The Mozilla Blog

The Mozilla Labs team today announced two new design challenges for the fall, via the Mozilla Labs blog.

The first is the University Design Challenge Fall ‘09. For this challenge, the team will  work together with students from universities and schools specializing in User Experience and Human-Computer-Interaction studies around the world to find innovative concepts to the question: “Browsing and Search History — How can we make sense of this rich source of data and how do we best present this data to the user?”

Over the course of 10 weeks, students will work together in teams, with each university deploying a different solution approach — from a semester-long integration of the Design Challenge into the course to shorter Design Sprints and high-energy 24 hour Design Jams. For more information visit Mozilla Labs, here.

The  second design challenge will focus on Weave Web UI, and will aim to answer the question: “Visualizing your browser data – How can we provide intuitive and useful visual representations of your browser data (such as your contacts, bookmarks, browsing and search history, tabs, stored credentials etc.) on a web page?”

The Labs team, together with IxDA, a network dedicated to the professional practice of Interaction Design and Johnny Holland, an open collective, talking, sharing and finding answers about all aspects of interaction design, will invite the wider community to join them in this challenge to develop concepts and submit them to their site.  The full design brief and background information can be found here.

For more information see the Mozilla Labs blog post and learn how you can get involved!

The Mozilla Add-ons team has release AMO 5.0.9, with updates to Recommendations, Collections, and Contributions! For more information, read the AMO blog post, excerpted below:

Add-on Recommendations

Some things go great together: peanut butter and jelly, popcorn and movies, Firebug and YSlow. Starting today, when you’re looking at an add-on’s listing, you’ll see several other add-ons that are often used together. We base these recommendations on the add-ons our users have grouped together in collections.

Contributions

Last month we launched our Contributions pilot, a way for add-on authors to accept monetary donations from users of their add-ons. We’ve gotten great feedback from users and developers, and are now expanding the reach of contributions on AMO. Add-ons that have turned on Contributions will now have contribution boxes in search results and category browse listings, where many installations take place.

While these new boxes help surface the existence of contributions, some users aren’t likely to make a donation without first testing the add-on to ensure it’s useful to them. With this release, developers have a new way to accept donations after a user has tried the add-on by simply pointing users to their add-on’s new about page.

Collections

Since the launch of Collections in June, add-on fans have created almost 30,000 collections, resulting in more than 6.5 million add-on downloads. This release includes many new features to make Collections even more useful.

Logged-in users can now rate collections and sort by those ratings to help the best collections bubble to the top.

To help determine the popularity of a collection, authors can now access a collection statistics dashboard that shows information on the number of subscribers, ratings, and downloads over time.

We’ve also added a treat for users of browsers that support localStorage (including Firefox 3.5): recently viewed collections. When browsing through the collection directory, users can now easily get back to a collection they saw, without having to log in.

Public Stats

In early 2008, we gave add-on developers their first look at the shiny new Statistics Dashboard for each add-on hosted on AMO. Currently some dashboards are public and some are private, but we’ve never offered an in-depth look at the aggregate statistics for all add-ons hosted on AMO.
Today we’ve launched a detailed view of AMO as a whole, with data on add-ons, downloads, active users, users, reviews, and collections. Go on, check it out!

Add-on Validation

Earlier this month, we announced the arrival of the new add-on verification suite on AMO. At the time it was an optional tool developers could choose to run for their files. With this release, the tool will automatically be run when uploading a new file, and the results of the tests will affect the submission process. Editors will see the test results and any flags when reviewing the add-on. We hope to help developers catch common problems before an editor’s review.

We’re getting close to Mozilla Service Week — it’s just 18 days away!  We’ve had over 4,300 hours pledged and over 2,200 volunteer opportunities posted.  We’re in the process of rolling out action templates for Service Week and OneWebDay for those that would like to create their own opportunities or need a little more flexibility   They’re sets of actions and resources that you can use to help non-profits, organizations and individuals improve their experience online and allow them to better leverage the Web.  Check them out:

• Internet Health Check:  Online privacy and security are major concerns for everyone.  The Internet Health Check provides four easy steps to update a computer’s browser and plug-ins.  You can perform Internet Health Checks for an organization or friends and family.
• Digital Marketing:  The Digital Marketing Template was created to help Service Week volunteers get organizations set up with a preliminary social media marketing framework (see Chelsea Novak’s blog for more details).  Social Media tools can greatly help an NPO connect with its community, donors and the general public – for free!

