CodeWeavers, best known for making its CrossOver programs that use WINE to run many popular Windows applications on Linux and Mac OS, has just released a proof-of-concept version of Chrome that runs on Linux and Mac systems.
The free CrossOver version of Chrome, CrossOver Chrome, is based on Google’s open-source Chromium code. It’s not, however, an actual port of Chrome to Linux or Mac OS X. Instead, using their expertise in bringing Windows applications to other operating systems, the CrossOver developers have ported the Windows version of Chrome to Linux and Mac.
It’s a neat trick, and it does work. While others at ComputerWorld got it to work on Mac OS X, albeit with fits and starts, I’ve been running it for over a day now on one of my openSUSE 11 PCs without a hitch. That said, as the CrossOver Chrome FAQ says to the question: “Should I run CrossOver Chromium as my main browser? Absolutely not! This is just a proof of concept, for fun, and to showcase what Wine can do.”