This strikes me as a very interesting strategy. The way I read it, by installing the Chrome browser, you are enabling Chrome apps that you install to live outside the browser.
Chrome Apps amount to a Trojan horse for Google. By way of the Chrome browser, the company is essentially putting its own app ecosystem right on top of Windows and OS X. It’s a play that’s been months in the making. “There are still reasons why a developer would build a native app over a Chrome App today, but we’re working to tackle each one,” Rakowski says. Google began promoting a handful of Chrome Apps (then called Packaged Apps) in May. In July, its Chrome notification center was pushed out to Windows and Chrome OS users, allowing for alerts and pop-ups outside the browser window. And for months, Chrome’s developer channels have shipped with an app launcher that lives in the Windows taskbar — this launcher rolled out to the public today too.
The new apps look and behave much like the native apps you find on Windows and OS X. They’re built using web technologies, but also with Chrome-specific code that means they won’t be able to run on other web browsers — they’re truly Chrome apps. They can exist outside of your browser window as distinct apps, work offline, and sync across devices and operating systems. They can also access your computer’s GPU, storage, camera, ports, and Bluetooth connection. Chrome Apps are, for now, only available through Chrome on Windows or Chrome OS on a Chromebook. Mac users will have to wait another six weeks before their version of Chrome will be updated.
Will be interesting to see how this all works on top of Mac OS X.
This is why I won’t let Chrome onto my computers. Google’s customers are advertisers. And just like Twitter which showed promise, but is headed for a one-way broadcast medium for advertisers with the users’ participation in the stream incidental to that, this is the same kind of abuse of people’s online experience. Not a chance I’d allow Google to spy on my using my own computer (outside of using Google search and GMail).
Sounds like yet another vendor who’s happy to replace my operating system’s UI guidelines with its own. I’m not happy when Adobe does it, and I’m probably not going to be happy when Google does it.
I’m not saying you should or you shouldn’t do this, but do people realize that their ISP knows EVERYTHING about them, what if they sell that “anonymized” data to healthcare companies, advertisers and other industries.
Things like this should scare Microsoft to death, Paul Thurrott said that Chrome and iTunes are the most popular 3rd party apps on Windows. Locking customers into ecosystems that are not Microsoft.
“Mac users will have to wait another six weeks before their version of Chrome will be updated.”
Don’t you mean….
“Mac users will have to wait another six weeks before their version of Chrome will be UNINSTALLED”
I remember back when WebKit extended HTML a bit for widgets and Google fans cried bloody, bloody murder. That mostly became HTML 5.
Is this part of an OOOOPEN standard?
Another reason not to have Chrome installed on your computer.
While I don’t disagree in principle, I don’t understand how this relates to Chrome Apps. Chrome Apps are just a way of letting web apps look a bit more like native apps.
There’s nothing nefarious about it, other than Google trying to get people to move from native apps to web apps (which, I think, is generally a good thing for Mac users, who still don’t have access to many Windows-only apps, especially in the enterprise).
Which part of this should be an open standard?
Yeah, heaven forbid Google add useful new features to its browser. OH NO, GOOGLE, NOT WITH ME!!!
this sounds like a bad idea from a security standpoint– it sounds like if you give chrome permission to run on your system and access files, camera, etc, any chrome app can as well? Sounds like the next vector for malware after flash fades away.
web browsers should implement web standards, not stick in proprietary features.
That is exactly my first impression of this. It’s not like Google has a impeccable tack record securing there own platforms against malware. Just look at the state of Android. Sure is open, to exploits.
It’s Google, not web apps that are the problem.
Web apps in the Enterprise? There’s a non-starter. First, performance can’t match native apps. That’s been clearly illustrated. But for apps that use the Internet, that’s a massive threat to security. I works for a company that has very high security (which drives me nut when I’m searching for pictures). They don’t even allow any company computers on campus to be on a WIFI network.
Lastly I have yet to feel there’s a Windows application I need that I can’t find a Mac equivalent or run in Parallels. And I could name five off the top of my head that Macs have I use every day to make me productive that don’t exist on PCs. Applescript, Script Debugger, Default Folder, Alfred, OmniFocus.
Which specific proprietary features are these? The alerts described above? They’re not unique to Google. They’re part of a standard.
The article mentions “Chrome-specific code”, but neglects to explain what exactly it is talking about. I’d love to know which APIs these are.
I just happen to work for a company that makes web apps for the enterprise. In the last five years, almost all of our competitors have switched to web apps, as well. The ones who haven’t are in deep trouble. These are apps for banks, by the way. Not exactly known for lax security measures.
This malware comes from risky apps that aren’t in the Play Store, so you have to uncheck a setting then go back and download it, which is why only 200K people experience malware, users that think they know what there a doing but don’t.
Its like going to a site and having your browser have a warning page that ask if you are sure you want to go there, and you do anyway and download something malicious.
Funny, I prefer the native apps from banks. American Express, Bank of America, my credit union. I despise Java-based applications. I use a million dollar DAMS at work, and the two things that make it nearly useless are Java and Flash. Both massive security black holes, and performance hogs. HTML (formerly known as HTML 5) is the base of the next update. But all the HTML is, is the interface. The real work gets done by Oracle.
I really doubt that your characterization of everyone going web app based is accurate for more than portals to information stored on computes. Photoshop is not going web-based any time soon. Neither is, InDesign, Acrobat, FileMaker Pro, nor applications to edit video, CAD, or serious gaming. Nothing that requires more than the lightweight hardware in tablets and phones.
But the point of the story was about Google infecting computers with software (regardless of it’s type) stealthily through Chrome. Why would they do that, but to gain access to information about us they can then sell to advertisers?
I’m not talking about public-facing applications, although those are obviously all made in HTML nowadays. No Java or Flash.
And yes, all of the HTML is in the interface. Where else would it be? It’s nonsensical to assume that the back-end is written in HTML. Of course it’s Oracle and Tomcat and stuff like that.
I’m also not talking about portals. I’m talking about real enterprise applications. Stuff that first used to be written for DOS, then for Windows. Now it’s all on the web. And that’s a good thing.
Plainly, this move by Google is meant to disintermediate Microsoft and Apple. If apps are written in HTML, Microsoft further loses influence in the desktop OS market, and Apple eventually loses influence in the mobile OS market, as mobile devices become fast enough to run complex HTML apps well.
In a way, all of this is to Apple’s advantage. People wouldn’t bring iPads into the enterprise if they’d have to run Windows apps to be able to work. Web apps make it possible.