We’re hoping these templates make it easier for you to act!  If you have any ideas on new ones or would like create some, please comment here.  A few ideas to keep in mind if you’d like to use these templates or others:

• Take a moment to pledge your hours.
• Share your plans or stories on Mozilla Service Week’s site — it will help provide inspiration for others.
• Challenge your friends to do this as well using PledgeBank (i.e. I will perform 10 Internet Health Checks if 20 of my friends do so as well).

And, remember to have fun!

Today the Mozilla mobile team announced the release of Fennec 1.0 Beta 3 for Maemo!   Stuart Parmenter, Mozilla’s director of mobile engineering, explains more about the exciting new features and improvements to performance in his blog post, excerpted below.

We’ve made big improvements to kinetic panning and added the ability to scroll iframes.  A lot of work has been done to make our theme more robust, taking advantage of things like media queries to support various devices, orientations, and platforms which you’ll see more of in the next Windows Mobile release.  Overall, this beta is a major improvement to previous Fennec betas.

Moving forward, we’re going to focus on fixing polish bugs, rough edges, and taking advantage of things like our new tile system to help avoid the user seeing a checkerboard while panning.

For more information, check out the developer release notes.

As you know, we launched the Mozilla Creative Collective today!  To kick things off we’re hosting a mini design challenge around Mozilla Service Week.  We’re hoping your creativity and artistic skills can help inspire action and ultimately better the Web experience for people and organizations around the world.

Here are some ideas:

• Craft a flyer, poster or banner (the offline kind!) to get the word out.
• Design new site badges, Twitter backgrounds or blog themes.
• Create a new Persona for Mozilla Service Week.  Check out the  current one.
• Dream up a new t-shirt design for the community store.
• Create an avatar for Facebook or other social networks.

As inspiration check out The Royal Order’s blog post about the design direction of the Mozilla Service Week site.  In a nutshell:

• The Mozilla Service Week site aims to be inspirational and make participants feel part of a bigger movement that has the ability to affect change and better the Web for people all the world.
• The site strives to reflect the organic, participatory and people-driven nature of the Mozilla project.
• We drew from the humanistic style of 1930’s WPA murals which evoked people working together and helping each other for the sake of the greater good.

You’re encouraged to use existing Mozilla Service Week elements (such as the logo) to create your own unique interpretation of the “take action” theme. In other words, your designs can look entirely different from the other Service Week materials…it’s up to you. As
inspiration, check out:

• Mozilla Service Week Website Design Graphic (Photoshop file)
• Website Design Elements (PNG files)

Please submit your designs to the Mozilla Creative Collective tagged with “mozservice09″ by September 14th.  We’ll be sending t-shirts to our favorites!

Lastly, you can make a difference by helping an organization with their design needs as part of Mozilla Service Week.  There are opportunities for both Web design and graphic design.  Social Actions for instance can use some help with a new Twitter background and more!

Let’s use our creativity to make a difference this Mozilla Service Week!

I’m excited to announce the initial beta release of the Mozilla Creative Collective, the official new home and hub of activity for our visual design community. The goal of the Creative Collective is to use art as a means for spreading Firefox and sharing the Mozilla story in new ways.

Building communities is a big part of what Mozilla is all about, and key to our success as an organization.  We have dedicated communities that contribute to nearly every aspect of Mozilla – from software development, to extensions, to localization, to marketing, and more – but an area that’s traditionally lacked an organized community is visual design. And because art is such a powerful form of communication, we’re harnessing that with the Creative Collective.

Mozilla actually has a long history with community design. Successful past projects such as the Firefox 3 t-shirt, Mozilla Mexico logo design contest and Personas are just a sampling of our community’s creative energy – and demonstrate the growing level of interest among people who are eager to contribute.

On the Creative Collective site, artists can create personal profiles, share their work in a public gallery, connect and collaborate with others from around the world, and much more. There’s also a variety of social features, such as a system of achievement badges, to make the experience more fun for everyone.

An important feature that’s not yet available (but will be added soon) is the Design Challenge, which will prompt members to submit design solutions based around a particular theme.  Although the feature hasn’t been formally introduced to the site, we’re already reaching out to artists to help support Mozilla Service Week with creative designs that inspire action. If you’re looking for an initial way to get involved, be sure to check that out.

As noted earlier, the site is still in beta so we’re eager to hear your feedback. If you have suggestions on how to improve the site, please don’t hesitate to share them with us. We’ll be making tweaks and adding new features over time, and are counting on the community to help guide the project’s future direction. So, make sure to check back often, or follow our tweets, for updates.  Looking forward to seeing you on the Creative Collective!

Editor’s note: Mozilla released a major update for Firefox 3.0.x users on Thursday, August 13th, 2009. Check out the Mozilla Developer News announcement, reposted below, for more details.

