After the recent updates from Firefox and Opera in the form of Firefox 3.1 Beta and Opera 9.6, its Chrome’s turn to go under the knife. Most users might have noticed how Mozilla has concentrated on speed with the latest Firefox update. Opera, on the other hand, now has even more features under its belt, retaining its position as one of the most feature packed browsers available now - off the shelf. And yes, support for three Indian languages in Opera too has been a welcome addition.

Chrome, in the meantime, whose market share dipped to 0.78 percent after reaching a peak of 1.7 just after its launch, seems to be concentrating on security and the occasional performance tweaks. The latest version of Chrome is 03.154.9, a beta release that claims to fix many security holes and offers zippier performance. The update will be automatically applied - however you can choose to “force” update to this version by selecting the update option from the “About” dialog. Note that not all users will see this option as Google seems to be releasing the update in patches. Patience, as they say, is a virtue!

As for the changes, here are some examples. On the security front, the security vulnerability that allowed malicious websites to spoof the addresses in pop-ups has been patched. The download manager has been “enhanced” to be more secure.

Now while downloading an executable, it does give you a warning. All that’s fixed is basic stuff, but good enough. Other bug fixes include improving performance while handling plug-ins. Users have reported issues with the browser consuming full CPU power whilst running rich media plug-ins. The scrolling bug with touch pads too has been fixed.

Minor tweaks to the UI of the browser have also been made. The spell-check feature has been enhanced as well with quite a few new words added.

Will this move make you give Chrome another chance? This seems to be more of a stopgap upgrade which has concentrated on fixing glaring issues. However, it does show Google’s commitment to Chrome and its future development.