Google Wave facts for kids
Google Wave was a special online tool made by Google. It was like a mix of email, instant messaging, and a way for groups to work together. Google called it an application that let people "communicate and collaborate in real time." This meant many people could work on a document or chat together at the same exact time.
You could use Google Wave for group discussions, like a forum. It also worked for sending emails or quick messages, similar to instant messaging, between two or more people.
How Google Wave Worked
Google Wave was designed to make working together easy. Imagine you and your friends are writing a story. With Google Wave, you could all type on the same story at once. You would see what everyone else was typing as they typed it! This was called "real-time" collaboration.
It was also useful for group chats. Instead of separate messages, all the messages and replies would stay together in one "wave." This made it easy to follow a conversation.
Browser Needs
To use Google Wave, especially with older web browsers like Internet Explorer, you sometimes needed to install something called Google Chrome Frame. This add-on made Internet Explorer act more like Google Chrome when you visited the Wave website. This was important because Internet Explorer didn't have all the features needed for Wave to work properly, like full HTML5 support.
Why Google Wave Ended
Google Wave was a very new idea, but it didn't become as popular as Google hoped. Because of this, Google decided to stop developing it. Google Wave was officially discontinued in 2010.
However, the idea didn't completely disappear! Google made the software code for Wave available to everyone. This is called open source. Other developers then took this code and continued to work on it. It is now known as Apache Wave.
