Try Out Chrome OS In a Virtual Machine 289
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Soulskill
from the that-didn't-take-long dept.
from the that-didn't-take-long dept.
itwbennett writes "Some very generous Alpha OS geeks have snagged the Chrome OS source code and compiled a version to share with the rest of us, writes blogger Peter Smith. 'The build comes in the form of a virtual machine, which means you'll need VMWare or VirtualBox running, and of course the image of Chrome OS itself. The folks at gdgt are distributing the latter, and they've set up a page with all the links you'll need. You'll need to create a gdgt account if you don't have one yet. The Chrome OS image is only a bit over 300 megs, so it's a fast download. If you need a little more handholding, TechCrunch has a step-by-step guide to getting Chrome OS installed and running using VirtualBox, and a Chrome OS torrent they link to.'"
Re:Counterpoint (Score:5, Interesting)
Tho I'll agree about Enderle and O'Gara, there's not much to ChromeOS at all. Apps? Look to the web.
I already have browsers coming out my ears. I like doing some of my own processing on the fat multicores in my notebook.
Google still hasn't shown a real 1) educational 2) business case 3) entertainment or 4) porn case for ChromeOS. Any of those could drive it. Right now, it's just a lightweight ROM-able appliance and a Microsoft/MacOS/Linux killer looking for a spot marked X.
This is centrist computing at best, and a goofy attempt at targeting the bloat in all of the aforementioend operating systems. Snooze.
Re:Counterpoint (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's why:
In medium business to enterprise IT, there are a bunch of really useful abilities that are taken for granted. They cost a fair amount of initial effort and money; but once you achieve them, you are get the benefits on all client machines. Those are, centralized storage of files and configurations and centralized application of updates and policies. If some cube-dweller's computer dies, IT can shove another one at him, he logs in, and all his files and settings are right there again. Easy, standard.
On the small business side, they are lucky if they have real backups to recover from, never mind being able to treat client machines are more or less interchangeable, consumable parts.
Imagine, though, tying ChromeOS' interesting single sign in setup to Google Apps for business(with an interface for managing the ChromeOS preferences tied to your employee logins added to the ones used for parceling out file access and email accounts)... You'd get idiot-proof access to the same client-independent features, and automatic backups, and single sign on stuff that the big guys have, on cheap, common hardware, without any need for much local IT expertise.
Obviously, this would not be trivial, nor would it necessarily be possible immediately. Google would likely have to either partner with or duplicate and exterminate a number of business software outfits to expand their offerings sufficiently for this to be attractive. Worst comes to worst, they could use Native Client to bring particularly stubborn blobs onto the web. Also, since anything you can get on ChromeOS you could also get in your browser on a full machine, there would be nothing preventing businesses from using a mixture of chrome and full computers.
Re:Torrent? (Score:5, Interesting)
User confusion, really. Users are fragile and easily puzzled creatures. Every link you put on your website is a link the user can frantically flail onto and accidentally click. Then you end up with people on your forum asking why the OS isn't working. After all, they burned the file right onto the CD!
In the case of a beta OS meant to be run inside a VM, yeah, user competence is probably not a huge issue. In the case of an OS which is trying to be a mass-market OS, you want it to be as easy as humanly possible, and adding a torrent link to the homepage does not make things any easier.
Re:Torrent? (Score:5, Interesting)
They do, though, have a great advantage, which is why we bother: In absence of a functional micropayment system, bittorrent is pretty much the best way of allowing the bandwidth costs of distributing something to be spread across all parties who are interested in receiving it. If it were possible to transact in 1cent increments, everyone would almost certainly be better off if the distributor just dumped it on Amazon EC2 or some other big hosting service and let interested parties pay the per-megabyte download costs directly(saving themselves the upload bandwidth and power costs). Since that isn't really viable(particularly, though not exclusively, if what is being distributed isn't wholly legal), bittorrent's easy sharing of hosting duties among downloaders is the next best thing.
