Google has released Chrome 57 for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The version brings various improvements, enhancements as well as new features for developers.
With more than 1 billion users and having Google on its back, Chrome is a popular web browser that is also the platform for many web developers. The first big change is Chrome in implementing CSS Grid Layout, which is a two-dimensional grid-based layout system for responsive user interface design.
Using Chrome 57, website's elements that are within the grid can be specified to span on multiple columns or rows. It allows developers to create uniform square grids where page elements can be placed. If the size of the screen shrinks, the page element is resized or moved to a new row, without breaking the grid or leaving big gaps.
The CSS Grid Layout is like a sipler way to create CSS grids without having dive deep into CSS frameworks that contain hundreds of lines of CSS code. This will help them to move away from complex code that is difficult to maintain.Developers are also allowed to name them so the layout code can be easier to understand.
The idea for CSS Grid Layout is to provide developers a more granular control, especially as they are creating websites that would be accessed by various screen sizes (Responsive Web Design)
Besides highlighting CSS Grid Layout, Chrome 57 also has WebAssembly. Both features are also available on Firefox 52 which debuted a few days earlier.
The stable iteration of Chrome for desktops is also packed with new tweaks, some of which are user-facing and some while most others work behind at the background. For example, users will now get a notification when a page tries to redirect them to a data URL linked to a remote server.
The new version of Chrome also introduces some changes to the way that Wikipedia pages are loaded.
Chrome 57 also crushed a bug that caused crashes related to the handling of shelves that also involved the placement of pop-up windows. Network crashes are now logged in a more detailed manner, and Google has fixed a bug that caused a memory leak originating from the EventListener process.
The majority of changes in this version are for Android and Chrome OS, like for example with an added support for admins to install Android kiosk apps - in addition to existing Chrome ones - and kiosk application management.
Specifically for Android, apps from Google Play can now be pushed to locked down Chrome devices used as retail displays in stores. Media notifications are having for more controls thanks to the new Media Session API that allows sites to provide more metadata to the browser.
This version also allows users to add Progressive Web Apps (PWA) to the homescreen and to the app drawers, as well as system settings. Like native apps, PWA can receive incoming intents and access the normal Android notification management controls instead of Chrome's.
Alongside the improvements, Chrome 57 also implements 36 different security fixes, a lot of which were made thanks to the help from researchers who aren't affiliated with the Google with its bug bounty program. Some of the highlights include a memory corruption fix, a cookie fix, and a number of fixes for bugs that allowed routines to run out of control and be exploited after they had done their tasks
Chrome 57 also adds a new badge in the URL bar that notifies users when they are on a secure Chrome page/settings or any other chrome:// site.