Introducing Chrome for Android

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/02/introducing-chrome-for-android.html

by cleverjake • 14 years ago

476 233 14 years ago

googleblog.blogspot.com

angryasian3• 14 years ago

Finally. If this can actually live up to the desktop experience, I hope we can finally bring an end to the app.

Only available for ICS https://market.android.com/details?id=com.android.chrome

benologist2• 14 years ago

Douche move making it require Ice Cream Sandwich while they don't require telcos to ship any of us upgrades.

steve-howard2• 14 years ago

If Samsung didn't lock down the bootloader so fucking tight on my $500 phone I wouldn't have to care what the telco does.

_ea1k2• 14 years ago

Which Samsung Android device has a locked bootloader?

starwed• 14 years ago

Yeah, lets just go ahead and assume there are no technical reasons here...

bryne• 14 years ago

Do you really still think Google has any say in the whole carrier upgrade thing?

benologist2• 14 years ago

You're right, it's not Google's fault that they're only armed with:

a) the only operating system that really competes with iOS while everyone struggle to compete with the iPhone

b) mountains of cash

c) a factory full of smart people solving much harder problems

It's much better to just abandon every single generation of Android and the hardware it shipped on!

thetrendycyborg• 14 years ago

It has canvas hardware acceleration. Hardware acceleration is a new feature in Android 4. Hence, it is only available on ICS.

gcp5• 14 years ago

They could have added fallbacks. HW graphics acceleration is also possible on pre-ICS Android, anyway.

angryasian3• 14 years ago

probably more related more to a minimum hardware requirements.

apress• 14 years ago

It's using 4.0 APIs, according to Matt Seigler's story and interview with Google SVP of Chrome Sundar Pichai:

"Back to the bad news: some of the more advanced features of Chrome for Android require APIs found only in Ice Cream Sandwich, so the team made the call to make it only available for Android 4.0 and beyond. Again, this means only 1% of current Android users out there can actually get and use the browser right now." - http://parislemon.com/post/17215781807/chrome-for-android-th...

fpgeek7• 14 years ago

1% of Android users is still at least a couple million. That's more than enough to get a reasonable pool of beta testers. By the time it gets out of beta, the Android release distribution will probably look quite different.

ashamedlion• 14 years ago

I wonder if it would be feasible for them to put Chrome on the iPhone. Technically, Apple wouldn't be against it since it's using WebKit.

davux• 14 years ago

I don't believe the iOS sandboxing would allow for V8, though. Isn't this the same problem as "my third party app WebView is slow because it doesn't support Javascript JIT"?

pvarangot2• 14 years ago

You are right, it wont allow V8. The only app allowed to JIT on iOS 4.3+ is Safari (before 4.3 not even Safari was allowed to modify it's own code).

It is technically part of the Mandatory Code Signing trusted computing implementation of iOS more than of the Sandbox. They use the dirty bit normally used to do Copy on Write to re-verify signatures when dirty executable memory is paged in.

gcp5• 14 years ago

The app store rules talk about "built-in Webkit". Judging from the size, there's a good chance Chrome for Android bundles its own WebKit version.

It's similar in size to Firefox, which obviously has to bundle its own Gecko rendering engine.

potomak• 14 years ago

A x-post by Google: http://news.ycombinator.org/item?id=3562814

SandB0x• 14 years ago

So what have we been using up till now on Android? Is this just a re-branding and overhaul of the Android WebKit browser?

cleverjake• 14 years ago

No. We have been using a webkit mobile browser. This appears to be a separate code base.

pvarangot2• 14 years ago

We've been user "Browser", I hope one advantage of using Chrome would be bookmark sync with my desktop browser. "Browser" doesn't even have folders for it's bookmarks.

Anyway, my phone only runs Android 2.3 so it seems I'll have to wait till my next upgrade to avoid using hacked up apps to sync my bookmarks.

ditoa• 14 years ago

"Browser" on Android 4 syncs with Chrome already (and has folder support).

papalalu• 14 years ago

well i've been using dolphin hd

jonursenbach2• 14 years ago

Dolphin HD is just a reskinned version of the stock WebKit view that comes on every Android device/OS.

voidfiles• 14 years ago

Wow, if they include extensions. This could be huge.

wslh• 14 years ago

Yes, having extensions in a mobile browser is the next step to quick personalization beyond native applications.

