# Off-Topic Discussion > The Lounge > Tech Talk >  >  Chrome OS Announced

## ninja9578

This is not much of a surprise to those of us in the tech field.  We've suspected that Google was working on an Operating system for quite some time.  They officially announced it yesterday.

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/200907...erating_system

With Apple's popularity growing at an exponential rate, IBM and Dell's option of Ubuntu, Windows piss-poor performance, this may be the final nail in the coffin for Microsoft Windows.  

I predict Windows 7 to be the second to final Microsoft Windows version.  They will release one more in the desperate attempt to stay in the OS business, then focus on other products.

Chrome OS is looking to be a web-based OS like a mobile OS.  It's target market is netbooks, but will most likely branch out very soon after the first wave of netbooks hit the market.  Linux's big problem is that is has no advertising and has a track-record of being difficult to use and for nerds only.  Google's name alone I think, will be enough to get people to embrace it, but seeing as Google also happens to the most hit site on the web, they can advertise with ease.

It seems to be Android based, which will make converting current apps and writing new ones very easy.

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## Adam

I'm not surprised...

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## Ynot

Entry on the official Google blog
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/...chrome-os.html





> Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010
> ....................
> Google Chrome running within a new windowing system on top of a Linux kernel



There's a lot of competition out there now
General purpose Linux distros (Ubuntu, Fedora, OpenSuse, etc.)
Specific netbook distros (Intel's Moblin, Google's Android, Ubuntu NBR, etc. and now Google's ChromeOS)

I think, all in all, I'm happy about this

I hope this "new windowing system" is built on top of an existing toolkit (QT or GTK+), rather than a custom toolkit

I'll certainly be keeping an eye on the Kernel staging tree and Linux-Next for ChromeOS stuff

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## Keresztanya

I don't think Windows will be passed up any time soon. Macs are still too expensive for a lot of people, and it will never be the year of the Linux desktop because most people are just clueless.

And to be honest, I think the Chrome OS isn't that great of an idea. I'd rather have all my stuff on my own computer, not on google's servers.

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## khh

I must say I agree with Demon Parasite here, on all accounts.

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## Ynot

Well, if people are clueless, then Firefox has a problem

It doesn't advertise
It's up against a pre-installed competitor
people (these clueless people) have to make a choice to use it over IE

Yeah, Firefox will never get anywhere
Oops.....

Anyway,

people may be apathetic in the short term
but most are not stupid
show them a better service, and they'll come

Windows is starting to collapse in parts of Europe now
http://gs.statcounter.com/#os-FR-dai...80701-20090708

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## Bearsy

I'd want to extensively read the ToS before I'd use Chrome... IIRC Google has problems with privacy and whatnot.
I don't want my every move on my computer being monitered by a farm of servers and supercomputers.
No thanks.

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## Keresztanya

> Well, if people are clueless, then Firefox has a problem
> 
> It doesn't advertise
> It's up against a pre-installed competitor
> people (these clueless people) have to make a choice to use it over IE
> 
> Yeah, Firefox will never get anywhere
> Oops.....
> 
> ...



Are you saying Firefox isn't already really popular? Firefox actually has a bigger marketshare than IE7 in the EU right now. It was pretty close to IE7 before, but then IE8 split a few &#37; of the share and put Firefox ahead. And Firefox does advertise. Don't you remember seeing sites with "This site is best viewed in Firefox" plastered everywhere? Plus, a lot of people get it from their friends in the "My internet stopped working so my friend put this 'Firefox' on it" way. Firefox is doing great, and it's only been getting more popular. Opera and a lot of the other small browser are the ones who need to advertise and get more market share.





> I'd want to extensively read the ToS before I'd use Chrome... IIRC Google has problems with privacy and whatnot.
> I don't want my every move on my computer being monitered by a farm of servers and supercomputers.
> No thanks.



Google is actually very good with privacy. I remember one case where Google refused to turn over a person's information, when Yahoo and Live would happily give out the information. There are never real people seeing your information with Chrome, just a machine that processes it.

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## Ynot

What I'm saying is, your quote is wrong





> it will never be the year of the Linux desktop because most people are just clueless.



