I recently installed the beta version of Google Chrome. After many years of using Internet Explorer and Firefox, I have to say that Google Chrome is the easiest and fastest web browsing experience I’ve ever had.

Here are 10 reasons that I feel Google Chrome will dominate the web browsing world and crush the current competition:
 

1. Amazing tabbed page system - Chrome features tabbed pages like other web browsers out there. However, Chrome’s system shines above the rest because each tab can be drug outside the current window to open a new window. Reversely, each window or tab can be drug inside another Chrome window and added to the tabs. Very cool!
    
2. Tabs run independently in memory - In Internet Explorer and Firefox, the current window and its tabs share the same place in memory (RAM). This means that if one tabbed page crashses, the whole browser will crash. In Chrome, the tabs have their own place in memory, independent of the actual browser window itself. When a tabbed page in Chrome crashes, it will not affect the other tabs or the browser.  So if you’re working on a long post in one tab and listening to music in another, and the tab with the music application crashes, then it won’t affect the tab with your post and all your hard work won’t be lost.
    
3. Simple and silent downloads - You know how downloading a file in Internet Explorer or Firefox means opening a download box prompting you if you want to save the file or a download manager that just gets in the way? Well this isn’t the case in Google’s new browser. In Chrome, when you click to download something, no box opens up and nothing gets in the way of your browsing. Your download shows up in the status bar as well as its progress. When the download is finished, you can click it to open the file or just leave it there and keep browsing. Simple. Discrete. Unobtrusive.
    
4. Incognito Mode - This is a nice feature that allows you to browse the Internet without any of the websites you visit or files you download being saved in history. Also, when you close the browser, Chrome automatically clears your cookies of the websites you’ve visited. This is nice if you wanted to do something like search for presents for your family without them getting on and knowing what sites you went to or looking at content that is not suitable for your children.
    
5. Security alerts when visiting possibly harmful websites - Rather than dealing with several security options that you have to set, Google Chrome automatically alerts you when visiting a site that may be potentially destructive to your computer, either through phishing, malware, or some other harmful software. When you click a link or go to an address that may be unsafe, Chrome brings up a page that says “Warning: Visiting this site may harm your computer!” From there, you can use your best judgment to either exit the tab or if you feel the site is safe, proceed to the site.
    
6. Viewing the source of a page - Viewing the source of a page is pretty much the same as it is in any other browser. You right click the page and click “View page source.” However, instead of opening Notepad with the source in it, you get another tab with the HTML in it with everything in easy-to-read color. The page source is displayed with a built in function called view-source. So if you knew a site you wanted to view the source of, but didn’t feel like actually going to that site, right clicking, and clicking “View page source,” you could simply open a new tab and type view-source:http://url-of-the-page-source-you-want-to-view. 
    
7. The V8 Javascript Engine - Google Chrome features a built in virtual machine for Javascript, known as V8. V8 was built from the ground up and is designed for large web applications, rather than small ones like most Javascript engines. V8 also translates Javascript code into direct machine level code, unlike other engines that create an interpretation of the code and have to constantly look at the code interpretation. V8 simply compiles the machine language code and it runs. The major feature of the V8 engine is its precise garbage collection. This allows for faster clean up of unreferenced objects as well as quick garbage collection round-trips that perform in milliseconds, rather than seconds like other virtual Javascript engines. All in all, with V8 you get faster performance while interacting with web applications (like smoother drag and drops) and bigger, better, more inventive web apps.
    
8. Easy to use bookmarks - Bookmarks with Chrome have never been easier. You simply click the start icon next to the address bar and select where you want the bookmark to go. You can put the bookmark on the “Bookmark bar”, which is located directly beneath the address bar (or OMNIBOX as Google calls it). Along with this feature is the ability to import your favorites/bookmarks, history, search engines, and saved passwords from Internet Explorer and Firefox.
    
9. Simple, fast, and effective design - One of the first things you’ll notice about Google Chrome is it’s simple design. The top of the browser is compact and stylish unlike others that include multiple bars (address, toolbars, menu bar, title bar, etc). The buttons coincide well with each other and are simple, easy to use, and easy to understand. There’s also no tacky status bar. Overall, the design just makes sense.
    
10. It’s made by Google - Whether you’d like to admit it or not, Google is taking over the web. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that it’s already taken over. When software is released from Google, you know it’s going to be great because they know what they’re doing. Just look at their search engine. They pretty much reinvented the wheel with that. Google is making Chrome open source, meaning programmers can download the source code and play around with it. Open source means faster development of the browser (through programmer submitted code) and more features (maybe other programmers can develop new features that Google didn’t think of).

It’s crazy that Google Chrome is only in it’s beta. According to Google, the browser is “far from done.” This fact is true, since there have been numerous bug reports since the first beta release. However, that is what beta is, a public testing of software. Google is already hard at work on fixing these bugs, fine tuning the browser, and hopefully adding new features.

I look forward to what Google has in store for Chrome in the future. Hopefully this write up helps you make the decision on whether or not to install the browser that is swiftly redefining the way we use the web.