by Stephen Shankland
Google has begun work on a 64-bit version of Chrome for Linux, a move likely to whip Linux loyalists into a lather of excitement.
"The V8 team did some amazing work this quarter building a working 64-bit port. After a handful of changes on the Chromium side, I've had Chromium Linux building on 64-bit for the last few weeks," said Chrome engineer Dean McNamee in a mailing list message Thursday.
V8 is Chrome's engine for running programs written in the JavaScript language common on the Web. Chromium is the open-source project behind Google's branded and supported Chrome browser, and McNamee shared instructions for programmers to build 64-bit Chromium.
Virtually all PCs today come with 64-bit processors from Intel or Advanced Micro Devices, but for desktop computing, 32-bit operating systems and software are common. The transition to 64-bit software is well under way--notably with Linux and Mac OS X--but the change isn't simple. In the browser world, for example, it can be problematic running a 64-bit browser with a 32-bit plug-in such as Adobe Systems' Flash, Microsoft's Silverlight, or Sun Microsystems' Java.
In 64-bit versions, programs can take advantage of larger amounts of memory, performance can benefit from extra storage spaces called registers on processors, and some mathematically intense computing tasks can run faster. But along with issues such as broken plug-ins, 64-bit software can hog more disk space, complicate programmers' testing and support chores, and often doesn't really run appreciably faster, so the transition isn't necessarily a top priority.
For example, Mac OS X already is most of the way through its 64-bit transition, but 64-bit Safari won't arrive until Mac OS X 10.6, aka Snow Leopard, which is due in coming weeks. Apple, by the way, says that JavaScript will run much faster on the 64-bit version of Safari.
But Linux fans, who offset their smaller numbers with higher technical proficiency and a fondness for programming, are champions of 64-bit software. They hammered Adobe until it released a 64-bit version of Flash Player for Linux, and now they're agitating for 64-bit browsers.
Indeed, a discussion emerged on Wednesday about why a 64-bit version of Firefox isn't a higher priority.
"Optimizations such as the Tracemonkey JIT engine (a just-in-time compiler for JavaScript) have yet not been implemented for x86-64, which means that the i686 build will be faster than the x86-64 build," among other reasons, replied Mozilla's Benjamin Smedberg.
Windows is another matter altogether for browser makers; although 64-bit Windows is a common option nowadays on new machines, the vast majority of existing ones are still using 32-bit Windows, and there are plenty of late adopters.
A 64-bit version of Internet Explorer ships with Microsoft's 64-bit versions of Windows, but Safari for Windows won't be available alongside the Mac OS X version when it debuts. The work to rebuild JavaScript engines for 64-bit chips applies to multiple operating systems, so producing a version for one operating system does help move a given browser to the others.
So what's standing in the way of 64-bit Chrome for Windows?
"Motivation," according to another message by Google's Marc-Antoine Ruel. Well, not just that. Google or others also need to work on the sandbox security mechanism and gyp programming tools, he said.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Microsoft Should Avoid Branding Issue for Office Web Version
Update: Office.com is now live under Microsoft's operation. By Chris Crum
Original Article: Microsoft is reportedly now the owner of the domain Office.com. This could be a key component of Microsoft staying competitive with Google as they amp up their quest to get businesses and consumers to use Google Apps.
One can only assume that Microsoft's cloud-based version of Microsoft Office will be residing at Office.com. This is only speculation, mind you.
The previous owner (or "operator" rather, according to Robin Wauters) of Office.com was ContactOffice. At Office.com currently, there is a letter from them to Office.com users explaining what will happen (or has happened rather) in the transition period:
Dear Office.com Users,
As you know from the recent email we sent you, we will be transitioning the operation of your Virtual Office account to ContactOffice.com during the next 30 days.
As part of this transition, on Monday, June 29, 2009, we changed email addresses in the office.com domain to ones in the contactoffice.com domain.
To access your existing account, you will now need to log in at http://office.contactoffice.com
As of Friday, July 31, 2009, Office.com will no longer be available so please be sure to bookmark this URL for future use....
It's going to be a heated battle between Microsoft and Google. Clearly they are going for each other's throats more aggressively than ever these days. Microsoft launched Bing. Google announced the Chrome Operating System. Now Google's really pushing Google Apps, and Microsoft's presumably got a real domain for its web version of Office that will directly compete with Google Apps.