As these same "clueless" people took it upon themselves to install Firefox
Firefox, as you rightly point out, is eclipsing IE

These "clueless" people just need to see, first hand, a sizable benefit and they'll switch browsers / office suites / OS's / any other software

It won't happen all at once
nothing ever does

I'm sure there's people out there now who wonder why IE is laughed at - it's all they use
but as time goes on, more and more people will switch

same with OS's

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## ninja9578

In all fairness, most companies preinstall Firefox.  Three of my family members just got new PCs running Windows, all of them had Firefox preinstalled.  My father's even had it as the default browser.

I see Windows' marketshare going below 50&#37; by 2011.  More and more corporate users are refusing to use it, and people will learn to use OSX because all the businessmen are.

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## Keresztanya

> More and more corporate users are refusing to use it, and people will learn to use OSX because all the businessmen are.



They're having a hard time getting businesses to stop using XP and move on to something else, most businesses use some form of Windows.

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## khh

> I see Windows' marketshare going below 50&#37; by 2011.  More and more corporate users are refusing to use it, and people will learn to use OSX because all the businessmen are.



Most businesses go from Window to Linux, I think, and not to Mac. Mac and Windows aren't really all that different. If you're gonna invest in a change, why not change to something that's free and open, as opposed to more of what you've got.

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## Exhalent

A lot of businesses already use OS other than Windoze, and at some point (deny it or not, it will happen) the majority of computer users will not use it. I think a big problem is lack of developers (i.e. Linux ). If Google can get a ton of people developing for their OS (especially the bigger companies), they should have no problem converting people. Like it or not, you will see Windoze fall in popularity. Micro$oft should try to stick to one thing; they cannot maintain their OS and all of the other products they create so easily when competitors are approaching.

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## Ynot

The issue is resources

No 1 company has the resources to effectively maintain & enhance an OS

75% of all Linux Kernel development is done by commercial companies
Obviously the large Linux vendors top the list (Redhat @ 10%)
but the sheer amount of companies doing their bit is staggering

At times, it seems MS has problems just keeping up with the security holes on their products, let alone enhancing products

Anyway,
As I said, I'm hopeful for the Google Linux distro
I just hope they keep to the spirit of the GPL, and contribute back

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## ninja9578

Window's problem is rotware.  They didn't fix their problems when they had the chance because they didn't have to.  During the time of Windows 95 and 98, Mac OS was horrible and Linux was still in it's infancy.  They don't change anything, they just pile things on top of it.  Almost every major software product gets completely rewritten every third release.  Windows hasn't changed since Windows 95.

It'll be nice to see something brand new on the Linux kernel.  Ynot, Qt is a library, not a window engine.  I have a feeling that they will do something new, X is already 15 years old.

I doubt this is real, but:

I think that's a skinned version of the Linux that Google already uses internally.

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## Ynot

x.org is also very mature, which is good
btw, X11 is 22 years old (1987)

I don't really see them implementing a custom X11 protocol
They could, but it'd be a lot of work for little end-user benefit

better for them to follow Intel & AMD's lead and get involved with x.org - you get more bang for your buck by joining in development on an open project, rather than going off on your own

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## ninja9578

It's possible, Google likes to use the best preexisting technology.  I think they'll use X11's network transparency features, but write their own window handling layer.  The windowing engine of X11 is outdated compared to Aqua and Aero.

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## Man of Steel

That screenshot is hilarious. Very obviously a bad mockup.


I think this has promise, but I agree that I would want to very carefully peruse the ToS, after the Chrome browser's ToS.

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## Keresztanya

> A lot of businesses already use OS other than Windoze, and at some point (deny it or not, it will happen) the majority of computer users will not use it. I think a big problem is lack of developers (i.e. Linux ). If Google can get a ton of people developing for their OS (especially the bigger companies), they should have no problem converting people. Like it or not, you will see Windoze fall in popularity. Micro$oft should try to stick to one thing; they cannot maintain their OS and all of the other products they create so easily when competitors are approaching.







> Most businesses go from Window to Linux, I think, and not to Mac. Mac and Windows aren't really all that different. If you're gonna invest in a change, why not change to something that's free and open, as opposed to more of what you've got.



