Mozilla and the Battle for the Desktop

Robert O'Callahan

Lizard Engineer

Novell

About Me

Graduated Auckland University 1993

Graduated Carnegie Mellon 2001

IBM Research mid-2001 to end 2004

Research on improving software development tools

Worked on Mozilla as hobby, 1999-2004

Planned return to NZ 2005

Looking to work on Mozilla

Novell (Ximian) looking for someone

I am a Novell employee but I am not an official representative. All statements and opinions are my own.

All questions welcome.

History

Brief History of Mozilla:
The Netscape Years

Netscape browser open-source in 1998

Impossible to make money with MS giving away IE

Major code rewrite started late 1998

The old code was a real mess ...

Netscape 6 release late 2000 --- crap!

Rightly savaged by press and users; project at nadir

Mozilla 1.0 release mid 2002

Much improved

Netscape team canned mid 2003, project survives under new Mozilla Foundation

Brief History of Mozilla:
The Mozilla Foundation

Foundation funded by grants from IBM, AOL, Sun and others, takes over Mozilla development

Reduced number of fulltime engineers

Makes decisions Netscape/AOL couldn't make, e.g., popup blocking, shift to lean user-friendly Phoenix/Firebird/Firefox browser

Netscape had insisted on feature parity with Netscape Suite (mail etc)

Firefox starts to gain market share rapidly

Building enthusiasm --- and MF revenue

Firefox 1.0 release, NYT full-page ad, rave reviews, etc

Brief History of Mozilla:
The State of the Wod

Rising Firefox market share

> 5% of average users in USA, > 10% in France, 20% in Germany

Organisational rollouts

25-70% of US technical audience

Still seeing 200K downloads/day --- straight line

Increased investment

Employing Mozilla developers: IBM, Novell, Sun, Google...

Foundation financially strong

Key developers who want to be paid, are

Why Mozilla Matters

Keeping the Web Open

IE monopoly ==> risk of everyone just coding to IE

Microsoft sets the standards

IE required to access the Web

Strategic issue: non-Microsoft platforms (desktops, phones) permanently locked out of Web

Issue of principle: no one company should control the standards of communication/information

Rising Firefox market share => Web sites cannot afford to be IE-only

Leveling the Playing Field

Control over browser can be leveraged to support Web properties (search, portal, etc)

E.g., search in IE goes to MSN

Control over Web standards can favour particular technologies

Need to open this control point to ensure a level playing field for online businesses

Promoting Healthy Competition

Browsers still matter!

A core application for most users

Or rather, the interface to their applications

Safety-critical

Vulnerabilities

Phishing, scamming etc

Usability

Interface to a complex and dangerous world

Without competition, the ruling product stagnates

No major revision in IE since 2001

Rising Firefox share => Microsoft announces IE7

Novell and Mozilla

Novell's Linux Push

Disclaimer: I know nothing

Novell sees open source as a disruptive force, needs new direction

Jump into open source with two key acquisitions:

SUSE Linux distribution (primarily servers)

Ximian Linux desktop

SUSE is where the money is right now

Linux established in servers, not yet on desktops

Ximian more far-sighted

Big money potential in desktops, but harder to penetrate

All server businesses vulnerable while Microsoft owns desktop

Novell Linux Desktop

SUSE + Ximian GNOME + trimmings

Extra stability work

Long support cycle (5 years?)

Integration (e.g., themes)

Targeted directly at corporate desktop

Becoming standard for all users within Novell

Standard browser: Firefox

Best Web compatibility, next to IE

Keep familiar applications when moving from Windows

Has decent GNOME integration

Novell's Mozilla Activities

SUSE engineers build and package Mozilla/Firefox

SUSE and India engineers fixing bugs and improving Firefox integration

E.g., make GNOME desktop lockdown preferences to apply to Firefox

My role

Novell's interface to the Mozilla community

Make sure Mozilla community schedule aligns with Novell's

Get community help for Novell issues

Help push Novell's changes back into Mozilla trunk

Contribute to Mozilla on Novell's behalf

Drive Mozilla forward in directions strategic to Novell

The Future

Microsoft Avalon

Avalon: Microsoft's new graphics/text/UI framework

“XAML” markup language

Covers most of HTML, PDF and Flash in one framework

Tight integration with Windows, .NET

Heavy use of hardware graphics acceleration

Appears to be designed to supplant Web standards

Microsoft denies this...

Suspicion that IE Web engine is deliberately stagnant to force developers to Avalon for new functionality

Prediction: new IE will have great new UI, but no new features/fixes for Web developers

Will appear for Longhorn and WinXP late 2006

Mozilla's Future: The Core

Not enough to just support today's Web apps better

Need to offer new capabilities to Web developers

Graphics-rich applications (like Flash, but extending HTML)

Use of hardware graphics acceleration

Better text handling (e.g., hyphenation, multi-column)

Easier development of rich Web applications

Build on existing Web standards and create new ones

Gmail, Google Maps show what can be done already

E.g., use XMLHttpRequest/SOAP to access Web services and eliminate “reload page” problem

An opportunity to go where Microsoft won't, with better features for Web users and developers

Technical Work

Moving graphics code to Cairo

An open source, modern 2D graphics library

Supports hardware acceleration (ab)using 3D/OpenGL

David Reveman employed by Ximian

Supporting SVG Web standard for advanced 2D graphics

Integrating SVG with HTML

Add SVG effects to HTML pages

E.g., rotating, blended HTML content and forms

Adding new features to core layout engine

Multicolumn text

Hyphenation

Easier layout

Mozilla for Desktop Applications

Mozilla engine can power local applications as well as Web apps

Classic Suite, Firefox, Thunderbird all use XUL

Ongoing work to make this easier for all developers

Plan: integrate with Mono

An open source .NET implementation by Ximian/Novell

Use .NET languages and tools, plus the convenience and standards-goodness of Web development, all on the portable and widely deployed Mozilla engine

A rich, efficient, cross-platform, standards-based application platform

Good for Novell, good for the world

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2005-02-23T15:18:15