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Valok
January 22nd, 2009, 04:48 PM
I know the people over at google are hard at work making a linux client for Chrome, but I haven't been able to find any news on it lately. Has anyone been able to stumble across an ETA, or maybe a progress of how far along the project is?

Skripka
January 22nd, 2009, 04:51 PM
Last I heard-it would be summer at the soonest.

Valok
January 22nd, 2009, 05:48 PM
Bummer! Thats a bit longer of a wait than I was expecting.

GCG199
January 22nd, 2009, 09:32 PM
It is supposed to be released for Linux and Macs by the end of the first half of the year from the articles I have seen about it recently.

So that leaves just over five months to go now.

It looks like they made the mistake of only focusing on the Windows version when they started it and now they have to go backwards to port the other versions so to speak.

SomeGuyDude
January 22nd, 2009, 09:43 PM
Is it really THAT hard to make a port? We're talking damn near a year since it came out.

Valok
January 22nd, 2009, 09:44 PM
I know next to nothing about programming, but I didn't think it would be that hard of a thing to do, especially with the types of resources that google commands.

meborc
January 22nd, 2009, 09:57 PM
why are you waiting for it anyways? what's wrong with the browser you use now?

or to put it in another way - what is so good about chrome? i have used it on windows and can't really see why to switch

init1
January 22nd, 2009, 10:30 PM
Yeah, I don't see any reason to switch.

meho_r
January 22nd, 2009, 10:45 PM
Is it really THAT hard to make a port? We're talking damn near a year since it came out.

Yeah, and because they kept us waiting for a year, I think I'll pass and let them wait for me to try it for, let's say, another year maybe :D

SomeGuyDude
January 22nd, 2009, 10:53 PM
Yeah, and because they kept us waiting for a year, I think I'll pass and let them wait for me to try it for, let's say, another year maybe :D

Yeah I was pretty jazzed when it was fresh, but at this point my enthusiasm's dropped off a bit.

DigitalDuality
January 23rd, 2009, 03:39 AM
d

RiceMonster
January 23rd, 2009, 03:53 AM
Chrome's nice, but even on Windows I still use Firefox. As DigitalDuality said, FF 3.1 will give me no reason to use Chrome.

mssever
January 23rd, 2009, 07:24 AM
I understand that Chrome uses a lot of Windows-only features, so porting it to Linux is means a substantial re-write. That's probably one reason why it's taking so long. Another factor, no doubt, is that Google probably isn't dedicating nearly as many resources to Linux Chrome as Windows Chrome.

As far as features go, Chrome is now my default browser on the few occasions when I run Windows. The two killer features, as far as I'm concerned are the way you can drag tabs into/out of windows and the fact that each tab is in a separate process. I'd love it if Firefox implemented both of these.

Xyhthyx
January 23rd, 2009, 04:27 PM
If only Google had written portable code from the beginning, they could have done a release on all 3 platforms right from the start.

Garudi
January 23rd, 2009, 04:48 PM
Google Chrome is nice and fast, but I still prefer Firefox when I'm running windows. All the addons that firefox has makes it better imo.

I'm in favour of more choice though, having more decent browsers is never a bad thing.

Valok
January 23rd, 2009, 05:02 PM
My main reason for wanting it right now is that for some reason firefox (and pretty much every broswer other than Opera for that matter) is painfully slow all of a sudden. But seeing as Chrome is at least a few months off, I'll most likely end up re formatting and starting anew.

Other than that, I really just love the way chrome looks. I'm a minimalist and Chrome fits the bill very well for me. It just looks and feels right for me, a personal preference.

mihai.ile
January 23rd, 2009, 05:13 PM
I understand that Chrome uses a lot of
The two killer features, as far as I'm concerned are the way you can drag tabs into/out of windows and the fact that each tab is in a separate process. I'd love it if Firefox implemented both of these.

I am using Firefox 3.1b2 on windows pc at the office and dragging tabs already does what you described there (no tab refresh, it actually moves from one window to another).
As for the separate processes thing.. last time I used chrome I opened a tab and typed ":%" and it crashed not only the tab but the whole browser. So the each tab/new process didn't work quite well...