ChromeOS is a Good Thing! (Score:5, Interesting)
ChromeOS is a very good move for everyone involved. Remember, this OS and the devices it will run on are not targeting average slashdotters. I can personally vouch that I come across daily contact with people, business people not just teenagers, who don't use anything other than their browser. The worst aspect of a computer for them, is upgrading, updating all applications, viruses, malware, and general maintenance of the system. They nearly all fail in these, and after a year, they think their laptop is not usable anymore and go and buy a new one. They would LOVE this OS, and are they primary targets of it. Also, synchronisation between multiple computers is a bitch, that even they most fail at. And they hate leaving their documents here and there. Files and directories don't work for them, it's a broken metaphor for most people, and as much as love to organise my files in hierarchical directories, they simply don't care. They just want access to their information, when they need, as conveniently as possible.
I hate Web apps as much as the next guy on this forum, and even use my trusty IMAP client for fetching my emails from Gmail. But I can't deny that web apps are the future, specially when HTML 5 comes off age and becomes widespread. If you look back at what the Web looked like 5 years ago and compare it to now, you'll see that it will be irresistible in 5 years time. Have a look at http://www.chromeexperiments.com/ [chromeexperiments.com] to get a taste of what we are looking at.
On a more general note, anyone who is comparing this to old failed projects based on thin clients, X terminals or net pcs, is missing the point. Yes, the technology behind this might be similar to those, but times are changing. On the one hand, people are getting used to ever-present always-available services. On the other hand, 3G is now widespread, affordable, and provides great utility for many. Laptops and phones are converging. 2007 was the year of netbooks, 2010 might be the year of smartbooks (running ARM processors). Smartphones are morphing into Internet tablets (e.g,, N900). These are very different, and interesting times.
Yes, this is cloud computing, and yes, it raises huge privacy issues. It is up to us the tech savvy crown to raise these issues and address them.
Slashdotters can always run their trusty Debian or Fedora or FreeBSD or on their computer. And they remain great choices. But Google is pushing applications to go online and cross browser. They are pushing for open source drivers. They are pushing for open standards and cooperation with upstream and downstream projects. This is a Good Thing (TM) for all of us, even if we are not the target consumers of this OS.
Re:Torrent? (Score:5, Interesting)
A very good point. I thought nothing of the impact the number of links on a page could have on navigation until I watched my girlfriend or my brother try to figure out which link was the one they needed when downloading software.
Platform shift? (Score:5, Interesting)
I've been waiting for the next platform shift. It's been moving towards cloud computing for about a decade, now, but aside from killing the client-server application, the Internet really hasn't caused any major change in platform.
We all still boot an O/S and run applications on the O/S, some of which are Internet-access applications. But it's struck me for some time that the browser really *should* be the next generation O/S. With plugins and all, Firefox is showing lots of signs, but it's just not stepping up to the plate - I guess the vision isn't quite there - the guys at Firefox still see the browser as a browser.
A decade ago, the idea of moving any kind of application "into the cloud" was a laughable concept that most people wouldn't dare touch. Nowadays, it's so common that perhaps 50% of all software development is now oriented around "cloud computing". I wouldn't be surprised if the number was even higher.
So Google's taking this trend to its logical conclusion: why bother with "local" at all?
It's an interesting take, and one that's sure to really upset the Winopoly if it's got any success at all. The flaws of the Winopoly are obvious and horrible - security woes too many to number, spam spewing from the many leaks, disks that crash, and an Operating System so big, complex, and cumbersome to work on that not even one of the wealthiest companies in the world can do much about it.
After investing untold billions into the Windows codebase, the result was Windows Vista/Windows 7, which is a bit prettier but certainly won't be introducing meaningful change. It might even be more secure, as much as something larger and more complicated is ever more secure than simpler, ancestral systems.
But Chromium takes us a whole new direction. My guess is that it *belongs* in a VM/application style software stack, where you can either run it alone on a netbook or something, or run it as a Win/Lin/OSX application. VMWare makes this a reality, even if it's never set up as an "application".
