Technology to watch – Google Native Client

Google has a new project, called “Google Native Client” that could mean faster, more powerful web applications will soon be possible. Google’s Native Client project is a primarily a developer release for now, but the free open source code base looks promising.

There has long been speculation that Google was working on some sort of operating system, but if Native Client is in fact the long-rumor Google OS, then the rumors were only half right. As it turns out Google wasn’t working on an OS specifically tailored to its apps, it was working to put every OS on the web.

One of the bottlenecks of the web is that web application code must execute in your browser. That means the speed of web apps like Gmail is limited to what your browser can handle. In other words, it’s out of Google’s hands. The goal behind Native Client is to allow web developers to build sophisticated web apps that can directly take advantage of the full power of your PC’s processor, rather than relying on your web browser as a middle man. At the moment, web apps that want to execute code without the browser as an intermediary use tools like Flash, Silverlight or Java. But Flash and Java are themselves intermediaries, faster than a browser in some cases, but also proprietary and out of Google’s control.

The goal of the new Native Client project is to give web developers access to the full power of the client’s CPU while maintaining the browser neutrality, OS portability and safety that people expect from web applications. In other words, Google wants to build an open, browser and OS neutral way for web developers to run code directly on your operating system. Native Client apps will be portable both across operating systems and across web browsers, and the plugin itself allows developers to take advantage of high performance operating system-level tools.

However there is need to be cautious as allowing web-based applications to execute code at the OS level is that it opens massive security vulnerabilities. To counter that Google has developed what it calls “very strict rules” about what code can execute in Native Client.

Among the applications that could see a boost from Native Client are online image editing, high definition video sites and sophisticated online games.

http://code.google.com/p/nativeclient/