Google Releases Chrome Beta for Linux, Mac

Chrome has been available to PC users for well over a year. Released in September of 2008, Google has long promised Mac users a version of the browser. Today, Brian Rakowski, Product Manager at Google, made good on those promises, announcing a version for both Mac and Linux machines while admitting that the whole thing had "taken longer than they expected."

Rakowski doesn't go into a lot of detail regarding the Mac version, other than to sing the praises of how fast Chrome for Mac launches. "(…) see how fast it launches — there's hardly even time for the icon in the dock to bounce!" But, the Googler is a lot wordier when it comes to the Linux version.

"At Google, most engineers use Linux machines, so we certainly heard loud and clear how much they wanted Google Chrome for Linux," Rakowski writes, adding that speed, stability and security remained top priorities for the Linux build. Brian promises Linux users tight integration with native GTK themes, updates that are managed by the standard system package manager, and "many other features that fit in natively with the operating system where possible."

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  • cushgod
    Excellent!
    Reply
  • nocturne111
    Of course, it will probably remain in beta for anther five years...
    Reply
  • donaldduck
    About time! :)
    However, the "dev channel" version has been pretty stable on my linux machine and I think I will keep on using it, as that is the only one that supports extensions (for the moment, at least).
    Reply
  • I've been using Chrome in Ubuntu (9.04) for four or five months now... Am I crazy? Or did they have an alpha release or something before this for Linux?
    Reply
  • donaldduck
    NoOne7331I've been using Chrome in Ubuntu (9.04) for four or five months now... Am I crazy? Or did they have an alpha release or something before this for Linux?
    It was the "dev channel" release. There is one for Windows as well. It is not really an Alpha release but more of a "testing" release, including more functionality that will eventually be integrated in the "stable" channel (such as extensions).
    Reply
  • jerther
    Groovy! :D
    Reply
  • wildwell
    Great news. When can we download?
    Reply
  • lifelesspoet
    Awaiting a mouse gesture plugin so I can finally switch from opera. Love both, but opera has been lagging in speed and stability lately.
    Reply
  • bk420
    Tried to install it, but did not work on Slackware. Hopefully they will release the source tar.gz.
    Reply
  • I have been using the dev version in Ubuntu for the better part of its existence. Been pretty stable and much faster than Firefox overall.
    Reply