Even as a Linux user, I think it's not very good for businesses. A lot of businesses use programs made specifically for what they're doing, and taking the time to rewrite the programs is just not worth it. Business is not just word formatting, there aren't many things a business can do with Linux aside from servers, which is better than Windows/Mac.

And I don't see why they would switch to Macs, because they're more expensive. It's not worth spending more money, then spending more time just to rewrite their applications for the Mac. I don't see the point in switching from a business standpoint, to either Linux or Mac.

Also Exhalent, I see you still like saying M$, but if I remember correctly, you dual-boot Vista still. Why is it that you bash a company and then use their products?

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## Man of Steel

> Even as a Linux user, I think it's not very good for businesses. A lot of businesses use programs made specifically for what they're doing, and taking the time to rewrite the programs is just not worth it. Business is not just word formatting, there aren't many things a business can do with Linux aside from servers, which is better than Windows/Mac.
> 
> And I don't see why they would switch to Macs, because they're more expensive. It's not worth spending more money, then spending more time just to rewrite their applications for the Mac. I don't see the point in switching from a business standpoint, to either Linux or Mac.
> 
> Also Exhalent, I see you still like saying M$, but if I remember correctly, you dual-boot Vista still. Why is it that you bash a company and then use their products?



Not sure what businesses you are talking about. A very high percentage of checkout computers at places like Lowe's, Home Depot, and even grocery stores like Kroger use Linux or FreeBSD, or SUN. Hard to tell which, usually, as they have their own branded programs (and sometimes strange KDE themes) running.

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## Keresztanya

> Not sure what businesses you are talking about. A very high percentage of checkout computers at places like Lowe's, Home Depot, and even grocery stores like Kroger use Linux or FreeBSD, or SUN. Hard to tell which, usually, as they have their own branded programs (and sometimes strange KDE themes) running.



A lot of places I've been to, I see Windows computers. Like airports, schools, and some stores.

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## Man of Steel

Ah, okay. I think it's a bit more balanced than you might expect, though. Several large libraries across the country are using Linux on their public computers, even. It's pretty cool, actually.

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## ninja9578

I also see BSODs in those places.  

From a business standpoint, Macs are cheaper.  They last longer, they require less maintenance, software for it is cheaper, and they don't need to buy virus protection.

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## khh

> From a business standpoint, Macs are cheaper.  They last longer, they require less maintenance, software for it is cheaper, and they don't need to buy virus protection.



I think I've read that mac viruses are getting more common.

Also, my public library use mac >.<

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## Keresztanya

> I also see BSODs in those places.  
> 
> From a business standpoint, Macs are cheaper.  They last longer, they require less maintenance, software for it is cheaper, and they don't need to buy virus protection.



I doubt you've seen a BSOD on an airport screen before that isn't on a photoshopped picture. Do you really think Windows just BSODs randomly for no reason at all? I haven't seen one in a very long time, they aren't very common anymore. And when you do get them, they at least give you the information to figure out what happened and try and fix it, unlike Macs which simply tell you that your computer has encountered an error and needs to shut down or whatever.





> I think I've read that mac viruses are getting more common.
> 
> Also, my public library use mac >.<



They are, there are more botnets going around, and there aren't many security applications for Mac or Linux. I think that once Microsoft "falls" and the other computers become just as mainstream and it evens out, they will also become "virus-ridden" which seems to be a huge complaint people have with Windows.

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## Phrisco

I won't use it.

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## ninja9578

> I think I've read that mac viruses are getting more common.



That's wrong.  There isn't a single active Mac virus.  Viruses on Macs are close to impossible.  The common misconception is that Macs have less viruses because less people use them and there are less hackers trying to make them for it.

While I'm sure that's true, Macs can't get viruses because they have a UNIX operating system.  The security of UNIX is embedded into the file system.  A virus can not access any files that it doesn't own.  Window's security, on the other hand is a level way above that near the user interface level.  The reason Wndows is so vulnerable, is that once it gets past that, it's free to do whatever it likes because the files are not protected at a system level.

