Google Chrome leaves beta
Published: 12 Dec 2008 17:01 GMT
Google's browser, Chrome, has officially left beta.
The company confirmed the move at the Le Web 08 conference in Paris on Thursday. Google vice president Marissa Mayer told TechCrunch's Mike Arrington that Chrome would leave beta, but did not say when. Google representatives have since confirmed the change of status.
Sundar Pichai, vice president of product development, told ZDNet UK's sister site, CNET News.com, that this release of Chrome will have "tons and tons of bug fixes," especially around audio and video playback, which should now be "more stable". Chrome will also be faster. Pichai said Google's browser is 1.4 to 1.5 times faster than it was at launch.
There are also new features; for example, the bookmark manager is being revised to do a better job for people who have lots of bookmarks, and for those who want to import or export bookmark lists. Privacy options have all been consolidated into one dialogue box. And there are improvements in the security features of the browser.
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Features that the team is still working on include autofill for forms and native support for RSS feeds, said Pichai. But the top features Pichai said he and his team are working on are extension support and Mac and Linux versions.
"All the developement is in the open," Pichai said. Curious users can monitor Chrome's progress at Chromium.org, or download the Google Chrome Channel Chooser, which will tell their installation of Chrome to download either the betas between major updates of Chrome, or even the nightly builds of the browser as it is developed. Pichai recommends that last option for those dying of curiosity about Chrome's upcoming extension support.
For a Google product, Chrome is leaving beta very quickly — 100 days after public launch. Pichai said that Chrome now meets Google's "internal standards for stability and performance" and that its heavy use inside Google before its public release has contributed to its rapid graduation to released product status.
Google has big plans and goals for Chrome. Truly widespread adoption of the product won't happen in businesses or on the pre-installed software suites of new computers until the product is not just known to be stable by users, but vouched for as production-ready by Google.
Credit: Google Chrome breaks out of beta from CNET News
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