Since the announcement of Google Chrome OS, the upcoming web-based operating system from search giant Google, a number of smaller web OS startups have hoped to capitalize on the renewed interest in the cloud desktop. One of those startups, eyeos, today announced their plans to release the next major upgrade to their web OS product, eyeos 2.0, on January 1st, 2010. To differentiate themselves from the herd, eyeos offers a couple of unique features including automatic sync with the local desktop and a host-your-own option. But is this what users really want in a cloud os?
Eyeos 2.0: Coming in 2010
According to news from the eyeos team, the new eyeos 2.0 operating system isn’t just a revamp of the company’s former product, it’s something entirely new, built “from scratch,” notes a company blog post. With a new UI (pictured below), new applications, and new concept for how the web-based desktop should work, the update is more than a fresh coat of paint.
Upon login, for example, instead of displaying a simulated computer desktop complete with icons and wallpaper, the updated OS features a new dock bar whose menus link you to applications, events, contacts, and more.
The other key part to eyeos 2.0 is the focus on collaboration. As with Google Docs, eyeos provides a web office component that allows you to invite friends to collaborate with you. As multiple users log in to edit the same file, colored lines display to highlight which sections are being edited by your colleagues or friends. You can also add comments and view the changes made by the other collaborators. At the moment, though, this “web office” feature appears to be limited to a word processor and calendar.
Other updates in eyeos 2.0 include real-time notifications via a new instant messaging component, a re-written file system and kernel, a new sync tool for syncing files, contacts, and calendar from your local desktop to the web, and new base applications which function as real apps as opposed to demos of what eyeos can do.
Why No Love for Webtops?
The main difference between what Google plans to offer with Chrome OS and what eyeos and other “webtops” like it is that Chrome OS doesn’t live in a web browser, it makes the web browser the operating system. Even though Google’s browser will sit on a Linux kernel, this won’t be apparent to end users. The browser, for all intents and purposes, is the OS. And unlike eyeos, Google is making deals with netbook manufacturers to come preinstalled on their hardware. Eyeos, on the other hand, is still a destination you reach via URL (Well, for the most part.)
Despite the revamp, new look, and new features of eyeos 2.0, end users probably won’t take note of this or any other webtop for that matter. As Ray Valdes, research director at Gartner Research, was quoted as saying a few months ago: “I have not seen growth or traction among the Webtop companies over the past year,” Valdes said. “From a long-term perspective, I don’t see any change to current market trends, which are that Webtop ventures are not gaining market traction.”
But why are users so underwhelmed? For one thing, the web office components of any of these ventures are poor comparisons (if they exist at all) to what Google Docs provides. The poor webtops would be better off partnering with Zoho Docs instead, a feature-rich web office startup that could offer a real alternative to Google’s online office. Webtop Ghost tries to make this transition easier by linking to both Google Docs and Zoho as opposed to offering their own applications, but they’re more of an exception than a rule.
Additionally, there’s more than a bit of hesitation among end users to make a full-on switch from a system they know – be that the OS on their local hard drive or Google’s cloud-based programs – to some young startup that may up-and-disappear at any time, like the better known You OS did only last summer.
Finally, there are issues of lag time and speed. Web OS’s that try to simulate the local desktop experience simply can’t duplicate the feel of native applications. And when they try, they can often end up using a huge chunk of memory in the process.
Eyeos: But Wait, We’re Not Just a Webtop, We’re Software Too!
Although eyeos has to fight all the same issues facing webtops as described above, they have an identity issue too. It seems eyeos can’t decide if they want to be a traditional webtop accessible via the eyeos.info URL or open source software you can install on your own server. This latter solution is designed for users worried about the “privacy and confidentiality problems” that come from hosting your data on a “big company’s” server.
While the host-your-own option will appeal to a handful of do-it-yourselfer geeks out there, the majority of mainstream users – and even the majority of early adopters – aren’t looking for a web OS you have to install on your own. If folks are that into privacy and open source, they’ll just install Linux and manage their own backups instead. Besides, offering the host-your-own solution almost misses the point of being a web OS. The promise of cloud computing is that it’s supposed to make our lives easier – our data lives on the web now and not on our fallible hard disks and CDs. We don’t have to backup, because Google (or any other cloud vendor) does that for you. We don’t have to worry with hard drive space either – we use the cloud, sometimes even for a fee, and we can get to our data from anywhere using any device. And all this is provided to you within your browser. Yes, it does mean that we give up a bit of our privacy in the process, but it’s a trade that most are willing to make.
All this being said, the updates to eyeos 2.0 are a nice step forward for the fledging webtop and will appeal to those interested in that sort of thing…but, sadly, we’re guessing that most of you aren’t.
