14 DAY TRIAL // Google is making its way to Chrome 9.0 as fast as possible, and this means releasing version 8.0 of the open source browser extremely soon after the general availability of Chrome 7.0. A new development Build of Chrome 8.0 has been offered to early adopters for testing, at just two weeks since the successor of Chrome 7.0 hit the Dev Channel.
Google Chrome 8.0.552.11 is now up for grabs through the Dev channel for testers running Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, with the three flavors of the browser being built in parallel by the Mountain View-based search giant.
According to Jason Kersey, from the Google Chrome team, the focus with the Chrome 8.0.552.11 Dev release was placed on enhancing the user experience of the early adopter testing the browser.
In this regard, Google worked to improve the reliability of Chrome 8.0. A number of fixes for stability bugs were introduced, on top of additional improvements.
Testers will be able to notice that about:labs has been migrated to about:flags and that there’s a New Tab Page cleanup.
As was the case with the first Dev release of Chrome 8.0, the latest Build does not contain new features, but is essentially part of the company’s efforts to increase reliability.
Google is hard at work on producing the first Beta Build of Chrome 8.0, and the search giant certainly needs to hurry since it aims to wrap up and deliver the fully-fledged version 8.0 no later than six weeks after the introduction of Chrome 7.0 through the Stable channel.
At the same time, Chrome 9.0 is already cooking in Mountain View. Early adopters and developers will get to play with Chrome 9.0 ahead of the end of the year, first through the Chromium project, and subsequently with releases offered via the Dev channel.
Google Chrome 7.0 Stable and Beta for Windows are available for download here.
Google Chrome 8.0 Dev for Windows is available for download here.