Going by the buzz making rounds, Google will likely release an early version of its Chrome OS - its free, open source operating system – next week; and the full version of the OS will probably find its way to the markets next year! 

The imminent launch of the Chrome OS was announced by Google in July, when the company had said in a blog post that, to begin with, Chrome will cater to the netbook market. The Internet search biggie had also noted that the availability of netbooks featuring the Chrome can be expected in the second half of 2010.

For the embedded Chrome operating system running on netbooks, Google is creating a very lightweight browser, Chrome. The company had previously remarked that the Chrome, an intended lightweight browser, will facilitate the users’ rapid connection to cloud applications – thereby assuming that the cloud apps would become pervasive in the times to come, and will not need a very powerful machine to run them.

As such, with its rumored next-week launch to the developers, the Google Chrome OS might mark a turning point in computing. While the OS will provide mobile functionality on a netbook, it will do much more on a desktop – virtually transforming the PC into a much-hyped workstation, which will largely be dependent on the Internet for almost all the tasks the user undertakes.