Google Chrome – Now with Extensions!
Google Chrome has reached a turning point. In the past, I’ve liked the speed and simplicity of Chrome, but never enough to discard my beloved Firefox. Why? Well, as everyone knows, it’s all about the extensions!
Extensions
I just couldn’t part with AdBlock Plus and Firebug for Firefox. But that’s all changed with the release of Google Chrome 4 Beta. Chrome now supports extensions, and out of the gate it has the ones I need:
- AdBlock: The web is a much different (and better) place without ads. Ad Block takes you to that happy web by obliterating nearly all inline, flashing and dreaded pop in-front ads.
- IE Tab: I frequently use Outlook Web Access (OWA) for checking email and it’s optimized for IE. The interface is totally different if you use any other browser so I like to have the ability to switch to IE rendering inline.
Developer Tools
Another requirement of any browser that I commit to is a developer toolbar such as Firebug for Firefox or the IE 8 Developer Tools. These tools let you trace CSS styles, debug JavaScript and generally make a web developers life much easier.
Chrome now supports its own built-in set of Developer tools. They are somewhat hidden, but can be summoned by pressing Ctrl+Shift+J. It looks similar to the developer toolsets built into the other browsers.
Blazing Speed
Finally, the best feature of Chrome is its speed. As Jeff Atwood often says, “Speed is a feature”:
Maybe I’m just impatient. However, there’s a lot of concrete data to support the theory that unless you make it load fast, nobody will stick around long enough to find out what you have to offer. For instance, a recent study found that most shoppers will only wait four seconds for a page to load before abandoning the site entirely.
To me Chrome feels faster than Firefox and IE in nearly every way – from cold startup to page browsing. It’s obvious that Google has been doing some heavy optimization.
I also like the sheer simplicity of Google Chrome (ie – one box for searching or typing URLs). Will it win out in the end? Who knows, but now that it has extensions I’m trying it as my main browser. What about you?
