Living with Chromebook: First Steps (Premium)

Chromebooks are often touted as a simpler and less expensive alternative to a Windows laptop. And that’s true, to a point. But many potential Chromebook users---especially older users and others who are familiar with Windows---will experience the same frustrations I do in making this switch because we have so many hardwired habits and requirements. 

For sure, the basics are familiar.  

Chrome OS boots into a desktop environment that has on-screen elements that look and work like the Start button and Start menu, the taskbar, and the notification area that we know from Windows. You can pin your favorite apps to the taskbar, and those apps can run full-screen or in a floating window. And there are notifications, which appear in the bottom right of the display and are collected for late examination when missed. 

That’s by design---early versions of Chrome OS were even more like Windows than it is today---and it’s helpful for making the transition. But there are numerous differences, most small if not subtle, that make this transition a bit more difficult. And I think it helps to remember two things: That Chrome OS is designed as a companion to Android and has thus incorporated some user experiences from that platform. And second, that the native apps in Chrome OS are all web-based, and are in many ways not as flexible as the legacy desktop applications we know from Windows. 

A little preparation will help in both cases.  

I assume that most Chrome OS users are Android users as well. Experience with Android will absolutely help when it comes to using Chrome OS. And it will provide some nice integration pieces that aren’t possible if you’re using an iPhone.  

But even if you’re not thinking about switching to Chromebook in the future, you should get started with using web apps---or just web pages that look and feel like apps---in Chrome (or the new Edge) on Windows today. This is something I’ve written about in the past, but it’s especially central to the Chromebook experience, so let’s go over it quickly again. 

As you may know, Chrome---and the new Edge---lets you pin any web page to your desktop and/or taskbar and access it as if it were a standalone (and native) app. If it’s a real web app, like a Progressive Web App (PWA), you’ll get additional capabilities too; they vary by web app but can include such things as notification support and the ability to run offline. But any web page will work. 

To get started, simply navigate to the web page/app you wish to use and then select the menu icon (“…”) in the upper right of the Chrome window. In the menu that appears, select Install (if it’s a web app) or More tools > Create shortcut. 

If it’s just a web page, you’ll be prompted to accept or change the shortcut’s name and whether it should “open as a window,” which it should, if yo...

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