Google’s been in the news alot lately.
Chrome, Andriod, Native Client, and the Open Handset Alliance…
Then of course there’s rumors of a google opperating system.
Chrome
It’s market share is standing quite stationary at the moment. However, as with all things the impact of the product itself is not just measured in by a market share (especially for a product that is free)
Chrome’s big goal was to change the way we look at the internet and web apps. Futhermore, it was to change the philosophy behind the browsers. The core behind Chrome was google’s new Javascript engine, called V8, which is able to execute Javascript more effeciantly then any other browser on the market according to google.
This is true if you test it by google’s metrics. It also was true on the other tests till recently. Firefox’s latest Beta, contains a new Mozilla powered Javascript engine. Which was able to match Chrome’s speed, in some of the more common tests. The moral of the story is that While it’s not making a huge splash as a browser, google’s philosophy is ringing loud and clear.
Chrome is by no means a bad browser choice, infact it’s quite good browser consider it’s still in beta (it’s what I’m using currently as I write this post).
Android
It’s an open source based mobile phone OS, which is based on Linux (Yea, bet you didn’t see that coming). So far there’s only one phone that uses it, the T-Mobile G1. The phone was well recieved for the most part, and recieved it’s fair share of good reviews.
In the plus colum andriod, as far as an OS pretty much crushes Microsoft’s Windows Moble, and the Blackberry OS.
However, the biggest thing that it has against it right now is that it’s not a corperate friendly OS at the moment. As it’s lacking alot of the tools that corperate users require, like an Exchange connection. My guess is that this is already in the works.
As it stands Apple’s Iphone still has the G1 beat, in most respects. However, Android’s got the open handset alliance behind it. This is looking to be a bit of a rehash of the IBM/Apple computer battle of old.
This race, is a marathon not a sprint…
Native Client
Well, Google’s had alot of people buzzing with rumors of an OS. Many people expected them to put together an OS based on the Ubunto Linux client that company uses on their internal computers. However, what ended up getting pushed out was something google called native client.
It’s a nice mix of Flash and Java in short.
It’s basically something that’s aimed to allow a web site to take advantage of a computers processor and other resources. Which will further blur the line between Web and Local applications. Which google gears is already doing.
Open Handset Alliance
Currently, especially in the USA. Cellphone carriers have pretty much walled up their services. Even more so when it comes to smart phones.
A cellphone that works for one carrier usually won’t work for any other carrier, and in the event that it does work… the features are severly limited.
The open handset alliance (or OHA) is aiming to tear down these walls. They’ve got alot of work ahead of themselves… as there is currently two standards that are supported in the US’s Cell Phones.
Once complete, the idea is to have any andriod phone, work with any andriod network.
As far as Carriers goes, (in the US) the only major carrier missing from the alliance is AT&T, but that’s in large because of a contract with Apple. (Sprint, Nextel, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless are all part of the alliance)
What does this mean for the consumer? Well a more friendly enviornment that’s for sure. All phones offer the same features, all carriers offer the same phones…