Today, we’re updating the Chrome beta channel with a couple of new capabilities, especially for web developers. Fresh from the work that we’ve been doing with the HTML Speech Incubator Group, we’ve added support for the HTML speech input API. With this API, developers can give web apps the ability to transcribe your voice to text. When a web page uses this feature, you simply click on an icon and then speak into your computer’s microphone. The recorded audio is sent to speech servers for transcription, after which the text is typed out for you. Try it out yourself in this little demo. Today’s beta release also offers a sneak peek of GPU-accelerated 3D CSS, which allows developers to apply slick 3D effects to web page content using CSS.
Lastly, as mentioned in yesterday's blogpost, those of you on the beta channel will start seeing the brand new shiny Chrome icon on your desktops.
Stay tuned as we make all these updates widely available in the stable channel soon!
Correction (March 23, 2011): This beta release's Speech API implementation is a prototype of Google’s proposal to the HTML Speech Incubator Group. The title of the blogpost has been changed to reflect this.
Tuesday, 22 March 2011
Monday, 21 March 2011
A fresh take on an icon
Some of you on Chrome’s early release channels may have noticed our latest tweak to Chrome’s icon:
Since Chrome is all about making your web experience as easy and clutter-free as possible, we refreshed the Chrome icon to better represent these sentiments. A simpler icon embodies the Chrome spirit — to make the web quicker, lighter, and easier for all.
Even before this effort, the new version of the Chrome logo was already being conjured up by Googlers and Chrome fans. Numerous creative reinterpretations have organically moved the icon towards simplicity and abstraction, so it felt right to make the icon structure cleaner and easier to recreate.
Redesigning the icon was very much a group effort. Collectively, we explored many variations, tried the icon in several different contexts, and refined the details as we moved along. It was important to maintain consistency across all media, so we kept print, web, and other possible formats in mind. Once we arrived at a good place, we finished up the icon by resizing, pixel-pushing, and getting everything out the door.
For Chrome users, you’ll see this latest icon reflected in your browsers soon, as we bring the latest features and improvements to the beta and stable channels in the coming weeks!
Posted by Steve Rura, Designer
Since Chrome is all about making your web experience as easy and clutter-free as possible, we refreshed the Chrome icon to better represent these sentiments. A simpler icon embodies the Chrome spirit — to make the web quicker, lighter, and easier for all.
Even before this effort, the new version of the Chrome logo was already being conjured up by Googlers and Chrome fans. Numerous creative reinterpretations have organically moved the icon towards simplicity and abstraction, so it felt right to make the icon structure cleaner and easier to recreate.
The Modern Browser poster by Mike Lemanski, celebrating Chrome’s 2nd birthday
Chrome Magnets by Tyson Kartchner
Chrome Starts Fast video
Chrome Speed Tests video
Redesigning the icon was very much a group effort. Collectively, we explored many variations, tried the icon in several different contexts, and refined the details as we moved along. It was important to maintain consistency across all media, so we kept print, web, and other possible formats in mind. Once we arrived at a good place, we finished up the icon by resizing, pixel-pushing, and getting everything out the door.
For Chrome users, you’ll see this latest icon reflected in your browsers soon, as we bring the latest features and improvements to the beta and stable channels in the coming weeks!
Posted by Steve Rura, Designer
Monday, 14 March 2011
Preparing for basketball madness with the Chrome Web Store
For those of you who follow college basketball in the US, today is National Bracket Day where millions are frantically filling out their brackets and preparing to follow their favorite teams' bids to the national college basketball championship. Luckily, I can use apps from the Chrome Web Store to help me follow the tournament like a pro.
Whether you're a loyal fan of your alma mater or college basketball powerhouses, you can get the most current news, scores, videos and photos all in one place with apps like FanFeedr and LockerPulse.
If you're watching multiple games at once, don't miss an upset with Are You Watching This?! Sports. This app shows you a scoreboard of all games you care about happening right now. You can also create personalized TV channel lineups for local cable and satellite TV providers that are automatically adjusted to your time zone.
You can even relive some of the best plays of the tournament with photos delivered by the Sports Illustrated Snapshot and create your own channels around your favorite college basketball teams.
