Chromium blog
Chromium OS is an open-source operating system designed for running web applications and
browsing the World Wide Web. It is the development version of Chrome OS, a Linux distribution
made by Google.
Like Chrome OS, Chromium OS is based on the Linux kernel, but its principal user interface is the
Chromium web browser rather than the Google Chrome browser. Chromium also includes the
Portage package manager, which was originally developed for Gentoo Linux.Because Chromium OS
and Chrome OS use a web browser engine for the user interface, they are oriented toward web
applications rather than desktop applications or mobile apps.Google first published the Chromium
OS source code in late 2009.
Chromium OS was first made available in compiled form by hobbyists. More organized efforts have
emerged over time, including a few manufacturers that have shipped devices with the operating
system pre-installed.
By May 2010, compiled versions of the work-in-progress source code had been downloaded from
the Internet more than a million times. The most popular version, entitled "Chromium OS Flow", was
created by Liam McLoughlin, a then 17-year-old college student in Liverpool, England, posting under
the name "Hexxeh". McLoughlin’s build boots from a USB memory stick and included features that
Google engineers had not yet implemented, such as support for the Java programming
language.While Google did not expect that hobbyists would use and evaluate Chromium OS ahead
of its official release, Sundar Pichai, Google’s vice president of product management (now the CEO)
said that "what people like Hexxeh are doing is amazing to see." Pichai said the early releases were
an unintended consequence of open source development. "If you decide to do open-source projects,
you have to be open all the way."
Hexxeh’s work continued into the following year. He announced "Chromium OS Lime" in December
2010, and in January 2011, released "Luigi", an application designed to "jailbreak"/"root" the Google
Cr-48 "Mario" prototype hardware and install a generic BIOS.The developer made the builds
available in virtual machine format on March 13, 2011. With no official build of Chromium OS
forthcoming from Google, Hexxeh’s "vanilla" nightly builds of Chromium OS were the principal
resource for people wanting to try Chromium OS. Hexxeh stopped uploading his builds on April 20,
2013.
More recent versions of Chromium OS are available from Arnoldthebat, who maintains daily and
weekly builds along with usage guidelines and help.In July 2012, Chromium Build Kit was released.
It automatically compiles a developer build and installs Chromium OS on a USB drive.[15]
In 2015, New York City-based Neverware produced a Chromium OS fork called CloudReady aimed
at the educational market, with the intention of extending the life of older PCs and laptops. A
subsequent version can dual-boot Neverware and the Windows operating system(until v64).In 2016,
Nexedi released NayuOS, a fork of Chromium OS precompiled for several Chromebook computers.
The operating system provides Chrome OS-like capabilities without storing data on Google servers.
It optionally removes the Google login and provides additional developer tools.[Also in 2016, a
London/Beijing based startup Flint Innovations has produced a line of Chromium OS fork named Flint OS, targeting a wider range of platforms including 64bits PCs, Raspberry Pi, Tinker Board,
Firefly development boards, and VMware virtual machines.The latest Flint OS releases are bundled
with features and enhancements additional to the original Chromium OS, including special releases
that help users in mainland China to use the OS.Later, they renamed it to Fyde OS.Fyde OS still has
same features in Flint OS, but brings Google Play Store and Android app support(if you are out of
China). The latest version of Fyde OS is based on Chromium R72. In 2017, Wayne Inc., a Korean
startup developed the Chromium OS fork for an ordinary PC named Chromic OS and launched their
Beta service. In 2019, Chromic OS was renamed Wayne OS and launched together with its newer
version and more compatible features, with the purpose of providing cheaper, safer, simpler & more
lightweight OS especially for older PCs and broken HDD/SSD PCs.
Some devices have shipped with Chromium OS preinstalled. In May 2011, Dell also released a new
build for the Dell Inspiron Mini 10v netbook, following up on an earlier build released almost 18
months earlier. The build did not support audio, but was bootable from a USB drive. Other devices
include the Kogan Agora Chromium Laptop by the Australian company Kogan and the Xi3 Modular
Computer, introduced by the company of the same name. In late 2015, a team headed by Dylan
Callahan released a beta Chromium OS port to the Raspberry Pi 2 single-board computer.In 2016,
Flint Innovations has also released Chromium OS port for the latest Raspberry Pi 3/B model named
Flint OS for RPi. Subsequently, this project has been fully open-sourced at GitHub, with all the files
and detailed instructions to re-create the build.
In June 2011, ISYS Technologies, based in Salt Lake City, sued Google in a Utah district court,
claiming rights to the name "Chromium" and, by default, Chromebook and Chromebox. The suit
sought to stop Google and its hardware and marketing partners from selling Chromebooks. The suit
was later dismissed and, as part of an undisclosed settlement between Google and ISYS, ISYS
abandoned its trademark efforts.