The Google Chrome web browser, and Chromium as well, use prerendering in a limited way. It may be used when you enter a phrase into the Chrome address bar. But which page or pages do get prerendered when this is happening?

That’s easy to find out (thanks to François Beaufort who posted a short demonstration video on YouTube). All you need to do is to open the Google Chrome or Chromium Task Manager to see which pages get prerendered by the web browser.

You can open the Chrome Task Manager with a click on the Wrench icon, the selection of Tools and Task Manager. You can alternatively use the keyboard shortcut Shift-Esc to bring up the Task Manager directly.

Look for Prerender: entries in the Task Manager. The indicator is followed either by the site url that got prerendered or the page title. It may still take time to identify the prerendered link on the page as Google is not displaying the information in the web browser.

Prerendering in the web browser is automatically enabled. Users who do not want to use the feature can disable it the following way. Enter chrome://flags in the address bar and locate the “Prerender from omnibox” option.

Enables prerendering of suggestions from the Omnibox and predicts appropriate network actions (prerendering, Instant, DNS preconnect) by calculating a confidence value for each Omnibox result.

Switch to disabled in the pulldown menu to turn the feature off.

Google Chrome Stable: As the name suggests, a stable release of the web browser that has been tested extensively. Aimed at the end user and computing environments where only stable releases are used.

Google Chrome Beta: The beta releases often contain features that need to be tested by a wider audience. They are not stable yet but more thoroughly tested than the developer releases.

Google Chrome Dev: Google Chrome developer releases have been the cutting edge releases for some time. They get updated often, may contain new features but also bugs that need to be sorted out before the features are added to the beta channel.

Google Chrome Canary: The new cutting edge version of the Chrome browser. Canary releases are not as often releases as Chromium snapshots but more often than dev releases. These builds get the new features first before they are added to dev builds, providing they cause no problems.

Chromium: Chromium is the Open Source part of the Google browser. Chromium may get updated several times a day. The browser does not contain Google browser specific features.

Which Google Chrome browser is right for you?

That question is not that easy to answer. If you like to test new features you may want to consider downloading the dev or canary versions of the browser. Users who do not want to experience bugs may prefer the beta or stable releases.

Download Google Chrome

Google Chrome Stable: http://www.google.com/chrome
Google Chrome Beta: http://www.google.com/landing/chrome/beta/
Google Chrome Dev: http://www.google.com/chrome/eula.html?extra=devchannel
Google Chrome Canary: http://tools.google.com/dlpage/chromesxs
Chromium: http://build.chromium.org/f/chromium/snapshots/

Which version of Google Chrome are you running on your system? Let me know in the comments.

One problem that users who work with Chromium experience is the inability to update from within the browser. Unlike Google Chrome which comes with built-in updating options, Chromium offers none which makes it hard to update the browser, especially since it is usually updated several times a day.

Chromium Updater

Chromium Updater is a Windows only application that can update an installed version of the Chromium browser. The software detects the installed version automatically and downloads the latest available snapshot from the official Chromium server.

If Chromium is not installed it will install the latest version on the computer and update it from then on in consecutive runs. Chromium Updater is available at the project website at Google Code.

JChromium Updater

The updater is just a few days old and an early version has been released by the developer. The Java based application is compatible with all operating systems that Chromium is compatible with. It currently seems to only work with installed versions of the browser as it fails to update portable versions even if the right installation directory is selected. It will place the downloaded browser in the selected folder so that it is possible to update the browser manually.

The software detects the operating system automatically and selects the latest Chromium build for download and updating. The project is actively developed and one to look out for. Downloads are available at the project website.

Chromium Nightly Updater

Another Windows only application that can scan the official release server for the latest version and download it from the official server as a zip archive or executable installer. It will not update the Chromium version on the other hand, leaving that task to the user.

Chromium Nightly Updater is available at DCmembers, a Donation coder service website.

Chromium Updater

Chromium Updater is an extension for Chromium that offers to download the latest zip or executable build from the official Chromium server. While it is not able to update the browser, it is the only option to check for new versions with a browser control.

Chromium Updater can be installed in all versions of Chromium that support extensions which means that it is another cross-platform option to download the latest update.

Did we miss an option to update Chromium? If so, let us know in the comments.