I bet that web augmentation on mobiles can be really huge.

bzbarsky• 14 years ago

You may want to try out Firefox Mobile!

aderaynal• 14 years ago

what makes you think they will ?

nickpresta3• 14 years ago

Firefox Mobile Nightly releases for Android already include "extensions". Here are some examples: http://people.mozilla.com/~mfinkle/addons/

adamrights• 14 years ago

Firefox for android unfortunately started out real slow...might be a good move for Google. Time to go to xda-developers and see if it'll be on your phone.

shmerl9• 14 years ago

Firefox moved to native UI on Android, which made it faster. The minus is obviously need for add-on developers to work with native UI too.

sunsu• 14 years ago

All I want to know is how long till it replaces the current implementation of WebView in the Android SDK.

trotsky2• 14 years ago

Decoupling the browser from the OS is one of the best things that could happen for android security going forward. While it won't help people who can't get upgrades to ICS, at least it will solve the future problems of people who get stuck on 4.x while their OS browser slowly becomes more and more exploitable. I have one phone that is still on 2.2 - it is trivially easy to own the phone with a little bit of javascript on any web page.

nextparadigms9• 14 years ago

I'm hoping this means it will get updates every 6 weeks, too.

Achshar• 14 years ago

yes it will..

> There will be the same 6-week release cycle for new versions, Pinchai says.

http://parislemon.com/post/17215781807/chrome-for-android-th...

but i would ask will they be automatic or manual?

huggyface2• 14 years ago

Decoupling the browser from the OS is one of the best things that could happen for android security going forward.

Decoupling everything but the most rudimentary services is the best way forward for both security and user satisfaction. Despite the laser focus on the underlying operating system version by so many, tens of millions of Android users, across makes, models, and carriers, are seeing endless updates of mapping and navigation, the search functionality, the mail applications, the Android market, and so on. Decoupling the browser adds it into the bin of "no longer need to care about the underlying OS much", and goes a long way to make the fragmentation issue a non-issue.

barista• 14 years ago

If the core services are going to be different then the fragmentation is still a problem for app developers. May be not so much for the end users but I guess the end users don't care as much.

Not everyone will update frequently or would want things to get updated for them without them knowing it. Certainly not the non-techy users. This makes it a pain to account for all different versions of browsers, OS, resolution and other functionality a pain.

psychotik2• 14 years ago

The real problem here is Android's inability to update what are considered 'OS components' independently of updating the OS. Ideally, the built-in browser (which should really just be Chrome) can be updated just like other apps can. Having a built-in browser and also Chrome for Android seems like it would confuse users, and not have the desired security impact you describe because it needs users to search for, install the browser and use it instead of the built-in version.

nextparadigms9• 14 years ago

Google can update apps independently of the OS. Youtube, Gmail, Maps, Market - are all updated independently of the OS ever since Froyo.

They will eventually replace the stock browser with Chrome, but they're waiting until it's not beta anymore, and until ICS has bigger marketshare, or maybe they'll just make it the default browser starting with Android 5.0.

ootachi• 14 years ago

You could always download an alternative browser, such as Opera.

adorton• 14 years ago

Opera Mobile is awesome. It feels so much faster than the stock browser. I recommend it to anyone stuck on 2.2/2.3 for the foreseeable future (like me).

nookiemonster• 14 years ago

trivially? please, more detail. Also: own is a loaded term. Please, more detail. Getting access to the sdcard is not the same as owning.

ReturnTheGift• 14 years ago

I presume trotsky is referring to the "content://" URI vulnerability found by Thomas Cannon:

http://thomascannon.net/blog/2010/11/android-data-stealing-v...

http://web.nvd.nist.gov/view/vuln/detail?vulnId=CVE-2010-480...

http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/48256/info

Exploit needs to be able to determine the exact path + filename of any file to be stolen. The securityfocus.com entry referenced above includes a demo script implementing the exploit if you want to see the details. Just wrap the XHR requests to the local URIs in a try/catch and go fishing for filenames of interest within standard directories. As mentioned in Cannon's original article, photos would be an easy target given the common location plus filename format for the jpg files (e.g., /sdcard/DCIM/Camera/IMG_yyyymmdd_hhmmss.jpg). Another interesting directory to poke around in would be /sdcard/Android/data/com.dropbox.android/files/scratch/. I tweaked the demo script a bit and was able to steal my own dropbox files and photos on my junky little LG Optimus V on Android 2.2.1. Good Times.

vetler• 14 years ago

Nothing is stopping you from using another browser right now.

There are not that many browsers to choose from, but you could for instance download Opera Mobile - the next time you open a link you will be asked which browser you want to use. You should also be able to replace the browser on your home screen, although how easy it is might depend on what kind of launcher you have.

loudmax2• 14 years ago

I had been wondering whether Google would port Chrome to Android, or they would port Dalvik to Chrome. I'm still not ruling out the latter option.

khuey• 14 years ago

What does "porting Dalvik to Chrome" even mean?

