Online search giant Google has stepped in the browser space. Following the releases by Mozilla (Firefox 3) and Microsoft (IE 8 beta 2), here comes Google (Chrome).

Google vice-president of product management Sindar Pichai and engineering director Linus Upson in a co- authored blog said “We realised that the Web had evolved from mainly simple text pages to rich, interactive applications and that we needed to completely rethink the browser,”

Google prefers to call it “a fresh take on the browser” and claims chrome is designed to handle media-rich and highly complex Web applications, efficiently and faster.

Chrome, is an open-source browser software, it means programmers can edit & add their own features into its code. In such case Chrome poses a great threat to current browsers basically designed to handle text and graphics. Google released Chrome (public beta) for Microsoft Corporation Windows’ users on September 2. Chrome will be available free to net users of over 100 countries via Google’s official blog. And soon, versions for Apple Macintosh and Linux will arrive.

Till now, Google had openly & actively supported Firefox . Google helped Firefox financially as well as technically for bug reporting system and making Firefox more secure. Advertising partnership with Google helped Firefox spread heavily. Coz of which, as per non-profitable Mozilla Foundation’s financials for 2006, 85% or around $57 million of company’s $67 million annual revenues came from Google. Recently Google extended its advertising alliance with Firefox till 2011. Firefox ranks second most popular browser, with market share of more than 10 per cent. Only Firefox has challenged Microsoft’s monopoly over the browser market.

John Lilly, chief executive of Mozilla Corp said in a blog, “It should come as no real surprise that Google has done something here, their business is the Web, and they’ve got clear opinions on how things should be, and smart people thinking about how to make things better.” John as well as Google have assured that Mozilla and Google would continue to collaborate together and also with others where it made sense for both organisations.

Dean Hachamovitch, General Manager of Internet Explorer at Microsoft said “The browser landscape is highly competitive, but people will choose Internet Explorer 8 for the way it puts the services they want right at their fingertips, respects their personal choices about how they want to browse and, more than any other browsing technology, puts them in control of their personal data online,”

Whom will Chrome strike more, Firefox or Microsoft IE? Get it Google (Chrome).

“The fundamental skill of a designer is talent. Talent is a rare commodity. It’s all intuition. And you can’t teach intuition.” –Paul Rand, 1996

Paul Rand, one of the most influential graphic designers of the 20th century.

Song: Quit Playing Games
Artist/Singer(s): Backstreet Boys

Even in my heart I see
You’re not bein’ true to me
Deep within my soul I feel
Nothing’s like it used to be
Sometimes I wish I could turn back time
Impossible as it may seem
But I wish I could so bad baby
Quit playin’ games with my heart
Chorus
Quit playin’ games with my heart
Before you tear us apart
I should’ve known from the start
Before you got in my heart
I live my life the way
To keep you comin’ back to me
Everything I do is for you
So what is it that you can’t see
Sometimes I wish I could
Turn back time, impossible as it may seem
But I wish I could so bad
You better quit playin’ games with my heart
Chorus
Quit playin’ games
Baby, baby the love that we had was so strong
Don’t leave me hangin’ here forever
Oh baby, baby this is not a lie, let’s stop this tonight
Baby, quit playin’ games
Sometimes I wish I could
Turn back time, impossible as it may seem
But I wish I could so bad, baby
Quit playin’ games with my heart
Chorus

To change the default search engine box on the top-right corner of FireFox:

This is how you can change it:

in the address bar of FireFox, type: “about:config”

In the box marked filter, type: “browser.search.defaultenginename”

Double click the value field or right click and choose Modify that value, by in the name of the search engine you wish to have as the default search engine. It must be one that you already have installed and also make sure you type in the name correctly.

Now if you type in “Yahoo”, restart Firefox and when your browser comes back you will see “red Yahoo Logo” and Yahoo as your default search engine box.

Then save that by pressing “Ok”.

Every browser like FireFox or IE does searches on a default search engine set some where in its configuration. Changing this default search engine is a little bit tricky, but not anymore. Deepak, my friend, installed a chat software from RediffBol which also changed the default search engine as Rediff Search but he now wants to change it back to Google [my fav].

This is how you can get it done:

in the address bar of FireFox, type: “about:config”

In the box marked filter, type: “keyword.url”

Double click the value field and modify that value, by pasting:

“http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=”

Then save that by pressing “Ok”.

Now, you can use your address bar just as google search bar. Go nuts, since now you can search by entering the search terms in the address bar and pressing enter. This way you never need to visit www.google.com again!!!