The wait is over; you can now install extensions on Chrome’s latest dev built. The feature is still not included in the browser; users have to add a command line parameter to enable extensions on the latest built.  It’s simple, worry not!

Currently there are 3 sample extensions available for installation,

1. Gmail Checker: Displays a toolstrip that shows how many messages are in your Gmail inbox.
2. Subscribe in Google Reader: Provides easy access to subscribe to a webpage’s feed in Google Reader.
3. BuildBot Monitor: Shows the current status of the Chromium Build Bot.

I installed all three of them and they come in pretty handy, at least the first two certainly do!

Update 16th-Dec: Best Chrome Extensions!

The following image shows the installed extensions

All set to install the extensions? Alright!

1. First make sure you have the latest dev built on your machine, get it here.
2. Next, rightclick on the chrome icon, click on properties and add “–enable-extensions” at the end of the target field and click “Apply”.

Once the parameter is added, start the browser and visit the Sample extension page, here.

I found two more extensions other than the official ones

1. GreaseMetal Script: This is a GreasMonkey-like script for Firefox which works with Chrome [link]
2. AdSweep: A popular ad-removing plugin for Chrome [link]

Have fun installing chrome plugins and leave a comment if you find new plugins!

ChromeExperiments.com is one such example. Applications showcased on this site are mostly built on JavaScript technologies and are a showcase of out-of-the-box thinking and creativity. These Applications/Experiments might not be put to use as it is, however, they serve their purpose of demonstrating the power of JavaScript and the Browser.

Following are the top 5 experiments from the bunch.. (I recommend viewing these experiments in Google Chrome. Click here to download Chrome if you don’t have it installed already)

BallDroppings: It’s a musical app which looks like pong. The balls are dropped one after the other, users can draw lines/bars to keep the balls from going off the screen. The balls bounce off the bar drawn on the screen creating a sound every time a ball hits the bar.  

Click here to launch the experiment or watch the video below to see it in action.

Browser Ball: This is another fun application which shows the power of JavaScript and how well Chrome handles it.

All you have to do is Open windows and throw the ball through them. Not only that but you can also add new windows on the fly.

Click here to launch the app or watch the following video to see it in action

Ball Pool: Ball Pool works on the laws of physics. Shake the browser, move or throw the balls around and see how the browser and see how the onscreen objects react to it.

From the Author:  Start by shaking the browser, then create new balls (click on empty space), move some others (drag) and reset the screen (double click).

It’s like the old days once again!

Click here to launch the experiment or watch the following video to see the app in action

Boombox: This application lets you control the volume of the sound by resizing the channel window.

For demo purpose the application plays a song online, however, it would be great if it can be integrated with any of the music services online.

Click here to launch the application or watch the video below to see the app in action

Monster: This application demonstrates how JavaScript is used instead of Flash to create 3D objects and animation in the browser.

Click here to launch the animation or watch the video below to see it in action.

Microsoft takes a more informative approach in trying to explain how browser benchmarking should be done and justifying their claim that Internet Explorer is faster than other browsers.

The testing team picked up TOP 25 sites from ComScore in December and started testing load speed across three browsers, Internet Explorer, FireFox and Chrome.  Results showed that IE won 48% of the times as opposed to Chrome’s 36% and Firefox’s 16%.

The following spreadsheet shows you all the 25 sites tested, their load times, and the winning browser.

The post also released a video which takes you through some of the details behind the whole benchmarking techniques and process. It also shows a few sites being put through the test.

Watch the video below

IE8 Performance

Well, I can’t disagree with the numbers and stuff but it’s just hard to believe IE is faster! Anyway that’s just me.

You can get more details from the whitepaper Microsoft released about the benchmarking and performance analysis.  Click here to download!

The release does not offer any new features including the support of Add-on’s. The upgrade is highly recommended as it offers security fix.

Google Chrome will automatically update itself as it is programmed to check for updates every 5 hours and download and install the latest releases as often as possible.

Without a manual check, Chrome will update itself automatically, Google said. "Google Chrome will automatically checks for updates approximately every five hours. If an update is available, it will be downloaded and applied at the next browser restart, Google said.

Google has decided that it know whats best for its users than the users themselves. The version of Chrome sitting on your machine will update automatically whenever there is a new release, bug or a security fix. According to Google, updates don’t have to depend on what users decide.

"Users do not get a notification when they are updated … When there are security fixes, it’s crucial that we update our users as quickly as possible in order to keep them safe. Thus, it’s important for us to not require user intervention," the company said in a statement

Users like you an I who cannot wait for the browser to be updated by itself can update it by going to Settings -> About Google Chrome.

As I already said it all began with http://blogoscoped.com/ which started the post with these words:

Google Chrome, Google’s Browser Project

Today there was a comic book in my mail, sent by Google and drawn by no less than Scott McCloud, creator of the classic Understanding Comics.

Google Chrome is Google’s open source browser project. As rumored before under the name of “Google Browser”, this will be based on the existing rendering engine Webkit. Furthermore, it will include Google’s Gears project.

We just know that this was the first blog on Internet that brought the news. Unfortunately we do not know who was second to blog about it. So we are just going to randomly pick other famous blogs.

Let’s see what techcrunch, has been writing about Google Chrome. OMG, in 2 days there are 9 posts and some of them updated very regularly. I think I’ll just put down the titles of the posts done by TechCrunch and move on to other blogs.

• Lehman: Google Chrome Can Catch Up To Firefox In Two Years
• Google Chrome Not So Lively
• Google Chrome Press Event: The Video
• GetClicky Analytics Service Tracking 2% Google Chrome Usage
• Giving Google Chrome A Spin. This Thing Moves Fast.
• Live From Google Chrome Press Event
• Meet Chrome, Google’s Windows Killer
• First Images of Google Chrome
• No Joke: Google Introduces The Chrome Browser With A Cartoon

There is an interesting post by TechCrunch titled GetClicky Analytics Service Tracking 2% Google Chrome Usage. I think it’s not fair to give a wrong picture to the users with a post like this. The main reason is that GetClicky tracking service that’s being used on very few blogs, cannot give validity to the 2% chrome usage. I mean let’s stop having fancy titles to our post just to fool people into reading them.

ReadWriteWeb also did close to 4 posts since Sep 1 and the most useful and interesting post is Serious Security Flaw in Google Chrome. It talks about how Google chrome could be exploited as it’s using the older version of WebKit which has a reported security flaw.

The other post from ReadWriteWeb on Google chrome are:

Mashable did 4 post since the news of chrome getting launched. The post Google Chrome a Killer Browser Already (screencast) is pretty interesting as it talks about how chrome is faster than firefox. I am not sure if the author, did the comparison with firefox’s clean profile without a single extension. I leave it for the readers to decide what they feel.

The other posts from Mashable are as follows:

LifeHacker has a very decent post comparing the 3 browser for speed on various parameters. You can read the post here. Following are the other posts.