"I have a copy of a May 18, 2007 (not April) email from Jeff announcing his project on a wide-distribution list. It does not have the subject line "Google OS"; it's actually called "Guppy needs testers". Given that it begins, "I'd like to publish my Linux distro, called Guppy, for some testers to try out and provide feedback. Guppy is a little side project to build a Google distro of PuppyLinux for USB.", I'm inclined to believe it's the first such wide-distribution email. The phrase "Google OS" is never mentioned; neither are "browser" or "Chrome" or "Firefox" or "webapps". The closest we get is the single sentence two thirds of the way through that "I set up some desktop shortcuts to Google Apps", which is literally the only time the email mentions anything close to Jeff's claim above that "all of the functionality came from webapps; performing any operation on the desktop launched a Chrome window to one of many webapps." In fact, the email explicitly mentions that you can install OpenOffice if you want, which seems to contradict this portrayal a bit."
"I have a copy of a May 18, 2007 (not April) email from Jeff announcing his project on a wide-distribution list. It does not have the subject line "Google OS"; it's actually called "Guppy needs testers". Given that it begins, "I'd like to publish my Linux distro, called Guppy, for some testers to try out and provide feedback. Guppy is a little side project to build a Google distro of PuppyLinux for USB.", I'm inclined to believe it's the first such wide-distribution email. The phrase "Google OS" is never mentioned; neither are "browser" or "Chrome" or "Firefox" or "webapps". The closest we get is the single sentence two thirds of the way through that "I set up some desktop shortcuts to Google Apps", which is literally the only time the email mentions anything close to Jeff's claim above that "all of the functionality came from webapps; performing any operation on the desktop launched a Chrome window to one of many webapps." In fact, the email explicitly mentions that you can install OpenOffice if you want, which seems to contradict this portrayal a bit."