New Google Chrome- First Impression

Posted under Business

Google released a new Internet web browser on Tuesday called Chrome.  

My first reaction after downloading, “Holy hell, this is faster than IE or Firefox!  This is a win for productivity!”  My second reaction, “Where’s the spell check button?”

I’m the literate computer user who gets slowed down because my PC cannot keep up with me or the demand I put on my operating system.  My heart fluttered a bit at the speed increase achieved with a simple download.  I’m a die-hard Google loyalist.  I’ve tried other platforms but I always go back to Google.  

The new browser has a minimalist design but claims to make the web “faster, safer and easier.”  So far, so good.

A Summary of Google Chrome

One Box For Everything- If you’re a fan of the “Alt + D” shortcut to quickly put your cursor into your browser’s address bar, you can run web searches and web history searches in the same box with suggestions.

New Tab Page- Each time a new tab is opened, you see a “visual sampling” of your most visited sites, search engines, bookmarks and closed tabs.

Dynamic Tabs- This feature allows you to drag tabs out of the new browser to create new windows or gather multiple tabs together.  I’m in love!

Application Shortcuts- Without opening your browser, you can configure chrome to load applications.

Crash Protection- I wish IE had this because I crashed my browser three times today when compiling research.  Every tab runs independently in the browser so if one application crashes, it won’t take everything down.

There are more features… download the new Chrome and see for yourself.

Opportunities

I’m still learning what Chrome can do but I would love seamless integration with my Google Reader.  This includes shared items, starred items, unread items.  I would like to see seamless integration with Gmail and GTalk… 

Where’s my spell check button from Google Toolbar?  I’m missing that.  I wonder if there are plug-ins?  That could be a deal breaker!

I’ve only seen one bug so far… the browser was confused on what size to maximize the window when I moved my browser to my dual monitor.  I could manually re size to fill the whole window but not use the maximize button itself.  

Chrome is still a Beta so hopefully, we’ll see new features added soon!