SpenceMakesSense
January 23rd, 2009, 05:20 PM
eh...chrome was good but I couldn't see it being that great on linux

Heck I tried opera and found it slow and apparently its supposed to be the next best thing to FF. And somethings telling me it wont be able to handle flash as well as FF considering it took multiple releases of FF until it was at a speed to my liking. (for isntance up until ubuntu 8.10 I couldnt go fullscreen on youtube videos)

Paqman
January 23rd, 2009, 06:09 PM
what is so good about chrome?

It's fast.

If it starts to support live bookmarks i'd probably switch to it unless Firefox picks up a lot of speed. Firefox has a lot of great extensions, but it's become a real slug.

happysmileman
January 23rd, 2009, 06:43 PM
If only Google had written portable code from the beginning, they could have done a release on all 3 platforms right from the start.
I agree, to be honest I don't think I'll use it for this reason, I'd like a cross-platform browser, not a Windows browser with Windows specific features that was ported after tons of development and will always be behind.

Only feature I saw that seemed in any way useful was the process separation (which of course is excellent), didn't seem much faster in any way and the interface was horrible.

andras artois
January 23rd, 2009, 06:52 PM
Will chrome support extensions like Firefox does? If it does I'll probably switch over.

Skripka
January 23rd, 2009, 06:59 PM
Only feature I saw that seemed in any way useful was the process separation (which of course is excellent), didn't seem much faster in any way and the interface was horrible.

Ditto.

Firefox has extensions-which get broken every time a new version release comes out....even something simple like an extension to unify the stop/reload buttons into 1 button, you either have to patch each extension manually to ignore the version # check-or wait for who knows how long for a fix.

Opera-is fast, yet for gawd knows what reason the Opera devs refuse to release a 64-bit Qt4 build. (my biggest personal complaint)...oh, yea and Opera doesn't look at all like a KDE app.

Chrome-has process separation and thats about all it has over other free browsers....otherwise it is like a car chassis,steering column, engine, drivetrain, and wheels...yes all the fundamentals of a car are there-yet a great deal is lacking.



Choose your poison.

mssever
January 23rd, 2009, 07:01 PM
If only Google had written portable code from the beginning, they could have done a release on all 3 platforms right from the start.As I understand it, there were several major things that Chrome does for which there was no suitable cross-platform library already in existance. So Google would have had to write their own. I'm guessing that their top priority was to make a Windows release and deal with portability issues later.


I am using Firefox 3.1b2 on windows pc at the office and dragging tabs already does what you described there (no tab refresh, it actually moves from one window to another).
So if you drag a tab out of the tabbar you'll get a new window? And if you drag the last tab in a window to another window, the now-empty window will close? If so, I wonder how long it'll be before we get that on Linux?

happysmileman
January 23rd, 2009, 07:17 PM
So if you drag a tab out of the tabbar you'll get a new window? And if you drag the last tab in a window to another window, the now-empty window will close? If so, I wonder how long it'll be before we get that on Linux?

I think he means that if you already have both windows open you can drag a tab from one to the other, but it doesn't automatically create a new window, so it's not the same thing

magnus0
January 23rd, 2009, 07:25 PM
I just hope they'll make a full GTK port, not use Wine, like they do on their other products

racoq
January 23rd, 2009, 07:31 PM
If you guys are complayning and wanto to use a fast browser, why not use Midori (http://www.twotoasts.de/index.php?/pages/midori_summary.html)?

It is based on webkit as chrome is, and IMHO it has more potential than chrome in Linux.

If people want to wait for chrome for linux, they can die waiting...

mihai.ile
January 24th, 2009, 01:47 AM
So if you drag a tab out of the tabbar you'll get a new window? And if you drag the last tab in a window to another window, the now-empty window will close? If so, I wonder how long it'll be before we get that on Linux?

