Google Quietly Launches Data Saver Extension For Chrome 39
An anonymous reader writes Google has quietly released a Data Saver extension for Chrome, bringing the company's data compression feature to the desktop for the first time. You can download the extension, currently in beta, from the Chrome Web Store. We say "quietly" because there doesn't seem to be an announcement from Google. The extension was published on March 23 and appears to work exactly as advertised on the tin, based on what we've seen in our early tests.
Proxy! WTF? (Score:5, Insightful)
So, it's a Google proxy service that routes, not just my searches through Google but, ALL of my browser activity through Google?
I'm going to take a pass. Thanks anyway, Google.
Re:Proxy! WTF? (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, that's exactly what Chrome is. But what does the extension do?
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It makes the unicorns run faster
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It's a poor man's version of Opera's Turbo, which Opera has had for five years now.
Just another example of Opera doing all of the innovation with the other browser makers stealing them.
Re:Proxy! WTF? (Score:4, Funny)
ilovefurriesporn.com doesn't even exists, you insensitive clod!
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yet.
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Except for pages accessed via SSL
Which means that once your favorite sites adopt HSTS, Data Saver becomes useless.
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ALL of my browser activity through Google?
1) No, SSL and incognito not included.
2) It does what just about every other "data saver" of this type have always done (BES compression, Opera data saver, I believe safari has an example as well)
What does it do? (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe it works "exactly as advertised on the tin", but TFS doesn't say whatever the tin says.
Why should I care about some random unexplained extension?
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Anyone remember Google Web Accelerator? (Score:3)
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Yeah, I remember it. It's an accelerating web proxy. Opera offers one, too.
And one can even set a compressing proxy at home. What's the difference between "Data saver" and such proxies?
Google's closely follows a lot of stuff that their PageSpeed Module [google.com] does. On-the-fly HTML/JS/CSS optimization, image conversion to WebP, etc. I don't know if they've extended it beyond that to other areas like recompressing videos (which I believe Opera's service does).
Worth noting that a variant of it has been available in Chrome's mobile browser for awhile now, and there was an unofficial version for the desktop called Data Compression Proxy [google.com] which was essentially a little hack to run the desktop browser t
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And it does... what, exactly? (Score:5, Insightful)
Would it kill you to explain even vaguely what this thing does in the summary?
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Would it kill you to explain even vaguely what this thing does in the summary?
It save data so your Chrome browsing can be analyzed.
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Sounds like my ex-wife. Badoom.
Works on many levels.
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compresses HTTP traffic, especially images, like Opera Mini
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Would it kill you to read the article? Its not even that long.
Proxy (Score:2)
Might as well just proxy all my stuff through the NSA's data compressor while I'm at it.
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Might as well just proxy all my stuff through the NSA's data compressor while I'm at it.
I thought that was what they said? They did say Google right? NSA spelled any other way is still NSA.
Did anybody else read that as 'Data Server'? (Score:2)
Already done (Score:2)
Anyone remember opera turbo?
http://www.opera.com/turbo [opera.com]