These are just a few apps to help you stay on top of your games and bracket. You can find these and more sports apps in the Chrome Web Store or learn how other Google products can enhance your game experience on www.google.com/collegebasketball2011.
Whether you're a loyal fan of your alma mater or college basketball powerhouses, you can get the most current news, scores, videos and photos all in one place with apps like FanFeedr and LockerPulse.
If you're watching multiple games at once, don't miss an upset with Are You Watching This?! Sports. This app shows you a scoreboard of all games you care about happening right now. You can also create personalized TV channel lineups for local cable and satellite TV providers that are automatically adjusted to your time zone.
You can even relive some of the best plays of the tournament with photos delivered by the Sports Illustrated Snapshot and create your own channels around your favorite college basketball teams.
These are just a few apps to help you stay on top of your games and bracket. You can find these and more sports apps in the Chrome Web Store or learn how other Google products can enhance your game experience on www.google.com/collegebasketball2011.
Tuesday, 8 March 2011
Speedier, simpler and safer: Chrome’s basics get even better
cross-posted on the Official Google Blog
Just three weeks ago, we kicked off the Year of the Rabbit with a speedy Chrome beta. Today, we’re excited to bring these speed improvements and more to everyone using Chrome. With today’s stable release, even your most complex web apps will run more quickly and responsively in the browser. (For the curious, this boost corresponds to a 66% improvement in JavaScript performance on the V8 benchmark suite.)
We realize that speed isn’t just about pure brawn in the browser—it’s also about saving time with simple interfaces. Chrome’s new settings interface will help you get to the right settings quickly so you don’t have to dig endlessly to find a way to import your bookmarks or change your browser’s homepage. We’ve added a search box that shows you the settings you’re looking for, as you type. On top of that, you can also copy and paste a direct link into Chrome’s address bar to jump to a specific settings page. (No more long, frustrating phone conversations with your dad on where to find that specific setting in the browser!) Here’s the new settings interface in action:
For those of you who save your passwords in the browser, you can now quickly log on to the websites you frequent even when you switch computers, by simply synchronizing those passwords across your computers. You can also encrypt those passwords with your own secret passphrase for extra security. To enable sync on each of your computers, visit the “Personal Stuff” section in Chrome’s settings (or just type “sync” in the settings search box). You can also choose to sync bookmarks, extensions, preferences, themes and more.
Finally, you’ll be even safer as you speed around the web, as we’ve extended Chrome’s sandboxing technology to the integrated Flash Player in Chrome. So if you’re using Windows Vista or newer versions, you’ll benefit from the additional layer of protection against malicious webpages. To learn more about sandboxing, check out this animated video:
We hope that Chrome’s speed, simplicity and security will continue to make your daily life on the web more enjoyable. You can download the browser at google.com/chrome, or if you’re already using Chrome, you’ll be automatically updated to this new version soon!
Just three weeks ago, we kicked off the Year of the Rabbit with a speedy Chrome beta. Today, we’re excited to bring these speed improvements and more to everyone using Chrome. With today’s stable release, even your most complex web apps will run more quickly and responsively in the browser. (For the curious, this boost corresponds to a 66% improvement in JavaScript performance on the V8 benchmark suite.)
We realize that speed isn’t just about pure brawn in the browser—it’s also about saving time with simple interfaces. Chrome’s new settings interface will help you get to the right settings quickly so you don’t have to dig endlessly to find a way to import your bookmarks or change your browser’s homepage. We’ve added a search box that shows you the settings you’re looking for, as you type. On top of that, you can also copy and paste a direct link into Chrome’s address bar to jump to a specific settings page. (No more long, frustrating phone conversations with your dad on where to find that specific setting in the browser!) Here’s the new settings interface in action:
For those of you who save your passwords in the browser, you can now quickly log on to the websites you frequent even when you switch computers, by simply synchronizing those passwords across your computers. You can also encrypt those passwords with your own secret passphrase for extra security. To enable sync on each of your computers, visit the “Personal Stuff” section in Chrome’s settings (or just type “sync” in the settings search box). You can also choose to sync bookmarks, extensions, preferences, themes and more.
Finally, you’ll be even safer as you speed around the web, as we’ve extended Chrome’s sandboxing technology to the integrated Flash Player in Chrome. So if you’re using Windows Vista or newer versions, you’ll benefit from the additional layer of protection against malicious webpages. To learn more about sandboxing, check out this animated video:
We hope that Chrome’s speed, simplicity and security will continue to make your daily life on the web more enjoyable. You can download the browser at google.com/chrome, or if you’re already using Chrome, you’ll be automatically updated to this new version soon!
Thursday, 17 February 2011
Faster than a speeding rabbit: speed, sync, and settings
In the spirit of the lunar new year, we’re excited to kick off the Year of the Rabbit with a slew of enhancements in the Chrome beta channel. Today’s new beta includes a dramatic improvement in JavaScript speed, new password sync features, and entirely revamped browser settings.
In our new beta release, JavaScript is as quick as a bunny. With a new speed boost that we previewed in December, Chrome’s JavaScript engine V8 runs compute-intensive JavaScript applications even more quickly than before. In fact, this beta release sports a whopping 66% improvement on the V8 benchmark suite over our current stable release.
This release also includes a preliminary implementation of GPU-accelerated video. Users with capable graphics hardware should see a significant decrease in CPU usage. In full screen mode, CPU usage may decrease by as much as 80%! This means better battery life so you can keep going and going like that pink bunny in the commercials.
For those of you who enjoy the convenience of saving passwords in Chrome, you can synchronize your saved passwords across multiple computers, along with your bookmarks, preferences, themes, and extensions. For added security, you can choose to encrypt your synced passwords with your own secret sync passphrase. To enable sync, visit the “Personal Stuff” section of Chrome’s settings dialog.
Speaking of settings, you’ll notice we have reworked the look and feel of the settings dialogs. Instead of opening in a separate window, they now open in a tab. More importantly, we’ve added two new settings features that make it easy to customize Chrome to your liking. Firstly, if you can’t remember where a particular pesky configuration setting is, simply type its name into the search box to see the settings that match as you type. Secondly, you can also now jump directly to most settings pages using their own dedicated URLs, without needing to navigate through a sequence of windows. Here’s a short video of the new settings interface in action:
As always, we’re eager to get your feedback, and look forward to bringing this basket of beta-fortified carrots to the stable channel over the coming weeks! (For those of you keen for some fun and games in this Year of the Rabbit, we’ll leave you with the mind-bending #ThinkFastGame speed challenge to try out alongside our new beta.)
Posted by Jeff Chang, Product Manager and Min Li Chan, Product Marketing Manager
In our new beta release, JavaScript is as quick as a bunny. With a new speed boost that we previewed in December, Chrome’s JavaScript engine V8 runs compute-intensive JavaScript applications even more quickly than before. In fact, this beta release sports a whopping 66% improvement on the V8 benchmark suite over our current stable release.
This release also includes a preliminary implementation of GPU-accelerated video. Users with capable graphics hardware should see a significant decrease in CPU usage. In full screen mode, CPU usage may decrease by as much as 80%! This means better battery life so you can keep going and going like that pink bunny in the commercials.
For those of you who enjoy the convenience of saving passwords in Chrome, you can synchronize your saved passwords across multiple computers, along with your bookmarks, preferences, themes, and extensions. For added security, you can choose to encrypt your synced passwords with your own secret sync passphrase. To enable sync, visit the “Personal Stuff” section of Chrome’s settings dialog.
Speaking of settings, you’ll notice we have reworked the look and feel of the settings dialogs. Instead of opening in a separate window, they now open in a tab. More importantly, we’ve added two new settings features that make it easy to customize Chrome to your liking. Firstly, if you can’t remember where a particular pesky configuration setting is, simply type its name into the search box to see the settings that match as you type. Secondly, you can also now jump directly to most settings pages using their own dedicated URLs, without needing to navigate through a sequence of windows. Here’s a short video of the new settings interface in action:
As always, we’re eager to get your feedback, and look forward to bringing this basket of beta-fortified carrots to the stable channel over the coming weeks! (For those of you keen for some fun and games in this Year of the Rabbit, we’ll leave you with the mind-bending #ThinkFastGame speed challenge to try out alongside our new beta.)
