April 16, 2012, 12:34 PM — 
Chrome OS is odd. That’s the one thing almost everybody can agree on. Whether Google’s web-centered, Chrome-based notebooks are “odd, but also the future,” or just plain “odd, and probably not for me” is the central point. It doesn’t help that very few people have had a chance to actually use Chrome OS, and that the majority of those who have seem to be tech writers, programmers, IT administrators, or other folks who have reaching, exacting demands of their hardware.
There are public offices, universities, non-profits, and corporations that were given Chromebooks under a test program, but we’ve heard comparatively little from those institutions, other than through the filter of customer testimonials posted by Google. So the greatest public service I can try to provide in this very narrow topic space is to clear up a few ideas about Chrome OS, Chromebooks, and what they are and are not meant to accomplish. I’ve been using Chromebooks since December 2011, when the first reference model Cr-48 notebooks were released.
Now that Google’s released a developer preview of Chrome OS’ almost entirely new look, it feels like a good time to do some Q&A.
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