DP, you've never seen a Mac crash.  In the billion to one chance that it does, that's not what happens.  It shows a kernel panic screen, which is equivalent to the BSOD.

In response to your post in the confessional, this forum is full of anti-windows feelings because the majority of us are computer professionals.  We need a stable, fast system for the DB management, or programming, or whatever else we do, and Windows isn't it.

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## [SomeGuy]

> hackers



Hey hey hey, the word you're looking for is *cracker*.

And, I wonder, what will it be like? They weren't very clear...obviously it's linux. Obviously they're making their own DE. But, what will it feel like? Is there an accessable Terminal? Is there a desktop? Wallpapers? Workspaces?

Or it it Google Chrome + linux Kernel + login Screen?

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## Marvo

This OS won't compete with Windows at all, since Windows is an all-around OS, while Chrome will be a micro-OS with hardly any support for anything, except surfing. However, this will most certainly promote Linux a lot, probably making more people check out the possibilities in Linux. Google did say they might expand on the capabilities of Chrome, to a more all-around OS.

If somebody actually starts to compete at like 20% market shares or higher levels with Microsoft, I'd bet $10 that Microsoft actually gets off their asses and fixes a lot of the problems in Windows. Windows 7 is already very promising, and I've yet to see any people having trouble, except the few bugs from the beta. The RC, which I'm using on both of my computers at the moment, seems to be almost bug-free and a very good OS. People also say that Windows 7 works better than both Vista (obviously, I can't imagine how Microsoft could make a more ineffecient piece of crap OS) and XP. By working better than XP, people mean that the performance is generally smoother and it's just as stable, if not more. Some people even say, that Windows 7 runs better on their netbook than XP. This is probably because Windows 7 is as flexible as it is. It's also more power-effecient than Vista.

Windows 7 will still lack all those basic features, that you Mac and Linux people are asking and criticising Windows for, but in the end Windows 7 is an excellent OS that works pretty much flawlessly, atleast in my experience.

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## Keresztanya

> Hey hey hey, the word you're looking for is *cracker*.
> 
> And, I wonder, what will it be like? They weren't very clear...obviously it's linux. Obviously they're making their own DE. But, what will it feel like? Is there an accessable Terminal? Is there a desktop? Wallpapers? Workspaces?
> 
> Or it it Google Chrome + linux Kernel + login Screen?



If they're going to be competing with easier to use OSs like Windows and OS X, I'd think it's safe to assume it won't be a full Linux experience. Since they are trying to get more people on Linux, they will have to make it easy to use, since the difficulties of Linux are something that will keep most people away.

And ninja, I'm fairly certain that this forum is not full of "professionals". Knowing a coding language does not make you a professional, and while some people here might do something with computers for a living, that doesn't make them a professional. And it's funny how you think they are only a professional if they use a Mac or Linux, because there are plenty of professionals who use Windows.

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## ninja9578

I'm sure that Chrome will have a terminal, but it won't be reliant on it.  I'll bet absolutely everything can be done without touching the terminal, but the terminal will be there for those of us who need it, just like it is for Windows and OSX users.

The guys who post the most in this forum are the professionals.  I mostly was referring to myself, MoS, and Ynot, but if I remember correctly marvo is a gd.  The only developer I've met in the past couple of years who used Windows more than *nix is ironically my boss.  He's too stubborn to migrate his own stuff to OSX.  In fact, the reason that I was hired was to lead the company migration of our software to OSX/Linux/Solaris. 

I still occasionally write Windows-only stuff, and it's a pain in the ass because I have to compile the same code 3 times.  Once for XP, once for Vista 32, and once for Vista 64.  I have to have special preprocessor for each one.

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## [SomeGuy]

So THAT'S why there are compatability issues! I honestly never knew.

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## Marvo

What does gd mean exactly? I am a student at a technical high school atm., but I will first start learning about programming and other more hardware related subjects next year. My plan is to most likely start reading datology (danish term) once I'm done, or perhaps something more related to graphics. I'm not entirely sure. Right now I don't really know that much about programming languages  :tongue2: 

On-topic, do any of you guys think you're gonna use this new Chrome OS? Right now I only have a laptop and a desktop computer, so except for perhaps a dual boot on my laptop (for fast boot if I just need something off the internet), I probably won't be using it.

