Hello,
Brendan Eich (Chief Mozilla Architect) has posted
the slides from last week's Mozilla Developer Day talk
titled "Mozilla Futures: Analysis and Proposals".
Brendan Eich kicks off the talk with a strategic
outlook:
* Web standards stagnating due to Microsoft monopoly
* W3C standards alone won't save us from this trend
* "Desktop" and "Web" applications converging
* Proprietary XUL-like languages springing up
* Rich 2D graphics with animation effects wanted
* Linux desktop (warts and all) usage growing
and continues with highlighting Mozilla's strength
before pointing out Mozilla's weaknesses and how to
address them e.g.:
1) Lack of complete, integrated 2D graphics
solution
--> Accelerate and optimize the SVG effort
* Help SVG implementors
- DeCOMtaminate, avoid past Gecko mistaked
* Future-proof Mozilla's rendering architecture
- Take advantage of hardware acceleration
- Target cairo and OpenGL; Quartz on OS X;
GDI+
* Port SVG code to the new rendering APIs
2) No well-integrated programming-in-the-large
language, only one well-integrated scripting language
(JavaScript)
--> support popular scripting and programming
languages
* Implement JavaScript 2 (Narcissus project -
self-hosted JS/JS2 - started)
* Extend existing Python support to match chrome
JS
* Integrate Perl5 a la Python?
* Support several language runtimes (Mono,
Parrot)?
* Better Java integration
3) XUL app learning curve steep for
non-web-developers
--> integrate a Mozilla XUL builder into the
Eclipse IDE
* wizards to generate boilerplate and packaging
* direct manipulation graphical layout design
tool
* integrated validation, inspection, debugging
* use Java, SWT for builder superstructure, front
end
* embed Geck back end with full XUL support
* should be "two-way": can read hand-crafted
sources
4) Poor or missing developer documentation
--> Launch developer.mozilla.org
* library of API documents
* tutorials for "how do I do X on this platform?"
* Bite-sized documents with lots of links and
TOCs
* Wiki front end to website CVS back end
To sum up Brendan proposals include:
* Building a new drag-and-drop style XUL designer
plugin for Eclipse
* Focusing on adding a built-in SVG renderer to
Mozilla
* Focusing on forging alliances with other open
source projects (fight NIH - not invented here -
syndrom)
* Focusing on adding new scripting languages (such
as Python, JavaScript 2 and Perl 5)
* Launching a new MSDN-like developer site
nicknamed DevMo (developer.mozilla.org) that will
offer documentation, samples and much more
* Working together with Apple and Opera to advance
W3C web browser standards (e.g. new CSS properties for
a XUL-like box layout system)
* and much more
Full story @
http://www.mozilla.org/events/dev-day-feb-2004/mozilla-futures
- Gerald
PS: You might also want to check out Gervase Markham's
talk slides on the Mozilla Foundation online @
http://www.gerv.net/presentations/fosdem2004 from the
FOSDEM 2004 conference in Brussels.
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