How Google invented chrome?

Priyalakshmi
4 min readMay 25, 2021

You have to read this viral story about how Google invented Chrome

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Before that we have a brief about google chrome.

Google Chrome is a cross-platform web browser developed by Google. It was first released in 2008 for Microsoft Windows built with free software components from Apple WebKit and Mozilla Firefox. It was later ported to Linux, macOS, iOS, and Android where it is the default browser built into the OS. The browser is also the main component of Chrome OS, where it serves as the platform for web applications.

Most of Chrome’s source code comes from Google’s free and open-source software project Chromium, but Chrome is licensed as proprietary freeware. WebKit was the original rendering engine, but Google eventually forked it to create the Blink engine; all Chrome variants except iOS now use Blink.

As of March 2021, StatCounter estimates that Chrome has a 66% worldwide browser market share (after peaking at 72.38% in November 2018) on personal computers (PC), is also dominant on mobile, and has caught up with Safari on tablets (or about a percent-point below at 42.33%), and at 63.59% across all platforms combined. Because of this success, Google has expanded the “Chrome” brand name to other products: Chrome OS, Chromecast, Chromebook, Chromebit, Chromebox, and Chromebase.

Password management

Windows

Since 2008, Chrome has been faulted for not including a master password to prevent casual access to a user’s passwords. Chrome developers have indicated that a master password does not provide real security against determined hackers and have refused to implement one. Bugs filed on this issue have been marked “WontFix”. As of February 2014, Google Chrome asks the user to enter the Windows account password before showing saved passwords.

Now we will move on to the trending story .How Google invented Chrome?

Search might be the cornerstone of Google, but trying to improve its search engine hasn’t been the company’s only priority over the years. It was only a matter of time until Google launched its own browser, and Chrome quickly became the world’s most popular browser. The service evolved considerably since its inception, and it’s still the dominant player in the industry. Chrome can be pretty annoying, especially when it comes to resource use and Google’s user tracking technologies, but no other browser has knocked it off of its throne.

But people might not realize that if it were up to long-time Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Google Chrome would have never seen the light of day. The story of how Google invented Chrome went viral online as a 2015 video surfaced with Schmidt telling the hilarious story.

Schmidt was the CEO of Google from 2001 through 2011. He continued as executive chairman through 2015 and then became the executive chairman of Google’s new parent, Alphabet. In 2017, he moved to the position of Technical Advisor at Alphabet, staying through 2020. Google Chrome was released for Windows in 2008. These dates are all essential for the story that follows.

Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma posted on Twitter a video of Schmidt during a 2015 lecture at Stanford University. During the lecture, Schmidt recollected that Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin would play tricks on him while he was the CEO of Google.

One such trick involved the creation of Chrome. Page and Brin would often come to him telling him they wanted to build an operating system and a browser. Schmidt would always turn them away, saying they’re not in the position to do that, as Microsoft would “kill” them.

“And I said there was no scenario we were going to do an operating system and a browser because Microsoft would kill us, and I don’t want to get killed,” Schmidt recounted, adding that he had been “killed” at other jobs.

Ultimately, Page and Brin hired someone to improve the performance of Firefox,” Schmidt said. “Six months later, I am called down to one office, and this person who was hired to improve the performance of Firefox has managed to invent Chrome,” the former Google CEO recalled. “Shocking!”

Schmidt asked the person how long they’ve been working on Chrome, and they said they’ve been doing it on the side. “No, you have done it full-time,” Schmidt told that engineer, asking how many people they had under them. “Oh, we have ten more people,” the Google employee informed Schmidt, confirming that Page and Brin knew about the project and encouraged it.

“I knew they were going around me,” Schmidt said. The rest is history, as they say, as Chrome is now the biggest internet browser on the planet.

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