Assuming that means "be able to run Dalvik bytecode in the browser", that doesn't help with all the Android APIs and such, so it's hard to see how it would be useful.

nl2• 14 years ago

What does "porting Dalvik to Chrome" even mean?

Perhaps it means porting the Dalvik VM to ChromeOS. I've wondered the same thing, since putting an Android layer on ChromeOS seems to be technically viable (if non-trivial).

dangrossman• 14 years ago

With Android 4.0 at 1% market share, it'll be a long time before most people can even try this.

http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-ve...

oflannabhra2• 14 years ago

Yeah, while I'm generally excited about this, I won't be able to use it anytime soon, unfortunately.

vertr2• 14 years ago

Root and install a 4.0 rom!

jebblue• 14 years ago

Same here, I bought into the Nexus One hype, great phone but without ICS we are left high and dry with an expensive paperweight with regards to something like Chrome on ICS.

cryptoz2• 14 years ago

This is common Google strategy. They are trying to build the future and pre-ICS devices are not the future. So they get shafted. Google may make unhappy customers this way, but they can move a lot faster than companies like Microsoft, who support everything back two decades or so sometimes.

schraeds3• 14 years ago

Apple seems to be able to innovate iOS while providing robust and timely updates for older devices.

KeyBoardG• 14 years ago

Hey, watch it there. All WP7 devices support all the updates thus far and for atleast the next year or so.

jrockway• 14 years ago

But to be fair, everyone gets a cheap phone every two years, so what's 1% today will be 100% in two years. Remember, the G1 is three-ish years old, and it's mostly gone now. The Nexus One was released on January 5, 2010, and so only the earliest of early adopters (with a standard contract) are just now gaining the ability to upgrade.

Two years is a long time, but if IE 6 went away after two years, we wouldn't even remember that it was once a thing :)

TechNewb2• 14 years ago

Chrome for iOS please.

fullmoon• 14 years ago

Apple doesn't allow applications to provide their own runtimes:

“3.3.2 An Application may not download or install executable code. Interpreted code may only be used in an Application if all scripts, code and interpreters are packaged in the Application and not downloaded. The only exception to the foregoing is scripts and code downloaded and run by Apple’s built-in WebKit framework.”

shmerl9• 14 years ago

That's not very precise. Legally, Apple doesn't allow to use iOS SDK, i.e. to build such applications. If you manage somehow to build it any other way (not using Apple's SDK), this restriction has no meaning, and while Apple could reject such kind of software from their app store, you could deploy it to alternatives, like Cydia, and still be legal, since you didn't violate any licenses.

I.e. for browsers makers the concern is not that they'll be rejected from the app store, but that they can't even legally build them with the Apple's SDK.

gcp5• 14 years ago

For the same reason there's no Firefox for iOS. Enjoy your walled garden.

TechNewb2• 14 years ago

I think it will be a matter of time until the iOS platform (3-5 years) is more akin to that of the Mac platform, where there is a walled garden app store, and an outside ecosystem as well. Buying from the walled garden will have many advantages, so it will thrive, but having the ability to buy apps from other locations will enable the platform to also stay competitive.

shmerl9• 14 years ago

No luck. Just don't use iOS.

dochtman2• 14 years ago

Too bad it's only available in "select countries", which certainly don't include the Netherlands... Probably just the US and Canada? Kind of old-fashioned.

dasmoth• 14 years ago

Just installed it in the UK.

I'm guessing it's a localization issue. Although for a Beta, I don't see why they can't just offer everyone who's keen to try it the en-us version.

bvdbijl4• 14 years ago

You can use https://market.android.com/details?id=com.notenking.mf if you're rooted, dan werkt het wel bij mij namelijk

dave1010uk2• 14 years ago

Does anyone know if this is Open Source?

lucaspiller2• 14 years ago

I'm guessing this shares code with Chromium, so will it be open source too?

EDIT: Looks potential: http://blog.chromium.org/2012/02/deeper-look-at-chrome-for-a...

"With hardware-accelerated canvas, overflow scroll support, strong HTML5 video support, and new capabilities such as Indexed DB, WebWorkers and Web Sockets, Chrome for Android is a solid platform for developing web content on mobile devices."

