<p>According to Google, the company is now allowing developers to make use the company's Google Cloud Messaging for Chrome feature throughout all Chrome channels a long and convoluted way to say that Google's finally unlocking push notifications within Chrome OS and its Chrome browser.</p><p>Naturally, a user has to be signed into Chrome in order to make use of the feature, but Google's switch will allow apps and extensions to now push messages directly to users when particular actions occur. To borrow an example from Google's post in the Chromium Blog about the change, this could include actions like, "a news alert, a message sent to a user or a stock hitting a price threshold."</p><p>Previously, apps and extensions had to continuously query servers in order to determine whether a notification needed to be sent to a user a process that, "consumed bandwidth and reduced the battery life of your users' machines," reads the blog post from Google product manager Mark Scott.</p><p>The process is a bit easier now and more of real-time process, to boot. After a user installs a particular app or extension, said user's channel ID (a special identifier that distinguishes an app or extension's users from each other) gets passed along to the developer's server. When it comes time to send out a message, the server notifies Google Cloud Messaging which, in turn, fires off a message to "all instances of Chrome where the user is signed in," Google describes.</p><p><a href="http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2418864,00.asp">Keep reading...</a></p><p>Read also:</p><p><a href="http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/10/google-brings-its-cloud-messaging-push-notification-service-to-chrome/">Google Brings Its Cloud Messaging Push Notification Service To Chrome</a> (TechCrunch)</p><p><a href="http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/05/09/google-brings-its-cloud-messaging-service-to-chrome-so-apps-and-extensions-use-less-bandwidth-battery-life/">Google Brings its Cloud Messaging Service from Android to Chrome</a> (The Next Web)</p><p><a href="http://www.tweaktown.com/news/30315/chrome-and-chrome-os-get-google-cloud-messaging/">Chrome and Chrome OS get Google Cloud Messaging</a> (TweakTown)</p><p>Explore: <a href="http://news.google.com/news/more?ncl=dE6uL_c3_xtmT8MgMtKXLWikVTu4M&ned=us">21 additional articles.</a></p>