Over a month ago Google released a stable version of Chrome 3 which signaled that it was more confident about it’s browser’s ability to compete with others. A day ago it released Chrome 4 as a beta version and the big difference it claims in its blog is that its performance as a browser has improved over 30%. I downloaded the beta version and it has been working fine. I hardly noticed anything different.
With Chrome 3 stable version I did have a problem of the browser crashing after a few hours especially if I had a theme on it. Its only been a hour since I downloaded the beta version so can not say that issue has been addressed. One exciting feature it does have is having a real time synchronization of bookmarks on two or more computers with Chrome browser.
Chrome Bookmark Sync
- If you want to have the same bookmarks on Chrome browsers across 2 or more computers all of them need to have Chrome 4 beta installed on it.
- Sign-in with Google account and then merge and sync the bookmarks from all the browsers. It happens real time if you are signed-in on all computers. That means if I add a bookmark it shows up on the other computer in real time. This technology is the same that is used for bundling Google Chat with Gmail. 😉
- Google has recently incorporated Sidewiki into Chrome which was earlier available through Google toolbar. Bookmarks could be previously shared on other browsers using Google toolbar, but it looks like Google is going to incorporate all that you can do with the Google toolbar into its Chrome browser as a feature. If that’s the course it is taking and assuming Google gets it right, Chrome might become the dominant browser in a few years.
There are many third party softwares and tools bars which allow bookmarks to be synced with multiple computers for example Foxmarks extensions with Firefox but this is the first time I see it as a main feature of a browser. Some people might be uncomfortable with the idea of storing bookmarks on a server which happens in the case of Chrome.
If you want to download Chrome 4 beta visit their landing page. Do comment on the post to let me know your thoughts on Google Chrome 4 beta.
4 Comments
Mozilla also has the Mozilla Weave for Firefox which though does not come as part of the standard browser but can be installed as an add-on. Its designed by Mozilla itself and can sync much more than your bookmarks such as URL history and form fields
@Nikhil: I am aware of it, I have written about it a month ago http://www.devilsworkshop.org/weave-information-togeather-with-firefoxs-weave/ 🙂
Oh good. Somehow missed that.
In this Mozilla Weave vs Google Chrome Bookmarks war, somehow get the feeling that Xmarks (formerly Foxmarks) is the loser. Unless you use IE, you don’t need to use Xmarks any longer
Chrome is getting very popular. I am getting most chrome visitors after. Firefox, IE.