ConstantineXVI3• 14 years ago

No context; but there's at least an "android" folder in the build section for what it's worth

http://git.chromium.org/gitweb/?p=chromium/chromium.git;a=tr...

lucaspiller2• 14 years ago

Woops, I pasted the wrong thing there:

"Much of the code for Chrome for Android is already shared with Chromium and over the coming weeks, the Chromium team will be upstreaming many new components developed for Chrome for Android to Chromium, WebKit and other projects."

estel2• 14 years ago

http://code.google.com/chrome/mobile/docs/faq.html

"Chrome for Android is derived from Chromium. Because of the ICS release timeframes, we haven’t started the open sourcing process until recently. New capabilities added for Chrome for Android will be open sourced in phases, by upstreaming components of it into Chromium, WebKit, and other projects, while maintaining the integrity of those projects."

nod• 14 years ago

I'm rather confused that Google seems to be aiming to fragment the browser market for its own platform. I already wasn't looking forward to supporting/testing both Browser and Firefox on Android... Is Google just this disorganized internally?

loudmax2• 14 years ago

Chrome and the old Android browser are both based on WebKit. Google will almost certainly make Chrome the default browser for new editions of Android, and will likely push for it on IOS and Windows phone.

gcp5• 14 years ago

Given that IOS is already on WebKit, there's no fragmentation here. WebKit has a monopoly on mobile.

fpgeek7• 14 years ago

Unless you think Google can negotiate exceptions to Apple's and Microsoft's respective store rules (or, more impressively, convince them to change the rules), we're not going to see Chrome for iOS or Windows Phone anytime soon (if ever).

emehrkay• 14 years ago

I've been hearing that the browser in Android is kinda bad from a lot of web/js developers. I hope that this makes the situation more palatable. Even better is when they'll ship a version for Windows Phone and ios.

fpgeek7• 14 years ago

I wouldn't hold my breath for Chrome on iOS or Windows Phone. In both cases, the app store rules ban key features of Chrome (like the V8 JavaScript engine).

Google may well do something to address Windows Phone and/or iOS users, but it will probably be much closer to Firefox Home for iOS (which lets you explore your bookmarks, open tabs and history and then follow links in Mobile Safari) than it will be to Chrome for Android.

Kevin_Marks• 14 years ago

According to MG Siegler, Chrome is in the bizdev-required proprietary 'with Google' part of Android, not the Open Source part. http://parislemon.com/post/17215781807/chrome-for-android-th... That means we're stuck with legacy browsers in existing Androids and in the non-Google-blessed world (Amazon Fire and the billion Chinese phones and tablets).

magicalist• 14 years ago

Interesting. The chromium blog post linked above mentions upstreaming a bunch of new components, so maybe it will be like the Chrome/Chromium situation? Here's hoping...

http://blog.chromium.org/2012/02/deeper-look-at-chrome-for-a...

Sephr• 14 years ago

Chromium for Android is going to be open source, and the only difference between desktop Chrome and Chromium is branding and nonfree codec support.

bad_user• 14 years ago

"This item cannot be installed in your device's country"

paulirish2• 14 years ago

It's currently available in: United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Australia, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil

Sundar, SVP of Chrome just said "We are working hard to bring this to more countries and should greatly expand within the next three months."

dchest• 14 years ago

How hard it can be to tick a few checkboxes?

dochtman2• 14 years ago

Why in the world is this restricted? I live in the Netherlands, and I really don't get what's so hard about releasing here. Sure, we're a small market, so not as important, but still... Software is global, man!

manmal• 14 years ago

If it works in Germany, why not in Austria?

danielwarna• 14 years ago

It doesn't seem to be available in Finland, found a apk at XDA tho: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1485420

Too bad, it instacrashes om my ICS GalaxyS

sjs382• 14 years ago

It insta-crashed for me too on my Samsung Fascinate with CM9. I cleared the app's data, its cache, uninstalled it and reinstalled it. It works like a dream now.

wavephorm3• 14 years ago

I think is the death knell for ChromeOS. Android browser has always sucked, it was the primary reason I haven't bought an Android device. Google had the resources to make Chrome on Android a long time ago, so I presume they were dragging their feet in a "wait and see" approach for whether ChromeOS had any chance on its own.

adamrmcd• 14 years ago

I don't believe so, for both your statements :)

First off, this took so long because Chrome was built using a "normal" devel framework (gcc, make, etc) with a few added tools (repo, gyp). The UX for Chrome is provided via OS-specific graphical APIs, like X.org, Cocoa, and Win32.

Android uses a Java framework, which in turn contains the code that manages all rendering and UX, so not only did Chrome UX needed to be ported to Android's graphical API, but the entire build environment needed to be JDK compatible.

I agree the Android browser is laughable compared to Chrome, and Chrome on Android is the future, but there were so many developmental problems that needed to be solved first before one could stick to the other.

