The different internet browsers that we use today on our computers do not stop growing and improving, something that extends to the popular Google Chrome. The firm has just launched a new version of the program with interesting new features that we are going to describe below.
At the end of last June, Google made Chrome 103 available to everyone. Here we find faster web page loads and access to local fonts. With this, what we want to tell you is that around six weeks have passed since the launch of the previous Chrome version. This is somewhat unusual, as these releases typically arrive every four weeks.
Now comes the new Chrome 104 with a good number of changes and improvements that we will talk about next. These new features include support for capturing custom regions on the screen, or the exclusion to save certain credit card information, among other things.
What’s New in Chrome 104 APIs
But perhaps the standout feature this time around is an updated Capture API. This is because it no longer only allows applications to capture the tab on video, but also crop it to adapt it to our needs.
In fact, Google itself states that developers have strongly supported the arrival of this API to get better performance from this capture function in the browser. But that’s not all, as there is another feature that has caused quite a stir in the browser community. We are talking about another API, this time related to Bluetooth connectivity, and that has been improved in Chrome 104. To say that it now integrates with the permissions policy and allows websites to communicate with other devices through the Bluetooth standard.
This bypasses the use of cross-origin iframes. In this way, Google believes that all this opens multiple ways of productivity and communication without compromising the security of the program. But in this sense they have met with strong resistance from Mozilla and Apple, since they have negative opinions about said API. Apple believes it diminishes browsing security, while Mozilla has similar concerns calling the API harmful.
More news in the Google browser
But these are not the only novelties that we are going to find in the new version of Chrome, since Google integrates other changes of interest here.
- Four legacy client elements are removed because they go against the standards set by the current infrastructure.
- The U2F Security Key API is now set to maintenance mode as it has been incorporated into newer implementations such as WebAuthn.
- Added support for using Chrome windows on multiple screens thanks to the improved API. It now allows sites to open a full-screen window and a smaller pop-up window on computers with multiple screens.
- Added a feature so users can opt out of having credit card information stored on developers’ servers.
- A feature for web pages loaded in the background should allow for better battery and CPU utilization without slowing down performance. Chrome.
