

Google struggling to define Chrome OS as launch approaches - rmah
http://venturebeat.com/2010/11/26/google-chrome-os/

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easyfrag
I really think the iPad threw a small monkey-wrench into Google's plans for
both Android and Chrome OS. When they were both announced there was a clear
delineation between mobile OS and Desktop OS; the iPad has blurred the line
somewhat though it appears that the keyboard is also what ditinguishes which
apple devices get the mobile OS (iPad) from those with the desktop OS (MacBook
Air).

Interestingly Microsoft, Apple, and Google all have the same "problem": they
each have 2 operating systems when it appears there is an ongoing convergence
between "mobile" devices and "desktop" devices.

~~~
riobard
Apple has an advantage here in that the difference between iOS and OS X is
smaller than that between Windows and Windows Mobile, or Android and Chrome
OS. Apple is also moving ahead now that they are adding mobile features
learned from iPad back to desktop in OS X 10.7.

By comparison Microsoft is still in the process of trying to figure out how
mobile features look like, while Google has the problem of fragmentation of
Android and not-released-yet Chrome OS. I doubt either is far into thinking
about merging mobile and desktop as of now.

~~~
sjs382
Is the difference between ios and osx really smaller than chromeos and
Android? Chromeos is just a browser, after all... anything written for
chromeos (presuming it doesn't depend on a mouse) should work on the Android
browser.

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arpit
Do I get extra points for actually asking that question at the Web 2.0
conference considering his answer seems to be circulating quite a bit in the
news ;)

The answer is kinda hogwash anyway, since Google TV is a keyboard based device
that is running Android.

For Chrome to actually not just increase the confusion around google OS's, I
really wish they add an emulation layer at least for Android apps to run on
Chrome OS

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nathansobo
Google should add "native" apps to Chrome OS by adding javascript-based APIs
for controlling processes, accessing the file system, etc. Essentially pitch
the browser as a GUI layer on top of linux, much as Cocoa sits atop Darwin.
You could build traditional apps in whatever language you wanted, but use HTML
for describing their interface.

~~~
patrickaljord
FileAPI is already in Chrome:
[http://html5-demos.appspot.com/static/html5storage/index.htm...](http://html5-demos.appspot.com/static/html5storage/index.html#slide43)

So is File System API:
[http://html5-demos.appspot.com/static/html5storage/index.htm...](http://html5-demos.appspot.com/static/html5storage/index.html#slide53)

And so are native apps: <http://code.google.com/p/nativeclient/>

