Since you last saw an edition of Chrome Corner, we've done some re-thinking about what it should be. Instead of trying to force together a weekly update when there's sometimes just not enough news to justify doing it, the Corner will now crop up whenever the crew at Download Squad has a nice haul of of Chrome-y goodness to post about.

Today's topic: syncing across multiple computers!

Google Chrome can sync your bookmarks, but what about all the other bits and pieces that you want available on all your machines? Passwords? Form data? Notes?

The Extension Gallery has plenty of awesome options that can help you keep all your Google Chrome installs marching in step -- read about eight useful ones after the break!

Passwords and form data: LastPass, RoboForm
Apart from not having the same set of bookmarks available on every machine I use, nothing irks me quite as much as having to recall and re-enter all my passwords manually. LastPass and RoboForm both handle the task admirably, and they have other benefits as well. LastPass, for example, includes a strong password generator which makes creating hard-to-crack passwords easy.

Both extensions can also auto-fill form data for you with your pre-entered information (name, address, phone number, etc.).

Tabs and Sessions: TabSync, FreshStart
FreshStart is a fantastic session manager and synchronizer (which I wrote about before), with the ability to restore sessions from machine to machine. It's also great at recovering from crashes. TabSync is more minimalistic in its approach. Set it up to auto-sync or press the button to do things manually, and your current window's tabs are locked in so you can restore them again later.

Google's Chrome browser has been heavy hit by people claiming it has serious privacy issues.

After an interesting discussion with people who are, “relevant to my interests”, the topic of Google Chrome soon came up. Most predictably what was mentioned was the privacy issues raised with it. As a believer in the open-source vetting process, I heavily disagree that Google could be doing anything subversive to our personal data.

To settle this argument in a non-subjective way I decided the best course of action would be an experiment. Essentially, what I wanted to test was the difference in packets between Google Chrome on first boot-up and search term “test123″ and a comparable browser with similar conditions. This way, we test Chrome against a vetted control browser. A few conditions before we get started:

• Experimental Browser: Google Chrome Beta for Linux (Ubuntu Karmic 9.10 x64) with experience reporting disabled.
• Control browser: Midori 0.2.3 (Ubuntu Karmic 9.10 x64), a WebKit browser licensed under a similar permissive license as Chrome.
• Analysis Method: A tcpdump, sudo tcpdump -w testbrowser.pcap -s 1550 dst www.google.com, command and Wireshark analysis.
  • This tcpdump commands monitors all traffic going to the Google domain (216.239.32.0 – 216.239.63.255)
  • Wireshark was to make the dump look pretty.
• Procedure: Start the dump, load up the browser and enter a search term to Google for “test123″. Stop the packet dump after this and monitor the results.

What I found:

The results actually surprised me in a very positive way. Not only did the two browsers communicate on exactly the same ports but Chrome also used around 60 less packets in the final dump. A cruel twist of irony that a third-party browser communicates with Google over 100% more than Chrome does. Anyway, without further hesitation, here is the dump from the different conditions.

Tipsters like theworldisasheep saw it, this editor confirmed it, and Google even mentioned it in their blog post, at the very end: the latest release of their Chrome browser often crashes when loading Gmail with Offline enabled. It will likely get fixed in a small new update coming soon, but in the meantime, if you're desperate to get back into Gmail without your browser dying, you can create a temporary bookmark to the no-labs version of Gmail. If you want a more surefire solution, head to your Options, switch to the "Under the Hood" tab, click "Gears Settings," and click the "Remove" link next to Gmail and Google-related items. You may lose your offline data for now, but you'll be able to re-synchronize it when two of Google's best products finish duking it out. [Google Code]

URL stands for abbreviation of Uniform Resource Locator which is the global address of web pages, documents or other services. It consists of two main parts: one is protocol identifier and second is document address in from of domain name or IP. They are separated by a colon “:” and two forward slashes “//”. URL needs to be unique which may result in a longer URL as the World Wide Web is growing at an exponential scale. Also there is a tendency to pass descriptive attributes in the URL to forward different kinds of information. This may result in awful situation where URL looks ugly and can’t fit in Human Memory.

