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0 pointsbzbarsky11y ago0 comments

Last I checked, the bits of Chrome that aren't in Chromium are:

1) PDF viewer. 2) Flash. 3) Some audio/video codec support (e.g. Chromium has no support for MP3, AAC, H.264, or the MP4 container format; see <http://www.chromium.org/audio-video>). 4) Crash reporting, metrics, that sort of thing.

#1 and #2 are certainly closed-source. I can't speak to #3. [EDIT: as surrealize points out, #1 is no longer closed-source.]

From an end-user perspective, there's a significant difference between "browser that will play the music and the videos and show me the PDFs" and "browser that will not do those things". Chromium, while open source, is really not a viable end-user browser on today's internet.

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6 comments · 3 top-level

mod11y ago· 2 in thread

> From an end-user perspective, there's a significant difference between "browser that will play the music and the videos and show me the PDFs" and "browser that will not do those things". Chromium, while open source, is really not a viable end-user browser on today's internet.

I don't think so, because really it's a difference between "will show the pdf..." and "will launch a program to show the pdf."

As a full time Chromium user, I've had frustrations twice--once trying to figure out why Netflix didn't work after I had heard it "now worked on linux," and the other with an app called mightytext that was doing a very stupid redirect loop forever in Chromium, but not Chrome.

That's over the course of a year or so.

bzbarskyOP11y ago

I've done some user support, and browsers showing PDFs in an external app instead of inline is an extremely common user complaint.

Not only that, but PDFs embedded via <object> don't get shown in external apps in any browser. And this does in fact happen. For example, if you want to get your pay stubs or W2s via https://portal.adp.com you end up dealing with just such a setup.

I realize anecdotes aren't data, but this also applies to your anecdote; you're very much not a typical end user (starting with the fact that you're using Linux!).

I should note that "Netflix doesn't work" is probably a deal-breaker for the average user all on its own.

mod11y ago

I have half a dozen devices that play netflix. Wii, chromecast, phone, tablet--and it's really not hard to switch to chrome to watch netflix.

I'll agree I'm not a typical end-user, but I don't remember having to "work hard" to get anything I wanted out of Chromium.

I troubleshoot every little problem for every member of my mostly tech-illiterate family, and I don't remember ever having this problem (like before PDFs would open in browsers, say).

Anyway, just more anecdotes.

surrealize11y ago· 1 in thread

It looks like they open-sourced the PDF viewer:

http://www.infoq.com/news/2014/06/google-chrome-pdf-engine-f...

bzbarskyOP11y ago

Oh, I'd missed that happening. Thank you for pointing that out!

nsgi11y ago

Also, Widevine.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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6 comments · 3 top-level

mod11y ago· 2 in thread

I don't think so, because really it's a difference between "will show the pdf..." and "will launch a program to show the pdf."

That's over the course of a year or so.

bzbarskyOP11y ago

I've done some user support, and browsers showing PDFs in an external app instead of inline is an extremely common user complaint.

I realize anecdotes aren't data, but this also applies to your anecdote; you're very much not a typical end user (starting with the fact that you're using Linux!).

I should note that "Netflix doesn't work" is probably a deal-breaker for the average user all on its own.

mod11y ago

I have half a dozen devices that play netflix. Wii, chromecast, phone, tablet--and it's really not hard to switch to chrome to watch netflix.

I'll agree I'm not a typical end-user, but I don't remember having to "work hard" to get anything I wanted out of Chromium.

I troubleshoot every little problem for every member of my mostly tech-illiterate family, and I don't remember ever having this problem (like before PDFs would open in browsers, say).

Anyway, just more anecdotes.

surrealize11y ago· 1 in thread

It looks like they open-sourced the PDF viewer:

http://www.infoq.com/news/2014/06/google-chrome-pdf-engine-f...

bzbarskyOP11y ago

Oh, I'd missed that happening. Thank you for pointing that out!

nsgi11y ago

Also, Widevine.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse