Google Updates Chrome Dev to 4.0.220.1

Google's Chrome web browser has seen yet another update on the dev channel. The new version is 4.0.220.1 and brings along a series of fixes, notes Jonathan Conradt, Engineering Program Manager. The new flavor has the Native Client as a built-in feature, which happens for the first time when it comes to the Windows version of Chrome, and there is also a series of Extensions APIs included with this release.

The new Google Chrome 4.0.220.1 dev has new features and fixes for all platforms, including the removal of “Remove Item” from download item context menu (which is no longer necessary as the shelf removes all completed and canceled items on close), or the fact that Omnibox now understands Zeroconf .local hosts. When it comes to the Windows version of the browser, the notable change is that the Native Client is now built into the renderer.

One thing that should be noted here is that the Native Client is disabled by default, and that users will have to do several actions to enable it. After downloading Google Chrome and registering tot hr dev channel, “launch Google Chrome from the command line, adding --internal-nacl. If you're in the directory that contains chrome.exe (something like C:\Documents and Settings\me\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\Application), your command should look like this:
chrome.exe --internal-nacl. Warning: Currently, using --internal-nacl disables the Google Chrome sandbox. This is related to a bug that we expect to fix soon, but for now, we recommend running Google Chrome with this flag only for testing Native Client and not for regular web browsing.” More details can be found here.

As for the changes with extensions, the list shows extensions menu item now in “wrench” menu; the presence of Browser Actions; extension packing has been implemented for Linux; the toolstrip dragging is being restricted to extension shelf; when the “ask for destination” option has been set in download options, the themes and extensions will install; a crash with non-extension iframe has been fixed; initial i18n API included; content scripts are now enabled to see their own functions in setTimeout.

Google Chrome is available for download via this link.