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## Keresztanya

I have never heard of having to compile everything 3 times on 3 different processors.

Also, just being a professional doesn't make your opinion more valid or mean you can't be biased. There are plenty of professionals out there who are biased towards each operating system, I'm sure, but that doesn't make any of them right.

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## Marvo

Depends on the program and what it's supposed to do Demon Parasite. However, it sounds a bit weird that Ninja has to compile a third code for Windows Vista 64 bit. Software that works in 32 bit tends to work fine in 64 bit aswell.

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## Ynot

I've never understood having a 64bit system, then loading it up with 32bit software
completely negates the benefits of having a 64bit system....

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## [SomeGuy]

I actually never understood having a 64 bit system...my Ubuntu is 64, feels the same, yet less supported than 34. Bad choice, should have went with 32.

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## ninja9578

> I have never heard of having to compile everything 3 times on 3 different processors.
> 
> Also, just being a professional doesn't make your opinion more valid or mean you can't be biased. There are plenty of professionals out there who are biased towards each operating system, I'm sure, but that doesn't make any of them right.



Vista has different administration privileges than XP, and that annoying "security system" restricts application's access to certain folders without consent by the user, so we have to put them in different folders that don't require that.  

64 drivers are very different than 32 bit ones, applications have to load the write one, which requires recompilation if using static libraries, which are far more common and much faster for almost all cases.


This code requires 3 compilations




```
#ifdef _64_Bit
   #include <wx64/thread.h>
#else
   #include <wx/thread.h>
#endif

wxString configuration(wxSystem::GetCurrentDirectory());
#ifdef _PLATFORM_VISTA
   if (configuration.EndsWidth(_T("Program Files"))
      configuration += "../../MyApp_tmp";
#endif
```


Being a professional means that we have more experience and more knowledge of the underlying systems, I think that does make our opinions better.  More educated = better judgement.

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## Ynot

> I actually never understood having a 64 bit system...my Ubuntu is 64, feels the same, yet less supported than 34. Bad choice, should have went with 32.



well, the obvious advantage is increased address space

I've said a few times before,
but 32 bit systems can address a max of 2^32 bits (or 4 Giga-bits)
The system cannot address more than 4Gb

I think you're probably aware of the RAM limitations of 32bit systems, but the 4Gb ceiling rears it's head in a few other places - One of which is memory mapping files

Large files (greater than 4Gb) are all too common
Single layer DVD's are 4.7Gb, but also think databases and other large sets of data

If you want to mmap a large file, on 32bit systems you have to do it piece-meal
This means you're doing more work, in order to overcome an architectural limitation - therefore it'll be slower

Also, there's quite a few operations (encryption, media encoding / decoding, other processor intensive operations) that can get significant speed increases when utilised in 64bit systems
There's a particular sorting algorithm (I forget which one) which gains a 60% performance increase when written for 64bit

Software has to be written to take advantage of 64bit CPU registers, but the benefits are quite real

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## Keresztanya

> Vista has different administration privileges than XP, and that annoying "security system" restricts application's access to certain folders without consent by the user, so we have to put them in different folders that don't require that.  
> 
> 64 drivers are very different than 32 bit ones, applications have to load the write one, which requires recompilation if using static libraries, which are far more common and much faster for almost all cases.
> 
> 
> This code requires 3 compilations
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Oh, I didn't know that, thanks. Although Vista is just adding more security, while not the best, it's better than what XP lacks. You shouldn't really be blaming Vista for something that XP doesn't have.

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## ninja9578

> There's a particular sorting algorithm (I forget which one) which gains a 60% performance increase when written for 64bit



Radix sort.  :tongue2:

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## ninja9578

> Oh, I didn't know that, thanks. Although Vista is just adding more security, while not the best, it's better than what XP lacks. You shouldn't really be blaming Vista for something that XP doesn't have.



I can blame them when AT&T invented an alternative which is infinitely better 40 years ago which is open source.  The PC industry isn't even that old.

