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Interested in making Chrome OS better? Join Chrome OS Testing, a brand new (unofficial) community for canary / dev / beta testers!

Chrome OS is a rapid release product with major software updates shipping to users roughly every 6 weeks. That's fast!

Fast updates can sometimes result in bugs though, and bugs are bad. To help combat this, Chrome OS allows anyone to test new versions of Chrome OS before they're pushed to everyone else. This is called the "channel" system, with each major update spending about 6 weeks on each release channel.

At the very top of this system is the bleeding-edge canary channel, which is prone to frequent big issues. Next up is the dev(eloper) channel, which is more stable, but still considered unstable for general usage. Then there's the beta channel, which is where a final layer of polish is applied before an update is pushed to everyone via the stable channel. Each update is promoted from one channel to another on a schedule.

Many Chromebook owners have already discovered these channels and are actively contributing feedback about the unstable versions. That's great! Unfortunately, there isn't really a good place to go to talk to other users running the same beta software to check if a bug is specific to you, or affecting everyone.

Enter Chrome OS Testing, a solution to this problem. The mission of this community is earlier, better detection of issues, reducing the number of issues that make it through to stable releases of Chrome OS.

Participation is completely voluntary, but we would love to make this a warm and welcoming environment for the super savvy to hang out and hunt down bugs.

As noted in the title, this is an unofficial community. It is not endorsed by the Chrome OS team. Leading this project are a handful of top contributors from the support forum who deal with bugs on a daily basis. You can guess why these individuals would want to help stop said bugs as early as possible :)

Does this sound like a community you could see yourself fitting into? Excellent! Come on in, the door is unlocked (*you may need to jiggle the handle - that will be fixed in a maintenance release at a later date).

http://bit.ly/ChromebookBeta


Feel like you need to learn a little bit more about the release channels before you're ready to jump in? That's okay too! Here's a great resource for learning more:

https://support.google.com/chromebook/answer/1086915?hl=en


We hope to see you soon!

#ChromeOS   #Testing  
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Roy van de Walle's profile photoLuis Gardea's profile photoNicholas Cantrell's profile photoGregory Bohus's profile photo
6 comments
 
Lifes best is all about you. YOU make life.

But to have a life, you must work. To work, you need fast internet, and without chrome you can't have that.

If you don't work, your poor. If you're poor, you can afford a ring or a house for your family, and your wife divorces you. If your wife divorces you, you cry. If you cry you aren't manly. Don't be a wimp, get google chrome!

PS: Canary for the win, because #WeAreGolden
 
but if it's unofficial who's getting the feedback? 
 
+Menachem Tauber Great question!

As the post notes, the community is run by top contributors from the official support forum. We have received approval to escalate issues shared on this community through our standard channels.

In other words, if users report an issue on this community, and other users can verify that the issue is legitimate, the top contributors can escalate it to the development team. We already do this with issues reported to the support forum, but very few canary / dev / beta issues get reported there :)

For an example, one specific issue that was reported to this new community has already been mentioned in a Chromium bug ticket by a Googler:

https://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=462459#c17

We're creating this community to allow more dev / beta issues to be reported and verified, so that they aren't lost in the sea of Google+ posts, reddit threads, or tweets.
 
I'm really happy to see this.  I've had an issue for awhile with no one to talk to about it.  Google Help doesn't, if you're not on stable, and although I've sent feedback, there is no feedback on the feedback.  At least it's a place to see if you're the only one with the issue, which may help fixing it.
 
I'm in for Beta Channel. Since my Chromebook isn't my primary may try Canary. 
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