This article was published on May 15, 2009

Google Chrome gets Add-ons. There goes Firefox’s USP.


Google Chrome gets Add-ons. There goes Firefox’s USP.

chrome21It’s no secret Firefox’s major competitive advantage lies in the thousands of extensions built by dedicated developers across the globe. The extensions make the browser perform functionality beyond the realms of virtually every browser out there, until now.

The latest developer channel releases of Chrome offer improved APIs and tools for developers who are keen on developing add-on for Google’s browser.

As WebMonkey points out, there are two current extensions developed by Google themselves. One shows the inbox message count at the bottom of the browser window and the other makes it a piece of cake to subscribe to RSS feeds in Google Reader.

We’re a long way from the catalogue currently available at Mozilla.org, but frankly the sooner Google get started the better.

To get started with developing for Chrome, you’ll need to:

  1. Make sure you’re receiving updates from Chrome’s developer channel. If you haven’t already, download the Chrome Channel Changer and switch channels to “developer.”
  2. Launch Chrome from the command line adding the --enable-extensions flag to the end of the application path.

H/T DaveWiner

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