Google has launched an assault on Microsoft's dominance of personal computers by announcing a new operating system.
Google Chrome
The Google Chrome OS will be available on netbooks first
Google Chrome OS will be available on netbooks - laptops designed for web browsing - from the second half of 2010.
It will be virus-free and allow quick access to the internet, Google said.
The search engine company laid down the gauntlet on its official blog and asked for the help of the "open-source" community.
"The operating systems that browsers run on were designed in an era where there was no web," vice president of product management, Sundar Pichai, wrote.
"[This is] our attempt to re-think what operating systems should be."
Their OS - the interface between a computer's user and its hardware, which hosts applications - will be based around the Chrome browser.
"The web is the platform," Mr Pichai said.
The Chrome browser, which was released at the end of last year, currently has less than 1% of the market.
This is significantly behind Microsoft Internet Explorer's 70% and other rivals Apple Safari and Mozilla Firefox.
Microsoft has said 96% of netbooks use its OS - a figure Google intends to demolish.
"This is Google dropping the mother of bombs on its chief rival, Microsoft," the TechCrunch blog concluded.
"And it's a genius play. So many people are buying netbooks right now, but are running Windows XP on them. Windows XP is eight years old."
Nonetheless, other commentators suggest it may take several years for Google to change the habits of consumers.