Regarding your ChromeOS comment, this has nothing to do with that as ChromeOS is designed to solve an entirely different problem. Many power-users (developers, technology bloggers, etc) seem to have a hate-on for ChromeOS because they're afraid it'll kill their venerable laptop. That will never happen. :)

ChromeOS is designed to kill those netbooks and laptops where common-users (my wife, for example) only use them for browsing gmail, facebook, and a few forums. 95% of what these users do are web based, barring a few native apps, of which NaCL and other HTML5 technologies are aiming to solve.

fluidcruft• 14 years ago

That's exactly the same market android tablets target. The market for ChromeOS is rapidly evaporating.

enoughalready• 14 years ago

This is exciting news. I just got the Galaxy Nexus, so the timing couldn't be any more perfect.

It doesn't look like they allow extensions yet. :(

Big win: You can remotely debug your web application via usb and adb. (Preferences -> Developer Tools -> Enable USB Web debugging.

trotsky2• 14 years ago

Chrome is now available in Beta from Android Market, in select countries and languages for phones and tablets with Android 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich.

What tablets have official ICS on them? Is ICS even fully tabletized? I thought they had said they were putting that off until Jelly Bean.

nextparadigms9• 14 years ago

I believe Transformer Prime and Xoom have it right now. Also the $79 Ainol Novo7 tablet.

They never said they will put it off until JellyBean. The only semi-official rumor about JellyBean was that they post-poned some "major changes" that were coming to ICS initially.

angryasian3• 14 years ago

Running CM9 / ICS on touchpad. ICS is fully tabletized, better than my ipad, on an alpha build full of bugs.

lostsock• 14 years ago

I was hardly using my Touchpad before I put CM9 on it. Now it really is quite delightful to use. Really looking forward to hardware accelerated video though.

r00fus• 14 years ago

Wow, that sounds great, can you tell me more?

51Cards• 14 years ago

My ASUS Slider is supposed to be getting the update quite soon along with the Transformer. Last I read a couple weeks ago it was in final checks at Google.

nuclear_eclipse4• 14 years ago

I've been running a build of CyanogenMod 9 on my Galaxy Tab 10, and I'm absolutely loving it. I really liked the tablet with honeycomb, but ICS has made it literally 10 times better and faster.

gruuk• 14 years ago

Who needs an "official" ICS? I've installed a beta ICS ROM (teamDRH) on my Viewsonic gTablet and it is as tabletized as honeycomb, though it looks better (this build has issues, but developer support is pretty impressive). The best Viewsonic could do as an update was a Froyo-based bugfix release.

Besides, people who have installed custom ROMs on their phone/tablet are likely less worried about using alpha/beta software, so I wouldn't be surprised if most of the early beta testers will be from this group.

ConstantineXVI3• 14 years ago

Other way around. ICS is effectively a re-merging of Honeycomb (which was tablet only) back to mainline Android.

eco3• 14 years ago

Trying it now. It's very slick. Neat little animations and effects all over. Pulling up tabs from my Desktop Chrome works great. All of my bookmarks show up. No extension support (yet?).

nickpresta3• 14 years ago

Direct Market Link: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.android.chrome The download is a hefty 16MB.

Features:

* Chrome-to-mobile, Sync bookmarks, history, settings, Auto sign-in

* Bandwidth management (preload webpages)

* Privacy settings

* Developer tools: Tilt Scrolling, USB Web Debugging (debug web pages from Chrome Desktop via USB??)

* Incognito mode

* About screen: http://i.imgur.com/Ahr6t.jpg

The homepage has a "sync" icon with all the tabs open on your desktop: http://i.imgur.com/6eadl.jpg

It can be a little slow to sync pages between devices, but works much better than Chrome to Phone.

Overall, Chrome Beta is a welcomed improvement.

jonknee2• 14 years ago

> USB Web Debugging

That will be great. Even better if iOS gains something similar--it's maddening to not have a real debugger.

rsynnott• 14 years ago

See this thing: http://www.iwebinspector.com/

bvdbijl4• 14 years ago

Instructions on how to use web debugging via USB: http://code.google.com/chrome/mobile/docs/debugging.html

You can then access http://localhost:9222/ which shows a list of all pages currently open on your device, which link to a page on http://chrome-devtools-frontend.appspot.com/ for example http://chrome-devtools-frontend.appspot.com/static/16.0.912.... which in turn connects to a websocket on localhost like ws://localhost:9222/devtools/page/2 to debug your mobile browser!

borismus• 14 years ago

To get a feel for USB web debugging, check out this remote debugging video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4zpL4VBbuU

ARolek• 14 years ago

Will this replace the browser that ships with Android in ICS, or will the user have to download Chrome?

bryanlarsen• 14 years ago

If I read what MG Siegler wrote correctly, it will eventually replace "Browser" on Google Android builds. People like Amazon who aren't paying Google for Android won't get it.

revorad2• 14 years ago

Can anyone please confirm if this includes access to the Chrome Web Store? That could be huge for web apps.

eco3• 14 years ago

If you visit the web store it says it isn't supported by this operating system.

revorad2• 14 years ago

Oh no! I hope they will open it up. Thanks anyway; I asked because I don't have an Android device but I do make web apps.

sern4• 14 years ago

And in typical Google fashion, they have assumed that devices have an infinite amount of memory: https://imgur.com/zkh7C (this is with the app in the background!)

huggyface2• 14 years ago

Why bigot your statement with such a ridiculous lead-in?

