A fourth major desktop-focused operating system (if you include Linux) joined the mix this week as Google rolled out a test program for the long-awaited, browser-based Chrome OS. Manufacturers aren't expected to send Chrome OS notebooks to retailers until the middle of 2011, but a small number of early adopters are getting the first batch this week.

At the same time, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) unveiled the Chrome Web store, which is getting some good early reviews. The store signals "the first baby steps" toward a merging of apps and web pages, writes ZDNet's Larry Dignan. 

"Google's Chrome Web store highlights "apps," but these extensions, games and rethinking of content are really new ways to present web pages. Indeed, the New York Times app highlights new ways to present content," Dignan writes, adding that he suspect that web pages will tend to look like apps going forward. "As mobile browsers and broadband speeds improve, web apps will diminish the need for apps."

InterContinental Hotels is testing Chrome notebooks in several areas of its business, according to Bryson Koehler, the company's senior vice president for Global Revenue & Guest Technology. Some of the compelling uses include call centers and business service centers, Koehler wrote in a post on Google's official blog. 

In the ICH call centers, Chrome notebooks may help speed agents' work and reduce the time they spend on each call. "And from an IT perspective, we won't have to spend countless hours manually installing security patches and upgrades to operating systems and client software," Koehler wrote.

IHC may even end up handing out Chrome notebooks to some hotel guests when they check in at the front desk.    

For more:
- see Larry Dignan's post at ZDNet
- see Bryson Koehler's post at GoogleEnterprise blog

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