It’s hard to say how popular Chrome OS, Google’s browser-centric operating system, really is. There can be little doubt, though, that Google is quite serious about this initiative. Today, Google launched the latest developer version of Chrome OS and this update sports the first major redesign of the operation system’s interface since its launch in late 2010.

In this new version, Chrome OS almost looks like a traditional OS, with a full-blown desktop and window manager instead of just a browser and tabs. Aura, as this hardware-accelerated window manager is known, is Chrome’s next generation user interface framework and it is making its public debut in this new developer version of Chrome OS.

This update is quite a departure from Chrome OS’s origins. Until now, Chrome OS basically just gave users access to a single browser window at a time (you could already have multiple browser windows open on separate virtual screens) and launching new apps meant you first had to open a new tab and then look for the app you wanted to start. Now, Chrome OS features a Launchpad-like app launcher, as well as a Windows-like taskbar (Google calls it a “shelf”). Apps, it is worth noting, still start in a browser tab and not as stand-alone windows, though.

In short, Chrome OS now looks and behaves a lot more like the desktop operating systems it set out to challenge.

In a way, this almost feels as if Google is admitting defeat here. When Chrome OS launched, Google’s Sergey Brin argued that traditional PC operating systems were “torturing users.” Chrome OS was supposed to be all about “speed, simplicity and security” and Google wanted to use it to “re-think what operating systems should be.” This new version, however, does away with a bit of this simplicity in favor of greater functionality. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, though, and may just help Chrome OS gain more mainstream acceptance as new users will surely find it to be a more familiar experience.

While Aura is obviously the star of this update, it’s worth noting that the latest version also introduces support for files compressed in the tar, gz and bzip2 formats, as well as better support for multi-monitor setups.

Chrome: We've mentioned lots of ways to keep your bookmarks in sync across browsers and across computers, but if your bookmarks are older than your choice of browser, it might be time to clean them up, get rid of any duplicates you may have, and get rid of any old, dead links that you may have lurking in an old bookmarks folder from way back. Bookmark Sentry for Chrome does just that. More »

Your dreams come true with Google Chrome.

If you always wanted to use a stylus or even a joystick to steer your web experience, now you can as the latest Google Chrome release includes a support for two mice or any other devices that can be plugged to your computer.

Thanks to a new multitasking feature, two users can surf the web at the same time and on the same computer. If that doesn’t sound too exciting, you can always play a video game while pretending to do something productive.

You can download Google Chrome Multitask Mode from the following web site and yes, it was April fools joke, the most useless day in all year.

The latest stable build of Google Chrome is here.

Continuing its release cycle, the search giant has pushed the version 18 to its stable channel. While there is nothing too exciting in terms of features, Google Chrome 18 does include some performance improvements.

Thanks to GPU accelerated Canvas2D, gaming and various web applications will be smoother than ever while users with older PCs will now be able to the basic 3D content due to a software backed WebGL implementation.

As always, for even more details, security and other fixes, check the following posts.

You guys seemed pretty stoked about creating your own custom Chrome themes using Google's new tool, so in the vein of our featured desktops, home screens, and workspaces, we're inviting you to share your custom Chrome theme with us. More »

It’s no secret that Google has been aggressively pushing its Google Chrome web browser across a variety of its services and partner’s web sites.

Now, Neowin reports that the search giant has decided to spice the things up and advertise on Microsoft’s search engine as well.

Once user types phrases to download different web browsers, such as, “get firefox”, the following ad will appear:

While it’s nothing spectacular, once you combine all the advertising campaigns, one can only wonder how many millions of dollars Google is actually putting into the Google Chrome promotion, but hey, at least its working.

Although there are tons of awesome Chrome themes available in the Chrome Web Store, perhaps you want a more personalized look for your browser. My Chrome Theme is one of the simplest tools to customize Chrome's appearance, such as the background image and tab colors. More »

For one day only.

Just after Microsoft’s post about the inaccurate market share reports from StatCounter, the company behind one of the most popular monitoring sites has published a report of their own.

However, it has nothing to do with the HitsLink vs. StatCounter, in fact what they did is revealed that Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has been overtaken by Google Chrome for the first time in history on Sunday 18 March.

While IE remains the number one web browser as of today, Aodhan Cullen, CEO of web Statcounter said that Google Chrome usage peaks over the weekends when people don’t work and can freely choose what web browser to use.