The solution produced to tackle the problem is URL Shortening which takes long URL addresses as input and outputs a unique and short URL. This short URL actually redirects you to the original web page. The URL shortening services became even more constructive with the popularity of micro blogging service known as Twitter which imposes a limit on maximum messages in a character. bit.ly is by far the most popular URL shortening service. The convenience of URL shortening services has pushed Google to launch goo.gl and youtube.be while Facebook to start fb.me.

It solely depends upon you which one you prefer for URL shortening. During web browsing on Google Chrome, you may need to shorten URLs quite often. Instead of moving to service’s webpage, you can use following extensions in Google Chrome for time saving.
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ChromeMUSE
This extension serves the both purposes.

• Shortening long URLs
• Expanding short URLs

It supports many popular URL shortening services. By default, goo.gl is enabled which can be configured from extension’s options. A favicon appears at the end of address bar. A click on the icon will short the URL according to preferences. This short URL is automatically placed in clipboard and can be pasted anywhere. The notable URL shortening services which can be chosen are bit.ly, is.gd, and TinyURL.

If you browse to a web page where shortened URLs are present, this extension will involuntarily expand the URLs. The titles and destination are shown when you move mouse cursor over the short URL.

You can configure ChromeMUSE to show a list of desired URL shortening services when you click the icon. Besides, the extension can be set to replace the short URL with actual URL after expansion.

Computer Mouse is really helpful for a normal computer user because it provides an easy way to navigate. It becomes even more convenient when browsing web. The user can easily select links, images, or text in a web page. Despite this functionality, there is some more juice which can be extracted from computer mouse. As a result, Mouse Gestures have been developed to provide more functionality. Mouse Gestures functionality is available as a utility for operating systems like Windows XP or they are available in modern web browsers like Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome.

I will review here best available Google Chrome’s Extension which let you use mouse gestures. If you are using Mouse Gestures for the first time then it should not be a problem but users who have migrated from Mozilla Firefox may feel some irritation in using the solutions as the solutions are not fit when compared to the mouse gesturing add-ons developed for Firefox.

Smooth Gestures
This extension works almost perfect. There are a plenty of already built gestures available. These gestures can be identified from extension’s options page and they are also customizable. Mouse Stroke supports and recognizes three types of gestures.

Simple Gesture: Draw a gesture by moving the mouse while pressing the right mouse button and then release
Scroll Gesture: Scroll the mouse wheel while pressing down right button
Rocker Gesture: Hold down either the right or left mouse button, and then press the other one.

The default mouse gestures provided by this extension are divided into three categories which are Page Navigation, Tab Management, and Miscellaneous. These mouse strokes almost will satisfy needs of any user. Any gesture can be disabled or modified. The modification is pretty straight forward.  When you will click on “+” sign, a canvas will be shown on which you can draw your own stroke for specified task. If the gesture already exists, it will show a warning. You can ignore it and over write the gesture or re draw.

Chrome: We love Gina's Better Gmail Firefox extension, a bundle of user scripts that improves the Gmail experience. Now that Google's beefed up support for Chrome extensions, reader Dimitar Gruev has taken a shot at bringing an unofficial Better Gmail to Chrome.

Almost a year ago our own How-To Geek put together a version of Better Gmail for Chrome, but that was way back when Chrome didn't even have extensions (his were all bundled into a single user script). This new Chrome extension is an unofficial Better Gmail for Chrome that was inspired by Gina's Firefox extension and our earlier Better Gmail for Chrome bag o'scripts.

Once installed, access Better Gmail's options by clicking the wrench -> Extensions -> Better Gmail Options. Tick the boxes of the features you want activated and you're good to go. You can choose to hide little used fields like "Invite Friends," remove ads, show the number of unread emails in the favicon, and more.

Gruev says future versions of Better Gmail will hide spam count, move to next message on delete or archive, and include support for POP3 email. A big round of applause goes to Gruev for putting this together. What kinds of features do you hope for in future versions of Better Gmail? Share your ideas in the comments.

Tabbed interface in web browsers boost the user experience in many ways. The user does not need to switch between separate windows. All of the browsing can occur in a single window which makes shifting between different web pages more convenient. You can even browse a website and the related links in a different window while other browsing activity may take place in a separate browser window.

