Google stomps dozens of Chrome bugs
Two developer preview releases in quick succession tidied up a lot of problems and withdrew a profiles feature until it can be revamped. Is a new beta in the works?
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Google released a new developer preview version of Chrome Friday that fixed more than 150 bugs--then another version Monday that fixed about a dozen more.
Chrome 2.0.169.0 is a version of the browser geared for people who want the latest builds and are willing to put up with bugs and crashes. It's also a preview of things to come in the more reliable "stable" and "beta" versions.
When using predecessors, I have been annoyed chiefly with long periods of unresponsiveness, but I can hardly complain given that they've been only developer preview versions. Perhaps, though, this spate of fixes indicates an effort to stabilize things a bit for a new beta version based on the 2.x code.
One hint that might be the case is in the removal of the user profiles feature, a technology that could let you browse the Web with different electronic personas but that caused problems on the Mac version of Chrome that's in the works.
"We have decided not to support the current profile implementation in Beta or Stable," said Chrome Program Manager Mark Larson in a note on the Chromium developer site. And Jonathan Conradt, engineering program manager, added in a blog post, "We want to take this feature back to the drawing board before releasing it."