The lack of a delete key makes the Chromebook a disappointment
For all of their technological genius and massive resources, Google sure doesn’t know how to make hardware. It’s a problem that has plagued them for years but it seems to be best highlighted with the Chromebook Pixel.
Over at CNET, they were focused on one of the major bugs with the laptop – the challenge the device has with connecting to cameras. There’s good and bad that comes with having an operating system that is designed to be light and shareable. One of the bad parts is that you often miss some of the common accepted notions that other operating systems (and their users) take for granted.
Because it runs on what is essentially a souped-up browser, Chrome OS faces the kinds of difficulties that don’t plague other operating systems. The regular updates can be a two-headed coin. Changes are made regularly and the browser OS gets better more often than not and on-schedule. But it also means that if the browser’s performance is off during an update cycle, you’re stuck with that hit.
There are sacrifices that people are willing to make in order to get the proper size and portability they want out of mobile devices, but this is one that crosses the line. There’s no delete key. There’s no way to hack your way into having a delete key. There’s no caps lock key either (replaced by a persistent search button), but at least that can be fixed in settings.
It isn’t that the delete key is all that important. It only takes a few days of steady use for someone to get used to it and start using the backspace key for all of their error-correcting needs. That’s not the point. It’s about changing a paradigm by replacing it with greatness rather than reducing it with poor decisions. Google is one of the few companies that can and should change the way we operate technologically in this world. The Chromebook family should be an absolute gamechanger the way that many of the Apple devices have been in the last decade. Instead, they have a dud. The lack of a delete key isn’t the end of the world for its users, but it’s enough to point to a fundamental flaw in the way that Google handles hardware in general.
“The chromebook actually does have delete functionality, just like on a mac, press ctrl+backspace”
Have you even used a chromebook for more than fifteen seconds? You get used to the fact there is not delete key very very fast with such a nicely trimmed and good working OS.
And labeling something a “disappointment” based on the lack of ONE key? That’s pretty rash and harsh don’t you think? It’s like saying no to a really nice car just because it doesn’t come with an automatic gearbox, only stickshift: lame and shortsighted.
Alt+Backspace = Delete
Are you serious? No Delete key is your only valid argument to say that Google fails at hardware? That’s being very short sighted isn’t it? (I guess having the highest resolution display in the market doesn’t count as “hardware”…did you even notice that it’s a touchscreen?)
Just so you know, if you use ALT+Backspace this functions the same way as the Delete key. These are two big buttons instead of one small key as seen on devices of companies that, in your opinion, do get hardware.
For me it actually makes it easier, because I don’t have to look down to my keyboard to see where the exact location of the small Delete key is.
Finally, try pressing CTRL-ALT-?, this will bring up beautiful overlay of all the shortcuts that exist on a Chromebook.
Last time I checked you just hit alt+Backspace and hey presto…