Each web browser has its own policy of ordering tabs. It is difficult to get accustomed with tab ordering if the user switches from one web browser to another. This is the case when someone is migrating to Google Chrome from Mozilla Firefox. Some prominent differences between the tab ordering strategy of Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox are regarding

• Position of New Tab.
• Which Tab should be active upon closing a Tab.

Some solutions in form of extensions have been developed which replicate the tab ordering Policy of Firefox in Google Chrome. This makes the migration of users from Mozilla Firefox to Google Chrome trouble-free.

Also take a look at: How to Manage Tabs in Google Chrome with Extensions

Tabs Plus
This extension changes tab ordering of Google Chrome to work like Firefox. The behavior can be changed from options.  Position of New Tab can be fixed to Default, First, or Last. You can also opt whether to open new tab in background or foreground. If an active tab is closed, the tab which was used last time will get active. If a specific tab is required not to be considered as Last Used Tab, it can be excluded.

Tab Stack
It is a useful extension with nice feature which moves tabs in a way that they are always arranged in a Most Recently Used order from left to right. In this way, the most recent active tab is always at left of tab strip. When you will use Ctrl-Tab key combination to navigate through tabs, it will work like Alt-Tab combination in Windows. The most recently active tab will be visible.

These extensions will modify the tab ordering strategy of Google Chrome so that the migrating users from Mozilla Firefox can feel at Home.

Historically I have always been a loyal Safari user. Sure, I’ve flirted with Firefox occasionally, but I always came back to Safari eventually. I’m afraid, however, that I’ve finally found a browser that has led me to leave Safari for good: Google Chrome.

I started using Chromium, the open-sourced branch of the browser, a few months ago and switched to the developer branch of Chrome when it got support for extensions. Even though the Beta version of Chrome for the Mac now has extensions support I’m sticking with the developer branch just because I like getting new goodies before other people.

Whatever version of Chrome you’re using on the Mac, you now have access to most of the features that people will want from a browser, so if you’re ready to take the plunge and make Chrome your default browser here, are a few hints and tips from you from someone who’s been using it for a while now.

If you're a fan of universal memory service Evernote, but can't or won't run its desktop software for quick access, the service suggests making Evernote.com easy to search from the address bar.

Evernote's team explains the process in the video above, but it's also easy to describe in text. Right-click on Chrome's address/OmniBar, select Edit Search Engines, and hit the Add button in the next dialog. From there, enter these results into the three fields:

• Name: Evernote
• Keyword: Evernote.com
• URL: http://www.evernote.com/search?q=%s

If you'd spent a good deal of time with Evernote.com, or read our power user's guide to Chrome, you might have already figured this one out. If not, it's a nice little convenience.

Here are few of the recent Google Chrome (offline) ads, which appeared in the UK.

Via Flickr

Via TwitPic

Via TwitPic

Mac OS X only: Chrome for Mac Beta just updated with support for Chrome extensions. Windows and Linux users have been enjoying support for Chrome extensions for a while, and while Mac users who're subscribed to the dev channel of Chrome have had extension support since January, this is good news for Mac users who prefer the relative stability of the beta release. Ready to get started installing some saucy Chrome extensions but not sure where to start? Check out these 13 excellent extensions, or just head to our Chrome extensions page to browse other extensions we've covered.
The release also brings with it bookmark sync, the bookmark manager, cookie manager, and task manager—so there's a ton of good stuff to in this beta release. [Google Chrome Blog]

Graphical User Interface is meant to facilitate the interaction of user with the device in a graphical way rather than typing in a command line. GUI has got matured with overall system development of computers. A window manager is an essential part that controls the placement and appearance of windows in a GUI. Tabs were a significant inclusion in a window. Tabs allow an application to contain multiple documents in a single window. This eases the way to switch between different instances of application.

Tabs became famous when they were introduced in web browsers. The user can effortlessly navigate between different web pages. The developers have introduced different particular functions for tabs in web browser. These functions may vary from browser to browser. Google Chrome is the new rival in the war of web browsers and outperformed many web browser. It is because of its speed and spectacular tabbed window interface. Its brilliant tabbed interface has pushed developers of Mozilla Firefox to employ almost similar concept in the next major upgrade of web browser. Google Chrome allows users to arrange and organize tabs easily and efficiently. Still the functionality of tabs can be enhanced in many ways to alleviate the web surfers. To serve this purpose, there have been many nice extensions developed which will be listed here.

