Analysis: Google enter the snake pit with Chrome

Google has finally unveiled the long awaited Google Chrome OS, provisionally titled Chromium. The minimalist operating system has been in the works since the Californian technology giant unveiled their new web browser, Chrome, in July.

Chrome OS utilises all of Google’s considerable experience in web technology, reinventing the concept of an operating system. The OS develops a number of forward thinking features: for starters, there is no desktop. All programs are web-based and run in Chrome, utilising the online applications suite that has been developed for the last few years (including Google Docs, Calendar and Gmail).

As expected, the release is open source and entirely free. Google opened the release to developers on November 19th, and are looking for feedback from the open source community.

Chromium does, however, ask some difficult questions of Google’s long term plans. The main pitfall the project faces is Chrome OS’ reliance on the internet. The operating system is entirely web based, storing applications and user information in the cloud. Only some of the online features will be usable without a connection via Google Gears, but all user information will be easily recovered if you lose your laptop; the system stores all user data on Google server clusters, adding strength to claims that Google are dangerously engaging in data-farming.

Furthermore, Google have optimised the system for specific hardware, namely Solid State Drives as opposed to the more cost effective traditional variety. The system will run on the current crop of netbooks, particularly on either x86 or ARM processors.

The release faces a double edged sword- many of the features are highly intuitive and brilliant engineered, but the technology Chromium relies on is not low-end. Development builds of Chromium have been blisteringly quick, booting up in under 7 seconds. In the same way that Chrome isolated each web tab as a process, Google has created a “security sandbox” for each application. The operating system will check and repair code upon reboot.

Chromium is pitched as an operating system for your second PC, namely a portable netbook. Its aim? To “kill the desktop”. With the first netbooks designed for the system arriving in late 2010, we have a long wait ahead to see if Google releases another Android (initial flop, eventual adoption) or takes the operating system into a new era. Either way, with Google involved, it’s bound to be an exciting wait. Roll on 2010.