From what I gather from What is Google Chrome OS video, Google Chrome OS is an operating system that only includes a browser. Great, as we all spend a lot of time on the internet, right?
According to the video, it means you won’t save documents on your computer for example and there will be no other apps, only a browser enabling you to access web apps.
I have quite a few concerns with the concept…
It means that all your stuff will be saved in the cloud. You know, the pictures of your nephew attached to the email from your sister, the spreadsheet to help you track your accounts you have created (with a web app of course) etc.
This requires a lot of trust in the reliability of your internet connection (and I have yet to find an ISP that is 100% reliable) and in the companies/websites/web apps that allow you to save stuff “in the cloud”.
Firstly, it means that if the internet is down, your computer is down. OK, I know there are web apps that work offline but a lot of them will not work if you have nothing saved/can’t save on your computer. For example, I have seen some great canvas or image editing apps but they all need a location to save your image to, and if your internet is down and you have no way to save on your computer, you will have no way to save your work, so you might as well not bother.
Secondly, what happens if you have chosen to save your stuff with cloud storage from company X and company X folds overnight? (hey, it’s a capitalist world and I’m sure you have all seen companies folding overnight – for example, some travel companies have, leaving customers stranded abroad, cancelling their return flights!). Also, how much can you trust them with your data? As our digital data is now the bulk of our data (who prints family pictures? who sends letters to their lovers?), I doubt we will want to trust third parties with them…
Sure, a browser-based OS makes sense for 90% of what we do on a computer, that is get on Facebook, send an email, watch a video etc – but what about the other 10%? Do you really want to limit your hardware to 90% of its potential? I mean, even my mobile phone can save documents to the phone (and to SD storage).
What are your thoughts on Google Chrome OS? Am I missing the point (or misunderstanding how it will work)? Or do you too also think that it’s asking a bit too much trust from the users, trust in unreliable ISPs and in the cloud as the only place where to save your data?
Google already has in place offline mail, offline docs, offline calendar and picassa stored on the cloud AND locally.
These will still work with Chrome OS, but the advantage is that you don’t HAVE to store these items locally.
It’s not like you wouldn’t be able to download anything either. The idea is that there is still a hard drive for storage space etc., but apps on chromium would be browser based and streamlined for speed and ease of use.
Comment by uesnyc — October 9, 2010 @ 10:35 pm
In the presentation video referred to at the start of my article, it says that “everything is stored on the internet” – it doesn’t directly say that this is the way Chrome OS will work but it implies it is. For me, the video implies that the way they can stream down boot time for the OS (which seems to be their goal) is by not providing all the bunch of stuff that normally comes with an OS.
An OS in itself doesn’t really come with many apps unless you want it to (you can load up Linux with very few apps for example) and their comment about “everything is stored on the internet” is making me think that their concept is to make do without the stuff an OS normally provides. Or else, is it just like a very streamlined version of Linux with Google Chrome browser pre-installed?
Of their own admission, “when you’re on a computer, you spend 90% of your time on the internet in a browser”, which is a statement I do agree with (not applicable to me but I accept that most home users are mostly interested in the internet and not the rest of their computers). But does it mean the other 10% isn’t important? I’m curious about their concept but also, let’s not forget that Google is a giant company funded by advertising and I find it scary that they are developing an OS which is pushing people to save their data on the web, including data on Google services. What I question is the fact they create an OS that forces you into that, rather than giving you the option to (I love their browser and I believe web apps are growing and it’s a good thing but at the same time, I think the user should have control of their data, not hand it all over to the cloud for the sake of saving 1 minute in boot time).
Comment by Nat — October 9, 2010 @ 11:15 pm
Perhaps there’s room for a service you pay to take a backup copy of your cloud data to store in its part of the cloud. I know the data is originally stored redundantly, but this would protect against corporate failure, or just changes to the rules of access.
Comment by Ralph Corderoy — October 12, 2010 @ 11:39 am
Your suggestion brings me back to my original question – are users ready for it? Business users might consider such an option (particularly if it means they can get rid of their own back-ups/servers) but would home users want to go down such a path?
As for Google Chrome OS, if it allows you to save stuff locally in a manner that you can control, then it’s basically a Google-branded streamlined Linux with Google Chrome browser at its centre. As Google’s revenue comes from advertising, I would be very weary of using it… as much as I like Google’s involvement in open source and open standards, let’s not forget that it’s a huge corporation.
Comment by Nat — October 12, 2010 @ 12:29 pm