Chromebook updates will get harder to follow as Google kills version-tracking tool
Chromebooks have many benefits, including frequent updates and a relatively long support lifetime. But following whichChromebooksare running which version of Chrome OS can be tricky without some help. For years, Google has kept track of which models are running which version across Stable, Beta, Dev, and Canary channelsat a dedicated site. Unfortunately for anyone trying to keep track of update rollouts at home, Google’s moving things over to theChromium Dash portal— it’s prettier but not quite as easy to find your Chromebook or the right numbers in.
The old page never really had a good name, but you might have ended up on it if you were following a major Chrome OS release, hoping to see it land on your specific Chromebook. The page title itself calls it “CrOS Updates Serving,” while Android Police’s Kent Duke refers to it as the update matrix spreadsheet. Whatever you called it, the page lists all the Chrome board codenames, together with product names and the currently-served versions of Chrome OS across all release channels, plus links to downloadable recovery images.
Theold page(left) might be uglier than the Chromium Dash (right), but it was arguably more useful.
Together with theOmahaProxy CSV Viewer, the tool lets you capture a complete image of the state of a Chrome OS update’s rollout. That’s particularly handy since updates don’t always hit all devices at the same time. Sometimes certain Chromebooks get held back (if, for example, there’s an issue), as a color-coded glance at the current page will show is still common.
Navigating to the page now shows the notice above, stating that Google is deprecating the old page and urging people to use the new Chromium Dash. Unfortunately for anyone that likes to keep track of when an update hits their Chromebook, the Chromium Dash page both makes it a little harder to find your Chromebook if you don’t know the board’s codename, and it doesn’t list version releases in the same easily understood format, using the less common “platform version” release numbers instead that most users won’t understand (i.e., 14388.61.0 instead of 98.0.4758.107). On top of that, it’s alsomissing some AUE boardsthat are no longer receiving updates.
The warning message you’ll see now visiting the page.
Chrome OS and Chromebook enthusiasts might be aware of asimilar but much snazzier tool at cros.techthat lets you follow both version rollouts and releases for individual Chromebooks via a searchable drop-down menu. Unfortunately, this tool gets its data from the page that Google is shutting down. However, the developer behind it tells us they’re hoping to be able to migrate it to the new source and still display data like version releases in a better format than Google does.
In the meantime, if you watched the old page like a hawk during major update releases, waiting to see when your particular Chromebook was updated, soon you’ll have to find a new way to do it.
Thanks: Skylar
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