Chrome OS Can Now Run Android Apps With No Porting Required 133
An anonymous reader writes On Thursday, Google launched "App Runtime for Chrome (Beta)" which allows Android apps to run on Chrome OS without the need for porting. At the moment, only Duolingo, Evernote, Sight Words, and Vine are available on the platform with the rest of the Play Store's offerings to come later. Google "built an entire Android stack into Chrome OS using Native Client" in order to achieve this.
Re:Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
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That makes my little Chromebox that much more awesome. Redmond be very afraid.
This, this, this.
After getting my chrome book, and seeing just how nice it is, this is icing on the cake.
Every day, less of the utter shit that we have to put up with in using Windows.
Sometimes life is very good.
Windows is to computing what Beta is to Slashdot.
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What does any of that matter? The only real practical thing anybody cares about is running their applications. Whether you are running Photoshop or Maya or ProTools on Windows or a Mac makes no difference when you are actually *doing* things with your computer.
Its nifty that you can run Android apps in Chrome but I can already do that (through bluestacks and probably now through chrome os mode) and a *lot* more on my Mac or Windows computer. I dont see as a feature that will somehow supplant Mac or Windows.
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What does any of that matter? The only real practical thing anybody cares about is running their applications.
Tell that to the fanbois that love to quote their installed user base. Whether you are running Photoshop or Maya or ProTools on Windows or a Mac makes no difference when you are actually *doing* things with your computer.
Sure. I look at computers as tools, I do video and photo work on my Mac. And it's built for that. Dual 27 inch screens, and a lot of horsepower.
And my last gasp of Windows use was for travel and out and about use, with laptops.
But the Chromebook is so remarkably superior to the Windows
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As in you can't handle the truth.
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I agree, Windows is an excellent gaming OS. But when I work, I want OS X on my desk and Linux on my server.
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I agree, Windows is an excellent gaming OS. But when I work, I want OS X on my desk and Linux on my server.
I had to smile - that's what people used to say about the Amiga.
But yeah - The most awesome thing about my Mac is I don't spend much time bbbszzzzzz! ANY time at all futzing with it to keep it working. On the linux side, I do mess a little more with it, but that's mostly a learning curve thing, plus checking out different distros and resurrecting perfectly good computers that Microsoft abandoned.
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Granted. But good enough to pay for - if all you want to do is stuff you can do on a Chromebook? If you need or want to run Windows apps, Windows is the best solution for you. If you don't, and don't want to keep paying for Windows, Office and their endless upgrades, a Chromebook is a great alternative. Cheap hardware that still performs well - and free applications. If they do what large numbers of people need them to do, why do you feel the need to insist they're wrong? And If they don't do what you
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Every day, less of the utter shit that we have to put up with in using Windows.
What utter shit? Despite the horrible Modern UI, Windows works pretty good these days.
Well, the horrible UI is good enough reason all by itself. But messed up updates, dropping support for the one system that just about everyone loved, The Vista Basic debacle, where unsuspecting people bought computers rated for Vista that could hardly be called functional, the Vista driver problems, the disappearing codecs that without announcement stopped playing a lot of videos, the Ribbon POS (if it was that good, Office for Mac would use it, and Open Office would deploy it) The insane updates that cau
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The part where you installed over your vista partition is your own stupid fault.
Absolutely. Every single problem I ever had with Windows was my fault. I supported Windows for years, and not once mind you not once ever was any of the problems that I mentioned with Windows ever anyone's fault but mine. A computer could be sitting in another building, an update bitches it up, and somehow, some way, it was my fault.
I know the drill shillboi. Windows can never fail - only we can fail Windows.
Which is why I switched to Unix like systems, where I'm nowhere near as stupid.
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That makes my little Chromebox that much more awesome. Redmond be very afraid.
Remond has no reason to be afraid until it gets movable, resizeable windows.
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Not sure what you mean, but if you're talking about chromeos, that already happened. ChromeOS windows do everything Redmond windows do.