The latest announcement in this regard came from the Chromium team just two days ago. Google has for some time worked on implementing hardware acceleration in Chromium, and the announcement acts as a primer to summarize those efforts.

The underlying infrastructure consists of a new gpu process which “accepts graphics commands from the renderer process and pushes them to OpenGL or Direct3D”.

The gpu process sandbox had to be modified to allow the renderer process to access those graphics apis.

With this basic piece of infrastructure, we’ve started accelerating some content in Chromium. A web page can naturally be divided into a number of more or less independent layers. Layers can contain text styled with CSS, images, videos, and WebGL or 2D canvases. Currently, most of the common layer contents, including text and images, are still rendered on the CPU and are simply handed off to the compositor for the final display. Other layers use the GPU to accelerate needed operations that touch a lot of pixels. Video layers, for example, can now do color conversion and scaling in a shader on the GPU. Finally, there are some layers that can be fully rendered on the GPU, such as those containing WebGL elements.

After these layers are rendered, there’s still a crucial last step to blend them all onto a single page as quickly as possible. Performing this last step on the CPU would have erased most of the performance gains achieved by accelerating individual layers, so Chromium now composites layers on the GPU when run with the --enable-accelerated-compositing flag.

gpu process chromium

To get optimal results users need to start Chromium with the --enable-accelerated-compositing flag.

The new gpu process is currently only available in Chromium, but it is likely that it will be integrated in one of the coming Google Chrome Dev releases. It will take some months probably before it will be available in beta and stable releases of Google Chrome.

Features are sometimes not tested enough to be made available directly in those web browsers, and Google until recently has only offered command line switches to enable those features in the browsers.

This ensures that users who want to test the features can do so by starting the browser with the startup parameters, while users indifferent to the new features do not have to worry about bugs or other problems associated with them.

Command line parameters on the other hand are not the most comfortable way of enabling those features in the browser, considering that there are more than just a few available for the Chrome browser.

Chrome Labs has been introduced in a recent Chromium build to provide users with an easier option to enable specific experimental features in the browser. The new page can be accessed by entering about:labs in the Chromium address bar.

Chromium Labs is a testing ground for experimental features that aren’t quite ready for primetime. They may change, break or disappear at any time.

The first release contains just one feature for Windows, the ability to display tabs in the left sidebar. It is however likely that future builds will offer access to additional features.

Tabs on the left can be enabled with a click, which is way more comfortable than adding --enable-vertical-tabs to the startup of the browser.

about labs

The browser needs to be restarted before changes take effect, a restart option is directly provided on the about:labs page.

Chromium Labs currently offers one experimental feature on Windows and Mac. Linux users at this point in development do not get anything, which is likely going to change in future builds.

Mac users do not get tabs on the left though, what they get is a tab overview option which displays an overview of all open tabs by swiping down with three fingers on the trackpad.

Labs will bring experimental features to a larger audience, considering that many Google users are already familiar with Labs in other Google products such as Gmail.

Expect the labs feature to hit Chrome Dev in one of the next public releases.

Usually, a major leap in version correlates to a big change in a product. Not so with Google Chrome 7, as the first release fixes one issue for all operating systems, one Mac specific issue and stability fixes for the Chrome Frame feature.

google chrome 7

That’s not really anything to get excited about, some would even go so far to state that the only reason Chrome accelerates the versioning is to beat Internet Explorer and Opera who currently sit tight in the first two spots with versions 9 and 10 respectively.

But it is only a matter of time until Google Chrome manages to get ahead of those two browsers. Will the developers top there, or will we see releases of Google Chrome 15 in two year’s time?

Users who want to download the latest dev release of Google Chrome 7 can do so at the official dev channel download page.

In the current system everyone can upload Chrome extensions to the gallery, and malicious developers could simply use that to their advantage to either spam the website, or distribute malicious extensions easily.

The new developer fee of $5 is a one time fee that new developers have to pay before they are allowed to publish extensions, themes and apps in the gallery (apps seems to hint at the long talked about Chrome app store).

The $5 fee “is intended to create better safeguards against fraudulent extensions in the gallery and limit the activity of malicious developer accounts”, says Gregor Hochmuth, Chromium Product Manager.

The theory is that malicious developers may not want to make the $5 payment to distribute their apps, considering that the payment may be linked to a person making the payment.

It is unclear at this point in time how the payments are processed, but the likelihood is that Google Checkout will be used for that.

On the other hand, a $5 payment may prevent extension developers from developing extensions for the Chrome browser. While this may be not the case in the US or Europe, users from countries with a much lower average income may think twice before they spend that money.

The Chrome developers have also added domain verification as another security improvement. Chrome “developers will be able to associate their extensions (and soon their apps) with domains they own or manage using Google’s Webmaster Tools”.

This basically links extensions to a website, and sometimes brand, to help Chrome users identify official extensions from unofficial ones. It may also increase the trust of users in an extension.

What’s your take on this? Let us know in the comments.

The developers of the browser have added a startup switch to enable side tabs. Users who are running a dev version of Chromium or Chrome can add the startup parameter –enable-vertical-tabs to enable the side tabs functionality.

Here is how it is done in detail (Windows):

Locate the Google Chrome icon, right-click it and select Properties. This opens the Google Chrome Properties window. Locate the Target field and add ––enable–vertical–tabs at the end of it. Make sure there is a space between chrome.exe and the parameter.

A click on OK saves the new parameter. Start or restart Google Chrome. There is no visual indication of side tabs yet. They are activated by right-clicking a tab and selecting Use side tabs from the context menu.

chrome side tabs

The current version seems to have problems drawing the side tabs right away. It is necessary to resize the screen, or minimize / restore it before the tabs are displayed in the sidebar.

chrome sidebar tabs

Each website is represented by its favicon, page title and a close button. It does not seem possible to change the width of the sidebar tabs yet. The title bar looks awfully empty as well with side tabs enabled.

A right-click on a tab in the sidebar and the selection of Use side tabs will revert the changes and move the tabs to their original location in the browser. It is once again necessary to resize / minimize the window before the tabs are displayed.

But the fear is only one side of the medal. Users who are careless about the installed plugins are benefiting immensely from the internal plugins. They personally do not have to follow the latest security announcements to update their plugins the second a new update is issued, Google does that for them.

Chrome users who prefer not to use the internal plugins can disable them easily.

The Chrome developers have added another powerful weapon to the web browser; Plugin controls that can be used to allow plugins only on whitelist domains, trusted domains that the user added to the browser.

The plugins will simply not work on other websites if configured correctly. That’s beneficial to users who need Flash or another plugin on a handful of sites only.

Google does not stop here, several interesting additions to Chrome’s plugin handling have been announced at the official Chromium Blog.

Google Chrome will protect the users from outdated plugins. It will simply refuse to run them and aid the user in updating the plugins so that they can be used again in the web browser. It is not clear how the plugin database will be maintained, it is however unlikely that all plugins available worldwide are listed in it. It is likely that the most popular plugins are maintained in the database.

Protection from out-of-date plug-ins: Medium-term, Google Chrome will start refusing to run certain out-of-date plug-ins (and help the user update).

A second interesting feature is the ability to warn users of plugins that have been infrequently used in the past. Some plugins are installed by software or the user and never used in the web browser. Chrome will warn the user about those plugins so that they can be deactivated in the plugin manager.

Warning before running infrequently used plug-ins: Some plug-ins are widely installed but typically not required for today’s Internet experience. For most users, any attempt to instantiate such a plug-in is suspicious and Google Chrome will warn on this condition

Those two additions can be very helpful and it is likely that other browser developers will offer those features in their browser eventually as well. Mozilla has already started to inform users about outdated plugins during updates.

The developers of Chromium, the open source browser project that builds the core of the Google Chrome web browser, have started removing http:// from the address bar of the web browser.

Even if users enter an url with http:// it will not be carried over and removed instead from the browser’s address bar.

The http:// is hidden from the user’s view. Users who copy and paste an url will notice that it will be added to the url automatically.

All other prefixes like https or ftp remain untouched and are still displayed in the browser’s address bar. This is especially important for https connections which give the user a heightened sense of security.

A globe icon is displayed next to the url now that visualizes the http:// prefix now.

The change is problematic from a usability standpoint especially since all other web browsers on the market display http:// normally.

Another issue that came up is that it is now not possible to only copy the hostname (e.g. www.example.com) as the http:// will always be added to the string when copied.

The change is only implemented in the latest developer builds of Google Chrome. The devs have however stated that they won’t revert the changes which means it is likely to hit the beta and release builds of the browser in the near future. What’s your take on the change?

