"Imagine the billion dollar market at stake here if Google can make good on this vision. Netbooks are basically small-scale PCs. For Silicon Valley myriad of software companies, it means a well-backed, open operating system that is open and ripe for exploitation for building upon. Now think of Chrome, Google’s web browser, and the richness it allows developers to build into the browser’s relationship with the desktop — all of this could usher in a new wave of more sophisticated web applications, cheaper and more dynamic to use. Ramifications abound: What does it mean for the stock price of Microsoft? Microsoft currently owns the vast majority of the desktop operating system market share? In recent weeks, Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer repeatedly dismissed Android as competition to Windows Mobile. Back to our experience in compiling Android for the Asus netbooks. It shows us that there is a big technology push to let Android run on netbooks under way."

Android running on Eee PC 1000 netbook

"Any operating system has several different levels that make up the software stack. As an example, let's look at Ubuntu. At the bottom, you have the kernel. The kernel deals with interaction with the processor, switching between tasks and input/output (filesystem, keyboard input etc). In Ubuntu, this is the Linux kernel. On top of this, you have the basic libraries that provide APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) that allow you to do common tasks in a standard way without dealing with the underlying kernel. On Ubuntu, this is the GNU C Library. From there, you can write and run applications. Typically, the most useful one is something for a user to interact with. In the olden days it used to be a shell (like the DOS shell or bash). These days people are used to having a graphical interface, so you have another service that abstractly deals with graphics. On Ubuntu is this it the X.org Server. On top of that is built a user interface, which on Ubuntu is GNOME."

"When you write an application, although you generally have access to all levels from the kernel upwards, but generally you try and use the highest level that is useful as they abstract away the complexity - although you don't have to. Now for Android, imagine that everything from the APIs upwards has been completely replaced with something completely different, and on top of that they've built extra layers that only provide certain secure ways of accessing the layers below. So although it's 'Linux' as it uses the Linux kernel, it looks and feels completely different to both the user and the programmer. In fact, you could actually remove the Linux kernel and replace it with one that acts similarly and you wouldn't be able to tell the difference - the only reason Linux kernel is used is because it's free, available for many platforms and is quite advanced."

Google Desktop Linux, not Linux Desktop

“It's been an exciting nine months since we launched the Google Chrome browser. Already, over 30 million people use it regularly. We designed Google Chrome for people who live on the web — searching for information, checking email, catching up on the news, shopping or just staying in touch with friends. However, the operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web. So today, we're announcing a new project that's a natural extension of Google Chrome — the Google Chrome Operating System. It's our attempt to re-think what operating systems should be.”

“Google Chrome OS is an open source, lightweight operating system that will initially be targeted at netbooks. Later this year we will open-source its code, and netbooks running Google Chrome OS will be available for consumers in the second half of 2010. Because we're already talking to partners about the project, and we'll soon be working with the open source community, we wanted to share our vision now so everyone understands what we are trying to achieve.”

“Speed, simplicity and security are the key aspects of Google Chrome OS. We're designing the OS to be fast and lightweight, to start up and get you onto the web in a few seconds. The user interface is minimal to stay out of your way, and most of the user experience takes place on the web. And as we did for the Google Chrome browser, we are going back to the basics and completely redesigning the underlying security architecture of the OS so that users don't have to deal with viruses, malware and security updates. It should just work.”

Source: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/introducing-google-chrome-os.html