Posted by Jeff Chang, Product Manager and Min Li Chan, Product Marketing Manager
Monday, 14 February 2011
New Chrome extension: block sites from Google’s web search results
Today the Google web search team launched a new Chrome extension to block low-quality sites from appearing in Google’s web search results. Read more in the post below, cross-posted from the Official Google Blog. - Ed
When you block a site with the extension, you won’t see results from that domain again in your Google search results. You can always revoke a blocked site at the bottom of the search results, so it's easy to undo blocks:
You can also edit your list of blocked sites by clicking on the extension's icon in the top right of the Chrome window.
This is an early test, but the extension is available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Turkish. We hope this extension improves your search experience, and thanks in advance for participating in this experiment. If you’re a tech-savvy Chrome user, please download and try the Personal Blocklist extension today.
Posted by Matt Cutts, Principal Engineer
We’ve been exploring different algorithms to detect content farms, which are sites with shallow or low-quality content. One of the signals we're exploring is explicit feedback from users. To that end, today we’re launching an early, experimental Chrome extension so people can block sites from their web search results. If installed, the extension also sends blocked site information to Google, and we will study the resulting feedback and explore using it as a potential ranking signal for our search results.
You can download the extension and start blocking sites now. It looks like this:
You can download the extension and start blocking sites now. It looks like this:
When you block a site with the extension, you won’t see results from that domain again in your Google search results. You can always revoke a blocked site at the bottom of the search results, so it's easy to undo blocks:
You can also edit your list of blocked sites by clicking on the extension's icon in the top right of the Chrome window.
This is an early test, but the extension is available in English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish and Turkish. We hope this extension improves your search experience, and thanks in advance for participating in this experiment. If you’re a tech-savvy Chrome user, please download and try the Personal Blocklist extension today.
Posted by Matt Cutts, Principal Engineer
Thursday, 3 February 2011
A dash of speed, 3D and apps
Today, we’re excited to bring several new features from Chrome’s beta channel to the stable build, including WebGL, Chrome Instant, and the Chrome Web Store.
WebGL is a new technology which brings hardware-accelerated 3D graphics to the browser. With WebGL in Chrome, you can experience rich 3D experiences right inside the browser with no need for additional software. Curious about the three-dimensional possibilities? Try out these demos to experience the power of WebGL in the latest stable version of Chrome.
With Chrome Instant (à la Google Instant), web pages that you frequently visit will begin loading as soon as you start typing the URL. (“Look, Mom - no enter key!”). If supported by your default search engine, search results appear instantly as you type queries in the omnibox. To try out Instant, you’ll need to enable it in the Basics tab of Chrome’s options.
Lastly, the Chrome Web Store is now open to all Chrome users in the United States. As part of this, we’ve now added a link to the Chrome Web Store on the New Tab page, along with two sample apps. (If you don’t use these sample apps, they will automatically disappear after some time).
Some of the newest additions in the Chrome Web Store include BBC GoodFood, Autodesk, Sesame Street, nine King.com Games and Marvel Comics. There are also many apps that take advantage of the latest web technologies to deliver an immersive experience, such as Tweetdeck and The New York Times. While the store is currently only available for Chrome users in the U.S., we’re working hard to expand availability to users around the world soon, so stay tuned!
WebGL is a new technology which brings hardware-accelerated 3D graphics to the browser. With WebGL in Chrome, you can experience rich 3D experiences right inside the browser with no need for additional software. Curious about the three-dimensional possibilities? Try out these demos to experience the power of WebGL in the latest stable version of Chrome.
With Chrome Instant (à la Google Instant), web pages that you frequently visit will begin loading as soon as you start typing the URL. (“Look, Mom - no enter key!”). If supported by your default search engine, search results appear instantly as you type queries in the omnibox. To try out Instant, you’ll need to enable it in the Basics tab of Chrome’s options.
Lastly, the Chrome Web Store is now open to all Chrome users in the United States. As part of this, we’ve now added a link to the Chrome Web Store on the New Tab page, along with two sample apps. (If you don’t use these sample apps, they will automatically disappear after some time).
Some of the newest additions in the Chrome Web Store include BBC GoodFood, Autodesk, Sesame Street, nine King.com Games and Marvel Comics. There are also many apps that take advantage of the latest web technologies to deliver an immersive experience, such as Tweetdeck and The New York Times. While the store is currently only available for Chrome users in the U.S., we’re working hard to expand availability to users around the world soon, so stay tuned!
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