Tab Menu
If you are used to open a large number of tabs, it leads to a cluttered tab strip. In this case the viewer is not able to identify the web page as the titles in tab squeezes and become invisible. In a less messy scenario, the user may identify a page by its favicon but there may be pages that don’t have any favicon. Tab menu extension for Google Chrome rescues you in such a situation. It displays a vertical menu which contains all open tabs. The user can easily navigate through the menu with keyboard and mouse. The tabs can be searched, opened, or closed easily.  There is a shortcut key (Ctrl+M) available which opens the tab menu in a new tab for better view and navigation. Tab Menu option will let you modify this shortcut key and configure display of tab counter. Also if there are multiple instances of Google Chrome windows, they can be merged from options.

Google Chrome: If you're a frequent Chrome and Dropbox user, this unofficial Dropbox extension puts one-click access to your Dropbox files right on the Google Chrome toolbar.

Once installed, the Dropbox extension places a small Dropbox icon in your Google Chrome toolbar. After your initial sign-in, clicking on the icon presents the menu seen here. You can select between your recently updated files and your folder structure to quickly navigate to the file you're looking for. Clicking on any given file will either display or play the file in your browser or download it to your computer for local viewing.

Dropbox extension is a free and unofficial extension for accessing your Dropbox files and works wherever Google Chrome does. Have a favorite extension or tool for getting the most out of cloud-based services? Let's hear about it in the comments.

Google Chrome: If you've recently moved from Firefox to Chrome, you probably miss the way that Firefox orders tabs. This small Google Chrome extension switches the tab ordering in Chrome to mimic how Firefox handles new tabs.

The default behavior for Chrome is to group tabs together—new tabs open relative their parent tab. If you prefer new tabs to open at the end of the row in the order in which you have opened them, as they do in Firefox, Modified Tab Ordering can make that happen.

In the screenshot above you can see how we opened Chrome, visited Lifehacker.com, then Google, and then returned to the original tab to open a few links from Lifehacker—all the new tabs appeared at the end of the row as they opened instead of appearing, grouped, beside the original Lifehacker tab. It's a small tweak, but if you've got a routine for how you open tabs and read them a little thing like the order they appear in can really throw you off. Note: As several sharp-eyed readers pointed out, as of version 3.6 Firefox has adopted grouped tabs instead of ordered tabs. This extension gives you the old-school-Firefox experience in Chrome for those who prefer ordered tabs over grouped ones.

On a recent Google Chrome post one of our commenters -- MoneyMike -- lamented the apparent passing of one of Chrome's popular UI features in recent nightly builds: pinned tabs.

I, too, noticed the change recently and wondered what was going on. There's been plenty of discussion amongst Chrome developers, and it boils down to an evolutionary step for Chrome and the introduction of app tabs. The arrival of phantom tabs recently is also part of the change.

To clear the air, I pinged Google's Eitan Bencuya to see if he could shed any light on the situation. Here's his response:

"As you know, all of these features are still pretty experimental (they're not even in the dev channel yet) and we're trying out different approaches to see what works. In this case this is part of a larger set of tweaks we are making related to extensions but we haven't yet fleshed out all the details of app tabs specifically."

The Google Chrome browser is making some great strides to take over the browser game. One of the areas where it lacks right out of the proverbial “box” is its inability to handle RSS. Until recently when Chrome users on Windows machines were given the ability to add extensions, you would have to (gulp) copy and paste the feed into your reader. Pretty archaic I know.

In the short time extensions have been available for the Chrome browser, quite a few add-ons have popped up to alleviate the RSS deficiencies. Below are 13 different extensions to ease your RSS withdrawal. Granted many of these do the same basic function, each can add something unique. By no means do you need every extension on the list, but its nice to have more than one option to try.

1. Google Reader Subscribe

This extension does exactly what the name implies. When you visit a page with a feed, you will see a Google Reader icon in the Chrome browser address bar.