On my Gingerbread device the browser right now, in the background, is using 67.15MB. What does that demonstrate? Nothing, given that the RAM was available and web browsing is one of, if not the most, complex activities you can do.

sern4• 14 years ago

I should have qualified my statement by mentioning that the Chrome app process runs a couple of background services - this causes it to be killed for low memory after normal background processes (the actual behaviour is a little more complex than that, but that's the gist of it), which could potentially impact the performance of multitasking. The proper thing to do is to run background services in a separate process from the UI or whatever uses the most memory so that the latter can be evicted more quickly.

I stand by my assertion that optimising for memory isn't a priority at Google. An Android engineer poignantly put it (sorry, can't remember who) when they bragged on G+ that Android 4.0.3 was the first time since Gingerbread that they'd run the OS on a <1G RAM device (namely Nexus S). Then again, as an actual embedded engineer (none of this gigs of RAM crap!), all I care about is memory usage...

eco3• 14 years ago

It's almost like they set minimum system requirements and then users installed it on phones that didn't meet them yet they felt the need to complain even though it still ran on their phones.

eli• 14 years ago

Using lots of memory is not necessarily wasteful. Actually, NOT using memory that would otherwise sit there full of zeros is almost always a waste.

tadfisher• 14 years ago

What else are you going to use the RAM for? Hell, you have 45MB wasted right there!

If the OS refuses to kill the app under memory pressure then you have a point. Until someone demonstrates this, you're being a bit more than disingenuous.

bvdbijl4• 14 years ago

Well, that's what memory is made for right? You could also not run any apps and enjoy 300MB of unused memory, but that wouldn't be very useful. Android has a very nice system in place that manages its memory.

zobzu2• 14 years ago

this might be because: - its loading its own webkit/js lib - it might be multiprocecss (is it?)

I'm wondering how much firefox nightly uses on your phone

sern4• 14 years ago

Look - as I said in my other comment, the issue isn't that it uses a tonne of memory. The stock browser does so too. The issue is that it is using that memory in such a way that it is evicted too late. The app is multi-process, but they're putting background services in the wrong process - they run in the main process that you'd expect to be heavy on memory usage. So instead of the memory-heavy UI stuff being evicted shortly after the UI goes away, it is evicted after all other background (multitasking) processes - including the launcher - have also gone away.

Note that my screenshot shows the active (i.e., not background processes that can be thrown away at any time) section of the running processes screen.

jyunderwood• 14 years ago

I wonder if/when the "Browser" app will get the hardware-accelerated canvas support.

Currently, some of the canvas apps I've tried on ICS run worse than on Gingerbread. However, those same apps run acceptable in this Chrome beta.

justincormack2• 14 years ago

Never by the sound of it. It will be discontinued in favour of Chrome now.

bvdbijl4• 14 years ago

Just a note: the rendering in this app does not use Android's webkit! For example the rounded borders on ihackersnews.com are square! It seems that it doesn't use the namespaced -webkit-border-radius but only the normal border-radius Interesting

porterhaney• 14 years ago

Much like Facebook's S-1, Google is seeing a huge increase in mobile traffic but not strong way to monetize it via advertising. I'd wager the preview pane (and maybe even the browser itself) is a play to increase the interaction they get on mobile advertisements.

SlimHop• 14 years ago

Can anyone speak to whether or not Chrome for Android supports WebGL?

paulirish2• 14 years ago

It doesn't support WebGL right now. Some more answers to questions like this at http://code.google.com/chrome/mobile/docs/faq.html

jentulman• 14 years ago

Just thought I'd try it. Nothing I've tried on chromeexperiments.com has worked using a galaxy nexus.

nuclear_eclipse4• 14 years ago

My initial perception is that all the Chrome features are great, primarily the data syncing with my desktop browsers. But the rendering is flawed; it doesn't render like the standard Android browser, doesn't render like desktop Chrome, and doesn't seem to even render consistent to itself.

