新近发表
Internet Digest: Search Giant Wants a Share of Browser Market
From The New York Times, Sep 2th 2008.
Original URL
By MIGUEL HELFT
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. — Google’s new browser, Chrome, is named for something it mostly lacks.
Among software developers, chrome refers to the menus, buttons and boxes that surround the main window of a program. The Google browser, which was unveiled Tuesday, dispenses with most of these in favor of a stripped-down look that is in keeping with the spare aesthetic of the company’s search site.
The clever name sets a more understated tone than those of the browsers Chrome will compete with: Explorer, Safari and Firefox. But in a roundabout way it also hints that the most ambitious elements of the browser are invisible.
Chrome sharpens Google’s already intense competition with Microsoft, the maker of Internet Explorer, by far the most popular browser on the Web. Google hopes that Chrome will loosen Microsoft’s grip on the browser market, which it fears Microsoft could leverage to promote its struggling search and advertising business at the expense of Google’s.
But Google also said Chrome was created in large part to allow users to interact with increasingly powerful programs that run in a browser window, like Gmail, Google Docs and applications created by other companies. The company claims Chrome is the first browser built from scratch with such applications in mind.
“I think it is a very basic, fast engine to run Web apps,” Sergey Brin, a Google co-founder and its president of technology, said during a news conference at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View.
The browser’s design underscores Google’s vision that in the next few years the digital lives of computer users will change significantly. Rather than rely on programs that run on personal computers, people will increasingly use software that is delivered over the Web from powerful data centers. They will store their data on remote servers and be able to access it wherever they are. This approach would make operating systems like Microsoft’s Windows much less important.
Microsoft also believes the Web will grow in importance, but it sees the PC remaining at the center of many computing tasks.
By adding speed and new functions to the inner workings of the browser, Chrome will encourage software makers to create increasingly sophisticated programs that can run on the Web, Mr. Brin said.
“A lot of things are difficult to do on the Web,” he said. Chrome will allow developers to overcome those difficulties, he said, and “you will be able to do more and more online.”
Microsoft quickly dismissed Google’s claims that Chrome was better suited for applications.
“It is not the first or best browser for Web applications,” said Dean Hachamovitch, general manager for Internet Explorer at Microsoft. “It is the first from Google.”
Mr. Hachamovitch added: “I think that the functionality available in Internet Explorer 8, for what people do every day again and again, is better.”
To advance its vision of Web computing at the expense of Microsoft’s, Google has been courting third-party software makers for more than a year. As part of its efforts, Google has created enhancements to Web browsing technology that it has made available to others in an open-source format, meaning it can be freely shared and modified.
For instance, last year it unveiled Google Gears, a set of tools meant to allow Web applications like Gmail to continue working even when users are not connected to the Internet — a hurdle that remains one of the major shortcomings of many online applications.
Analysts said the development of Chrome appears to reflect a decision on Google’s part that it needs to take a more direct and active role in furthering Web browsing technology.
“Google needed to make a move to make sure it controls its own destiny,” said Peter O’Kelly, an independent analyst.
Chrome forgoes many of the menus and bars that are common in most browsers, and it combines into one the two separate boxes where users normally type Web addresses and search keywords. As users type, Chrome figures out whether a term represents a search term or a Web site address.
Individual tabs in the browser are designed to work independently, so if a Web page crashes one of them, the rest of the program continues to run.
Google also claims that Chrome is far faster at loading Web pages and running applications, features that it said would persuade programmers that they could rely on browsers to run increasingly complex software.
Google said others are free to use and modify its enhancements in their own browsers. And while the company made it clear that it hoped to chip away at Microsoft’s dominance in the Web browser market, it said it would benefit if all major Internet browsers became better able to run Web applications.
Chrome’s success is by no means guaranteed. Many of Google’s products and services, like Google Finance and Google Video, have received a lot of attention and hype at the time they were introduced, but managed to achieve only modest success. And Chrome’s gains, at least initially, may not come at the expense of Internet Explorer, but rather of Firefox, the open-source browser managed by the Mozilla Corporation.
While Internet Explorer comes preinstalled on Windows computers, Firefox, like Chrome, requires people to download it. As such, these two browsers may appeal to a similar set of users who actively seek alternatives to the programs that come with their PCs.
But John Lilly, the chief executive of Mozilla, said Chrome would help further define Firefox as the only independent browser dedicated to creating a better Web experience, not furthering the agenda of a single company. The publicity around Chrome may also encourage people to consider alternatives to their built-in browsers.
Just last week, Google and Mozilla extended for three years an agreement under which Google pays Mozilla to be the default search engine on Firefox. Mr. Lilly said he knew about Chrome when he renewed the agreement with Google. He also said that the extent to which Google would contribute to the open-source community was not yet clear.
“We have yet to see what open-source means to Google,” he said.
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer holds 73 percent of the browser market, according to Net Applications, a research firm. Firefox’s market share has climbed to 19 percent, while Apple’s Safari has 6 percent.
Google refused to discuss its expectations for Chrome’s adoption by users. It said that it was likely to sign deals with others to further its distribution.
Mitchell Kapor, a computing pioneer and technology investor who is on the board of the nonprofit Mozilla Foundation, which owns the Mozilla Corporation, said Chrome lacked some features that users had come to expect.
“It’s a mistake to believe that their entrance will dramatically alter market share in the short term,” Mr. Kapor said. But he noted that “having a platform that is better suited to run Web applications is an enormous asset .”
注释
unveil: v. 向公众透漏，揭示
dispense with: v. 省略，放弃
understated: adj. 朴素的
roundabout: adj. 绕圈子的，不直接了当的(= indirect)
grip: n. 支配，控制
at the expense of: 在…受损害的情况下
from scratch: 从零开始,白手起家
court: v. 试图得到,寻求
hurdle: n. 障碍,困难
forgo: v. 放弃
chip away at: v. 削弱,损害
hype: n. 广告策略
market share: n. 市场份额
dramatically: adv. 显著地
enormous: adj. 巨大的
asset: n. 优点, 有利条件
GRE Question of the Day (Sep 4th, 2008)
TAKEGRE.com是一个帮助学生准备GRE考试的网站，网站每天提供GRE Question of the Day，内容涵盖Antonym，Analogy，Reading Comprehension和Sentence Completion等。为了方便，学生也可以用自己的邮箱注册，网站就会每天发一封电子邮件到注册时填写的邮箱。每天一道题，只用一两分钟的时间，是很好的备考练习。
题目
GRE Question of The Day: Reading Comprehension
Although a historical lack of access to formal Spanish-language education initially limited the opportunities of some Chicanos to hone their skills as writers of Spanish, their bilingual culture clearly fostered an exuberant and compelling oral tradition. It has thus generally been by way of the emphasis on oral literary creativity that these Chicano writers, whose English-language works are sometimes uninspired, developed the powerful and arresting language that characterized their Spanish-language works. This Spanish-English difference is not surprising. When writing in Spanish, these authors stayed close to the spoken traditions of their communities where publication, support, and instructive response would come quickly in local or regional newspapers. Works in English, however, often required the elimination of nuance or colloquialism, the adoption of a formal tone, and the adjustment of themes or ideas to satisfy the different demands of national publications.
1.The passage is primarily concerned with doing which of the following?
(A) Debating the historical value of a literary movement
(B) Describing and accounting for a difference in literary styles
(C) Explaining a publishing decision and evaluating its results
(D) Analyzing the expectations of a particular group of readers
(E) Classifying several kinds of literary production
2. According to the author, the Chicano oral experience contributed directly to which of the following characteristics in the work of some Chicano writers?
(A) A sensitivity to and adeptness in using the spoken language
(B) A tendency to appear in national rather than regional publications
(C) A style reflecting the influence of Spanish language education
(D) A reliance on a rather formal style
(E) A capacity to appeal to a broad range of audiences
3.Which of the following best describes the function of the last two sentences of the passage ?
(A) They expand on an advantage mentioned in the first sentence of the passage.
(B) They outline the consequences of a limitation discussed in the first sentence of the passage.
(C) They provide explicit examples drawn from the oral and the written works mentioned in the second sentence of the passage .
