14 DAY TRIAL // Stainless, the multi-process browser for OS X inspired by Google Chrome, has recently been updated to version 0.4.5. The new release adds dynamic loading of WebKit nightly frameworks, some fresh keyboard shortcuts, notification enhancements, and support for browser launch from Adobe AIR apps, among others.
Stainless is a rock-solid web browser, although it still lacks some basic features and functions like a bookmark manager, font and text handling, page search, and others. Each tab in Stainless runs independently in a separate process. This has its benefits, of course. Increased performance is one of those advantages. Slow page loads due to plugins such as Flash won't affect the responsiveness of Stainless or other open tabs.
For the same reasons, crashed pages won't bring down the browser or other tabs, while memory for a session is completely freed to the system, once a tab is closed. Another Chrome-borrowed function is represented by Stainless' draggable tabs between windows. An unified address and search bar and a private browsing mode can also be mentioned as Chrome-like assets.
With version 0.4.5 of Stainless out, the changelog looks a bit like this:
· Added dynamic loading of WebKit nightly frameworks. · Added cmd-shift-arrow shortcuts. · Added proper escpaing to smartbar searches. · Fixed full-screen flash playback. · Fixed javascript window.close notification across processes. · Fixed client hang issues during some javascript uploads. · Fixed browser launch from Adobe AIR apps.
Mesa Dynamics, the developers of Stainless, have recently slapped a cool new icon onto the browser as well. Although resembling LimeWire's icon quite a bit, the new design is very appealing.
Before you download the free browser, keep in mind that “Stainless is really just a technology demo,” as Mesa Dynamics puts it. In other words, it's a beta-class application that cannot be relied upon. It's probably best just to fire up Stainless only for a quick YouTube watch, or as an alternative for opening pages that take too long to load on browsers like Opera and Firefox.