For example, a few screenshots comparing the standard Browser view of this comment page and the way Chrome beta views it:

Browser: http://db.tt/kv3xP1Mk

Browser: http://db.tt/s7S6lCBN

Chrome beta: http://db.tt/p9YXoWJU

karl_nerd2• 14 years ago

Without testing, this particular issue looks like it could be handled with the viewport-tag and -webkit-text-size-adjust

necubi• 14 years ago

It's apparently a feature:

"An issue that often pops up for mobile browsers is that text on the website may be too small to read properly. Where the Android Browser employs a text reflow algorithm to clarify the situation, Chrome for Android features a technique which we’ve called Font Boosting. It uses an algorithm to increase font sizes when necessary, aiming to make the text readable regardless of the zoom level."

(from http://peter.sh/2012/02/bringing-google-chrome-to-android)

mikeryan• 14 years ago

Wow - I honestly can't decide if thats a horrible idea or not. But I can guarantee there's a ton of UX/UI folks who are going to get pissed that that.

nuclear_eclipse4• 14 years ago

Then their algorithm isn't consistent, as shown by screenshot. Some comments on HN are "boosted", while others remain tiny. This also makes it impossible to reliably hit any of the other page controls, like voting, without having to manually zoom way in and then back out.

FaceKicker• 14 years ago

While it's indeed imperfect and inconsistent, in the 10 minutes I've spent playing with it, it does seem much, much easier to read and click links without zooming, which is quite a bit more important to me than it being slightly ugly. I'll definitely be using it over the stock browser.

mikeytown2• 14 years ago

I wonder how chrome does speed wise when compared to opera mini. I'm currently using opera mini as its one of the fastest browsers for my phone; G1 running the superE rom.

condiment• 14 years ago

The blog post doesn't go into it, but I'm curious to know what the long-term implications of this release are for the built-in android browser and the android SDK's WebView and WebChromeClient.

If this is indeed the first step towards decoupling the browser from the Android platform itself, I would expect to see continuing development of those aspects of the SDK to dwindle and die completely, leaving them in the dust feature-wise when compared to native apps, and putting the people who work on web-wrapper-apps at an even more serious disadvantage.

nextparadigms9• 14 years ago

That's a very good question indeed, especially since some seem to suggest that Google will eventually replace the stock browser with Chrome, and Chrome is proprietary.

estel2• 14 years ago

The FAQ's been linked to a couple of times from here, and it vaguely says:

Are you still working on the Android browser, or are you dropping support in favor of Chrome?

Android Browser and Chrome for Android are both derived from Chromium and already share a lot of code. We will continue to evaluate where it makes sense to harmonize our efforts; for instance, Google now has just one port of WebKit to maintain.

lwhi• 14 years ago

It's a shame that this has only been released for Android 4.0. My hope is that use of Chrome for Android becomes commonplace. SVG support has been lacking in the Android stock browser in all releases up to Gingerbread - Android 4.0 (and 3.0) already have SVG support, earlier release could really benefit.

gcb2• 14 years ago

A browser with that many permissions? what good is sandboxing and everything if the browser can access 100% of my device, including microphone?

i'm thankful this is not available for my ancient, 11mo old, nexus one.

Shank2• 14 years ago

Can we please stop with the hyper-generalization that is that each permission is being used for the app 100% of the time for everything? In almost every instance, one permission or another is required for some trivial task, and they add up quickly.

gcb2• 14 years ago

and for something like a browser, a silly bug will make my personal data ... heck even my mic vulnerable.

android permission is only good if you make specialized apps and make them talk togheter. like it was the original intent with actions and intents. but i guess it didn't worked out ok.

klausa2• 14 years ago

It appears to be significantly faster on JS front than stock Browser.

Sunspider results:

    Stock - 3852.2ms
    Chrome - 3131.8ms

(tested on HP Touchpad with CM9 A.06)

edit:

I was curious and redid it after rebooting:

    Stock - 2816.1ms
    Chrome  - 2928.1ms (!)

So it turns out it's faster on systems under load, but actually slightly slower on freshly booted one. Weird.

In case anyone is interested in full benchmarks:

Stock: http://u.42.pl/2HRq

Chrome: http://u.42.pl/2HRp

mikemaccana• 14 years ago

Html5test.com scores? I've got a new android phone but it won't run chrome.

klausa2• 14 years ago

256+3 bonus on stock, 343+10 bonus on Chrome.

I don't know how to paste which tests pass and which fail, is there any?

curveship• 14 years ago

On my Xoom with stock ICS 4.0.3, Chrome is on the whole dead even with the stock browser:

    Chrome - 2276.2ms +/- 1.0%
    Stock - 2288.9ms +/- 2.0%

Here's a screenshot of the detailed breakdown: http://i.imgur.com/WA37A.png . The "FROM" column is Chrome, the "TO" column is stock. Some tests Chrome wins, some stock.

