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Google Chrome 29 Is Out: Omnibox Suggestions, Profile Resetting 120

Posted by Soulskill from the ramping-up-for-number-thirty dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Google today released Chrome version 29 for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Android. The new version features improved Omnibox suggestions, profile resetting, as well as new apps and extensions APIs. The biggest change is undoubtedly around how Omnibox suggestions work on the desktop. When the feature arrived in the beta channel, Google said that the improvements were 'based on the recency of websites visited, so you’ll get more contextually relevant suggestions at the right time. ... Chrome 29 for Android meanwhile has received WebRTC support, which enables real-time communication (such as videoconferencing) in the browser without installing any plugins."
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Google Chrome 29 Is Out: Omnibox Suggestions, Profile Resetting More

Google Chrome 29 Is Out: Omnibox Suggestions, Profile Resetting

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  • Google Service (Score:5, Informative)

    by Frankie70 ( 803801 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @04:25PM (#44623799)

    Does Chrome still install and run background services on Windows? That's the reason I uninstalled Chrome. A Browser is a client side application. It should start when I start it and stop when I stop it. I see no reason for Chrome to run Windows Services. I uninstalled GTalk also for the same reason.

    • If I'm not mistaken, in Windows Task Scheduler it can also be seen that the Google update service runs once per hour. Isn't that a bit too often methinks..?

      • Re:Google Service (Score:5, Interesting)

        by DarkOx ( 621550 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @04:42PM (#44623959) Journal

        I think you could make the argument its not to often, provided its sufficiently light weight. If the thing is able to start up do a quick http request to fetch the latest version number and die, if its unchanged what is the big deal. On the flip side browsers often hold lots of personal information and spend all of their time rendering untrusted documents; making them huge malware targets.

        You can take the value proposition away from the malware writes somewhat if you can at least make it also true the vast vast majority of the installed base will patched in a short time window, hours not days.

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by icebike ( 68054 )

            Why don't you look at what they run in the background and what controls they give you rather than having
            a tantrum and start throwing toys out of your crib?

          • Re:Google Service (Score:4, Interesting)

            by DarkOx ( 621550 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @07:29PM (#44625695) Journal

            The updaters are stupid and wasteful, but if you are using the system schedualr, which is running anyway, I don't see a problem.

          • Uhhh isn't that the argument that EVERYBODY uses to stick their shit in startup and slow Windows to a crawl, that THEIR shit is important and lightweight

            And they're all absolutely right.

            Now more than ever, it IS important to keep BOTH applications and OS updated. You Windows promoters are all very quick to leap to their defence and claim it's Flash, Acrobat, Java, Browser XY or Z, and/or any one of dozens of other applications that allow malware attacks. Why are you now beating them up for trying to solve the problem?

            This is another example of Windows being designed to be defective. Other OSs have recognised this problem and solved it long ago. Microso

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by smash ( 1351 )
              Uh... Windows update was automatically updating systems back in 1995.

            • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

              by Anonymous Coward

              Other OSs have recognised this problem and solved it (horribly) long ago.

              FTFY.

              First of all from a repositorys perspective.. bandwidth consumed updating linux software is TINY. From microsofts perspective.. who is going to pay the bills when 500+ million users suddenly are updating several hundreds of megabytes. microsoft gets like 20-30 bucks or something from the PC maker to support a single user for the lifetime of the OS.

              Secondly what makes you think that application developers are going to be OK with microsoft handling their updates? What .. suddenly oracle and adobe are goi

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by smash ( 1351 )
          Have they changed the brain damaged behaviour whereby it re-attempts to connect once every 5 seconds if unsuccessful yet?

    • Re:Google Service (Score:5, Funny)

      by MightyYar ( 622222 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @04:32PM (#44623871)

      Without the background task, you'll have no hope of keeping up-to-date. By the time I finished downloading 28, 29 was released.

      And now it's 30. Crap.

    • Is turning off the updater such an arduous task?

