The have been some interesting discussions around Google's ChromeOS and what it represents as a CloudOS. Yet, many still perceive ChromeOS as just a thinner for of a DesktopOS. I argue that it represents more than that - it represents an abstraction of the DesktopOS. Rather than pinning applications to a DesktopOS which itself is pinned to HW, the technologies that have evolved into the CloudOS abstract away this away from the applications. Applications can now be written to a higher level of system functionality and are no longer pinned to an OS; they are distributed and assembled componentwise, in a dynamic manner which can now target HW capabilities, but yet are as easily provisioned and deployed as traditional thin-browser based applications.
The history of Chrome and ChromeOS themselves provides insight into this evolution. Google Chrome represents a new form and model of ‘browser’ (one that takes on the greater use of HW resources presently performed by RIA runtimes) – it is more an integrated runtime stack with both rich and simple rendering and processing capabilities, rather than a traditional thin browser with its traditional web sandbox. Chrome and the RIA runtimes each provide platforms for richer, more immersive/expressive and adaptive experiences than traditional thin browsers, in a way that abstracts (and thus “squeezes”) the desktop OS.
ChromeOS, in a sense, is attempting to take this type of
environment a few steps further by assuming/abstracting additional DesktopOS capabilities.
The trend that is seen directly pressures the DesktopOS, challenging
its relevance. Microsoft has recognised this beforehand and has sought to
position Azure (and the client platform pieces of Azure, ‘scattered’ as they
are at present across multiple RT bits) as its CloudOS. Each of these CloudOS
do the same thing – they spawn Cloud/Web apps as local processes.
Microsoft and other purveyors of DesktopOS will take a hit
financially from this. If they, as is Microsoft, act in a timely manner to capture the CloudOS market, they will continue to have a play, but the revenue stream from CloudOS has shaped only to be a fraction of DesktopOS, and doesn’t show any sign or likelihood of rising.
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