Introducing Google Chrome OS

Google's recent re-labeling of it's applications from Beta to official has culminated in an announcement on their blog that they will be entering the operating system market with their long-anticipated Google OS, or Google Chrome OS as they would like to call it.

Since the launch of it's Android OS for mobile phones, it became clear that this sleeping giant is not just a one trick search engine pony. And with the market for netbooks increasing, currently 8% of the market share, PC manufacturers will welcome the competition to challenge Microsoft prices for software licensing.

This new emerging market is crucial as sales of these lighter and cheaper computers continues to grow. Microsoft's current OS, Windows Vista, is simply too big and cumbersome to install and run on the smaller hard drives and RAM. So they've had to extend the life of Windows XP which it officially killed off in June 2007.

With the migration of expandable storage and software online, Google has allowed Chrome to run on varying machine sizes. It can even be run on the chip that powers the Apple iPhone. Online usage is the key issue, where computers are no longer limited by their physical constraints. Google has also addressed users without internet connection with the launch of it's offline software, Google Gears.

With Microsoft Bing's recent foray into the search engine business, it looks like Google is fighting back. Interesting times are ahead.

Read more on Guardian Online.