If you ask me, branding was the biggest problem Microsoft has had in the past in competing with Google in the search market. With Bing, they seem to be making some headway (although they have a long way to go. Too much damage may have already been done at this point). By getting Office.com, at least they won’t have to worry about any brand issues with that product. Office is already a well-established brand. Of course, this is again, only speculation that this is what Microsoft will do with the domain.
Original Article: Microsoft is reportedly now the owner of the domain Office.com. This could be a key component of Microsoft staying competitive with Google as they amp up their quest to get businesses and consumers to use Google Apps.
One can only assume that Microsoft's cloud-based version of Microsoft Office will be residing at Office.com. This is only speculation, mind you.
The previous owner (or "operator" rather, according to Robin Wauters) of Office.com was ContactOffice. At Office.com currently, there is a letter from them to Office.com users explaining what will happen (or has happened rather) in the transition period:
Dear Office.com Users,
As you know from the recent email we sent you, we will be transitioning the operation of your Virtual Office account to ContactOffice.com during the next 30 days.
As part of this transition, on Monday, June 29, 2009, we changed email addresses in the office.com domain to ones in the contactoffice.com domain.
To access your existing account, you will now need to log in at http://office.contactoffice.com
As of Friday, July 31, 2009, Office.com will no longer be available so please be sure to bookmark this URL for future use....
It's going to be a heated battle between Microsoft and Google. Clearly they are going for each other's throats more aggressively than ever these days. Microsoft launched Bing. Google announced the Chrome Operating System. Now Google's really pushing Google Apps, and Microsoft's presumably got a real domain for its web version of Office that will directly compete with Google Apps.
If you ask me, branding was the biggest problem Microsoft has had in the past in competing with Google in the search market. With Bing, they seem to be making some headway (although they have a long way to go. Too much damage may have already been done at this point). By getting Office.com, at least they won’t have to worry about any brand issues with that product. Office is already a well-established brand. Of course, this is again, only speculation that this is what Microsoft will do with the domain.
Five Features We Want to See in Ubuntu
Ubuntu isn't the only Linux operating system, but it's where the dream of a usable, completely free desktop is closest to reality. If every Ubuntu developer were assembled at one place, here are five things we'd ask them to accomplish.Ubuntu's not a single service or application developed by one team, so our wish list is a bit broader than just asking for five new features or improvements. Ubuntu is an open-source distribution of Linux, developed and fixed by thousands of developers around the world. It incorporates the efforts of many of the projects it relies on, like the GNOME desktop, open-source drivers, apps like Firefox and Pidgin, and many more.
But let's pretend there happened to be a worldwide summit on how Linux could become a viable, convenient desktop for more people, and let's pretend I had a panel approved at said summit at which I could present to all the interested parties. I wouldn't argue about hardware compatibility, or pretend that high-end games are an ultimate issue. I'd confess that I'm biased toward thinking about Apple computers more than Windows, because Apple has gained ground with a surprisingly similar product, and because some corporate, locked-down environments will never switch from Windows.
Then I'd ask for these five things:
An App Store better than Apple's
Integrate dual-booting and virtualization
A wave of right-brain rethinking
Awesome cloud-based backup
Good video editing software
v
Going one better, Good OS launched a stripped-down version of gOS earlier this year that runs just a web browser (Firefox) for accessing applications on the web. Thanks to its simplicity, gOS Cloud boots in mere seconds, allowing people to check their e-mail and perform other simple web tasks without having to boot a full operating system. If more horsepower is needed, then the user can quickly switch into the main operating system, which Cloud continues to load in the background.
If Google, with its powerful brand name and marketing clout, makes anything half as good as gOS Cloud, it will spell big trouble for Microsoft and its Windows franchise.
If Google, with its powerful brand name and marketing clout, makes anything half as good as gOS Cloud, it will spell big trouble for Microsoft and its Windows franchise.
Google goes in search of an instant operating system
NEWS that Sony would be installing Google’s Chrome browser on its sleek, if pricey, Vaio laptops instead of the ubiquitous Internet Explorer from Microsoft has prompted your correspondent to re-examine the internet-search company’s foray into the world of web browsers and operating systems. The announcement came just as he began to notice how the latest version of Mozilla’s highly regarded Firefox browser was dragging its feet.
From cold, it was taking anything from 20 to 25 seconds for Firefox 3.5 to load his home page. Even Internet Explorer 8 was five seconds nimbler. Opera 10, the latest version of an old favourite from Norway, was faster still. But Chrome 3 blew everything away, loading the home page in half Firefox’s time. Once they had been started from cold and had loaded their innards into memory, all four browsers could be restarted and load the home page in five seconds or so.
