Google Chrome dev channel update brings theme sync, drops taskbar thumbnails

Google has released an update to Chrome's developer channel build, and the changelog is a lengthy one. Among the plethora of bugfixes and UI tweaks are some notable changes like the arrival of theme syncing, the departure of Windows 7's taskbar thumbnails, and several minor UI tweaks.

As predicted yesterday, the expanded sync options which landed in Chromium have made their way into the dev channel build. Theme sync wasn't even present in Chromium's preference menu as of yesterday afternoon, yet it snuck in to Chrome today.

That was also the case with support for Aero Peek, which was removed on April 5th. Those who want them back can simply add a command line switch (see the previous post), and thumbnails will likely reappear in Chrome once a satisfactory implementation can be engineered.

You may also have noticed that the bookmark star has been moved to the right-hand side of the Omnibox. Other minor tweaks to Chrome's interface have also been made, like the browser actions area resize grabber. Just about every other aspect of Chrome has received some updating, from the V8 JavaScript engine, to autofill, to its geolocation feature (which is now enabled by default).

Interested users can either update their current dev channel build via the wrench menu -> about Chrome and new users can download the build from Google's site.

Tags: browser, channel, chrome, dev, geolocation, google, sync, update, v8