Chromebooks, ChromeOS and Google Chrome browser news
Excited to download content from Android apps such as Google Play Movies, Spotify and other apps to an external storage card on your Chromebook? If you have Chrome OS 72, it works, but there’s a trick involved. Here’s how to do it.
It’s not an official commitment to a particular release, but Google is considering a way to sideload Android apps from outside of the Google Play Store on a Chromebook in the next few months. It’s going to depend on security and other priorities, however.
While the official Google changelog list of features in Chrome OS 72 Stable Channel has some welcome additions, there’s plenty more goodness included behind these scenes.
Using a Linux app on your Chromebook and you just can’t read or use text and app controls because they’re super small? The reason may be due to display scaling and a new option is available in Chrome OS 72 to address it.
The mobile-friendly web page option for Chrome tablets is available in the Chrome OS 72 Dev Channel. Here’s how to enable and use it, although if you have a large-screened slate, you might not ever need it.
Now that Google Assistant is a native feature on Chrome OS, meaning you can use it without having the Play Store enabled, it makes sense for most, if not all, Chromebooks to get it. This video demo shows you what to look forward to when it arrives.
Additional code was added to expand USB support for Linux on Chrome OS. Behind the scenes, the virtual machine will manage details of USB devices and their state, meaning you should soon be able to connect to a range of USB devices in Crostini.
Got a 2-in-1 Chromebook or Chrome tablet like the Pixel Slate? You might have noticed that the relatively new automatic Desktop and Tablet modes cause an upside down screen in tent usage. Here are details on the upcoming fix for this issue.
After adding access in Project Crostini to share Chrome OS folders with Linux, the next function in the works is to bring shared Play Files to Linux from the Android implementation on Chromebooks.
USB support for Project Crostini is finally here, enabling read & write access to a memory card from the Linux Terminal app. Here’s how to enable and use it. Oh, and Android 9 comes along for the ride on Chromebooks.
There’s a slew of changes in the newest Chrome OS Dev Channel including several for Project Crostini USB and file sharing support. Oddly, Chrome OS is losing its double-tap to zoom function when in tablet mode.