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ChromeOS windows do everything Redmond windows do.
They do not look like windows, they look like browser tabs. Because they are. Until they look like _Windows_ windows and include all the same functionality, many potential adopters will be needlessly alienated.
Re: Wow (Score:1)
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... Right because Redmond doesn't know anything about forcing a tablet style UI on desktop/laptop users and having it fail utterly.
While theres nothing wrong with a Chromebook, pretending its going to take over the world is kind of silly.
Native Client ... REALLY? Let me put a VM in your VM so you can run VMs ...
This may sound like a great idea, but I suspect you'll find after using it a minor amount that its not all that great in reality.
Re: Wow (Score:2)
Yay?
I say that with extra skepticism.
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Yay?
I say that with extra skepticism.
Um, yes. Tell me what is your assessment of Chrome?. I've used it for about a year, and it is vastly superior to any windows OS I've seen yet. Yay.
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Um, yes. Tell me what is your assessment of Chrome?. I've used it for about a year, and it is vastly superior to any windows OS I've seen yet.
The OS is nice, I agree but outside of very basic tasks it doesn't really have the capability (mostly lack of 3rd party support) to do much else. Personally I don't need MS Office, I use Google Docs because even if there is some little formatting bug when importing a document it's no big deal so as far as that is concerned ChromeOS works but if you're gaming it's no good, same goes for professional photo, audio, video editing/production or architectural and product design, simulation, etc...
I can absolutely
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I can absolutely see this replacing Windows for office workers (presuming they don't mind the few-and-far-between formatting bugs with GDocs importing DOCX)
Err, what? There are several elephants in the room who'd like to be acknowledged.
These are the real problems with cloud-based office software. They would apply even if Google Docs were totally free of bugs, and capable of e
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Google Docs/Google Drive does offer offline access [google.com].
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Neat. Does it sync back with Google's 'cloud' when it's back online, though?
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- Not all organisations trust Google with their documents, which may contain proprietary information
Yeah I'm not saying 100% of everything can go on there, many things would stay completely offline and perhaps you would need to run Libre/Open Office in a chroot for those things.
- Using Google Docs introduces a dependency on Google (they're uptime track-record is pretty damn good though, granted)
- Using Google Docs introduces a dependency on an Internet connection
That changed years ago, you can use them offline.
These are the real problems with cloud-based office software.
Well given the offline access the only real issue is the privacy one, but it's not to say everything has to go on google docs. Would be nice if there were some self-hostable web-based version of Libre/Open Office, with Google and Microsoft paving the way on that front with their main
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As I replied above to another comment:
Neat. Does it sync back with Google's 'cloud' when it's back online, though?
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As I replied above to another comment:
Neat. Does it sync back with Google's 'cloud' when it's back online, though?
In your sync settings you can choose what you want to sync and what you don't.
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Is that you [youtube.com]?
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Most of these boxes have zero need to access the greater Internet, since they're for internal use (business, civil service) or running stand-alone games or whatever (home), so nobody in these scenarios cares about SHA2 certs. XP will still have users at the end of the decade, same as DOS and Win3x apps are still around.
Re:Why not just run Chrome on Android on Chromeboo (Score:5, Funny)
So your friend's husband bought a web-connected device, knowing fully well that they live in a rural area with shitty web connections?
What your you going to complain about next? Not being able to tow semi-trailers with your Yugo?
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He probably wasn't fully aware how crippled Chromebooks truly are..
Perjhaps he has about your levell of just how cripled Chromebooks are.
Now you'rehow about some specifics of just how crippled Chromebooks are?
I have one, and we'll compare notes..
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Perjhaps he has about your levell of just how cripled Chromebooks are.
Now you'rehow about some specifics of just how crippled Chromebooks are?
I have one, and we'll compare notes..
I didn't know this before right now, but it looks that Chromebooks have bad keyboards.
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I didn't know this before right now, but it looks that Chromebooks have bad keyboards.
You are correct, for at least he Acer 720 has had trouble with the left space button on the bottom. Mine did, and a search found others. Same key mostly. I think at issue is the plastic the keys are made of can break too easily. I took the computer back to order a new key, and they replaced the whole thing, so I'm pretty certain they knew, and I believe they fixed it, because the new one they gave me is all good so far.
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Few things, AC:
1. Chrome on Android is way, way slower compared to Chrome on Chrome OS. Go ahead, run any benchmark and see the numbers.
2. Chromebooks are locked down to prevent end users damaging their system. nothing prevents you from pressing a combination of keys and switching to developer mode, and then you can format the machine, install Linux or anything else that you want (although not Windows since the firmware doesn't support it).
3. The hardware sucks? I beg to differ. The whole point was to make
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RE: "no offline use" http://lmgtfy.com/?q=chromeboo... [lmgtfy.com]
Things that were true when they first came out have changed. Wow, that NEVER happens with software and hardware. Try keeping up with things.
Is this the new emulator story for Android devs? (Score:1)
Because the stock AVD emulator stinks and HAXM acceleration is difficult to get working on it. Genymotion is my current solution when I need a fast emulator.
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Sure, if you're the dev for Duolingo, Evernote, Sight Words, or Vine.
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Re:Is this the new emulator story for Android devs (Score:4, Insightful)
Been there, done that. Show me a $100 tablet that's actually running Ice Cream Sandwich or Kit Kat... as opposed to all of the ones running Gingerbread with a skin hack to look like ICS/KK and displaying a bullshit version number in Setup.
Neighbor just bought 2 today running Jelly Bean, which is newer than ICS. Dell Venue 7, $105.00 each. 2 gigs ram, 16 gigs storage, 2 (rather crappy) cams, but nice displays and long battery life.
I doubt Dell went to the trouble to print up packaging with fake specs and get them stocked in stores ... so these are the real McCoy. Same as the 32 gig Kingston USB 2.0 stick I bought on sale this week for $15 that I'm installing Fedora 20 on for another laptop. There's some crazy loss-leaders out there if you look.
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Here, Dell Venue 7 - $120 offer (you'll have to add shipping costs): http://hetz.me/sq-xk [hetz.me]
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You can get a refurb 2013 Nexus 7 for less than $150, it will run 4.4.4 today and is guaranteed to get L. Asus MemoPad 7 is available for $124 new at Walmart.com and runs 4.4, though for a developer the Atom might not work (it depends on if you're using native code, though if you're going there you shoudl probably get a sample of the top x devices you plan to support)
Android (Score:1)
So now it's just Android with a windowing system?
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Chromebook seems to be doing pretty well [theregister.co.uk].
Giving it the ability to run Android apps just makes it more capable. Assuming the "emulation" works well on the underpowered hardware running most Chromebooks.
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I think those stats are total bullshit.
I'm a part-time college lecturer, and I work part-time in the finance industry. On a daily basis I work with all sorts of people, from students to academics to accountants to lawyers to traders to managers/executives. Then there are my friends and family. While I've seen thousands upon thousands of these people using Dell, Apple, Toshiba, HP and Lenovo laptops, I don't think I've ever seen anyone using a Chromebook. If Chromebooks make up 10% of the market, then after
Re:Android (Score:5, Insightful)
They aren't being used by students because they need to be able to run general purpose software. They are bought by budget minded people who only need a web browser and web apps to use a computer which is the case for most non-technical people these days.
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The cynic in me suggests this is a pre-emptive strike against alternative open-source OSes Tizen and Firefox OS.
By utilizing a Chrome-only technology (NaCl), by value-adding, Google kills off Gecko and Webkit competitors running a pure HTML5 platform.
(Also stifling adoption of BB and Sailfish, which both include Android compatibility)
Preempting mobile OSes that are total non-threats? (Score:1)
What exactly are they preempting here?
Aside from BlackBerry OS, which only has something like 1% of the market these days, the other mobile OSes you listed are well, well under 1%. They're all irrelevant today, and have no hope in hell of ever becoming relevant.
Fuck, Firefox OS goes out of its way to make itself undesirable. All of the reviews I've read suggest that the software is total shit, the hardware it has been available on so far is total shit, there are next to no apps for it, and that it offers an
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I would imagine that this new "Android in Chrome" capability will end up most commonly used to play Candy Crush on Windows systems. And that's fine. The nicest thing about Chrome (the browser) is it's (largely realized) potential as a meta-platform that works on just about every device out there - except iOS. And if Apple would allow it, it'd be on iOS too. That was the initial promise of Netscape before Microsoft got scared and started with their dirty tricks. It was never the promise of IE, which was
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If anything is being preempted, it's the still present threat that developer resources will be diverted into application rewrites for Windows 8 Metro - locking users into Windows-only apps for another generation. Whatever qualms you may have about Google, Chrome is about the best supported large multi-platform app, and there's nothing about Chrome (the browser) itself that locks you into Google apps or services. It's primary purpose is to keep the open web open and available on all devices, living up to i
Why not all apps at once? (Score:5, Insightful)
Google launched "App Runtime for Chrome (Beta)" which allows Android apps to run on Chrome OS without the need for porting. At the moment, only Duolingo, Evernote, Sight Words, and Vine are available on the platform with the rest of the Play Store's offerings to come later.
I wonder why all apps aren't available at once. I understand this App Runtime for Chrome akin to the Java RunTime, which when installed, would have all Java applications available. What am I [mis]understanding?
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The massive testing required to ensure all the apps will work.
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Since when did Google test android apps?
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Re:Why not all apps at once? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless those proportions change fairly markedly, it probably makes sense for them to start with some popular, mouse and keyboard friendly, applications that don't lean on native ARM blobs much or at all.
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Luckily all chromebooks come with multitouch touchpads which are perfectly capable of handling pinch/rotate gestures.
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Say, many android apps have arm binaries.
Well, many Chrome OS devices [samsung.com] are ARM-- and supporting multiple architectures is something all Android apps have to deal with on actual Android.
With only a few apps released, I'm guessing not everything is ready and they want to do it slow and steady. I wish they'd release this stuff and let everyone develop in the open on the canary builds of ChromeOS and let devs know what this environment is like, what SDK might be needed, how to configure the manifest, how to pre
Re:Why not all apps at once? (Score:5, Informative)
Some points here:
- Most Android apps are Java bytecode, not native code, so the underlying processor architecture is irrelevant (for those apps)
- x86 is a supported Android platform, so many apps that do require native code have x86 binaries available
- Intel provides an ARM emulator for the x86 version of Android so that x86 Android devices can run ARM binaries
- Some ChromeOS devices use ARM processors to begin with.
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- Android apps are compiled into Google's Dalvik bytecode, not java.
- x86 and arm does not play well together, despite 'emulation'
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- The difference is irrelevant, the apps are stored as platform-independent bytecode that (as of the next Android release) is then converted to machine code by ART or done on-the-fly by Dalvik itself. As a result, so long as Dalvik or ART supports the processor architecture, the application doesn't need to.
- As long as the ARM app doesn't use NEON (which I believe Intel's Houdini emulator doesn't support), it shouldn't have any problems running the ARM code on the x86 devices. In fact, you're likely to have
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Say, many android apps have arm binaries
Android apps are interpreted byte-code, not native binaries, same as java class files are interpreted byte code. The only binary you need is the dalvek apk interpreter, same as the only binary you need to run java on a windows machine is a windows java interpreter, and the only binary you need to run the same java class files on a linux box is a linux java interpreter.
