Google ignites world browser (and OS) war II

Yesterday Google followed up on earlier statements that the browser is now the platform by releasing their own browser dubbed “Chrome.” Click here for full details from Google.

This is not Netscape vs. IE all over again. It’s not even Windows vs Mac. 

It’s more like cold war Russia vs. USA where instead of fighting in proxy countries such as Korea or Vietnam, they’ve chosen the browser as their proxy for world interweb domination.

The browser is the gateway to everything else – from desktop to mobile and everything in between that connects technology to people.  Check out Sachendra’s article here as he goes deeper into some of the other implications to other browser and mobile players in the ecosystem.   

I downloaded the browser last night on my home system and was impressed with the overall experience.

Here are a few things I really liked:

1. URL window is ALSO a search window. Now type in what you are looking for if you don’t know the exact URL without having to open a separate search window
2. When you open a new tab – it shows you large thumbnails of sites you’ve recently visited. 
3. Beautiful & simple interface that optimizes screen space
4. Bookmarks and cached sites were pulled in from firefox
5. Download window appears nicely at the bottom
6. Multi-threaded – meaning your browser will no longer crash or get hung up while waiting for wonky javascript

Things I didn’t like? Like firefox, my web Outlook mail does not render correctly. There doesn’t appear to be the equivalent to the Firefox IETab pluggin – but i’m sure this is coming soon.

Ironically, I had just finished pimping my firefox browser on the advice of co-workers with coComment, IETab, Delicious, Faviconize, Firebug, FireFTP, Linkwad, Live HTTP Headers, PDF Download, PicLens, ScrapBook, ScreenGrab!, SeoQuake, SnapLinks, StumbleUpon, Twitterbar, WebDeveloper, and Window Resizer. 

How soon will it be before Chrome has their own list of custom plugins? Chrome is open source – so it shouldn’t be too long before we start seeing them.

Will there be a mobile equivalent too?

Until there is a declared winner or somebody beats everybody else into submission, I’ll continue to run with Opera, Safari, Firefox, IE and Chrome for all my daily browsing needs