      • Are we sure he's talking about the updater? There's also the option "Continue running background apps when Google Chrome is closed" at the bottom of the Settings page. I'm not sure what those apps are, but I've always unticked the checkbox to not leave any junk running.

        • Are we sure he's talking about the updater? There's also the option "Continue running background apps when Google Chrome is closed" at the bottom of the Settings page. I'm not sure what those apps are, but I've always unticked the checkbox to not leave any junk running.

          Well hell, that's even easier to change the setting of than the updater. Either way, it seems a massive overreaction to the problem.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by icebike ( 68054 )

          I'm not sure what those apps are, but I've always unticked the checkbox to not leave any junk running.

          Its not hard to find out what those are. Google is pretty up front about it.
          Cloud print, Google Voice, Google drive, etc. All of these are under your control.
          Most people are in and out of a browser 100 times a day. Having one idling makes a lot of sense.

          Unless you machine is paging furiously, why not use the memory you paid for?

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I uninstalled windows for the same reason.

      • The reason why I uninstalled chrome/chromium was because I finally got sick of the way it insisted on nagging me: specifically, and most importantly the "this file may harm your computer" message in the big box at the bottom of the screen that appears whenever you download a PDF file to read in an alternative client. I have to do read PDFs frequently, and I prefer to take my own steps to minimise risks, so I don't want to be nagged about it.

        Since Google obviously has no intention of changing the behaviour

        • Re:Google Service (Score:4, Informative)

          by icebike ( 68054 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @08:08PM (#44625955)

          Seriously, I don't get this warning.

          I click the pdf, it opens in chrome, and I tell it to save a copy.

          Have you ever considered that maybe it actually found malware in the pdf's java script?

          • No, I did say that I don't really want to use Chrome's pdf viewer. If anything, doing so would have to be less secure, to an extent depending on how much you trust Google. As soon as you try to do anything else with a PDF other than open it with Chrome, you get that message. And it happens with *all* PDF files, regardless of whether or not there is any embedded javascript.

    • There is/was a Google Update Service on old versions of Windows to, I think, work around bugs in the Windows task scheduler. The latest Windows versions have those bugs fixed and on those versions it uses the task scheduler to do update checks.

    • "Does Chrome still install and run background services on Windows? .."

      Have you tried deselecting the box titled " Continue running background apps when Chromium is closed "

    • Comment removed (Score:4, Interesting)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @05:48PM (#44624697)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

        Settings -> System -> untick "Continue running background apps when Google Chrome is closed", job done.

        I looked at Comodo but can't see any proof that their DNS servers are more secure or that their browser is less "evil". You can turn off phishing and malware blocking in Chrome too, BTW.

        Did you even look in the Chrome settings? You clearly missed these two options, yet found them in Dragon.

    • Does Chrome still install and run background ....snip....

      Yes. If I understand your question the answer is yes.

      This quiet update is both good and bad. With many many users using Chrome the number of users unable to keep it up to date or make informed decisions is large.

      In a community like /. the number of individuals that have a clue is vastly larger yet the idiot factor has not vanished to zero. Myself -- I have three different browsers installed on all my systems. I select each based on what I am doing. I also have command line invocations that modify wh

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by icebike ( 68054 )

      Does Chrome still install and run background services on Windows? That's the reason I uninstalled Chrome. A Browser is a client side application. It should start when I start it and stop when I stop it. I see no reason for Chrome to run Windows Services. I uninstalled GTalk also for the same reason.

      They do, but they also explain what all of them are. (It used to be called view background tabs, now they call it task manager.
      Each and Every One of them is under your control.

      There is one for each tab (each tab is sandboxed),
      plus one hot running spare tab for the next tab you might launch,
      one for each of most extensions you have installed.

      You can decide that NONE of these run in the background when google chrome exits if you want.
      You can also kill any one of them if you find a reason.