Yes, you get the new window created with the tab the same as it were on the other window, and the window with no tabs closes..

bruce89
January 24th, 2009, 01:53 AM
#!/usr/bin/env seed

var home_page = "http://live.gnome.org/Seed";

Seed.import_namespace("Gtk");
Seed.import_namespace("WebKit");

Gtk.init(null, null);

BrowserToolbar = new GType(
{
parent: Gtk.HBox.type,
name: "BrowserToolbar",
instance_init: function(klass)
{
// Private
var url_bar = new Gtk.Entry();

var back_button = new Gtk.ToolButton({stock_id: "gtk-go-back"});
var forward_button = new Gtk.ToolButton({stock_id: "gtk-go-forward"});
var refresh_button = new Gtk.ToolButton({stock_id: "gtk-refresh"});

var back = function()
{
browser.get_web_view().go_back();
};

var forward = function()
{
browser.get_web_view().go_forward();
};

var refresh = function()
{
browser.get_web_view().reload();
};

var browse = function(url)
{
browser.get_web_view().browse(url.text);
};

// Public
this.set_url = function(url)
{
url_bar.text = url;
};

this.set_can_go_back = function(can_go_back)
{
back_button.sensitive = can_go_back;
};

this.set_can_go_forward = function(can_go_forward)
{
forward_button.sensitive = can_go_forward;
};

// Implementation
back_button.signal.clicked.connect(back)
forward_button.signal.clicked.connect(forward);
refresh_button.signal.clicked.connect(refresh);
url_bar.signal.activate.connect(browse);

this.pack_start(back_button);
this.pack_start(forward_button);
this.pack_start(refresh_button);
this.pack_start(url_bar, true, true);
}
});

BrowserView = new GType(
{
parent: WebKit.WebView.type,
name: "BrowserView",
instance_init: function(klass)
{
// Private
var update_url = function (web_view, web_frame)
{
var toolbar = browser.get_toolbar();

toolbar.set_url(web_frame.get_uri());
toolbar.set_can_go_back(web_view.can_go_back());
toolbar.set_can_go_forward(web_view.can_go_forward ());
};

// Public
this.browse = function (url)
{
if(url.search("://") < 0)
url = "http://" + url;

this.open(url);
};

// Implementation
this.set_scroll_adjustments(null, null);
this.signal.load_committed.connect(update_url);
}
});

Browser = new GType(
{
parent: Gtk.VBox.type,
name: "Browser",
instance_init: function (klass)
{
// Private
var toolbar = new BrowserToolbar();
var web_view = new BrowserView();
var scroll_view = new Gtk.ScrolledWindow();

// Public
this.get_toolbar = function()
{
return toolbar;
};

this.get_web_view = function()
{
return web_view;
};

// Implementation
scroll_view.smooth_scroll = true;
scroll_view.add(web_view);
scroll_view.set_policy(Gtk.PolicyType.Automatic,
Gtk.PolicyType.Automatic);

this.pack_start(toolbar);
this.pack_start(scroll_view, true, true);
}
});

var window = new Gtk.Window({title: "Browser"});
window.resize(600, 600);
window.signal.destroy.connect(Gtk.main_quit);

browser = new Browser();
browser.get_web_view().browse(home_page);
window.add(browser);

window.show_all();

Gtk.main();

Yes, it's a Web browser in JavaScript.

y6FgBn)~v
January 24th, 2009, 01:58 AM
Yeah I was pretty jazzed when it was fresh, but at this point my enthusiasm's dropped off a bit.

Agree, they have missed their window of opportunity, no pun intended :p

Aenoble
January 24th, 2009, 02:53 AM
I've been using it exclusively for the last few months and it's actually a big part of why I haven't gone back to Linux in that time. It's not finished, but it's getting there quick, and the speed and UI are better than anything out there. It just feels better than any other browser I've used.

edit: The lack of auto-scroll is a pain, but it should be there in the coming weeks/months.

wolfen69
January 24th, 2009, 03:18 AM
Yeah, I don't see any reason to switch.

i agree. firefox does everything i need.

bruce89
January 24th, 2009, 04:02 AM
There's nothing really going for Chrome apart from its use of a decent rendering engine.

For instance, it has a stupid messed-up UI. I can't stand those sort of things.

I'll stick to Epiphany and hope that WebKit appears at some point (not for 2.26 either).

vishzilla
January 24th, 2009, 04:03 AM
Chrome does bring something different. Forget that there no add-ons, although the current beta is supposed to support Greasemonkey scripts. Chrome is fast, and I don't want to compare with Firefox. Firefox does work well for me. I would surely try it out when it comes out for Linux, and let the better of the two be my main browser. (Amazing, how a browser is so important to us)

BTW.. Chrome will mostly have GTK [link (http://code.google.com/p/chromium/wiki/LinuxGraphicsPipeline)]