Google Chrome to Get Extension-Sync Support

Google Chrome started getting some sync features a few months back. At first, it supported just basic bookmark sync, a nice feature, but nothing special. But the synchronization options got a lot more robust with the addition of preferences and finally even theme sync. With users developing a taste for having everything synced between browsers, one obvious need arose, support for extension sync.

Wouldn’t it be nice if your extensions from work were available on your home computer without the hassle of searching for and installing each and every one of them? Well, that’s about to become a reality, as very preliminary support for extension sync has been added to the Chrome source code.

Don’t get your hopes up just yet. For now, just some bits of the code needed for extension-sync support have been added to the Chromium source code. There is no actual support for the feature, not even disabled by default. It is a first step, though, and, given the way Google developers move, the feature should be coming fairly soon to Chromium.

And once it lands in the open-source browser, it’s only a matter of days until it’s built into a Google Chrome dev channel release. From there, it will float down the stream until it finally ends up in the beta and stable releases of the web browser.

When the feature is complete, though, expect it to do exactly what it implies. Your installed extensions from one browser will be then available to any other Chrome browser you sync with. Chrome extensions use the same packaging as Chrome themes, so it shouldn’t be much of a hassle getting them to work.

What’s more, since Google already handles an online repository of extensions, which is where most people will get them from, it could simply store a list of installed extensions in the cloud. Whatever the case, it will probably be a very welcomed addition for most individuals. [via DownloadSquad]