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## Katia

> Well, if people are clueless, then Firefox has a problem
> 
> It doesn't advertise
> It's up against a pre-installed competitor
> people (these clueless people) have to make a choice to use it over IE
> 
> Yeah, Firefox will never get anywhere
> Oops.....
> 
> ...



Dude.

That's really interesting, but there's a big difference between a web browser and an OS. You can't compare the two. 

Most people just don't care about linux. They're happy with either Windows or Mac, it comes pre-installed on most computers anyway.

inb4 fanboy baww

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## Keresztanya

> Dude.
> 
> That's really interesting, but there's a big difference between a web browser and an OS. You can't compare the two. 
> 
> Most people just don't care about linux. They're happy with either Windows or Mac, it comes pre-installed on most computers anyway.
> 
> inb4 fanboy baww



I like how you signed up just to post this.

It's an operating system IN a web browser, not a comparison of Google Chrome and Linux.

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## Katia

> I like how you signed up just to post this.
> 
> It's an operating system IN a web browser, not a comparison of Google Chrome and Linux.



no no, I was talking about Ynot comparing the success of firefox to linux.

Because switching web browsers isn't a terribly big deal while changing os is a little more work.

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## Keresztanya

> no no, I was talking about Ynot comparing the success of firefox to linux.
> 
> Because switching web browsers isn't a terribly big deal while changing os is a little more work.



Yeah, that's true. Sorry for the misunderstanding  :tongue2:

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## [SomeGuy]

> no no, I was talking about Ynot comparing the success of firefox to linux.
> 
> Because switching web browsers isn't a terribly big deal while changing os is a little more work.



Someone call for a Linux fanboy?

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## Marvo

> Dude.
> 
> That's really interesting, but there's a big difference between a web browser and an OS. You can't compare the two. 
> 
> Most people just don't care about linux. They're happy with either Windows or Mac, it comes pre-installed on most computers anyway.
> 
> inb4 fanboy baww



I was meaning to make this post aswell, but this nice girl did it for me  ::D:

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## ninja9578

FYI, Dell, HP, and IBM all sell computers preinstalled with Linux.  All of them are Ubuntu, but HP is hard at work on it's own operating system.

HP is the largest computer vendor in the world, Dell is #2.

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## Keresztanya

Yeah, I hear HP is also working on a way to send data through lasers instead of wires, and it will be incredibly fast.

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## ninja9578

> Yeah, I hear HP is also working on a way to send data through lasers instead of wires, and it will be incredibly fast.



Uhm... this has been around for 25 years.  FIOS popularized it, but other companies have been using them for a long time.  If you mean as small as a microprocessor, that's IBM, not HP.

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## Marvo

> Yeah, I hear HP is also working on a way to send data through lasers instead of wires, and it will be incredibly fast.



Fiber optics? Or something beyond that?

Tachyons!

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## Ynot

> Fiber optics? Or something beyond that?
> 
> Tachyons!



if it's what I think he means,
it's a way for the CPU to communicate with external components (RAM, chipset components, etc.) via a bus of optical flashes, rather than a bus of electrical pulses.
effectively eliminating the copper trunks on motherboards

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## Keresztanya

> if it's what I think he means,
> it's a way for the CPU to communicate with external components (RAM, chipset components, etc.) via a bus of optical flashes, rather than a bus of electrical pulses.
> effectively eliminating the copper trunks on motherboards



Yes, that is it. A friend told me something about it and I didn't hear all of it, but yes, it is supposed to eliminate the use of copper.

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## ninja9578

That would be very useful and dramatically increase speed.  IBM is working on something like that.  Unfortunately, since no PCs use PPC processors anymore, I think servers will benefit the most, at least until the other processors catch up.

RAM is already as close to the cpu as possible and it's still not fast enough, most of the time you CPU is actually waiting for the RAM.  Electricity through insulated copper travels at about 80% the speed of light, eliminating that lag will dramatically increase speed.

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## Keresztanya

If that were to be implimented, would you have to have an OS that supports it? Or would it give automatic benefits?

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## ninja9578

It's be a hardware benefit, so nothing would change in the software, not even at the HAL.

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