(D) They explain the causes of a phenomenon mentioned in the third sentence of the passage.
(E) They limit the applicability of a generalization made in the third sentence of the passage .
4.The passage suggests that which of the following was probably characteristic of the a€?national publicationsa€? mentioned in line 19?
(A) They primarily presented scholarly material of little interest to a general audience.
(B) They sometimes published articles treating controversial themes.
(C) They encouraged authors to feature local issues in articles in order to increase circulation.
(D) They included a significant number of articles by minority authors.
(E) They took a stylistically formal approach to material of interest to a general audience.
GRE Question of the Day (Aug 22th, 2008)
TAKEGRE.com是一个帮助学生准备GRE考试的网站，网站每天提供GRE Question of the Day，内容涵盖Antonym，Analogy，Reading Comprehension和Sentence Completion等。为了方便，学生也可以用自己的邮箱注册，网站就会每天发一封电子邮件到注册时填写的邮箱。每天一道题，只用一两分钟的时间，是很好的备考练习。
题目
GRE Question of The Day: Reading Comprehension
Historians attempting to explain how scientific work was done in the laboratory of the seventeenth-century chemist and natural philosopher Robert Boyle must address a fundamental discrepancy between how such experimentation was actually performed and the seventeenth-century rhetoric describing it. Leaders of the new Royal Society of London in the 1660s insisted that authentic science depended upon actual experiments performed, observed, and recorded by the scientists themselves. Rejecting the traditional contempt for manual operations, these scientists, all members of the English upper class, were not to think themselves demeaned by the mucking about with chemicals, furnaces, and pumps; rather, the willingness of each of them to become, as Boyle himself said, a mere a€?drudgea€? and a€?under-buildera€? in the search for Goda€?s truth in nature was taken as a sign of their nobility and Christian piety.
This rhetoric has been so effective that one modern historian assures us that Boyle himself actually performed all of the thousand or more experiments he reported. In fact, due to poor eyesight, fragile health, and frequent absences from his laboratory, Boyle turned over much of the labor of obtaining and recording experimental results to paid technicians, although published accounts of the experiments rarely, if ever, acknowledged the techniciansa€? contributions. Nor was Boyle unique in relying on technicians without publicly crediting their work.
Why were the contributions of these technicians not recognized by their employers? One reason is the historical tendency, which has persisted into the twentieth century, to view scientific discovery as resulting from momentary flashes of individual insight rather than from extended periods of cooperative work by individuals with varying levels of knowledge and skill. Moreover, despite the clamor of seventeenth-century scientific rhetoric commending a hands-on approach, science was still overwhelmingly an activity of the English upper class, and the traditional contempt that genteel society maintained for manual labor was pervasive and deeply rooted.
Finally, all of Boylea€?s technicians were a€?servants,a€? which in seventeenth-century usage meant anyone who worked for pay. To seventeenth-century sensibilities, the wage relationship was charged with political significance. Servants, meaning wage earners, were excluded from the franchise because they were perceived as ultimately dependent on their wages and thus controlled by the will of their employers. Technicians remained invisible in the political economy of science for the same reasons that underlay servantsa€? general political exclusion. The techniciansa€? contribution, their observations and judgment, if acknowledged, would not have been perceived in the larger scientific community as objective because the technicians were dependent on the wages paid to them by their employers. Servants might have made the apparatus work, but their contributions to the making of scientific knowledge were largelya€”and convenientlya€”ignored by their employers.
1) Which one of the following best summarizes the main idea of the passage?
(A) Seventeenth-century scientific experimentation would have been impossible without the work of paid laboratory technicians.
(B) Seventeenth-century social conventions prohibited upper-class laboratory workers from taking public credit for their work.
(C) Seventeenth-century views of scientific discovery combined with social class distinctions to ensure that laboratory techniciansa€? scientific work was never publicly acknowledged.
(D) Seventeenth-century scientists were far more dependent on their laboratory technicians than are scientists today, yet far less willing to acknowledge techniciansa€? scientific contributions.
(E) Seventeenth-century scientists liberated themselves from the stigma attached to manual labor by relying heavily on the work of laboratory technicians.
