browser

The Web browser is the most-used kind of software in the world, having become the de facto way that people access the Internet. Today, virtually all computing tasks can be completed in the browser.

Testing browsers can veer from incredibly complex to shockingly simple, depending on what you're looking for and why. At CNET, we prefer a holistic approach to browser benchmarking, looking at a combination of tests that benchmark general browser behavior, as well as several "real-world" tests that look at browser performance in common scenarios.

Those who've bought the low-cost Samsung Chromebook will be able to watch Netflix streaming video -- at some point.

"We are collaborating with Google on a solution for ARM-based Chromebooks," said Netflix spokesman Joris Evers last night.

He didn't share details on the company's schedule or its technical approach to bringing its service to Chrome OS, Google's browser-based operating system.

Most Web apps work just fine on the $249 Samsung Chromebook even though it has a Samsung ARM processor rather than the x86 chip found in all other computers running Google's Chrome OS. … Read more

Moving its PC line beyond Microsoft's Windows operating system by embracing Google's Chrome OS, Hewlett-Packard today announced the $330 Pavilion 14 Chromebook.

Samsung and Acer were the first to offer Chrome OS devices, with Lenovo following suit. Now HP evidently believes it's worth jumping on the bandwagon for the browser-based operating system, describing the Chromebook as part of its "multi-OS approach."

"Google's Chrome OS is showing great appeal to a growing customer base," said Kevin Frost, general manager of HP's Consumer PC, Printing, and Personal Systems group. "With HP's Chromebook, … Read more

Close your eyes and look beyond the Firefox, Chrome, IE, and Safari of today. Do you see a "stream browser"? David Gelernter does.

The Yale computer science professor has been musing about what comes next for all the digital information that swarms and surrounds us, and it has led him to write an op-ed piece on Wired called "The End of the Web, Search, and Computer as We Know It." The emphasis in the online time/space continuum, he says, will be shifting from the "space-based web" of the present day to a "… Read more

New mobile browsers including Google's Chrome, Microsoft's IE, and Amazon's Silk are gaining a foothold in a market that's growing faster than traditional browsing on personal computers.

The mobile browsing market has long been dominated by three products. Apple's Safari has long held the top spot in usage share measurements by Net Applications, with second place going to Google's unbranded Android browser after it surpassed Opera Mini last year.

Safari had 61.0 percent, the Android browser 21.5 percent, and Opera Mini 9.8 percent of usage in January, measurements released today show. … Read more

Mozilla Firefox (download for Windows, Mac, Linux, Android, or the Portable App) didn't invent tabbed browsing, but they sure as heck perfected it, or at least the extended network of extensions developers did. If Firefox doesn't include a tabbed-browsing feature you want, there's a good chance you can find one among its numerous add-ons.

Personally, I'm a tab glutton. I might be using a Windows XP box from 2004, but that doesn't stop me from running four Firefox windows with 10-15 tabs open in each. Each window usually relates to a specific task, project, or … Read more

Google is getting closer to building Google Now notifications into Chrome, marrying the anticipatory alert system of Android with its browser.

Yesterday, developers committed a patch with an "initial implementation of Google Now notifications."

According to the code, the patch means that "The Google Now event page gets Google Now cards from the server and shows them as Chrome notifications. The service performs periodic updating of Google Now cards."

Google's work to build Google Now into Chrome emerged in December. Although Android is Google's highest-profile operating system project, Google Now would ensure Chrome OS … Read more

To improve security and cut crashes, Firefox will block plug-ins including Microsoft Silverlight, Adobe Reader, Apple's QuickTime and Oracle's Java, Mozilla said.

Only the newest version of Adobe Systems' Flash Player will be run by default, said Michael Coates, Mozilla's director of security assurance, in a blog post yesterday.

Plug-ins extend a browser's ability to run software or handle different media and file formats, but that extra ability opens new avenues for attack. They've been a staple of Web development for years, but browser makers are working hard to reproduce their abilities directly with Web … Read more

Riding on the heels of the recent U.S. lawsuit against Google for Safari tracking, Apple users in the U.K. have now launched their own similar case against the Web giant.

Peeved that their online privacy was violated, roughly a dozen people are suing Google in a class action suit, according to The Guardian. The case alleges that Google secretly tracked their Internet habits via cookies in the Safari Web browser. The lawsuit revolves around the way Google may have sidestepped Apple's security settings on the iPhone, iPad, and desktop versions of Safari.

"This is the first … Read more