Google Chrome OS

I downloaded the pre-Beta release of Google Chrome OS and am running it in a Virtual Machine on my computer. My initial reaction is that it maybe too light weight. Everything is web based. There is no access to your local file system that I have found. Everything will be stored on the web. The image to the left is a screen shot of the Chrome OS main menu. All of these "Applications" open in a new Chrome (Web Browser) Tab.

The light weightiness of this custom linux kernel is great for light weight netbooks or older laptops that are not as fast as new dual core laptops. Here is a link to a youtube.com video about Google Chrome OS. The concept of a completely cloud dependent computer seems a long way off but Google plans to release Chrome in late 2010. There are several issues that they need to over come before this OS will be used by the masses.
1. Connectivity - To log on to their computers users must have a constant internet connection everywhere they want to use their computer. Many new netbooks are shipping with 3G cards built in that will solve this issue.
2. Drivers - Google must work with manufactures to come up with standard drivers to work on their OS. A big problem is with printer drivers. Each manufacture has their own proprietary drivers. They might be able to tap into CUPS which is an open universal printer driver developed by Apple that works for linux.
3. Cloud Acceptance - Google has to build up confidence in the Cloud. GMail and Google Docs have had outages in the past. It is crucial for the cloud to be dependable all the time for this to be a viable option.
4. Web standards - Many websites use additional programs or plug-ins to make there apps work. For instance Flash, Java VM, Java FX, Microsoft SilverLight, and Adobe AIR are all add ons to web browsers. These plug-ins allow for lots of awesome interactive content. Google might be able to get these companies to develope these for Chrome and build it into the browser. On the other hand HTML 5 is close to being released and it supports much of this sort of functionality in a web standards way.

Some other screen shots of Chrome OS: