Google Is No Longer Bringing the Full Chrome Browser To Fuchsia (9to5google.com) 24
Google has formally discontinued its efforts to bring the full Chrome browser experience to its Fuchsia operating system. 9to5Google reports: In 2021, we reported that the Chromium team had begun an effort to get the full Chrome/Chromium browser running on Google's in-house Fuchsia operating system. Months later, in early 2022, we were even able to record a video of the progress, demonstrating that Chromium (the open-source-only variant of Chrome) could work relatively well on a Fuchsia-powered device. This was far from the first time that the Chromium project had been involved with Fuchsia. Google's full lineup of Nest Hub smart displays is currently powered by Fuchsia under the hood, and those displays have limited web browsing capabilities through an embedded version of the browser.
In contrast to that minimal experience, Google was seemingly working to bring the full might of Chrome to Fuchsia. To observers, this was yet another signal that Google intended for Fuchsia to grow beyond the smart home and serve as a full desktop operating system. After all, what good is a laptop or desktop without a web browser? Fans of the Fuchsia project have anticipated its eventual expansion to desktop since Fuchsia was first shown to run on Google's Pixelbook hardware. However, in the intervening time -- a period that also saw significant layoffs in the Fuchsia division -- it seems that Google has since shifted Fuchsia in a different direction. The clearest evidence of that move comes from a Chromium code change (and related bug tracker post) published last month declaring that the "Chrome browser on fuchsia won't be maintained."
In contrast to that minimal experience, Google was seemingly working to bring the full might of Chrome to Fuchsia. To observers, this was yet another signal that Google intended for Fuchsia to grow beyond the smart home and serve as a full desktop operating system. After all, what good is a laptop or desktop without a web browser? Fans of the Fuchsia project have anticipated its eventual expansion to desktop since Fuchsia was first shown to run on Google's Pixelbook hardware. However, in the intervening time -- a period that also saw significant layoffs in the Fuchsia division -- it seems that Google has since shifted Fuchsia in a different direction. The clearest evidence of that move comes from a Chromium code change (and related bug tracker post) published last month declaring that the "Chrome browser on fuchsia won't be maintained."
good! (Score:5, Insightful)
Great, let fuchsia die, we don't need another OS controlled by google, just to track you without any way to workaround and lock hardware behind their selected "partners"
Even if that wasn't a problem, it is yet another project that google will kill sooner or later, leaving millions of devices without support
Re: good! (Score:3)
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Yet another OS that was supposed to replace Android and/or Chrome -- I say both because not even Google knows what to do with it. Don't be surprised when it ends up in the Google Graveyard in a few years. /s
Recently [arstechnica.com] the Fuschia team lost 16% of the 400 person team (around 64 people.)
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No need for the /s there. Google has been hyping Fuschia for almost a decade, dropping lots of hints that it will eventually replace Android (or Android will move from Linux to Fuschia as its base) and it's yet to actually do anything. It will be killed as a project eventually, there's just nothing of value there.
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Google struggles even to get vendors to upstream their drivers to Linus' kernel.org tree for Chrome OS and Android.
Imagine if Google had to write drivers themselves for every miscellaneous piece of hardware.
A capabilities-based secure microkernel is good in theory but if you have to fall back to running Linux in a hypervisor to get any real work done, what's the value? c.f. Chrome OS already runs Android, Chrome the browser, and crostini the Linux environment as 3 separate VMs and both OSes share the same h
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So kind of like Gnu Hurd...
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Officially it's known as Fuchal, or the Promised Land. As depicted in the Book of Smeg.
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> What the fuck is fuscia?
Isn't that the guitar player in Red Hot Chili Peppers?
Re:good! (Score:4, Informative)
It seems like an interesting OS idea, harking back to the WorkPlace OS days when IBM and Apple were making an OS that would work everywhere.
What I see is one issue is that the OS doesn't really have a great niche. If I want a bare-bones OS that is for limited environments, there are things designed for that. If I need dedicated security, QNX or INTEGRITY come to mind. If I want something that can run on almost anything but an abacus, a Linux build can be good enough.
Then, there are development tools. If you do any development on Linux, you have a ton of tools, documentation, and people who know what they are doing. Another OS like Fuchsia, it can be far more limited.
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It seems like an interesting OS idea, harking back to the WorkPlace OS days when IBM and Apple were making an OS that would work everywhere.
We have an OS that will work everywhere. It's called Linux with a GNU Userland and X11. It will run on fairly pathetic hardware (albeit with unmaintained kernels now since Linux has been abandoning the old stuff) and it will also run on the newest and fastest hardware around.
Google fucked around and found out what everyone else is finding out, making a modern OS is really really hard to do from scratch. The last successful effort was BeOS, and the state of the art has advanced since. Even BeOS built on othe
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Beos and successful do not belong in the same sentence.
Which word confused you?
sorry for your niche OS, but it failed. move on.
I'm sorry too, because I think it would have moved things forward for Apple users much more than did NeXTStep. But I'm not super sorry, because I never spent much money dipping my toe into that generation of Macintosh.
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What Google needed to do is find a niche for their OS. For example, some OS that can run well on Apple ][ level CPUs which a lot of cheap microcontrollers are. What would be nice is a sophisticated OS for the market for MCU tier components and stuff that runs on 8-16 bit architectures, stuff where a Linux kernel will not fit. An OS that is modular, and can have various sizes/complexities of items, such as for security, devices attached, and so on. Ideally, hard real time capability too.
It is easier to u
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For example, some OS that can run well on Apple ][ level CPUs which a lot of cheap microcontrollers are.
It's so crazy cheap to get a little ARM core MCU now. Is anyone really still using a 6502 or equivalent where they need multiple tasks? I feel like that'd be chasing a disappearing niche. I get that if you're making a jillion of something cheap there's a savings to be had, but most of those things don't strike me as needing an OS.
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ARM core MCUs are dirt cheap (a penny, apparently). Having an OS that can use the most out of those little CPUs with their limited environments would be useful. However, for most things, there isn't really a need for that, but it is always cool to be able to run an office suite on something like that.
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I still find it amusing that the only way I can remember how to spell "fuchsia" is by saying "fucks-yer" in my head.
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Too much like work (Score:2)
Smart people don't like work. They use their superior intellect to get interns to do it. Modern interns don't like work either, and don't try to make them do it or they will go work for Spacex. Bugger.
It's fucking Google, after all (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, at least I can't say... (Score:2)
Well at least now I can't say "I never heard of Fuchsia" on the day they announce it's being terminated.
Fuchsia not that great, huh? (Score:2)
Well. Google cares about ads, nothing else. Everything else is just a side-show or misdirection.
Typical Google (Score:2)
Another project with no fuchsia.