2d ago

Google confirms it's 'combining' Chrome OS and Android into a single platform

www.androidauthority.com

Sameer Samat, president of Android ecosystem at Google, asked a TechRadar journalist why they were using an Apple Watch, iPhone, and MacBook:

I asked because we’re going to be combining Chrome OS and Android into a single platform, and I am very interested in how people are using their laptops these days and what they’re getting done.

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Closed ecosystems are one of the reasons I don't use an Apple Watch, iPhone, or MacBook. I know I'm not the typical target consumer, but I'm not that special. There are a lot of people who specifically avoid convergence.
- This one might be different. Many Chromebook owners mostly use Android Apps when not browsing in Chrome. Chromebook tablets are great, for instance, because they are basically Android tablets with full desktop Chrome (I still use FF, though).
  Adding a full desktop browser to Android would realistically remove the need for ChromeOS, and be more efficient since it would remove the emulation requirement.

A decade ago this would have been exciting news for mobile computing.
Enough has changed that all I can think is, uuugh.
- Enough has changed that all I can think is, uuugh. This is exactly my feeling. While I still consider Google to be the lesser evil out of all the big tech companies. They have been in freefall in the last decade. Just the amount of telemetries give me shivers.
  Also, it will be a license nightmare. As far as I know, Chrome OS is proprietary and actual Android has proper open source license.
  
  Parts of Chrome OS are available, parts aren't. Parts of Android are available, parts aren't. Neither are really Open Source, but both have Open Source parts.
  
  As far as I know, Chrome OS is proprietary
  It's only proprietary in much the same way as Android. That's why there are forks like FydeOS.
- Two decades ago people would remember when M$ decided to do something very similar on the desktop. Nothing has changed.
  
  I'll thank you not to refer to 2012 as "two decades ago." Felt like I drank from the wrong grail, before double-checking when Windows 8 came out.
- Exactly my feelings.

pls someone take android away from google before they ruin it even more.

Oh god they are getting rid of adblock on Android too :D
- Hopefully everyone can start dumping support into Linux for mobile
  
  I'm hoping for this too. All it takes is someone figuring out verified boot and encryption and I'm jumping ship. Could not care less about battery life or optimization, I am rarely far from a charger or portable battery.
  
  Android is way better than any Linux device I've used. It is very solid security wise and has apps made for mobile. Mobile Linux feels clunky since the apps are typically ported from the desktop.
  It would be better if there was a Android fork with lots of momentum and money.
- ???
  Unless they ban installations from 3rd party stores, I don't see how that can happen.
  You could always install firefox from F-Droid
  With the EU's Digital Markets Act, I think its gonna be quite difficult to ban 3rd party installations, I mean unless they pull an apple and make 2 versions of the OS for EU vs rest of the world?
  
  Manifest 3

Apple doesn't exactly try to converge OS platform, even forking off iPad OS from iOS.
Microsoft's converged desktop and tablet OS hasn't been well regarded.
Google's efforts to make Android well suited on tablets has been poorly maintained.
I did find ChromeOS Flex on an old Surface Pro 3 to be a pretty good tablet experience. I'm cautiously optimistic about this, though I haven't tried the desktop mode on my Pixel 7.
- Apple doesn’t exactly try to converge OS platform, even forking off iPad OS from iOS
  It is more that they couldn't figure out how - but they keep on slowly removing bits of all three and making all of them act the same way, so eventually they will be one bloated monolith if they continue down this path.
  
  Well iPad and iPhone did have the same OS at first, so they knew how to do that. I would have preferred when they forked iPad OS out for them to have converged desktop and iPad instead of making a 3rd distinct OS variant. I can't reasonably say that a docked iPad is the same as a Mac, as commercial apps I use have different versions, with different capabilities, for iPad and Mac. Things like Adobe Lightroom andIK Multimedia Amplitube. But my Surface Pro has one set of apps whether I'm docked at home, using a clamshell keyboard case, or as a tablet and pen. That's more useful to me than having a really well polished and dedicated tablet OS.
- Lineage works great on the Galaxy Tabs that support it

Considering Google's failure to support the tablet form factor on Android (many 1st party Google apps have much better versions for the iPad), I am skeptical this will lead to anything good.
- Their ChromeOS tablets suck as well. The only reason for me to buy Google hardware is to put GrapheneOS on it.
- I miss the era around the release of Android 4 where there were all sorts of interesting 10" Android tablets coming out.

It's sort of an open secret for years now. But I'm not totally convinced that it will work well.
I have a Chromebook with a Ryzen APU (Ryzen 3250 or smth). And while it handles all web tasks really well, it completely struggles with Android Apps. Even apps like "YouTube Kids" or "Prime Video" run far worse than their web couterparts.
And I'm not even talking about gaming - even old games like "cut the rope" run at unplayable framerates.
(my guess is that the whole virtualization framework is holding these apps back.)
- I have a Chromebook with a Ryzen APU (Ryzen 3250 or smth). And while it handles all web tasks really well, it completely struggles with Android Apps. Even apps like “YouTube Kids” or “Prime Video” run far worse than their web couterparts.
  That's why future ChromeOS won't be a dedicated OS with an Android running in a VM. They'll be actual Android.

this is pretty good news, seeing ChromeOS supports Linux apps and is wayland-based now
- It would be nice if it way all unified so that Linux apps would run on any Android device.
- I think this is precisely why they added Linux support to Android.
- Supports Linux apps poorly.

"No shit."
Everyone who remembers that announcement that chromebooks would run android apps.
- I'm thinking this is the opposite direction, with the enhanced desktop mode in Android 16. You hook your phone up to a KVM and get Chrome desktop, complete with containerized Linux apps and your mobile apps staying on your mobile device.

This is such a good business move
Android would really help to increase competition in the desktop space.

Which I will never use, thank you very much.

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