Once thing I still have hard time understanding is Chrome App Store and Google Chrome Apps. I'm guessing it's something akin to Adobe Air, but has there been any success stories with Air? Also, I feel like Chrome App Store goes against the idea of open web.
I'm tempted to go make fake HN accounts just so I can come back and up vote this more.
I can understand, if not personally endorse, the need for "apps" on smart phones where access to functionality like the accelerometer is not available through APIs used to create browser based apps, but Google's insistence on trying to push app stores in the browser will just lead to pointless balkanization of the open web.
I see it as Google's way to lock people in to the Chrome ecosystem. And they have quite a bit of pull and opportunity because of Drive and Android.
I do see the benefit of some apps (I love Pocket and Clearly). But in terms of usability, I have seen issues that haven't been sorted out yet, such as the interaction with Chrome Sign-In (on public computers, the app start pages start up every time you sign in). And I do think this focus on browser app development takes away some of the effort that should be done on the web itself.
It's the only way to make a "native" app on a Chromebook. As Chromebooks become more popular, these API's become more important (just like Android and iPhone API's).
Conveniently, you can still run them using desktop Chrome. Should be handy for development.
Besides Air, there was Mozilla's Prism/WebRunner/Chromeless, Fluid for OSX and several others. What advantage does Chrome Apps have other those previous failures?
Mozilla's Prism/WebRunner/Chromeless are all basically defunct, and Chrome Apps aren't really the same as those anyway. Chrome Apps and Firefox OS Apps are basically the same – and in both cases it's adding some extra APIs that web pages can't normally get access too, and an optional packaging format, and a little application-related metadata. Firefox Apps are a bit more cross-platform, as they look a bit more like native apps on normal desktop systems and on Android.