This has caused some controversy and the latest Chromium nightlies now have the feature disabled by default which means that it is again possible to one-click access the web browser. It takes two clicks to open the web browser with taskbar thumbnails enabled.

Why is that good news? Because Chromium is the core of the Google Chrome browser which means that this new feature, or shall we say the lack of it, will make its way into the Google Chrome web browser as well.

The feature is disabled by default now which means that it is still available and can be activated with the command line parameter –enable-aero-peek-tabs.

Chrome users who want the taskbar thumbnail previews can add the parameter to the shortcut of the web browser to enable the previews again.

It would obviously be better if the developers would add an option in the browser to enable or disable the previews but the choice will do it for now.

It is not yet clear when the disabled taskbar previews will make their way into the Chrome browser. It is however likely that they will be added first to the Google Chrome 5 dev releases and at a later time to the Chrome 4 stable builds.

The latest Windows Chromium build can always be downloaded directly from here. (via Download Squad)

The latest versions of Chromium, the Open Source core of Google Chrome, outline another interesting feature that will be available soon in the web browser as well: Allowing extensions to run in incognito mode.

Incognito Mode is the private browsing mode in Google Chrome. This mode prevents that data from that browsing session will be recorded in the web browser so that no traces of it can be found after ending the session.

No extensions are enabled by default and in previous versions of the web browser. The main reason for this behavior is that some extensions do record data which could interfere with the incognito mode.

The latest Chromium releases now give the user the choice whether to enable an extension in incognito mode. It would for instance be no problem to activate extensions that do not record data so that they can be used in incognito mode as well.

The option to allow extensions to run in incognito mode is available in the Google Chrome extension manager. Placing a checkmark in the “Allow this extension to run in incognito” box will enable that extension in the private browsing mode.

The feature is currently only available in Chromium with the likelihood that it will be implemented in one of the next Google Chrome development version updates.

One problem that Chromium users experience is that the web browser does not come with an automatic update option, at least not when it comes to the snapshot builds that are often uploaded to the ftp server several times a day.

It is highly impracticable to download and install new Chromium builds manually which is why Chromium Constantly Bleeding Edge has been developed.

The third party software has been designed to automatically query the Chromium server for the latest build. The version that is retrieved that way will be compared to the Chromium version installed on the computer system the program is executed on.

A newer version will be automatically download and installed. This process is handled in the background without user interaction. The only user interaction is required if Chromium is not installed on the computer system (which will trigger the standard setup) or if the operating system or security software display warnings during the download or installation.

The program has a size of only 50 Kilobytes. It should be added to the startup items or task scheduler in Windows so that it will regularly check the latest builds on the server against the local build.

The latest Chromium developer build – Chromium is the core browser that is used by Google to create Google Chrome – contains a first step in the right direction. It adds a movable separator to the Chromium toolbar which the user can move to the right or left to decrease or increase the space that the extension buttons get in the Chromium toolbar.

This is not a perfect solution yet as there is no way to sort the extension buttons in a different order so that those that are used the most by the user are displayed in the visible area while the others are not. The extension buttons on the left are the ones that have been added first by the user which means that a user could theoretically uninstall all extensions and install the most popular ones first so that they are displayed even if the slider is used to hide some of the buttons from the toolbar.

It is very likely that the Google developers will add that slider to Google Chrome eventually and that the slider is just one of the new usability options in the web browser. An option to customize the placement of toolbars and elements on those toolbars just like Firefox offers would be welcome by most Chrome users.

The latest Chromium release can be downloaded at the Chromium snapshots site (via Techie Buzz)

The Iron developers have released the Iron 4 release candidate two days ago which is as usually available as a portable version and installer for the Windows operating system. Most notable changes in Iron 4 are similar to that of the Google Chrome web browser. This includes support for the extension system, bookmark synchronization and better Windows 7 support.

The extension system seems to be pretty stable and most extensions seem to install and work just fine. Some extensions on the other hand, like the Stumbleupon extension, seem to install fine but fail to work afterwards, something that is very likely to be fixed in upcoming versions of Iron. The developers have also mentioned that Linux and Mac version of Iron 4 RC will be offered soon on the official website.

Windows users can download Iron 4 Release Candidate right now from the developer’s website.