Of course, Chrome is still a bare-bones browser, while Firefox is a powerful piece of software that can be configured in a multitude of ways that make it safer and easier to use. However, to make the (admittedly unscientific) comparison more meaningful, all but a handful of Firefox’s add-ons and extensions were turned off. Even so, it was trounced by Chrome.
A ten-second difference in loading time ought not to matter. After all, most people these days keep their browsers running, open or minimised, for the duration of the session. But loading times say much about a program’s inner architecture, how efficiently it has been coded and the way it uses computer memory.
Loading times can also be a guide to a program’s robustness and resistance to attack. At the annual CanSecWest security conference in Vancouver last March, the year-old Chrome was the only browser left standing after stalwarts like Internet Explorer, Firefox and Apple’s Safari had been hacked to pieces—Safari in literally seconds—by security experts.
Throughout their brief history, browsers have basically done just one thing: serve up pages of information for people to read. But the web has evolved dramatically over the past two decades while browsers have lagged behind. Today, the web is about applications rather than pages. People use the web to play games, download music, buy things, make telephone calls, share pictures and inner secrets, watch videos and television and, oh yes, search for information.
To catch up, the first thing Google did was abandon the browser’s traditional architecture. Instead of uniting the user with the web in a single protected area, Chrome uses a “sandbox” approach that gives each application its own space to play in, which makes it harder for bad guys to wrestle control.
In Chrome, the main part of the program, the kernel, is separated from the various rendering processes that draw the pages on the screen. That way, the browser kernel—which interacts directly with the operating system—is shielded from anything questionable lurking outside. Meanwhile, the rendering engine resides in a special space that controls what resources within the computer can be read or written to. In so doing, viruses, Trojans, key-loggers and spyware are prevented from infecting the computer.
The last time he wrote about such things, your correspondent fretted that, as the migration of computer applications from the desktop to the web (or “cloud” as it is now known) gathers pace, more and more of our personal and professional lives will be filtered through our browsers (see “Browser wars are back”, March 27th). So, they had better be a lot more secure than they have been to date.
One reader perceptively noted that the security problem was mainly a legacy issue. In other words, the fundamental flaws in computer programs will remain as long as people insist that each new version of software be compatible with the previous one. The only answer is to start from scratch.
That seems to be the thought behind Chrome OS, a minimalist operating system that Google announced it was working on a couple of months ago. All that has leaked out so far is that it is based on the Chrome web browser and the Linux kernel, and designed mainly for lightweight laptops known as netbooks. The aim is to provide users with an instant way of accessing the web without the hassle and delay of a heavyweight operating system like Windows or Macintosh OS X.
Chrome OS is designed primarily to work with applications such as e-mail, word-processors, calendars and the like that are stored in the cloud rather than on a user’s hard-drive. Google has already developed the software, called Gears, that lets a browser run such web-based applications. Gears is built into Google Chrome but can just as easily be added to other browsers.
To transform Chrome and Gears into a lightweight operating system, Google will have replaced the rest of Linux with a slimmed down windowing and application manager that integrates with Chrome and Gears for running applications on the web and with the Linux kernel for running the computer hardware. That is no trivial exercise.
But it has been done before. Several times, in fact. Jolicloud is a French development which likewise uses bits of Linux that have been tweaked to run on netbooks with tiny screens and limited storage. But instead of using Google’s Gears, Jolicloud relies on Mozilla’s Prism and Firefox to run various web-based applications.
However, one of the most impressive instant operating systems yet has to be the gOS Cloud produced by Good OS of Los Angeles. While doing voluntary teaching work a couple of years ago, your correspondent refurbished some old computers for kids to take home (see “Life after cyber-death”, January 11th 2008). Of all the free operating systems his then ten-year-old daughter tested for the revitalised machines, the most child-friendly by far was gOS—a Linux distribution used in an Everex desktop computer that Wal-Mart sold for $199.
The attraction of gOS was the way it worked seamlessly with Google Apps—the search company’s free online alternative to Microsoft Office. Ever since, your correspondent has kept a copy of this clever Linux distribution (gOS 3.1 Gadgets is the latest version) on one of his office machines to remind him of what, with luck, the future could look like.
