Will Google Succeed With Chrome?

Nine months ago, Google, the search engine and web application giant, released Chrome, their web browser. Since then, more than thirty million people use it on a regular basis.

Today, Google has unveiled their plans for an operating system that is designed for the web.

This operating system, or OS, is supposedly based off of their web browser, Google Chrome. It will be open-source, targeted at netbooks, and built from a lightweight Linux kernel.

The Google Chrome OS is being designed to be booted and ready in a few seconds, and its graphical elements will be sparingly placed – ‘to stay out of your way’.

If done correctly, this will be one of the first netbook operating systems that solely runs on the web. It will use Google’s suite of applications – Docs, Calendar, and Gmail, as well as any web application available.

The Google Team intends for this operating system to be simple and straightforward – no software updates, no virus or malware issues, and no down time. They seem to be adopting the Apple Inc. mantra of “It just works.” This is most certainly due to consumers’ lack of enthusiasm towards the relentless updates of both main operating systems today.

Google states that Android and the Google Chrome OS are not connected; Android is a complete, offline operating system, whereas Chrome OS is for users who spend nearly all of their time on the internet.

They will, however, overlap in certain areas which are not yet made clear.

The OS will apparently run on both x86 and ARM chips so that it can be widely distributed to many computing platforms. Google intends on releasing the code into the open-source market sometime later this year for developers, and OEM netbooks will begin appearing sometime in the second half on 2010.