With the upcoming release of Windows 8, Windows Phone 8 and Xbox Next, which might have IE pre-installed, it will be interesting to see how IE’s market share changes over the course of next year.

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Stop me if you've heard this one: Once upon a time, you visited a web site that you're not exactly proud of. Let's say the content of said web site rhymes with "corn". And oops! You forgot to go incongnito beforehand. You've frantically deleted the site from your history once you realized your mistake, but from this point forward, every time you type in "po", Chrome helpfully autocompletes the entire URL. THANKS CHROME! More »

Opera looking into it.

Although it was previously known that Firefox will include a Metro like UI, the team behind Mozilla’s web browser only recently started the development. However, turns out, Google is also developing a Google Chrome Metro version, which will be available for the Windows 8 consumers.

In addition to Google’s announcement, the search giant has also confirmed that they will work on a touch optimized version of Google Chrome for the desktop.

What about other web browsers? Safari remains silent, however, ArsTehnica contacted Opera Software and received the following statement, “Unfortunately we can’t comment on any specifics yet, other than we are currently looking into Windows 8. The new OS and the Metro UI offers an interesting new platform and we know users will want to run Opera on it.”

We are curious to find out, how exactly will Google Chrome and Firefox differentiate themselves from the IE10 Metro, UI wise.

With each update, Facebook has gotten incrementally more cluttered, perplexing, and ornery—and I'm not even talking about all your annoying acquaintances flooding it with inane status updates. Yet, at the same time, it's become a tool few of us can live without. If Facebook has you on your last nerve, here's how to fix some of its biggest annoyances in a matter of minutes—and with only one new addition to your browser. More »

Chrome: Normally Gmail uses a paperclip icon to let you know a file is attached to the email. The free Chrome extension Attachment Icons for Gmail replaces the paperclip with standard Windows file type icons for PDFs, pictures, spreadsheets, and many other file types. More »

Open Chrome tabs can eat up a lot of RAM, even when not in use. TabMemFree unloads tabs after a specific amount of time to free up memory when you aren't using them. More »

From left to right Jim Hebert, Cris Necker, Justin Schuh

Just 24 hours after reporting the critical vulnerability in Google’s Chrome web browser, the search giant has already released a patch to address the issue.

Identified as a bug CVE-2011-3046, discovered vulnerability is described as “UXSS and bad history navigation”, with no additional details revealed.

Having said that, the latest stable build of Google Chrome (17.0.963.78) also fixes earlier reported issues with the Flash games and videos.

Security contests prove to be useful.

Just as some might have thought that Google’s Chrome sandboxing feature is bullet proof, Sergey Glazunov, a security researcher who have found quite a few vulnerabilities in the fast, has enriched his life with a $60k reward, received for a “Full Chrome” exploit, which bypassed the sandbox feature. Although Google Chrome was previously known to withstand various attacks in Pwn2Own and similar contests, this time it was the first to fail.

Justin Schuh, Chrome’s security team member said, “It was an impressive exploit. It required a deep understanding of how Chrome works. This is not a trivial thing to do. It’s a very difficult and that’s why we’re paying $60,000.”

The second exploit was executed by a team from VuPen Security, which took about 6 weeks to write and test. According to Chaouki Bekrar, the co-founder of VuPen Security, they wanted to demonstrate that Chrome not as unbreakable as some might have though.

While details about exploits were not revealed, he said, “We had to use two vulnerabilities. The first one was to bypass DEP and ASLR on Windows and a second one to break out of the Chrome sandbox. It was a use-after-free vulnerability in the default installation of Chrome [which] worked against the default installation so it really doesn’t matter if it’s third-party code anyway.”

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The keyword here is “up to”.

As if the Pwn2Own contest was not enough, Google will be holding its own competition at the CanSecWest security conference.

Called Pwnium, contest attendees will be asked to exploit the Google Chrome web browser and in return, will be rewarded as follows:

$60,000 – “Full Chrome exploit”
$40,000 – “Partial Chrome exploit”
$20,000 – “Consolation reward, Flash / Windows / other”

So where does this $1 million reward come from? Well, Google will be giving away money not for the first two or three hackers, but for pretty much everyone, who manages to compromise their web browsers security.

As simple as that.