The keyboard shortcut Shift Esc will open the Google chrome task manager that will display the memory usage of the plugins, tabs and core browser. The task manager displays the page or plugin, the memory usage and cpu usage. Initially Google Chrome users had only the option to end a process listed but the latest Chromium builds outline an improvement.

The developers have added a purge memory button to Chromium which will eventually be included into Google Chrome builds as well. For now it has to be activated with the startup parameter –purge-memory-button.

A click on the button will free up memory in Chromium which can be very interesting for users who work with the web browser all the time. Firefox users have a similar option with the third party program Firefox ultimate Optimizer which can drop the memory usage of the web browser significantly.

Users who are interested in this new feature have to download a Chromium build for now as this is the only version that supports the purge memory startup parameter currently. (via Download Squad)

Google two days ago made an announcement over at the Chromium Blog where they showcased part of their vision to make the process faster, their answer: SPDY, “an application-layer protocol for transporting content over the web”.

SPDY is “designed specifically for minimizing latency through features such as multiplexed streams, request prioritization and HTTP header compression”. Initial tests in a “lab-environment” have shown speed increases of up to 55% over standard connections while downloading pages from the top 25 websites.

The SPDY project defines and implements an application-layer protocol for the web which greatly reduces latency. The high-level goals for SPDY are:

• To target a 50% reduction in page load time. Our preliminary results have come close to this target (see below).
• To minimize deployment complexity. SPDY uses TCP as the underlying transport layer, so requires no changes to existing networking infrastructure.
• To avoid the need for any changes to content by website authors. The only changes required to support SPDY are in the client user agent and web server applications.
• To bring together like-minded parties interested in exploring protocols as a way of solving the latency problem. We hope to develop this new protocol in partnership with the open-source community and industry specialists.

A whitepaper goes into further detail. Users who are interested in the project should start there and follow the discussion over at the Chromium blog.

Chromium users who want to install a userscript simply visit the website where the userscript is offered, e.g. userscripts.org, and click on the install link offered there.

The process after clicking on the link is similar to the process of installing extensions in the Google browser. It begins with a warning at the bottom of the screen that explains that extensions can be dangerous. It gives the user the choice to continue or discard. The installation dialog will appear if the user selects the continue option. Here it is again possible to install the extension or to cancel the process.

Installed userscripts will appear in the extensions manager of the web browser from where they can be disabled, uninstalled or reloaded.

Support for this new userscript behavior is only provided in the latest Chromium builds with the promise that it will soon be added to the Google Chrome web browser as well. The only thing left do to for the Google Chrome developers is to release a public version of the web browser with this new feature set (extensions and userscripts) enabled.

These five features add mouse gestures, super drag, IE tabs, download tool support in context menus and double-click functionality to close pages to the web browser.

All options are accessible from the Chrome option’s page that has been expanded and is now offering access to Chrome Plus options in an extra tab.

Super Drag is an interesting new option to open links by dragging them. These links can either be opened in the foreground or background.

Mouse gestures and double-clicking tabs to close them are pretty self-explanatory. Available mouse gestures include navigating back and forward, switching to tabs, closing tabs or launching a page up or down command. Holding the right-mouse button and dragging the mouse in available directions will trigger the commands.

Custom builds often offer improvements in performance or functionality. Their main downside on the other hand is the time it takes to “follow” the builds of the official developers. It usually takes additional time to react on the latest builds that are provided by the Chrome developers which can sometimes be problematic (e.g. when security updates are issues).

Chrome Plus (via Download Squad) can be downloaded from the developer’s website.

The development team adds a serious warning to the announcement that both builds are considered incomplete meaning that they are missing features but also support for various web services and websites. It is for example not possible to play videos on the Youtube website with the builds.

How incomplete? So incomplete that, among other things , you won’t yet be able to view YouTube videos, change your privacy settings, set your default search provider, or even print.

The Chrome team keeps track of so called issues that are encountered in both web browsers. The current list contains 440 issues of which several are considered important including missing plugin support which means no Flash yet, no full screen browsing, no favicons, partial preference access, no web print, no bookmarks bar and lack of input methods for some languages.

The developers are aiming for a beta release as soon as possible without going into detail when the release is expected. The public release on the other hand is a good sign that we are soon going to see stable well supported builds of the Google browser for both Mac and Linux.