2) It can be inferred from the passage that the a€?seventeenth-century rhetorica€? mentioned in line 6 would have more accurately described the experimentation performed in Boylea€?s laboratory if which one of the following were true?
(A) Unlike many seventeenth-century scientists, Boyle recognized that most scientific discoveries resulted from the cooperative efforts of many individuals.
(B) Unlike many seventeenth-century scientists, Boyle maintained a deeply rooted and pervasive contempt for manual labor.
(C) Unlike many seventeenth-century scientists, Boyle was a member of the Royal Society of London.
(D) Boyle generously acknowledged the contribution of the technicians who worked in his laboratory.
(E) Boyle himself performed the actual labor of obtaining and recording experimental results.
3) According to the author, servants of seventeenth-century England were excluded from the franchised because of the belief that
(A) their interests were adequately represented by their employers
(B) their education was inadequate to make informed political decisions
(C) the independence of their political judgment would be compromised by their economic dependence on their employers
(D) their participation in the elections would be a polarizing influence on the political process
(E) the manual labor that they performed did not constitute a contribution to the society that was sufficient to justify their participation in elections
4) According to the author, the Royal Society of London insisted that scientists abandon the
(A) belief that the primary purpose of scientific discovery was to reveal the divine truth that could be found in nature
(B) view that scientific knowledge results largely from the insights of a few brilliant individuals rather than from the cooperative efforts of many workers
(C) seventeenth-century belief that servants should be denied the right to vote because they were dependent on wages paid to them by their employers
(D) traditional disdain for manual labor that was maintained by most members of the English upper class during the seventeenth-century
(E) idea that the search for scientific truth was a sign of piety
5) The author implies that which one of the following beliefs was held in both the seventeenth and the twentieth centuries?
(A) Individual insights rather than cooperative endeavors produce most scientific discoveries.
(B) How science is practiced is significantly influenced by the political beliefs and assumption of scientists.
(C) Scientific research undertaken for pay cannot be considered objective.
(D) Scientific discovery can reveal divine truth in nature.
(E) Scientific discovery often relies on the unacknowledged contributions of laboratory technicians.
6) Which one of the following best describes the organization of the last paragraph?
(A) Several alternative answers are presented to a question posed in the previous paragraph, and the last is adopted as the most plausible.
(B) A question regarding the cause of the phenomenon described in the previous paragraph is posed, two possible explanations are rejected, and evidence is provided in support of a third.
(C) A question regarding the phenomenon described in the previous paragraph is posed, and several incompatible views are presented.
(D) A question regarding the cause of the phenomenon described in the previous paragraph is posed, and several contributing factors are then discussed.
(E) Several answers to a question are evaluated in light of recent discoveries cited earlier in the passage.
7) The authora€?s discussion of the political significance of the a€?wage relationshipa€? (line 48) serves to
(A) place the failure of seventeenth-century scientists to acknowledge the contributions of their technicians in the large context of relations between workers and their employers in seventeenth-century England
(B) provide evidence in support of the authora€?s more general thesis regarding the relationship of scientific discovery to the economic conditions of societies in which it takes place
(C) provide evidence in support of the authora€?s explanation of why scientists in seventeenth-century England were reluctant to rely on their technicians for the performance of anything but the most menial tasks
(D) illustrate political and economic changes in the society of seventeenth-century England that had a profound impact on how scientific research was conduced
(E) undermine the view that scientific discovery results from individual enterprise rather than from the collective endeavor of many workers
It can be inferred from the passage that a€?the clamor of seventeenth-century scientific rhetorica€? (lines 39-40) refers to
(A) the claim that scientific discovery results largely from the insights of brilliant individuals working alone
(B) ridicule of scientists who were members of the English upper class and who were thought to demean themselves by engaging in the manual labor required by their experiments
(C) criticism of scientists who publicly acknowledged the contributions of their technicians
(D) assertions by members of the Royal Society of London that scientists themselves should be responsible for obtaining and recording experimental results
(E) the claim by Boyle and his colleagues that the primary reason for scientific research is to discover evidence of divine truth in the natural world