So, if they've come up with a dalvek interpreter that runs on chromebooks, this is a good thing. It shouldn't look like the crappy androi
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Incorrect. Many android apps have arm binaries.
https://developer.android.com/... [android.com]
Many do not, to be fair, but most games do at the very least.
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That doesn't make what you said any less incorrect.
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The very first part of the very first sentence you linked to:
The NDK is a toolset that allows you to implement parts of your app using native-code languages
There is simply, by definition, no such thing as an "arm binary android app." All apps
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Android apps are interpreted byte-code, not native binaries
Unless they use the NDK.
The only binary you need is the dalvek apk interpreter
What about if they use the NDK? What happens if the application uses OpenGL ES?
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Perhaps they want to make sure it works for a few selected apps, so the developers of all the other apps in the play store don't get flooded with complaints if there are issues?
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The first big issue will be screen sizes - Android has provisions for apps supporting multiple screen sizes, but it's kind of weird in how it works, and not every app works well (or at all) if you hand it a screen size markedly different than what it was designed for.
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The Evernote app, at least, appears to "solve" this by putting a fixed-size window on the screen. Not resizable, or dockable.
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Google's NaCL only works with x86[64] the majority of apps use native libraries that are ARM. Only pure Android SDK apps (Java and java dependencies) will work. So say if you use libZbar (bar code decoding library) which is supplied in x86 and ARM, will work, is that app packaged the x86 version... which they didn't do becuase no one runs android on x86....
So that's the main technical reason.
Not true, NaCl supports arm as well (Score:3)
http://blog.chromium.org/2013/01/native-client-support-on-arm.html
And PNaCl supports whatever you have, since it uses intermediate code that is compiled and optimized on the client system.
Re: Why not all apps at once? (Score:1)
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I wonder why all apps aren't available at once. I understand this App Runtime for Chrome akin to the Java RunTime, which when installed, would have all Java applications available. What am I [mis]understanding?
Probably partly because it's not stable yet, but allso many/most apps won't work well since they tend to assume that the device has touchscreen support. That's reasonable for Android devices, but usually wrong for ChromeOS. Properly supporting keyboard navigation is a bit of a task when you've designed for touch... as Windows 8 metro demonstrates... Metro's OK if you have a touchscreen but a nightmare with a mouse.
Android apps on all Linux distros? (Score:1)
Does this mean that we'll be able to run Android apps on Linux soon? ChromeOS is basically just Gentoo as far as I am aware.
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Do not forget http://www.android-x86.org/
I use it within KVM to run closed source Andriod apps that have no native app for Linux.
Very soon (Score:1)
As in years ago.
http://www.linuxinsider.com/st... [linuxinsider.com]
Here's where this gets funny (Score:3)
Never failed before (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, OS/2 running Windows apps was a huge push forward for IBM. Wine completely changed the Linux desktop picture, and BSD's Linux binary compatibility made it an effective super set of Linux, to the point nobody bothers to install the later (not to mention the similar capability of SCO Unix: they wouldn't be where they are today without it).
I hear that ChromOS is a nice platform and is doing well. I'm glad, in a "diversity is good" non-committed sort of way. I don't think this particular feature will change much.
Shachar
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Actually, Wine does a surprisingly good job on a surprisingly large number of applications.
But also, and I cannot stress this enough, whoosh. In your haste to spew unfounded ridicule, you completely missed the sarcasm.
Shachar
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Yeah, I heard that claim before. Aside from the Novel Wordperfect stink, that is just not so.
What people fail to consider when saying this is that, even if it were still true (and I don't think it is), it is immaterial. Wine does not need to, and does not do so, implement every one of Windows' APIs. It just needs to implement those APIs that programs are actually using.
MS cannot change interfaces to existing APIs. That will break application compatibility (without which, MS has no monopoly). They can add ne
XBMC (Score:1)
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What's the diff? (Score:3)
So to ask a stupid question... since Android contains Chrome, and now Chrome contains Android, why are they different, and/or why do they need to be different?