The Google Chrome OS Bombshell - the fallout extends beyond Microsoft and Apple
Sometimes big things happen on the other side of the world while we peacefully sleep through our night. Of course at that time it is daytime in the busiest and most influential parts of the world so it is with interest that we open up our newsreaders bleary eyed first thing in the morning while reaching for a coffee or tea to start the day. So when I powered up my computer this morning and it slowly booted and I eventually managed to connect to my network then start up a browser, a steady feed of posts about the Google Chrome OS started to fill up my screen. Intrigued, I just thought I'd go straight to the Google blog and see what they had to say. Sure enough, there it was - must be a big week at Google after all Gmail came out of Beta after five years just the day before! Anyway, back to the announcement - is this really going to be a big thing? After all I was less than impressed with Chrome as it wouldn't run on my Mac when it first came out and I had to find a PC to test it (still waiting for that email from Google about a Mac version eight months on). Well perhaps it is if you look at some of the commentary. The obvious target for speculation is Microsoft and Windows 7. The ZDNet blog has an interesting analysis on how Google is going after Windows with the launch of this Web OS. They note the push from Google on the promotion of cloud computing:
Google, which has long been singing the praises of cloud-based applications, is stepping up its game to bring the cloud to the mainstream.Some interesting views over at TechCrunch. From MG Seigler:
..But let’s be clear on what this really is. This is Google dropping the mother of bombs on its chief rival, Microsoft. It even says as much in the first paragraph of its post, “However, the operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web.” Yeah, who do you think they mean by that? And it’s a genius play. So many people are buying netbooks right now, but are running WIndows XP on them. Windows XP is 8 years old. It was built to run on Pentium IIIs and Pentium 4s. Google Chrome OS is built to run on both x86 architecture chips and ARM chips, like the ones increasingly found in netbooks. It is also working with multiple OEMs to get the new OS up and running next year. Obviously, this Chrome OS will be lightweight and fast just like the browser itself. But also just like the browser, it will be open-sourced....For a different view by John Biggs at CrunchGear:
ChromeOS is a specialized version of Linux designed for netbooks. It is more like Android than anything else and, as Fake Steve notes, no one will use it. Oh, manufacturers will pay lip service to it and maybe someone will install it on a few million machines but it will be a drop in the bucket compared to the powerful web OSes called Windows 7 and OS X. ChromeOS, like Android, is a bargaining chip. OEMs can wave ChromeOS in Microsoft’s face and reduce they price they have to pay per PC for installing Windows. It won’t work, but they’ll try. Die-hard Linux users will stick with Linux and the average consumer, when presented with Chrome, will ask where the Start menu went.And then MG Siegler also has a look on the impact for Apple. It seems that Apple operates in slightly different markets and is less likely to feel the impact. So, given these thoughts from prominent blog(ger)s, I thought it more appropriate for me to speculate in a narrower area, that of education. Netbooks seem to be grabbing the attention of education departments at the moment. They are great entry level devices and pricewise probably represent the best alternatives for getting ICT into the classroom and to each student. Most probably run XP (I am guessing but that seems to make sense), an operating system that was designed for a different time if you read some of the blogs that I have linked to above. Many are locked down and Internet access is very tightly controlled and filtered. In this way departments aim to exercise their duty of care and at the same time educate their students in an ICT enabled environment. What does this mean for the Web OS? Everything is in the cloud - applications, services, content, collaborators, friends and anything else worthwhile you can think of are pulled from the cloud. Does the Web OS have a place in education and if so what will that environment look like? Will departments need to reconsider the way they deploy their SOEs and if so what will they look like? Is the Web Os compatible with long established thinking on deploying ICT into the classroom. We have been talking about cloud services for a while now but what does this next step in the evolution of computing mean for education? I don't have the answers but it would have been nice to just power on my computer this morning and not wait an interminably long time for it to boot and then gradually start the programs that I needed to commence working. That promise of instant access sounds good, at least for a couple of minutes as I wait for my trusty Mac to get going - but then, when would I have chance to go and get my coffee?