From cold, it was taking anything from 20 to 25 seconds for Firefox 3.5 to load his home page. Even Internet Explorer 8 was five seconds nimbler. Opera 10, the latest version of an old favourite from Norway, was faster still. But Chrome 3 blew everything away, loading the home page in half Firefox’s time. Once they had been started from cold and had loaded their innards into memory, all four browsers could be restarted and load the home page in five seconds or so.
Of course, Chrome is still a bare-bones browser, while Firefox is a powerful piece of software that can be configured in a multitude of ways that make it safer and easier to use. However, to make the (admittedly unscientific) comparison more meaningful, all but a handful of Firefox’s add-ons and extensions were turned off. Even so, it was trounced by Chrome.
A ten-second difference in loading time ought not to matter. After all, most people these days keep their browsers running, open or minimised, for the duration of the session. But loading times say much about a program’s inner architecture, how efficiently it has been coded and the way it uses computer memory.
Loading times can also be a guide to a program’s robustness and resistance to attack. At the annual CanSecWest security conference in Vancouver last March, the year-old Chrome was the only browser left standing after stalwarts like Internet Explorer, Firefox and Apple’s Safari had been hacked to pieces—Safari in literally seconds—by security experts.
Throughout their brief history, browsers have basically done just one thing: serve up pages of information for people to read. But the web has evolved dramatically over the past two decades while browsers have lagged behind. Today, the web is about applications rather than pages. People use the web to play games, download music, buy things, make telephone calls, share pictures and inner secrets, watch videos and television and, oh yes, search for information.
To catch up, the first thing Google did was abandon the browser’s traditional architecture. Instead of uniting the user with the web in a single protected area, Chrome uses a “sandbox” approach that gives each application its own space to play in, which makes it harder for bad guys to wrestle control.
In Chrome, the main part of the program, the kernel, is separated from the various rendering processes that draw the pages on the screen. That way, the browser kernel—which interacts directly with the operating system—is shielded from anything questionable lurking outside. Meanwhile, the rendering engine resides in a special space that controls what resources within the computer can be read or written to. In so doing, viruses, Trojans, key-loggers and spyware are prevented from infecting the computer.
The last time he wrote about such things, your correspondent fretted that, as the migration of computer applications from the desktop to the web (or “cloud” as it is now known) gathers pace, more and more of our personal and professional lives will be filtered through our browsers (see “Browser wars are back”, March 27th). So, they had better be a lot more secure than they have been to date.
One reader perceptively noted that the security problem was mainly a legacy issue. In other words, the fundamental flaws in computer programs will remain as long as people insist that each new version of software be compatible with the previous one. The only answer is to start from scratch.
That seems to be the thought behind Chrome OS, a minimalist operating system that Google announced it was working on a couple of months ago. All that has leaked out so far is that it is based on the Chrome web browser and the Linux kernel, and designed mainly for lightweight laptops known as netbooks. The aim is to provide users with an instant way of accessing the web without the hassle and delay of a heavyweight operating system like Windows or Macintosh OS X.
Chrome OS is designed primarily to work with applications such as e-mail, word-processors, calendars and the like that are stored in the cloud rather than on a user’s hard-drive. Google has already developed the software, called Gears, that lets a browser run such web-based applications. Gears is built into Google Chrome but can just as easily be added to other browsers.
To transform Chrome and Gears into a lightweight operating system, Google will have replaced the rest of Linux with a slimmed down windowing and application manager that integrates with Chrome and Gears for running applications on the web and with the Linux kernel for running the computer hardware. That is no trivial exercise.
But it has been done before. Several times, in fact. Jolicloud is a French development which likewise uses bits of Linux that have been tweaked to run on netbooks with tiny screens and limited storage. But instead of using Google’s Gears, Jolicloud relies on Mozilla’s Prism and Firefox to run various web-based applications.
However, one of the most impressive instant operating systems yet has to be the gOS Cloud produced by Good OS of Los Angeles. While doing voluntary teaching work a couple of years ago, your correspondent refurbished some old computers for kids to take home (see “Life after cyber-death”, January 11th 2008). Of all the free operating systems his then ten-year-old daughter tested for the revitalised machines, the most child-friendly by far was gOS—a Linux distribution used in an Everex desktop computer that Wal-Mart sold for $199.
The attraction of gOS was the way it worked seamlessly with Google Apps—the search company’s free online alternative to Microsoft Office. Ever since, your correspondent has kept a copy of this clever Linux distribution (gOS 3.1 Gadgets is the latest version) on one of his office machines to remind him of what, with luck, the future could look like.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
