Too Geek To Be True

Updated: If you want to run Chrome OS ‘right now’, check out my follow-up post here.

Many people were shocked when back in July this year, Google announced that they were working on an alternative Operating System (the piece of software which gives our computer hardware a soul), dubbed the Chrome OS!  What! Somebody is making Operating System, and it’s not Microsoft or Apple?! That was what’s on many people’s mind.
In one sense though, this shouldn’t be a big surprise for us, because if there is one entity who can challenge Microsoft or Apple domination in Operating System arena, it would be Google.

The most interesting thing about this Chrome OS is that it is based on an Internet Browser (in this case Google’s own Chrome Browser), and that the code will be an Open Source Project.  This means that, like Linux, and unlike Windows or Mac OS, people like you and me would be able to contribute to the development of this Operating System (provided that you understand programming of course).

So, what is Chrome OS? The following video will give you a basic understanding of what it’s all about.

Yesterday, the 19th of November, Google finally announced that they are releasing the Chrome OS to the public!
Here is the video from the Release Event:

And here is the demo of the Chrome OS running:

Google’s goal is to release Chrome OS to the mass by this time next year. In the mean time, you can sign-up here to get notified when it’s coming.  Or if you want to get involved in the development yourself, check out Chromium.org.

Or, if you want to see it running and play around with it now, the team at GDGT.com has managed to get it running, and you can download it for free. The only thing is you need to have VMWare Player (Fusion for Mac) or VirtualBox to run it.

Here is more video on some UI concept for the Chrome OS: