Tag Archives: Chrome

Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Google Chrome Guest Mode Is Great For Shared Computers

Google has recently rolled out a small but important change to its Chrome browser for Windows, Linux and macOS users. The most recent update adds a ‘Default to Guest mode’ to the browser that can be enabled via Enterprise policy or a simple command-line switch.

When the new feature is enabled, any time a browser session is opened on the machine in question, it will default to Guest Mode.

That means that Chrome will delete all browsing activity from the machine when the browser is closed, providing users with a “stateless browsing experience from session to session.” This is actually a lot more significant than first meets the eye.

In particular, it means that Chrome set to Guest Mode will not save any information about:

  • Websites you’ve visited, including the ads and resources used on those sites
  • Your employer, school, or whomever controls the network you’re using while surfing
  • Search engine details
  • Your internet service providers
  • Websites you sign into

From a privacy perspective, that’s huge.

If it’s something you’re interested in enabling, the easiest way to toggle Guest Mode to the default is to follow these steps:

  1. Exit Chrome (all instances)
  2. Right click on your “Chrome” shortcut
  3. Click “Properties”
  4. Scroll to the end of the “Target” and add the following: chrome.exe -guest
  5. Apply that change and close the properties window. When you double click the shortcut, you’ll be in guest mode.

If you’re a macOS or Linux user, follow these steps:

  1. Exit out of Chrome
  2. Run the Terminal application of your choice
  3. Find the Chrome application and add – – guest as a command-line parameter, then hit the enter key to launch Chrome.

This is a small but superb addition. Kudos to Google for the inclusion!

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

The Web Browser Wars Have A Clear Winner In 2020

It’s notoriously difficult to get reliable statistics on web browser usage.

While there are sites that purport to track such things such as StatCounter and NetMarketShare, the numbers coming from these sources have proved to be problematic and unreliable.

Enter the US Government’s Digital Analytics Program (DAP, for short).

While it doesn’t reveal anything about browser statistics worldwide, it does give us a running count of the browsers used when visiting government websites over the last 90 days, which gives us a clear view of the American browser market breakdown.

The results will probably not be terribly surprising to anyone, but in 2020, the most popular web browser is Google Chrome, with 49.3 percent of the recorded share of visits. This is a far cry from IE’s once dominant share of 96 percent back in the infancy of the web, but it’s hardly a surprise that no company has that kind of dominance anymore.

Apple’s Safari browser comes in a distant second with 31.6 percent. At a glance, this number is interesting because to this day, Macs only make up about 10 percent of the PC market. Remember though, that most web surfing is done on smartphones these days. In the US, 29.5 percent of smartphones are Apple devices, compared to 23 percent Android devices. So most of the Safari use actually comes from phones, not PCs.

The big surprise is the third place winner. Internet Explorer. Despite the fact that Microsoft has been urging people to switch to Edge, IE is still the third most widely used browser, capturing 5.7 percent of the market. IE 11 is the most popular version, but there are still some users (0.5 percent of the market) using IE 7 which has been out of support for years now.

Edge loses out to IE, capturing only 4.2 percent of the market, and bringing up the rear is Firefox, with a mere 3.6 percent. The remaining 11.3 percent of the market share is divided up between a constellation of tiny, seldom used browsers that nonetheless have niche followings.

If you use Chrome, count yourself among the mainstream. If you’re still using IE, please consider switching to a more modern, more secure browser. Seriously.

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Dashlane Password Manager Removed From Google For Privacy Issues

Do you use the Dashlane Chrome web extension to help you manage your passwords? If so, you’re not alone. The extension has more than three million users based on download stats.

Unfortunately, Google recently announced that they took the extension down from the store temporarily because of issues with the “Use of Permissions and User Data Privacy.”

The following message was posted to the Dashlane status page:

“Currently, our Extension cannot be downloaded from the Chrome Web Store. This issue has no impact on users that already have our Chrome extension installed and running. Only users needing to download our Chrome extension for a first time install or a reinstall will encounter the issue. We are working actively with Google to have it back as soon as possible. Thank you for your patience and understanding.”

