> Currently Mozilla is a browser (Navigator), with additional "applications"
> like Communicator/Composer. However I am interested in generalising its
> design so that it becomes a generic application platform in which plug-in
> applications (lets call them PIAs, not to be confused with the current
> browser plug-ins) run.
Er... Mozilla is currently an application platform. It's just that running
it with no command-line arguments defaults to "mozilla -browser" :-)
> 3) PIAs live in a single subdirectory (like current browser plug-ins),
> probably as JAR files which can be remotely installed and updated.
>
> 4) On startup Mozilla looks for the installed PIAs and makes them accessible
> via the lower panel (from which Communicator/etc are currently accessed).
This is what currently happens - check out installed-chrome.txt in your
chrome directory.
> 5) Unlike the current Navigator/Composer/Communicator scheme, PIAs always
> run in the Mozilla instance from which they are started - they do not start
> off new Mozilla "instances" (though perhaps the user can optionally override
> this). The user can switch between them using the same lower panel icons,
> which "activates" the selected PIA and "suspends" (hides) the last one.
What is an "instance"? Currently, all Mozilla applications running at once
share resources.
> tell, the current Mozilla outer design already nods in the
> direction of many of the above (5 and 9 excepted), so this *might* not be
> such a major undertaking.
Do you think this is a coincidence? Mozilla has for a long time been an
application platform (albeit an unfinished one.) Almost all of what you
suggest has been thought of and is planned. Ask [EMAIL PROTECTED] about
Mozilla-as-platform - he can talk about this for hours...
Gerv
