If you've ever used Google's free Chrome browser, you may or may not be aware that it's closely related to another, similarly named Google project called "Chromium."

Chrome and Chromium share a heavy portion of their core browser code, but Chrome is a proprietary Google product, while Chromium is open source. Both serve Linux, Windows and Mac OSX platforms, however, and both continue to vie for user share with Mozilla's open source Firefox, their distant cousin.

"Firefox and Chromium-based browsers are likely to continue to leapfrog each other in minor ways," Paul Hill, senior consultant at SystemsExperts, told LinuxInsider. "Each development community is aware of the other and each benefits the other."