My guess? It's going to succeed, but in about 5 years' time. Google really needs to unify Chromium and Android. They should be virtually identical platforms. Microsoft is going the other way with IE - trying to pound the web, kicking and screaming, back into Windows proprietary extensions.
They *still* haven't figured it out...
Re:Counterpoint (Score:5, Interesting)
In medium business to enterprise IT, there are a bunch of really useful abilities that are taken for granted.
In this spare we already have Citrix, Terminal Servers, Roaming Access Profiles, etc. They've got a blackberry enterprise server hooked into their exchange server, and everyone uses outlook to schedule their meetings. The finance people want excel. The marketing group wants powerpoint. The graphic artists want photoshop. The CEO wants an imac on his desk.
Where does gmail and some watered down office apps fit into this? Seriously.
On the small business side, they are lucky if they have real backups to recover from, never mind being able to treat client machines are more or less interchangeable, consumable parts.
On the small business side, everyone has an ipod, and they run simply accounting or quickbooks, or some industry specific accounting/point-of-sale/CRM suite.
. You'd get idiot-proof access to the same client-independent features, and automatic backups, and single sign on stuff that the big guys have, on cheap, common hardware, without any need for much local IT expertise.
Except its missing a key feature: the ability to run the apps they rely on.
If you were starting a new business, and set out to only use stuff that was in chromeos you might make it. But for any established business shoehorning everything you need into whats available from google is outright absurd.
Just today one of my clients needed to download a 2.2GB iso image from a vendor in australia and burn it to DVDs. This is a trivial task most of us would take for granted. Can't do it in ChromeOS. They burned 5 copies and then ran some simple software that came with their printer to print attractive labels for the DVDs they'd just burnt. Can't do that in ChromeOS either.
Another client used some software provided by Fedex Courier to print out a bunch of shipping labels.
Another runs a VB6 app someone wrote to query data from the enterprise SQL server.
Another runs a C# app to decode the lathe parameters for cutting a proprietary contact lens design.
Another client.
It goes on and on and on.
Also, since anything you can get on ChromeOS you could also get in your browser on a full machine, there would be nothing preventing businesses from using a mixture of chrome and full computers.
Politics. Nobody likes getting the 'dumb terminal' when somone else got a 'full pc'.
Re:Torrent? (Score:3, Interesting)
If you're just downloading Ubuntu you don't need to continue uploading once you've finished downloading.
I downloaded 9.10 using both bittorrent and HTTP -- KTorrent (and other clients) have an option to fetch chunks from an HTTP server.
Why would I ever make an account at gdgt? (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:You're both missing it... (Score:5, Interesting)
My babysitter is a nursing student, [...] She doesn't need anything but a basic word processor...
I suspect you are mistaken. Either that or you have found the only student on the entire planet that has neither a digital camera, nor an ipod. Both of which need a real computer, unless iTunes has a ChromeOS version or she likes uploading 4GB of photos into the cloud at consumer DSL speeds.
She is a self-described techno-idiot, and loves the idea of a cheap computer with limited moving parts.
I do too. They are called netbooks, and they've been around for a few years already.
It will replace terminals (either traditional dumb terminals or Citrix) in call centers, at least at first. These things literally run one and only one application all day long.
The call centers that have reached this point are ALREADY booting off a network image of a locked down OS running that one app in kiosk mode. ChromeOS offers nothing new or compelling here, the PCs they are already using are cheap as dirt and don't have any disk drives.
Plus even call centers run 17" and 19" screens. The staff are staring at that screen all day, they aren't going to use $100 netbooks.
But I do think that the availability of the Google platform and ChromeOS may push applications that have in the past been PC based onto the cloud.
Sure that's generically true. But LOTS of applications can't move to 'the cloud'. That lathe calculation utility I mentioned will NEVER be on the 'cloud'. That VB6 front end to the enterprise SQL will never be on the cloud, etc, etc.
The real story here, though, is that whether Chrome OS wins or loses, the web has reached the point that Bill Gates feared ten years ago: it is now "the platform" for many apps. [...] It will replace desktop PC's...
