I spent the last couple of hours testing Google Chrome, the new entrant into the web browser wars. I use both Internet Explorer and Firefox, with my preference definitely being the latter of late, and I’m pleased to say that Chrome has got a lot going for it.
Google’s browser is fast, and it doesn’t seem to get as bogged down with multiple tabs as, well, IE does. I really like the “omnibar” — it ain’t perfect, but it’s a great step in the right direction. Moving the tabs to the top and compartmentalizing functions beneath them (so one broken app doesn’t crash all the open tabs) is excellent design. And there’s a lot of little touches that are quite pleasing: the homepage, the download management, and the history search come immediately to mind.
That said, this is beta software, and there are certainly some things that need fixing. For starters, it needs some of the essentials that came with Google Toolbar. Autofill? Google Bookmarks? Gmail Notifier? Chrome doesn’t have them yet, and I can’t go without them. I’d also like to see the user get control over the blue background. Blech. Can we not have something clear?
Oh, and it needs to be available for Linux — ’cause I’m loving Ubuntu. 🙂
i use this gmail notifier http://gmailnotifier.net