      They are pretty up fr

    • Yes, but it's set to automatic, delayed start at least. That way it doesn't really slow down your boot. Although I wish Microsoft would finally create an update repository that applications could subscribe to. Doesn't have to be anything beyond just having a 3rd party register the current version and where to grab the update from. Every application vendor could create an application profile there, and just update the version number and windows would periodically ask if any of your applications had updat

  • Trust (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I will only install chrome in a VM.... I do not trust google not to load it with spyware or some "legitimate" excuse to constantly call home/checkin/spy on me.

    These "omnibox" combos in chrome and IE are intentionally designed to leak as much information as possible and send every "URL" you want to go to to google unless you are very careful.

    And finally fuck google and firefox with their childish versioning conventions.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Ultra64 ( 318705 )

      >childish versioning conventions.

      Numbers are childish?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Arker ( 91948 )

        Numbers are supposed to convey information.

        A version number, specifically, needs to convey both major and minor revision levels, and distinguish them.

        The numbers being used here do not convey that information. Thus they are not suited for their purpose.

        The 'logic' seems to be that many people dont understand the version numbers, and therefore they should be eliminated and replaced by something no one will have trouble understanding. This would make sense, if you didnt understand that the replacement fails a

      • Of course numbers are childish. Chrome XXIX is much more grown-up.

    • I do not trust google not to load it with spyware or some "legitimate" excuse to constantly call home/checkin/spy on me.

      You'll get a lot of replies saying "but they *don't* do that" or "check the source" or "use chromium". Even if it is true that Google *does* nothing bad with Chrome, currently, what do you think they will do when they hire too many people and need to raise more money? Or once there are no other browsers but Chrome?

      At some point Google will reach a balance of income and spending because too many people will get fat raises and inefficiency will creep in, and any corporation is going to favor screwing over u

  • Because it's been promised [thenextweb.com] for years.

  • Pardon my troll, but... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Red Jesus ( 962106 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @04:48PM (#44624031)

    I hate to troll what could be a pleasant discussion about a new release of a popular web browser, but Chrome sends lots of extra data to Google and Google sends lots of extra data to the NSA. I therefore do not trust Chrome.

    I understand that this is irrelevant to the current topic. If I don't want to use Chrome, I should just use another web browser, right? Like how I didn't want to use GMail, so I got a Lavabit account in 2009. (Seriously!) But Lavabit is gone now. And when I updated my friends with my new email address, I sullenly noted that well over half of them use GMail because the convenience outweighs the loss of privacy.

    So... I'm tired and afraid. Google is integrating more features into the browser that are based on the "recency of the websites visited"? That information will almost certainly be radioed back home to Google. And when the NSA is finally forced to answer for their sins before Congress, they'll point to how many people downloaded Google Chrome 29 and they'll say, "People don't mind being tracked! They sign up for this stuff voluntarily!" Regardless of whether that's a good reason for the NSA to be able to read my email, it's going to come up repeatedly in the inquiry, and that one fact might be enough to allow the program continue.

    I have no choice but to see the existence of Google Chrome 29 as a threat to my freedom. I wish I could be more reasonable about it, or at least keep my stupid opinions to myself, but being reasonable about Snowden wasn't enough to save my email account.

    *sigh*

    • I was using google for everything until the last few days.. in the process of moving to a new email service now, it's a PITA but it has to be done. There is no way I'll use this google product under this surveillance environment.
    • "Chrome sends lots of extra data to Google"

      I can't see any evidence of 'extra data` in Wireshark ..

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Chrome sends lots of extra data to Google and Google sends lots of extra data to the NSA

      Citation please?

      Poster downthread indicates that this is not the case (at least for the first part), having examined the actual traffic. I'd say that you're assuming facts not in evidence. And what do you mean by "extra data"? Do you mean that data that would be necessary in order to provide this feature? I suppose that's "extra" if you're looking for a completely lean and mean browser that runs more or less as a command line for your own highly skilled, deft fingers. Why, a browser should only give me exac

    • Re:Pardon my troll, but... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SoupGuru ( 723634 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @07:21PM (#44625617)

      Oh for God's sake. The NSA has compromised everything. Google is no exception. Google is actually doing more than any other company to fight the gag orders and expose the extent of the monitoring. If you're concerned about privacy , do you stick with any number of companies that are compromised or do you stick with one company that is compromised but shows an extreme dislike of it? And not only that, Google is a company that has clout and resources.

