software on your computer. These days much of what you do with your computer happens in your browser. Today, Google Chrome leaves beta on Mac and Linux. Just in time! I recently made Google Chrome (beta by then) my default browser. So, that made me feel better about my decision.

How about you? Which browser do you prefer/use?

You can now download Chrome from google.com/chrome.

Google I/O 2010: Day 1. Hint: open standards.

George T — Wed, 19 May 2010 21:59:23 +0000

As expected, Google I/O keynote was thrilling. Google made some major announcements regarding the future of the web. The event began at 9 a.m. PDT, that is around 7 p.m. here in Greece. The keynote started with VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra taking the stage followed by VP of Product Management Sundar Pichai. It was all about HTML5 and open standards.

First and foremost, the VP8 codec. Last summer Google acquired On2 for its video compression technology. Today, Google announced VP8 codec as part of a new project named WebM. By the way, VP8 is now open-source.

The WebM project is dedicated to developing a high-quality, open video format for the web that is freely available to everyone.

One of the most important things about this is that the WebM launch is supported by Mozilla, Opera, Google and more than forty other publishers, software and hardware vendors! Read more here.

…including Microsoft!

In its HTML5 support, IE9 will support playback of H.264 video as well as VP8 video when the user has installed a VP8 codec on Windows.

What’s Great About WebM

Very high quality video
Great video playback performance, even on older computers
100% free and open to everyone
Supported on popular video sites like YouTube

Later on, Adobe shared some HTML5 love on the stage.

The keynote continued with the Chrome Web Store. The Chrome Web Store opens later this year.

Users will be able to discover a broad range of amazing web apps while developers will be able to reach millions of new users.

Next was Wave. Google Wave has been opened up to everyone as of today (also part of Google Apps as of today).

The keynote ended with an extensive reference to App Engine, GWT and some great things coming from Google + VMWare.

VMWare has been working with Google to bring an open-source layer for the cloud

You can watch the Google I/O 2010 Keynote online here.

I am guessing Day 2 will be all about Android. Woo hoo!

P.S. By the time I am writing this Google Buzz APIs come into play. Take a look here.

Mozilla: Plugin Check for all browsers

George T — Tue, 11 May 2010 20:59:15 +0000

Last year, Mozilla introduced this nice tool that helped Firefox users keep their plugins up-to-date. Today, Mozilla announced the expansion of this plugin check coverage to work with Safari 4, Chrome 4, and Opera 10.5.

Outdated plugins are a major source of security and stability risk for web users, and some studies have put the proportion of users with older versions as high as 80%.

Just visit mozilla.com/plugincheck/ to run a plugin check for your browser.

You should also check out SecBrowsing, another powerful tool that helps you keep your browser and plugins up-to-date. If you are using Google Chrome, there is a SecBrowsing extension that alerts you if plugins are out-of-date.

Google I/O 2010 – Moscone Center, San Francisco

George T — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 20:03:34 +0000

Google announced the next Google I/O taking place at the Moscone Center, in San Francisco during May 19 – 20, 2010. Early discounted registration is now open through April 16, 2010. If I lived in San Francisco I ‘d definitely register right away. Last year’s Google I/O sold out before the start of the conference, so all those lucky guys and girls who live nearby San Francisco sign up as soon as possible. Maybe I ‘ll see you at the Moscone Center at Google’s largest developer event of the year. :)

Sessions include overviews, basics and advanced content featuring:

Android
App Engine
Chrome
Enterprise
Geo
Google APIs
GWT
Social Web
Wave
Tech Talks

Google I/O features 80 sessions, more than 3,000 developers, and over 100 demonstrations from developers showcasing their technologies. Talk shop with engineers building the next generation of web, mobile, and enterprise applications.

Follow @googleio for the latest updates on I/O. (official hashtag: #io2010)

Google Chrome 3, a new stable release

Argy A — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 13:51:05 +0000

Kicking off Chrome’s second birthday, Google announces the third stable release of the infamous web browser. The new release features lots, and I mean LOTS, of bug fixes and the long anticipated Themes support! All the new improvements, means speed, and speed is everywhere from the start up, to the web applications.

A more personalized “New Tab” redesigned to fit user’s needs.
Improved Omnibox by adding little icons to help you distinguish between sites, bookmarks, history, searches.
Getting ready for HTML 5 (supporting video, audio, canvas)
Theme support, to give your browser a photo finish ;) You can browse for themes in the Theme Gallery

Not so good news for Mac users as Google announced that the current beta version will be released by year-end. Extensions won’t be available until version 4.0.

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