Be afraid of Google Wave!
Microsoft’s Internet Explore is the most used browser in the world, while Google’s Chrome is only used by a small percentage of internet users. So how does Google compete? It intrudes on Internet Explorer by inserting a plug-in which effectively makes the browser run on Chrome engine…on some sites, and Internet Explorer on others.
And how about the timing of this plug-in release? Just before Google opened up Google Wave to some select users. This is just one illustration of Google Wave trying to force it’s presence into every other internet platform and application. Wait and see what happens when it goes live for every internet user. It seems like not just Microsoft, but all major companies and internet communication platforms will be forced to let Google Wave invade and modify them as it wishes, or else face extinction.
From New York Times:
While it is awaiting a wider release, Google Wave has already gained notoriety for being associated with a clever, if sneaky, attack that Google aimed at Microsoftannounced Google Chrome Frame, a plug-in for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer that turns the browser into one that essentially runs Google’s rival Chrome browser inside itself. With Chrome Frame, Internet Explorer appears unchanged to users, but runs Chrome’s engine for displaying Web pages rather than I.E.’s. last week. That’s when Google
Google said it created Chrome Frame because Internet Explorer, especially in the older versions that are still common on millions of PCs, is not suited to running complex Web applications like Google Wave. Google’s plan is that developers of complex apps, including itself, will add a line of code to those programs telling users that they need the Chrome Frame plug-in to run them, thereby making an end run around Internet Explorer. Developers who use the code will not have to dumb down their applications to run on less capable browsers, like older versions of Internet Explorer.
Microsoft did not take kindly to Google’s tactic. The company blasted Chrome Frame as a potential security and privacy problem.
There’s little doubt that this latest skirmish between Google and Microsoft could escalate, putting Google’s latest innovative app, Wave, at the center of the dispute.
As both Microsoft and Mozilla are pointing out, this becomes a major security issue for internet users.
From Tech World:
Mitchell Baker, the former CEO of Mozilla and currently the chairman of the Mozilla Foundation, strongly disagreed with Google’s tactic to slip Chrome inside IE.
“The overall effects of Chrome Frame are undesirable,” Baker said in an entry to her personal blog. “I predict positive results will not be enduring and - and to the extent it is adopted - Chrome Frame will end in growing fragmentation and loss of control for most of us, including web developers.”
According to Baker, Chrome Frame’s browser-in-a-browser will confuse users and render some of their familiar tools useless. “Once your browser has fragmented into multiple rendering engines, it’s very hard to manage information across websites. Some information will be manageable from the browser you use and some information from Chrome Frame. This defeats one of the most important ways in which a browser can help people manage their [web] experience.”
But Chrome Frame’s biggest problem, said Baker, is that it cedes control to the site, not the person surfing. And that will just confuse users.
“For many people, Chrome Frame will make the web even more unknowable and confusing,” Baker said. “Image you download Chrome Frame. You go to a website. What rendering engine do you end up using? That depends on the website now, not on you.”
Microsoft took a different tack when it slammed Google for releasing Chrome Frame. The plug-in, claimed Microsoft, not only doubles the risk of attack - users have to worry about vulnerabilities in both IE and Chrome - but also breaks several features in its browser, including the private browsing mode.
Mozilla’s vice president of engineering, Mike Shaver, weighed in alongside Baker, but also gave Google some advice.
“The user’s understanding of the web’s security model and the behavior of their browser is seriously hindered by delegating the choice of software to the developers of individual sites they visit,” Shaver said. “It is a problem that we have seen repeatedly with other stack plug-ins like Flash, Silverlight and Java, and not one that I think we need to see replayed again under the banner of HTML 5.
“It would be better for the web if developers who want to use the Chrome Frame snippet simply told users that their site worked better in Chrome, and instructed them on how to install it,” Shaver added.
He also panned Chrome Frame for some of the same reasons as Microsoft, but added several features “bricked” by the plug-in to the list, including IE8’s Accelerators and accessibility tools.
Google’s approach to solving the outdated browser problem is the path to madness, Baker concluded.
“Imagine having the Google browser-within-a-browser for some sites, the Facebook browser-within-a-browser for Facebook Connect sites, the Apple variant for iTunes, the mobile-carrier variant for your mobile sites,” said Baker. “Each browser-within-a-browser variant will have its own feature set, its own quirks, and its own security problems. The result is a sort of browser-soup, where … the web is less knowable, less understandable and certainly less manageable.”
The Chrome Frame plug-in works with IE6, IE7 and IE8 on Windows XP and Windows Vista. It’s available from Google’s site as a free download .
Google did not immediately reply to a request for a reaction to Mozilla’s criticisms of Chrome Frame.
