Exactly. I mean, Chrome itself (being an app) is pushing updates on android at a cadence now that almost matches what they are doing on the desktop.
Doing hardware integration is a lot harder than writing an app. I wish more app developers recognized this.
(That said: I do think Google could have done a much better job at separating out the true kernel/HAL/BSP layer stuff, which needs to be done per-device, from the framework layers that are largely device-independent. There's no reason to force a full hardware test just to push an fix for the Intents framework or whatever).
Performance is part of the Chrome brand and supporting 2.3 would only serve to weaken that brand. It would also require a monumental engineering effort.
Can you be more specific? There is no reason for Chrome to use the platform WebView on any Android version supporting loading native libraries.
Are there OpenGL limitations or something else blocking Chrome from running on 2.3?
Doing hardware integration is a lot harder than writing an app. I wish more app developers recognized this.
(That said: I do think Google could have done a much better job at separating out the true kernel/HAL/BSP layer stuff, which needs to be done per-device, from the framework layers that are largely device-independent. There's no reason to force a full hardware test just to push an fix for the Intents framework or whatever).