As a reference librarian, and the person in charge of tech at the library, one of the main reasons I wanted to try the Cr-48 was to evaluate whether ChromeOS could potentially be used on our public access machines. The touted advantages are very tempting - no documents stored locally, can be used in guest mode so nothing is kept, no need for anti-virus, etc. Google promises us that we can (or will in the near future) do everything we need to do in the cloud. What could be better for a computer lab at a public library, where we want the machines to be strongly protected, while allowing users to do everything from fill out online applications, to making PowerPoint presentations, to playing games? Our peculiar use case requires both high flexibility and high security, and Chrome OS provides much of the latter, while Google promises we'll be getting more of the former in the cloud.
Problem is, Chrome OS can't do a lot of things that a library needs it to do. Dut to the very nature of this OS, commentary and reviews are going to focus on what Chrome OS can not do. After all, Google's contention (well, my take on it) is that we don't need 90+% of what computers can do, thanks to the power of the cloud.
Here's a list, of the top of my head, of what a library would need for public access machines, that Chrome OS does not yet provide:
User Authentication: Much to my annoyance, we are required by law (as a condition of blah blah blah...) to have some sort of tracking of who used a given computer at a given time. We maintain these records under strictest confidentiality. It used to be that we had people sign in on paper, but we've since moved to a software solution (called PC Reservation, by Envisionware). The program actually takes the patron's card number and contacts our user database to make sure the card is valid, not expired, has less than $5 in fines, and, if it's a juvenile's card, that the parent has signed off to allow internet use. Obviously, Chrome OS can't do this. Certainly, Google (or some other vendor) could do this, but will there be much impetus to do so in order to sell to such a small, specialized, non-profit-organization's market? We could go back to signing people on to the computer via paper, but that would be a huge step backward, in functionality, staff time usage, and complication.
Time Vending: The same program that does authentication also does time vending, meaning that grants access to the public computer for an hour at a shot, according to various settings staff can control. We have to have some time vending process, to distribute PC time fairly. Otherwise, a few patrons would monopolize the computers all day long, and the library would be the very last place anyone would go to get something done. Again, the same issues listed above also apply here. We could go back to watching the clock and forcing people to get off the computer when time is up, but that's a big step back, and creates the kind of interactions that lead to patrons complaining. In a library, patrons complaining can get very big and very ugly very quickly, leading to yelling patrons, threats of violence, and the ever-present "I'm a personal friend of the mayor and...." It's just asking for trouble to go back to the paper system.
Print Control: Before we put a print control system in place, patrons would print hundreds of pages of junk, then pretend it wasn't theirs when it was time to pay for their prints. Now, the patron sends the print, the print is held in a que, and staff releases the print after the patron has paid. It saves us a lot (a LOT) of paper. What's Chrome OS going to do for this? Heck, the Chrome OS, currently, doesn't even support direct printing. It has to be done through the cloud. If they put a piece in where we could control that print process via staff-only login, then it could work for us. This piece seems more do-able than the rest.
Making Documents without a user account: Google promises that online document creation can fill our needs (even working on a true Microsoft Office emulation online), and they are probably right. Problem is, our patrons need to be able to produce documents, then either save them to flash drives/floppies or email them to themselves. But, they need to be able to do this without taking the extra steps to make an online account. Some of our patrons are just beginners at computing, and having to make an online account before they can make a resume is a hurdle too high to jump in a reasonable amount of time. They don't have to do that with Word or OpenOffice, but they need an account for every online document service I know of. This one could also be easily fixed, if Google or someone else made a secure, one-off document creation website that did not require establishing a relationship with the user beforehand. I need to look more deeply into Microsoft's online document offerings to see if there is a venue that does not require login and password.
Online Forms that Require IE: Much to my frustration, many of the job application websites require Internet Explorer. Some government websites require IE. Employee intranets often require IE. It's a well known ugliness of the net, this IE lock-in. Will Google find a way to overcome it? They'll have to, if Chrome OS has any hope of being a user's main or only computer. Certainly, the library absolutely needs IE to work. The things our patrons need most often require it.
The Illusion of Not Needing Anti-Virus: Chrome is very well defended against viruses, from what I've read (spyware? - not so much). But, even with the built-in defenses, Chrome OS is an example of security through obscurity. It's a false promise. If Chrome OS were to be widely adopted by businesses, making hacking it a profitable proposition, then you can bet that viruses and spyware will absolutely become an issue. Will Google respond? Can they, with the limits of the architecture? Who knows?
There are various security programs absolutely necessary for a public PC (a shell to keep patrons from accessing the OS, a program that sets the computer back to a clean state where no data is retained, and anti-malware), but the very nature of Chrome OS allows us to ignore some or all of them, for a while. Such is the promise that tempted me to even consider using Chrome OS on our public-access computers.
Very, very interesting times for us librarians.
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