Steko6• 14 years ago

Anandtech did a Sunspider comparison with Chrome slightly trailing stock and both somewhat behind Firefox 10. Not really gamebreaking differences though.

http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/graph5517/43983.png

I use Firefox Home on iOS for the sync even though the JS is gimped in non-Safari webkit views. Sync is that killer.

eklitzke• 14 years ago

I believe that both browsers are based on WebKit and V8 (that's what they've said about the stock browser in the past, anyway), so your results aren't too surprising. The Chrome app adds a bunch of new features, better UI, and makes the browser into a real, bona fide app.

That's my read on it, anyway.

rodion_89• 14 years ago

ICS on Nexus S.

  Browser - 4432.6 ms
  Chrome  - 3258.4 ms

EDIT: Didn't reboot or anything like that.

sathishmanohar• 14 years ago

This app is incompatible with your Nexus S. :(

karl_nerd2• 14 years ago

"Swipe from the edge to switch tab" is beautiful :)

nextparadigms9• 14 years ago

It's something I've been asking from Google for a while. They need to implement swipes and gestures like that throughout the OS, and get rid of the bottom buttons which I think are wasting space.

dave1010uk2• 14 years ago

For those wondering what the differences between the stock Android ICS browser and Chrome 16 (which this is based on), Chrome has extra features such as:

    * WOFF fonts 
    * Web workers
    * drag and drop (not sure if this would work in mobile)
    * file API
    * IndexedDB
    * form validation 
    * CSS border images 
    * SVG filters

Desktop Chrome currently doesn't support touch events. I wonder if the Android port's touch events implementation will make it to the desktop.

Source: http://caniuse.com/#compare=y&b1=chrome+16&b2=androi...

its_so_on• 14 years ago

I never thought I would see the day that a BlackBerry can run Chrome. I still never think so, but I never thought so, too.

pamelafox• 14 years ago

Since I use Phonegap for my Android apps, I've filed an issue requesting that the Chrome browser be usable in WebView somehow: http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=113088

Click the star if that's something you'd like too. :)

ConstantineXVI3• 14 years ago

Since it doesn't replace the base WebKit, you'd either have to require everyone install Chrome to use your app (not guaranteed), or bundle the entire runtime (adding ~10MB to your app). It's possible, but doesn't seem very practical unless there's a serious leap in performance or capabilities in Chrome vs the baked in WebKit.

Far more likely we'll see Chromium replace Android's engine in a version or two.

rkon• 14 years ago

This is unusable on the Galaxy Nexus due to its mysterious tendency to make fonts microscopic for random sections of the page. Guess it never occured to anyone to test their flagship browser on their flagship phone? It doesn't even resize the page to fit the screen when you pinch zoom (which the stock browser does)

Also, it has a persistent address/menu bar that takes up the top 10% of the screen, no doubt thanks to ICS' lack of a dedicated menu button. Once again, proof that removing said button was a pure stroke of idiocy.

cma• 14 years ago

Put the stock browser into fullscreen mode and you see the button was totally useless. You just scroll up a bit for the address/menu/tab buttons to show.

jgnatch• 14 years ago

It was about time!

dahlia• 14 years ago

It reminds me of the truth that speed is the best user experience.

Shank2• 14 years ago

Crashes on start on my HTC Incredible (4.0.3 via Evervolv), and on my Nook Color it can't load pages.

TwoBit• 14 years ago

The problem with FireFox on my (512 mb) phone is that the OS usually kills it when I switch to another app (even tiny apps like messaging), and it's a slow FireFox restart if I want to use it again. The OS doesn't do this with the stock browser.

nextparadigms9• 14 years ago

Does anyone know if it comes with the same tab sandboxing it has on the PC? They say it has the same security as Chrome for PC, but they don't specify this.

rplnt3• 14 years ago

Would this have any benefit if I don't use chrome on my computer (and even if I was I probably wouldn't want all my tabs syncing to phone)? Because the ad left me with impression that syncing is its only feature.

ssn• 14 years ago

Why only "in selected countries"?

afsina• 14 years ago

missing i18n?

darklajid• 14 years ago

While I understand the appeal (and - being stuck on pre 4.0 anyway, not utterly relevant for me at this time): I really hope that this will stay an optional offer, with a simple browser being the default.

Things like "When searching, your top search results are loaded in the background as you type so pages appear instantly." make me shudder in disgust. The 'inspired by WebOS' card stuff looks nice, but I won't be having more than 2-3 tabs open on my phone at any given time (tablets might be different here).

A browser is a very central part of the user experience. I prefer it simple and stupid.

gavanwoolery• 14 years ago

EEeaagh...getting tired of the upbeat-catchy-music-with-stop-motion-video-and-smarmy-narrator product demos. Who started these? I think it was Apple, not sure though...

Introducing Chrome for Android

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