1. TASK MANAGER
This is a cool little feature that no other browser has. It's just like the task manager that pops up when you hit ctrl+alt+del in windows. This opens up a list of the different applications (such as java or flash) and tabs (similar to windows) that are running, and allows you close one if it is failing, or simply see what they are doing. Although this might seem like just a cute gimmick for people who like to watch shifting columns of five digit numbers, it is way more important than that.

It is one of the most ground breaking advances in the internet that I have ever seen. The reason you get this cute little feature is because Chrome is the first "mutli-threaded" browser t...

1. TASK MANAGER
This is a cool little feature that no other browser has. It's just like the task manager that pops up when you hit ctrl+alt+del in windows. This opens up a list of the different applications (such as java or flash) and tabs (similar to windows) that are running, and allows you close one if it is failing, or simply see what they are doing. Although this might seem like just a cute gimmick for people who like to watch shifting columns of five digit numbers, it is way more important than that.

It is one of the most ground breaking advances in the internet that I have ever seen. The reason you get this cute little feature is because Chrome is the first "mutli-threaded" browser that I know of. Rather than processing the different things, such as java scripts and html script, sequentially, it allows these all to run at the same time, the same way your computer allows more than one program to run at a time. This means if one crashes, the rest can survive. It also means that Chrome is MUCH more powerful, because it can actually be used to manage programs, rather than simply using them to decode data.

This is a gigantic exciting step towards creating a web browser that can function as an OS.

2. SANDBOXING
So because google creates separate processes for each thing you do in Chrome, it is easy to keep tabs separate from each other and other computers using Sandboxes.

A sandbox is a cool tool that isolates the part of the memory being used to run an application, so that all the extra data and files that the application introduces into your computer are quarantined, so to speak. This is really great for stopping websites from accessing your personal data, or putting viruses or tracking bugs on your computer. I use it to make sure that the commie thought police here in China don't know who I am, where I go, and what I do.

Microsoft doesn't like this... at all. That's why they'v...

2. SANDBOXING
So because google creates separate processes for each thing you do in Chrome, it is easy to keep tabs separate from each other and other computers using Sandboxes.

A sandbox is a cool tool that isolates the part of the memory being used to run an application, so that all the extra data and files that the application introduces into your computer are quarantined, so to speak. This is really great for stopping websites from accessing your personal data, or putting viruses or tracking bugs on your computer. I use it to make sure that the commie thought police here in China don't know who I am, where I go, and what I do.

Microsoft doesn't like this... at all. That's why they've sent out cease and desist orders against a number of websites who provide free sandbox software for you to use with windows. As a result, it's becoming harder and harder to get a sandbox that will work with IE or even Firefox, especially if you are on a 34 bit system. Fortunately, the sandbox is an integral part of Chrome, not just a feature or add-on.

This is important for security, because if you are going to experiment with cloud computing, you will be opening up your computer to a lot of internet access, so there will need to be good technology to separate the "public" and "private" areas of your computer.

It also makes things a lot more stable, because bad mojo going down in one tab, or app, is isolated, and can't spread or influence others. It might also be useful for forcefully blocking pop ups.

3. APPLICATION SHORTCUTS
This may seem like just another shortcut, or an aesthetic change, rather than technology shift, but that's just on the surface.

Application shortcuts put a shortcut to a web application on your desktop, start menu, or wherever you want. A web application is essentially a computer program run via the internet. For example, I can type up a word document using Microsoft Word, which is a program installed locally on my computer. Or I can type a word document on Google Docs which is a remote program that I access through the internet. I can access Microsoft Word directly through my operating, presuming my hardware is good enough. A web app isn't run locally, so it doesn'...

3. APPLICATION SHORTCUTS
This may seem like just another shortcut, or an aesthetic change, rather than technology shift, but that's just on the surface.

Application shortcuts put a shortcut to a web application on your desktop, start menu, or wherever you want. A web application is essentially a computer program run via the internet. For example, I can type up a word document using Microsoft Word, which is a program installed locally on my computer. Or I can type a word document on Google Docs which is a remote program that I access through the internet. I can access Microsoft Word directly through my operating, presuming my hardware is good enough. A web app isn't run locally, so it doesn't depend on my hardware beyond certain basics, but there had been one problem...

In the past the problem is that I have to access the internet program through my browser interface, which is kinda clunky and messy and over-burdens programs like Java. Thus performance sucks, and getting there is a pain in the ass.

With chrome, the built a brand new "java machine" that is once again more like an OS. It organizes different java objects into classes (kinda like the way your OS organizes programs and files into different types, and for the same reason: more efficient processing) It has dynamic code generation, meaning it will interpret individual java and then recognize it as a familiar object or command. This also allows them to clean up junk and detritus much better, because they can recognize what is a fragment and what isn't.

But most importantly, this allows a powerful, flexible, non-linear utility to interact with programs on the web, meaning improved efficiency approaching what you get when your computer interacts with a program on your hard disk. Even cooler is that it can deal with lots of different kinds of programs, not just the ones that were designed to go with it.