      I'm not trying to advocate for Google here, I just don't see too many other companies so publicly pissed off at what they're being forced to do.

  • so you’ll get more contextually relevant suggestions at the right time. ...

    Generally I don't want suggestions and ask straight away how I can disable such features.

  • Make it more Firefox Like (Score:4, Interesting)

    by wisnoskij ( 1206448 ) on Tuesday August 20, 2013 @05:47PM (#44624691) Homepage

    I really do not want a bar that auto searches through my history. 99% of my history is one off sites I will never visit again. Give me a bar like FF's where I can exclusively search through my bookmarks (you know the list of sites that I want to visit again).

    • I know bookmarks are so last century, but they work really well for some us. Chrome could do a better job of letting users manage them.
  • Someone is sleeping at the wheel. At this moment I see:

    Google Chrome 30.0.1599.10 (Official Build 217721) dev
    OS Linux
    Blink 537.36 (@156117)
    JavaScript V8 3.20.15.5
    Flash 11.8.800.129

  • Fix the bugs first? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I'm a chrome user. I read the chrome update, and said "what?".

    For background: I'm a google voice user. As far as I can tell, Google has abandoned voice in place. I'm a chrome user. Except chrome has huge issues with streaming video: you'll find thousands of complaints of no volume. I use facebook only to read what my friends are doing, and yet gmail continually wants to try to combine my accounts. Gmail wants my phone number. It keeps trying to put my real name on youtube account, which I repeatedl

  • Yes, I can go to Chrome://flags, change a flag and then use the restart button, but why can't I make an extension to do that? I just want to refresh my Chrome browser windows without losing my tabs, cleaning up the lost/wasted memory. My machine reboots rarely... once a week is rare, normally once a month. Chrome is the only beast that becomes ungainly in RAM usage.

    • wait - how is this different from selecting the "on startup ... continue where i left off" (which, i gather, you're already doing anyway), choosing "exit" from the menu (as opposed to closing all the windows) and then restarting? for me, chrome restores all the windows and tabs when i do that.

  • Just look at all the features they've included and focused, and added recently and ask yourself if it's improving your browsing experience or if it's replicating something you'd expect to be in the operating system itself (e.g.: bulitin pdf reader, builtin flash runtime, webtrc, cloud password store, logging *into your browser*, ability to cast to Chromecast, etc). While not mutually exclusive, Google is focusing on Chrome being almost independent of the underlying OS.

    These moves are very indicative that G

  • Nothing like going to one website on one occasion, only to have it come up first, every time you begin to type the URL for a site you visit every day.

    Or, having an article you read three months ago appear in the drop-down, but not the one you called up three times that day.

  • Support for .opus [opus-codec.org] files in HTML5 <audio> tags has been in chrome for a few versions now (finally - Firefox has had it for about a year now), but they've kept it disabled by default (and you've had to manually enable "playback of opus in video[sic]" in the switches to use it).

    Have they enabled that by default yet, or do we have to continue waiting for the glacial pace of webm-with-vp9-and-opus support to work its way through for them to allow it by default?

  • Does it have an option to accept cookies for This Session Only yet? That's the only reason I haven't switched.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Chrome's memory usage has increased tremendously over it's lifetime, more so that Firefox is leaner on memory than Chrome and starting to lose it's edge in the quickness department (I use Firefox a lot more than Chrome(ium) and even at cold start for both browsers Firefox is loaded up before Chromium has even appeared). Firefox has come a long way since the first release of Chrome (see https://areweslimyet.com/ [areweslimyet.com] and http://arewefastyet.com/ [arewefastyet.com]) It's amazing what competition can do! Speaking of which, does S

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