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Topic: Browser

Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

Summary: Google's Chrome browser is ready for the workplace, updated and enhanced so that IT folks can not only deploy it on office computers but can also starting testing those Web apps - just in case the company is thinking about switching to the Chrome OS platform when it goes live next year.That's the bigger message in an announcement today about enhancements to the Chrome browser.

Sam Diaz

By Sam Diaz for Between the Lines |

Google's Chrome browser is ready for the workplace, updated and enhanced so that IT folks can not only deploy it on office computers but can also starting testing those Web apps - just in case the company is thinking about switching to the Chrome OS platform when it goes live next year.

That's the bigger message in an announcement today about enhancements to the Chrome browser. In a post on its Enterprise blog, the company wrote:

...Chrome offers controls that enable IT administrators to easily configure and deploy the browser on Windows, Mac, and Linux according to their business requirements. We’ve created an MSI installer that enables businesses who use standard deployment tools to install Chrome for all their managed users. We’ve also added support for managed group policy with a list of policies and a set of templates that allow administrators to easily customize browser settings to manage security and privacy.

The selling point: businesses can take advantage of "improved security and web application performance" without breaking the bank on other expensive software licenses or new hardware. Who could say no to something like that?

More importantly, though, Google seems to be trying to lure businesses into a Chrome environment before the big rollout of Chrome OS next year. At an event last week, the company showcased the OS and even started a pilot program to hand out free Chrome-powered notebooks so that real users - consumers, businesses, bloggers like me - to start putting Chrome OS through some early tests.

The jury is still out on whether Chrome OS - and the browser-only Chrome notebooks due out in mid-2011 - will gain any real traction against Microsoft's Windows, Apple's Mac OS X or Linux. But Google is being proactive about trying to get businesses to start thinking about alternative operating systems and Google's take on Web-based applications.

Google suggests that companies interested in deploying these features will be ahead of the game - but the one that's really ahead of the game here is Google, which hopes to get business customers interested in a technology that's not even available yet.

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Topics: Browser, Google

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  • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

    OK.
    james347
    Reply Vote

  • Critical Component

    If I were Google I would not offer a business trial before CITRIX receiver was working nicely over a Gigabit Ethernet port.

    Otherwise there will be an avalanche of "yes but I can't because I need to use {this PC software}".
    johnfenjackson@...
    Reply Vote

  • Awesome

    Now they just need to build an admin template for Group Policy management, such as disabling or at least controlling updating, and they'd be good to go. It's one thing to roll out a browser, but you still need to maintain control once it's rolled out.
    LiquidLearner
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

      @LiquidLearner
      But that's the whole point about Chrome OS .. IT staff are left out-of-the-loop over OS updates. Google handles "All that Jazz".

      All Corporate Data under the Chrome OS model is in Google's Cloud now. This is not FUD. This is what a company "signs on" to if it endorses this computing paradigm.

      There are many corporate benefits for running the Chrome OS model. One of them being a reduced IT department.
      kenosha77a
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

        @kenosha7777 I think that the complement question as to how Chrome OS automagically updates is *why* corporate IT still runs IE6...

        Granted, RHEL also doesn't automagically update, but there's at least a cycle there. Part of the problem is that the patches to Windows aren't applied.
        THUFIR.HAWAT
        Reply Vote

      • This article is concerning the chrome *browser*

        @kenosha7777

        NOT the Chrome OS...
        wolf_z
        Reply Vote

      • But what happens if Google decides to drop support for this

        like they've done with so many different things in the past?
        At least with Windows, OS X, Linux, no matter what happens, what you have will allways work, supported or not.
        John Zern
        Reply Vote

  • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

    I wouldn't expect too many companies to switch, or at least the ones that want to keep their data as theirs. Google is known to steal data and claim it as their own. Much testing needs to be done as well to see if this browser and OS work behind proxy servers and firewalls. I'm guessing it will fail at that point because Google wants to be able to access everything easily, if you have a firewall that hinders them so they will have you try to avoid it.
    Loverock Davidson
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

      @Loverock Davidson wow, if google's stealing data and claiming it as its own, sounds like a good lawsuit. Have any specifics? (I can't believe that I'm coming across as some sort of Google apologist, but some of these claims are a bit much.)
      THUFIR.HAWAT
      Reply Vote

    • It works fine with Proxies & Firewalls because...

      @Loverock Davidson ...proxy and other settings are set to the same as Windows settings (so the same that IE use) and if they are locked down by using GPOs then the user can't change them (unlike using FF which requires more work to lock down).

      I should add that I did a pilot roll out using the MSI version of Chrome in my previous job. The main issue was controlling the Homepage settings across large user groups with out some hackery (I managed it by copying a pre-set Chrome settings folder on logon). Hopefully this will change with the extended GPO template support from Google.

      This pilot was done because of issues with IE and slow JavaScript performance on Virtual Machines. Chrome fixed the issue, massively speeding up browsing heavy JavaScript pages (one of which was the companies Internet site).
      DevJonny
      Reply Vote

  • Ready?

    Ready as in can get real work done? Not hardly...

    I'll stick with my PC, thanks.
    NoAxToGrind
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

      @NoAxToGrind

      What a dumb post. The article said "Google?s Chrome browser is ready for the workplace".

      The browser runs on PC as well.
      mKind
      Reply Vote

    • He isn't even talking about the os, He is talking about the browser....

      @NoAxToGrind You need to reread the First sentence of the paragraph.
      dougogd@...
      Reply Vote

  • privacy anyone?

    except for the fact that Google employees will trespass on private property and their admins will snoop your emails and contacts. Sorry, google cant be trusted.
    tiderulz
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

      @tiderulz Really, have any proof? Also whats all this FUD google snoops on data, really though. If you read their privacy statement they collect anonymous data just like anything else these days to improve their software. Lame statement.
      spdrcrtob
      Reply Vote

      • Read their software agreements. any thing on a pc that runs their...

        @spdrcrtob software belongs to them so any data they want off your pc belongs to them.
        dougogd@...
        Reply Vote

  • No thanks

    No Google crap allowed on our network, period.
    itpro_z
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

      @itpro_z uhm something about this statement leads me to closed minded admin that restricts everything because he can, I'm sure your users aren't happy neither.
      spdrcrtob
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Google Chrome for business: It's ready for you, even if you're not ready for it

        @spdrcrtob and still running IE6 (my pet peeve)
        THUFIR.HAWAT
        Reply Vote

  • I don't really think

    anyone is going to make the switch. Their chasing a dream.
    The one and only, Cylon Centurion
    Reply Vote
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