Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

The thing is we're due for a massive OS paradigm shift... maybe overdue. What we're experiencing now was predicted at least 10 years ago and only now becoming truly possible. It's inevitable. Scary too.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

I don't understand what point you're trying to make. The US networks are horrible precisely because it's so hard to compete with them, and even if this wasn't the case software isn't a physical object.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

The point is your post advocated stopping cloud computing because of the cost of entry in that competitors to MS Office would have to "set up a professional server farm just to offer [their] product." Just because a service requires an expensive infrastructure is no reason to oppose it, whether it is cloud computing or, as in my example, a mobile phone network.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

Of course not, but when you're setting up that limitation artificially, it's not the same. There's no reason a computer shouldn't be able to run local applications.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

There are plenty of reasons you create devices (hardware and software combinations) that cannot run local apps. A number of architectures (from time sharing to client-server to cloud computing) have been and are based on a limited local device for input and output and a comparatively massive remote device for computing and storage.

The theory behind this architecture is that not everyone needs to buy a quad-core processor with RAID SSDs for their local computer. It is cheaper, in theory, to buy a server farm which utilizes a greater percentage of the CPU cycles to deliver performance to the local computer over broadband pipes. This does, of course, depend on the server farm being sufficiently powerful and the pipes being sufficiently broad.

This is not to say that you can't buy a personal computer that can run local apps, just that it may be cheaper to buy a service that provides the apps and the computing power to run them. Then again, personally, I'd love to have Velocity Micro's new Raptor:

Intel’s Core i7-975 Extreme Edition (stock speed of 3.33GHz)
CoolIt Domino ALC to overclock the CPU to 4.2GHz
Three EVGA GeForce GTX 285s video cards
Four SLC-based Intel X25-E Extreme 64GB SSD drives in RAID 0

Now that's a computer that can run some serious local apps. Unfortunately, I don't have a spare $9,000. :(

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

Why?

And anyway - running stuff in a browser instead of a desktop and moving storage into 'the cloud' is not a massive OS paradigm shift. It's shifting your storage location and running some web-apps.

I must admit that I just don't get it. A browser is not an OS - it still requires an OS to run. All I see is that the desktop is now a browser and the user loses the desktop. Where's the advantage in that? I'd rather have both please.

But then I still think all software should be written in Oracle Forms 4.5.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

The better question is "what's the advantage of a desktop" - within its current metaphor/iteration?

If you will, when you are utilizing the web/internet as both storage and network-runtime spaces, your hardware requirements go down, resource efficiency goes way up, and the perception of limitaitons are no longer constrained to "what fits within this box here" or "what can I build onto this from the Tiger Direct catalogue."

Yes, a browser isn't an OS. And that's the point. The paradigm shift is from localized OSs to localized services that can run independent of an OS, but can and do tap into the hardware through the OS exposing elements. For this a browser (and a few choice programming languages with it) works wonders.

For the bulk of users who don't need/want to deal with the OS user space, who are concerned first and foremost with getting things done. The browser as the entire OS is not only a paradigm shift, but a relevation towards computing done differnet.

As with many things computer-related, personal relevance may vary depending on several factors.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

I think this is something most people don't examine sufficiently. Which is what makes it a paradigm shift. Within a few years, the average user will not need to leave the browser. The computer OS will be as invisible as my TV's OS.

And a TV is a good comparison. I understand from another thread that my TV runs Linux and I can get even get root. I assume this means I could change channels from the command line. Would I want to? Not so much. I'm a TV user, not a TV programmer. The TV UI isolates me from as much of the hardware and software as it can. And I like it that way.

That will be the paradigm shift - when a new user no longer realizes the tablet he's holding has an operating system under all that Chrome.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

But this is so backwards. Hardware is getting cheaper not more expensive. Why do I need to limit my resource requirements - what advantage will that bring in 5 years time. I should be able to do most anything low end hardware at that point.

The one resource that isn't getting cheaper currently and where there are likely issues is with bandwidth - so why build a system that increases bandwidth use and dependancies on that.

Furthermore in what way does running stuff through a browser increase resource efficiency? It pure and simple doesn't. I have no stats to back this up but the overhead running an app in the browser vs running on the OS is huge.

It's a return to dumb terminals and mainframes which we moved away from for very good reasons.

(And don't get me started on the fact that most people will trust their important data to 'for free' services only to find that 'for free' = 'zero customer service'. Ever lost a googlemail password?)

It's all madness i tell you.

Re: Why should I care about Google Chrome OS?
 

This is an incorrect analogy. As a mobile phone user you accept that you can't change this around because their are many financial restrictions and legal regulations to do with broadcasting.

Computing is different. We're talking about control of user experience here. Currently, the cloud is fast becoming an alternative to actual software applications.

But cloud computing isn't balanced at all. With software apps, finances generally aren't a huge barrier.

But the cloud is being played off by huge corps such as Google and MS who already have a mass of resources at their fingertips. If the computing market moves mainly to the cloud, hobby businesses and FOSS projects are going to be crushed as they will simply not have the finances to compete nearly with these major players. The server costs will be too high to make it sustainable for the average indie developer/hobbyist/FOSS proponent.

As a user, I prefer my computing experience to be arbitrary. And I plan to support this experience for a long time.

On a side-note, reading your posts, you seem to be eating up Google's "do no evil" policy. But, to be honest, the only intentions companies really have in mind is those of their shareholders. Pretty much any for-profit entity is out their for its own back, and not anyone else's.