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"they’re Google’s way of pushing the limits of the Web as a platform." Nope, they're Google's way of extinguishing non-Chrome browsers. Only Chrome/Chromium wi

by zobzu 13y ago

"they’re Google’s way of pushing the limits of the Web as a platform." Nope, they're Google's way of extinguishing non-Chrome browsers. Only Chrome/Chromium will be supported. That's called vendor lock-in - regardless of being open source.

ahoge 13y ago
Firefox's addons also only work with Firefox. Thunderbird and Komodo also only work on top of the Mozilla platform. Eclipse and Netbeans needs Java. A bunch of apps need Air. You can make this work inside XULRunner if you want. You only have to write some library which provides the same API as the chrome_gen package (reading/writing files etc) and then import it instead of chrome_gen or just overwrite the package. Everything else is regular web stuff. Anyhow, using some apps which use Chrome as runtime doesn't meant that you have to use Chrome as default browser. You only need to have it installed. Just like any other runtime you're using.
techzomby 13y ago
These apps don't run on Chrome the browser. They run on the Chrome runtime, and open outside the browser. So, if they're extinguishing non-Chrome browsers, they're extinguishing Chrome browser too - which is obviously not the case.
coldtea 13y ago
>Nope, they're Google's way of extinguishing non-Chrome browsers. Only Chrome/Chromium will be supported. That's called vendor lock-in - regardless of being open source. In order for it to be "vendor lock-in", people should care about those apps in the first place. Which they don't, much. In fact, they are quite niche. So, yes, they'll might lock a 0.1% of people with that. Now, if they did the same for Search, Mail or YT I'd be worried. (Hint: even after all those years, Google Docs, a flagship has an insignificant user base -- and that one is not even Chrome-locked).
reidrac 13y ago
"vendor lock-in" and "open source" are incompatible. Google won't stop anyone that wants to add support for other browsers. In fact, anyone could fork Spark. If you want an example, see OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice.

by zobzu 13y ago

ahoge 13y ago

Firefox's addons also only work with Firefox. Thunderbird and Komodo also only work on top of the Mozilla platform. Eclipse and Netbeans needs Java. A bunch of apps need Air. You can make this work inside XULRunner if you want. You only have to write some library which provides the same API as the chrome_gen package (reading/writing files etc) and then import it instead of chrome_gen or just overwrite the package. Everything else is regular web stuff. Anyhow, using some apps which use Chrome as runtime doesn't meant that you have to use Chrome as default browser. You only need to have it installed. Just like any other runtime you're using.

techzomby 13y ago

These apps don't run on Chrome the browser. They run on the Chrome runtime, and open outside the browser. So, if they're extinguishing non-Chrome browsers, they're extinguishing Chrome browser too - which is obviously not the case.

coldtea 13y ago

>Nope, they're Google's way of extinguishing non-Chrome browsers. Only Chrome/Chromium will be supported. That's called vendor lock-in - regardless of being open source. In order for it to be "vendor lock-in", people should care about those apps in the first place. Which they don't, much. In fact, they are quite niche. So, yes, they'll might lock a 0.1% of people with that. Now, if they did the same for Search, Mail or YT I'd be worried. (Hint: even after all those years, Google Docs, a flagship has an insignificant user base -- and that one is not even Chrome-locked).

reidrac 13y ago

"vendor lock-in" and "open source" are incompatible. Google won't stop anyone that wants to add support for other browsers. In fact, anyone could fork Spark. If you want an example, see OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice.