Google’s iPad App: Almost Chrome, and Trouble for Apple

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Google has earned a reputation of late for releasing troubled iOS apps. Gmail was so buggy in its initial state that Google had to pull it from the App Store. Google+ was temperamental too, and even now it lags behind its Android counterpart in getting new features. After the launch of iOS 5, Google had to pull its Voice app for a week due to crashes.

So when Google releases a beautiful, flawless iOS app like Google Search for iPad, I figure the company is up to something.

Despite the name, Google Search does more than spit back search results. The app presents you with big, colorful links to several Google services, including Gmail, Calendar, Docs, Google+, Picasa, YouTube and Google Books. These are apps within the app, sliding onto the screen in a self-contained web browser. You can also search by voice within the app, and get instant search results as you type.

As is, I can see myself spending a lot of time in Google’s iPad app, but what’s frustrating is that with a few tweaks, Google Search could be a proper iPad web browser, and probably the best one. All it needs is a full URL bar instead of a search box at the top of the screen, some bookmarks and a way to open multiple browser tabs. The groundwork for a clean, snappy interface with useful search tools is already in place. Add some more features, and suddenly it’s Chrome for iPad.

And that’s where things could get really crazy–as in, Google creating its own competing app platform within iOS.

I’m not the only one to suspect a secret plot in Mountain View. Over at The Next Web, Matt Panzarino argues that this app is Google’s way of sneaking its own web-based operating system, known as Chrome OS, onto the iPad. He figures that Google could update the app over time, replacing each web app with native software, and he suspects that Google’s Chrome OS team is behind the whole thing.

I think Panzarino has it backwards. Instead of tying in more native apps, Google should be adding more web apps, not only from its own services, but from the Chrome Web Store. By working with third-party developers to make their web apps touch-friendly, Google could build up a tablet app catalog that works in its own iPad browser.

Some of the work is already done. Try accessing NPR’s Chrome web app from an iPad. It looks almost exactly like the native App Store version–it responds to finger swipes and it plays audio within the browser. Other apps are part way there. Vimeo Couch Mode, for instance, has the interface in place, but uses Flash for video instead of the iPad-friendly HTML5. (Vimeo’s main site uses HTML5 when accessed on an iPhone or iPad.)

(LIST: ‘Do a Barrel Roll’ and Several Other Fun Google Easter Eggs)

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The point of all this, for Google, would be to disrupt the app-focused nature of tablets. On desktop PCs, the browser is the most important piece of software you own. But on a tablet, functions that once belonged to the browser–e-mail, news, social networking, casual games–have split off into separate apps. It’s in Google’s interest for users to do more in the browser, where the company makes money on web searches. Web apps aren’t ready to replace native software outright, but the iPad would make a good place for Google to experiment, especially if the company wants to make Chrome OS tablets in the future.

There’s an upside for consumers as well: The more you can do on a browser, the less you need to rely on any particular operating system for your apps. Imagine using the same apps on an iPad, Windows PC and Android phone, because they’re all based in the browser. That would be quite liberating. Also, if you’re doing work in a browser, switching between tabs is a lot faster than opening and closing individual apps.

If this is really Google’s intent, it’ll have to tread carefully. Google can’t sell anything from within its iPad app without going through Apple, so any Chrome Web Store purchases would have to happen on a PC or within the Safari browser, including music, video and paid apps. And if Apple doesn’t like the idea of Google building its own app platform within iOS, it could simply shut down the Google Search app outright. Worse yet, Apple could retaliate by switching to a different default search engine for its own browser, such as Microsoft’s Bing.

Given those risks, I’m not terribly optimistic that Google will take its iPad app to the next level. But in this first release, Google is at least showing the potential to do great things.

MORE: Gmail App for iPad and iPhone Now Available

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