This is just a small part of a saga that’s been unfolding since January 10th, when one of Dashlane’s senior engineers received a warning that the extension’s use of permissions was not in alignment with Google’s terms of service and that the company had seven days to correct the issue.

The engineer responded right away explaining why the extension used permissions the way it did, and in response, Google pulled Dashlane from the store.

In any case, as the Dashlane announcement indicated, if you already have the extension installed, you can certainly continue using it as you have been. However, if you need to reinstall it for any reason, you’ll need to wait until it reappears in the Google Chrome Web store before you can do that.

It’s a very good, well-respected extension, so it’s unlikely that it will remain out of the Web Store for very long, and it will be interesting to find out why Google pulled it so abruptly after the company sent an explanation in response to the warning.

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Google Search Update Caused Backlash And Will Be Fixed

If you use Google Chrome on a mobile device, you’ll notice something any time Google displays a list of sites. Let’s say for example, if you perform a search for a keyword on Google.com, each website’s favicon will be displayed next to the link.

This is to provide a visual cue about exactly what site a given piece of content is coming from.

It’s a genuinely useful feature, so Google decided to add it to their desktop experience for PCs. Unfortunately, based on the immediate backlash the company got, some things that work well in the mobile ecosystem simply don’t translate well to the desktop ecosystem.

Users complained bitterly when they noticed the new feature (which had been unannounced), claiming that the change made it harder to distinguish legitimate search results from paid advertisements. In fact, some users claim that it was an intentional bid on Google’s part to disguise their paid advertisements, making them blend seamlessly into the search results proper.

The backlash was severe enough that Google rolled back the change and issued a statement.

Their statement reads, in part, as follows:

“We’re dedicated to improving the desktop experience for Search, and as part of our efforts we rolled out a new design last week, mirroring the design that we’ve had for many months on mobile. The design has been well received by users on mobile screens, as it helps people more quickly see where information is coming from and they can see a prominent bolded ad label at the top. Web publishers have told us they like having their brand iconography on the search results page. While early tests for desktop were positive, we are always incorporating feedback from our users. We are experimenting with a change to the current desktop favicons and will continue to iterate on the design over time.”

Based on this statement, we conclude that although Google rolled back the change temporarily, it’s almost certain to return at some point in the not too distant future.

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Posted on Author Atlantic Computer Services Categories Blog

Google Fixed The White Screen Issue On Chrome

Google recently found itself in hot water with corporate IT administrators for rolling out a feature designed to help prolong battery life. The new feature accomplished its mission, but it had an unintended consequence that left Enterprise IT personnel furious.

The feature is called “WebContent Occlusion,” and the idea is simple.

If a user has multiple browser tabs open, only the content of the tab currently being viewed will be displayed.  All other tabs will be “whited out” until a user clicks on a different tab, at which point, the old tab will be “whited out” and the content of the new tab will be rendered. Data that’s not being actively viewed simply doesn’t get rendered, which extends battery life.

Unfortunately, in some Enterprise environments, it caused things to go haywire.  In particular, it proved to be a problem in organizations running terminal server environments like Windows Terminal Server or Citrix. In those cases, if any user locked his or her workstation to step away from the computer, the update caused the displays of all other users currently logged in to also have their screens whited out until the user returned to unlock his or her workstation.

Of course, in any large organization with scores, or even hundreds of people making use of such a system, someone was always locking their computer to get up from their desk, which essentially ground the entire system to a halt.

Most IT managers run pretty tight ships and don’t allow updates or new applications onto the network without thorough testing.  They were categorically furious that Google was able to introduce this change without informing anyone, and that it slipped past their change control and monitoring systems, catching them by surprise.

Google has since backed the change out, so the issue should now be resolved for all users.  Even so, it’s fair to say that the incident gave Google a black eye where system admins are concerned.

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