SRWare Iron: Chromium without the data-mining

[Dylan McCall]

> I've posted this on the debian-devel mailing list as well. This was
> posted out of a concern that Canoncial is thinking about switching
> over to Chromium in later releases as Lubuntu has done already. I have
> seen articles of this possibility as well. I don't feel making
> Chromium the default browser is appropriate until the privacy issues
> are addressed. I also feel that taking care these issues before a
> switch to Chromium is even seriously considered is beneficial to
> everyone.

Given that the privacy concerns have been neatly documented[1] by
Google including instructions on disabling the offending features, I
can't shake the doubt that they could ever be addressed in some
peoples' opinions.
[1] http://www.google.com/support/chrome/bin/answer.py?answer=114836&hl=en-GB

Granted, I may just be ill informed. Is there some detail being missed
in that document?

It's not that I have anything against Iron, of course, though I am
slightly wary of their website and apparent lack of a source
repository. Doesn't feel brilliantly maintained. Maybe they just need
a gentle nudge in Launchpad's direction.
With regards to packaging, there is a Launchpad PPA with daily builds
of Chromium, so they surely have sorted out any installation and
packaging quirks in that source repository. Perhaps you can get a diff
with Iron's changes, and if you're incredibly lucky it'll apply
smoothly. Could save you some work :)


Dylan