Tablet Development Starts For Google Chrome OS By Jen Williams Expert Author Article Date: 2011-04-29 While Google is seen primarily as a web-services company, they've started their way into the realm of operating systems. First, the company conquered the smartphone arena with the deployment of the open-source Android project - now on version 2.3, codenamed Gingerbread. Android is the most popular OS for smartphones as of early 2011, and the market share seems to be increasing. However, Google is also pushing hard to get into the tablet OS market and into laptop/netbook operations. The initial efforts for both tablets and mobile computers deserve some attention. First, we have the "Honeycomb" version of Android. Honeycomb, the 3.0/3.x lineup for Android development, is optimized specifically for tablets - and pitches itself as being the only true tablet OS. Meanwhile, Google has also been hard at work on the Chrome OS project. Chrome OS, initially designed for netbooks, will be released later in 2011 for laptops and netbook computers. As a Linux-based interface, Chrome OS will be open-source. Among other merits, Chrome OS is incredibly minimalistic, designed for web use, and is (according to Google) the most secure OS in existence. Now these two projects are crossing wires or, perhaps, fusing into one project. The evidence was found in Chrome OS' most recent version, which included several new tablet-oriented developments. Most notably, Google added a touch keyboard, layout optimization for the touch environment, the ability to pull up the tablet version of visited websites, and development notes that specify opening Chrome OS to tablets. When asked about the additional features, a Chrome representative stated, "We are engaging in early open-source work for the tablet form factor, but we have nothing new to announce at this time." They also clarified that this is nothing new for Google's game plan, since the company had always hoped to open Chrome OS to various "form factors," including tablets. About the Author: Jen Williams is a guest author for Pronet Advertising.