Running online data offline just got a little bit easier for users of Apple’s Macintosh and iPhone. Google unveiled a beta of its Gears browser plug-in for Safari, the default Web browser on those Apple platforms. Until now, Gears was only able to run in Firefox or Internet Explorer browsers, but with the advent of the beta, Google now opens up Gears’ functionality to a nice new chunk of users.
Google posted instructions on how to install the Safari flavor of Gears but cautioned that it’s only a beta and “Chances are it will break your browser. Please proceed with caution.” The beta requires at least Safari 3.1.1 on Tiger 10.4.11 or Leopard 10.5.3 to run. Interested users can download a copy here.
The news is another in a string of Gears announcements, including the new geolocation API and Gears’ expected support within Gmail and Calendar. Google keeps hacking away at the online/offline problem of cloud computing, and the wider the adoption of Gears, the more its strategy will pay off.
