Chrome OS uses single sign-on account synchronization to create a truly unique experience. You can pick up a new Chromebook or powerwash an existing one and get back up and running with virtually all of your life’s data in just a few moments. This means that if your hardware is damaged or lost, time-consuming data transfers and boredom are a thing of the past. However, there are five very specific things that Google has chosen not to include in its sync that make the Chromebook setup process seem a little less magical and efficient.
Do not disturb
We’ve already talked about reducing distractions using the Do Not Disturb feature found in your quick settings, but a very uncomfortable thing is that after power washing, setting up a new device or just rebooting a Chromebook, you need to reactivate Do Not Disturb … every time. Maybe it’s just me, but every time I turn on my Chromebook during the day, it becomes second nature for me to activate DnD as a first action. If a user has a specific preference for it, then it stands to reason that it must be persistent, right? If I no longer want Do Not Disturb activated, I would be more than happy to disable it manually. Food for thought!
User dictionary
Having to right-click on the words you use frequently to get rid of the red scrambled line under them is already annoying the first time, but having to do this every time you wash your device or log in to a new one drives me crazy. Maybe it’s just my undiagnosed OCD taking action here, but if I tell my device that a proper name, a brand name, or a popular but relatively new word, which is not part of the official dictionary, is something I want to be accepted as correct, I don’t want to continually hear that I’ve never heard of it just because I’m on different hardware. Synchronizing in the cloud from the user’s personal dictionary makes perfect sense to me – why isn’t that yet?
You can find your personal Chrome OS keyboard dictionary here:
Settings> Apps> Google Play Store> Manage Android settings> System> Languages> Personal dictionary
Chrome flags
Chrome OS flags are for developers and even the fixing elite, so I realized that it doesn’t really affect a new Chromebook user – especially a basic browser, but for those of us who continually activate tons of them to try new and future features, it is very annoying to have to do this every time we get into a new device. Many flags, such as global media controls, picture-in-picture mode, and so on, are so well developed that they almost became the basis of our experience with the Chromebook before they were even released. It would be very convenient to have persistent flags synchronized with our accounts – I can’t be the only one who feels that way.
Automatic login on all sites
This isn’t really something they need for cloud syncing, but it dramatically slows down the process of setting up a new device, so I thought about mentioning it here. Chrome automatically fills in passwords thanks to the feature that is part of Android 9, which Chromebooks now have integrated, but it’s not good enough in my opinion. I could be imagining this, but it seems like I remember a time – perhaps incorrectly – that, in addition to Chrome auto-complete, also provided you with the ability to auto-login to websites. Recently, a reader pointed out that Chrome OS does not do this and made me realize how slow it makes setting up a new device or reconfiguring an existing one – especially for those of us who have hundreds of accounts.
Custom keyboard shortcuts
The OOBE or out of the box experience for Chromebooks that dock while the process starts and completes forces the ‘All’ button to take on the functionality of a Caps Lock key instead of Search until it is manually changed through the settings. For someone who has never attributed all of the caps lock obsession, I quite like the way Google handles things and I prefer my Everything button to be Search out-of-the-box – as it is for non-docked Chromebooks. If our keyboard key customizations were synchronized with our Google account, that would be phenomenal.
What do you think of these five categories? Did I miss something vital that you think slows down the experience of setting up a new device? Let’s discuss it in the comments!
