about:mozilla » Experiments

Developer Tools and the Open Web

deb — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 17:08:59 +0000

Mozilla Labs recently announced the formation of a new group that will focus on the research and development of developer tools for the Open Web. “We believe that there’s tremendous opportunity for innovation in tools that increase developer productivity, enable compelling user experiences, and promote the use of open standards.” Dion Almaer and Ben Galbraith, co-founders of Ajaxian, the Ajax Experience, and long-time supporters of the Open Web have joined Mozilla in a full-time capacity to lead the new project. For more information, please see the Mozilla Labs blog post.

Ubiquity tutorial: turn bookmarklets into commands

deb — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 16:42:25 +0000

Aza Raskin has put together a short video tutorial on how to turn your Firefox bookmarklets into Ubiquity commands. “Bookmarklets are clickable actions (technically a link containing some Javascript) that can be added to the bookmarks bar of your browser. They’re a good way of getting control of the web back into users’ hands, by allowing them to add whatever new functionality they want to the websites they visit. The main problem with bookmarklets is that they don’t provide a scalable solution for accessing their functionality. You can only have so many buttons on the toolbar before they become unusable.” There’s a new utility function in Ubiquity that makes it trivial to turn any bookmarklet into a Ubiquity command, and Aza’s video tutorial shows you how to do it.

Mobile Firefox: User Experience developments

deb — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 13:40:31 +0000

Mobile Firefox (code-named “Fennec”) recently hit its milestone 8 (M8) release. Mark Finkle blogged about the release at the time, and Madhava Enros has since blogged about the user-experience changes and additions to the mobile browser. “This is an exciting time from a user-experience perspective because, along with functionality and stability improvements, this milestone brings with it the beginnings of Fennec’s look and feel. In a sense, we have some UI worth playing with, evaluating, and improving.” Madhava’s post includes a bevy of screenshots that you can check out, and if you would like to take part in the discussion about the Mobile Firefox UI, you should do so over in the Mobile development group.

Language-based interfaces

deb — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 16:57:07 +0000

Jonathan DiCarlo has been writing a series of blog posts discussing language-based interfaces — interfaces that allow you type commands in real language and the right stuff happens. “What would the web be like if you could tell it what you want to do as easily as you currently tell it where you want to go?”

Mozilla Labs has started experimenting with linguistic interfaces that are designed to do just that, the first of which is the recently-launched Ubiquity project. Jonathan’s posts are an extensive look into the concepts, questions, and thinking behind the experiments, and he has written three so far: Language-based interfaces: The problem, Language-based interfaces: Where do we stand now?, and Language-based interfaces: Report card for Ubiquity. If you’re at all interested in these approaches and ideas you should read Jonathan’s blog, and then head over to the Ubiquity project to get involved with the growing community working on these experiments.

Introducing Ubiquity

deb — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 14:16:03 +0000

Mozilla Labs introduced the Ubiquity project last week, an “experiment into connecting the Web with language in an attempt to find new user interfaces that could make it possible for everyone to do common Web tasks more quickly and easily.” Alongside the announcement, Labs also released an early experimental prototype to demonstrate some of the concepts of Ubiquity. You can install the prototype, read the tutorial, and learn more about Ubiquity in depth. Further information is available at the Mozilla Labs announcement and Aza Raskin’s weblog.

Firefox Mobile design session: bookmarks

deb — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 16:33:45 +0000

Aza Raskin writes, “For the third installment of the Firefox Mobile design discussions, it’s bookmark time. Bookmarks have been a fundamental feature in the browser since Mosaic days. Do they have a place in Mobile? Are there better paradigms? How are they displayed? What’s the difference between a tab and a bookmark? Is it only a matter of one being in the device’s memory?” These are some of the questions that are asked and answered in the third video installment of the Firefox Mobile design sessions. Aza and Madhava look forward to your thoughts and feedback. More information is available at Aza’s weblog.

A glimpse into the Mobile Firefox design process

deb — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 15:25:12 +0000

Aza Raskin writes, “Designing at Mozilla is an interesting process: We are committed to doing design in the open and involving community in a fundamental capacity, yet we must avoid design by committee. For the latest round of user experience iterations for Firefox Mobile, Madhava Enros and I are recording our discussion sessions. It’s an experiment, so I have a couple of questions: 1) is this a useful thing to do — do you find value in seeing our unfiltered face-to-face meetings, and 2) in what ways could we make it more valuable to you?” Aza and Madhava have posted two videos so far: Preferences, Add-ons, and Downloads in Fennec, and In-page Find in Fennec. They’re looking for feedback, so if you have anything to add, leave comments on the blog posts.

No browser left behind

deb — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:14:54 +0000

Vladimir Vukićević has developed a native Canvas implementation for Microsoft Internet Explorer that is based on the same rendering core that’s in Firefox. Microsoft does not support Canvas in IE7, and has stated that it will not be supported in IE8, which continues to be one of the biggest roadblocks towards the widespread adoption of the Canvas technology. Vlad writes, “With an object tag, a bit of CSS, and a single line of script,

Snowl: an experiment with messaging in the browser

deb — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 14:00:37 +0000

Myk Melez has been working on an experimental prototype for a “next-generation conversation app” that he’s calling “Snowl”. “Lots of users use desktop applications like Thunderbird and Apple Mail to converse with each other online, while many others use web apps including not only webmail but also social networks, web discussion forums, and other site/service-specific tools. Is there a role for Firefox in this mix?” Myk writes that his prototype, while not quite usable yet, has basic support for subscribing to, searching, and browsing messages from feeds via two views: a list similar to a three-pane email application’s interface, and a variant of the “river of news” view described by Dave Winer.

Myk is hoping to have a 0.1 version of the prototype ready by the Mozilla Summit, where he is hoping to lead a session to present and discuss the experiment. If you’re interested in the progress so far, Myk has made the source available and requests feedback through any of a variety of channels. For more information, check out Myk’s blog post.