No. It won't. Desktop PCs will evolve. Some of the 'stuff' that is a "Windows application" today, yes, will become a web app and run in a suitable browser. But some won't. Some can't.
What happens to AppleTV and iTunes store sales when you just stream your movies and music off Amazon when you want to watch them? This technology is already here.
Will amazon let my kids stream Mary Poppin's 40 times for a one time cost? Will they let them do it on a plane? A boat? A minivan? Will it work on a trip to Mexico? And what happens if Amazon goes under?
Seriously, streaming is set to kill the rental video. I agree with that. But replace buying movies? I don't see it. Today we can't stream 1080p, a bluray disc is better than anything you can get streamed. Sure 20 years we'll have more bandwidth... we'll also have ultra-hd. And I bet in 20 years you still won't be able stream 1080p to your laptop in a van in the middle of the rocky mountains.
Re:Torrent? (Score:3, Interesting)
Torrents would be much better if they chose peers based on logical (not necessarily physical) distance.
In a perfect world perhaps, but in the real world this has been attempted and it fails badly. Even if the scheme can't be abused (somebody says "I'm the best" then pisses off once they have the file) the guesses the algorithms make are always worse than the default algorithm.
The basic for the default is "tit for tat", or "here's a block you wanted now you give me something and I'll give you more". Odd as it may seem this actually tends to favour the closer (well behaved) peers.
What Bittorrent actually needs is something that will encourage people to seed as this is the only way that a swarm will get enough overall bandwidth to fill downstream links in a world of ADSL. So called 'seed boxes' can also fill this role by adding more upstream to a swarm but they cost money.
Re:The real deal about Chrome OS (Score:3, Interesting)
data is stored on GOOGLE servers, which means if Google powers down their servers you cannot access your data.
On the other hand, if your laptop is stolen or the hard drive gets corrupted, you cannot access your data either (but whoever stole it might).
Of course, as /.ers, we all have robust backup strategies (including an offsite backup in case our house burns down) and keep our laptop hard drives strongly encrypted... (it says here) but the most important thing to realise about Chrome OS is that it is Probably Not For Us.
Lets face it, Google will probably do a better job of keeping data safe than Mr Average User or a company data center outsourced to the lowest bidder. I'm sure that there will be "incidents" but Google have a strong incentive to prove themselves dependable.
Also remember, that you can always log into Google on a Real PC and download your files in any number of standard formats.
Now, the VM version of Chrome OS is currently about as useful as a chocolate teapot because there's currently no way of getting your data out - I was apparently able to download a doc as ODF but its not clear where it has been stored, if at all. Whether an official ChromeOS machine will let me download to a USB stick remains to be seen. However, that might be an "optional" feature: I can see that some corporates might welcome the idea that individual proles can't copy files to usb sticks...
Re:Can't Get It To Work In VBox (Score:1, Interesting)
Here you go:
http://skattertech.com/2009/11/video-install-chrome-os-in-virtualbox/ [skattertech.com]
Re:Torrent? (Score:4, Interesting)
Talk to the busybox developers. They have plenty of experience of being the victims of piracy. You pirate it by distributing it in a way that doesn't conform to the licence agreement you have for it. Generally by not releasing the source code and not letting people know they can distribute it themselves under the terms of the licence in question.
Re:Torrent? (Score:3, Interesting)
Alright - assuming that you don't know how to configure bit torrent, then you'll almost certainly NOT want to download this prototype of an alpha operating system. ChromeOS may be ready to rock for the average user in a year or so, but right now, it's not even made it to a public alpha stage. Almost nothing works. It's something to play with - e-peen for geeks.
Now get off my lawn. Go play with your - uhhh - windows or something.
Oh wait - I have an idea for you. If your torrent client clogs your intartubez, you should install Wondershaper. Have fun - but I still want you off my lawn!
For all you nay-sayers (Score:3, Interesting)
Can you not see a team using Bespin on this platform? https://bespin.mozilla.com/ [mozilla.com]