Users with the latest version of Firefox 3 will be getting an offer to update to Firefox 3.5. If you’re running Firefox 3.0.13 you will see the offer in the next couple of days, though if you’re eager you can always “Check for Updates” in the “Help” menu. This is what the offer will look like:

Clicking the “Upgrade to Firefox 3.5″ link will open a new tab with more information about Firefox 3.5 to help you make your decision about upgrading. From there, you have a choice:

• select Later if you don’t want to decide now; Firefox will ask again in 24 hours
• select Never if you don’t want to accept this upgrade offer; we might send you another offer again in the future, but it won’t be for several weeks or months
• select Get the new version to continue on with the upgrade process!

Once you’ve accepted that, Firefox will download and install the update, then offer to restart the browser. When you restart, you’ll be rolling with Firefox 3.5!

Now, although over 90% of Firefox add-ons have been updated to be compatible with Firefox 3.5, in some cases the authors have created entirely new versions. If that happens with your favorite add-on, you might see the following screen:

You can see exactly which add-ons are being flagged as potentially incompatible by clicking on Show List. As mentioned above, for most popular add-ons, there probably is an update available, but you’ll need to install Firefox 3.5 first in order to check. If you continue with the update process, when Firefox 3.5 starts up for the first time you’ll see the following screen:

By all means, Check Now to see if there’s a version of that add-on which works with Firefox 3.5. If there is, you’ll see the following:

You’ll want to Install Now which will fetch the update and then continue loading Firefox 3.5.

If an update isn’t available, Firefox will check every day and let you know once the add-on author has created one. If you’ve come this far and decide that you can’t live without your favorite add-on, you can always go to www.firefox.com and click on “Other Languages and Systems”, and click on the link to download an older version of Firefox.

Mozilla Service Week is coming up in just one month – September 14 to 21, 2009! The driving force behind service week is our strong belief that everyone should know how to use the Internet, have easy access to it, and have a great experience when they’re online. You can have a hand in helping organizations and people all over the world experience the joy of using the Web too!

Here’s how to help:

• Choose from a list of service opportunities: Search our partner sites (Idealist & betterplace.org) for a volunteer opportunity near you or anywhere around the world! Our site is now available in Spanish, Italian, French and German as well!
• Take part in “Earth Day for the Web”: We’ve partnered with OneWebDay on September 22nd, which aims to celebrate and preserve the Web as an important commons accessible to everyone. This year’s theme is “Digital Inclusion” and there will be local service events that you can join!
• Create your own: Reach out to a local school, organization or people near you to find out what sort of technology help they need. Here are some examples:
  • William Reynolds of the University of Virginia is going to teach his student council how to use social media to better communicate with students.
  • Tim Hogan and The Royal Order design firm are helping the Tutor/Mentor Connection in Chicago rearchitect and redesign their current site.
  • William D. of the UK is creating a guide on how the Internet can benefit people of different age groups, different career paths and different levels of technical knowledge.
• Follow our lead: If you need an idea of how to help we’re providing a series of simple activities that can help make the Web better. First up is an “Internet Health Check” with easy steps on how to keep people safe on the Web. We’ll roll out more in the coming weeks!

Mozilla Service Week wouldn’t be possible without the incredible community and our wonderful partners who are supporting the program. Idealist.org and betterplace.org have stepped up to help organizations list service needs and help volunteers find them. Major names in non-profit technology, service and social entrepreneurship spaces have joined on as as “Friends” of the program to help promote Mozilla Service Week to the various communities that they serve which include schools, NPOs, NGOs and more. “Friends” of the project include:

• Aspiration
• ChristianVolunteering.org
• CiviCRM
• Community Technology Network
• Convio
• DemocracyInAction
• DonorsChoose.org
• The Extraordinaries
• GiveIndia
• IfPeople
• Innovation for People
• JustGiving
• Live Earth
• Ned
• NPower
• NTEN
• PopTech
• Social Actions
• Social Edge
• SocialBrite
• TakingITGlobal
• TechSoup Global
• The Transmission Project
• Zazengo

We hope you’ll join us in Mozilla Service Week and make a difference by helping people and organizations use something you love – the Web!  If you’re an organization in need of help, learn more here. For more details on how to volunteer visit here or join our online workshop tomorrow, August 19th at 9 a.m. PDT.  And, remember to register, pledge your hours and share your stories on mozillasevice.org!

Today the Mozilla Labs team announced its Test Pilot platform is opening with the release of the first Test Pilot add-on for Firefox 3.5.  They are looking for Firefox users of all levels of skill and technical knowledge to help improve Firefox and Labs experiments.

The Mozilla Labs teams explains the project further in its blog post, excerpted below:

Test Pilot is an opt-in program that everyone on the Web can join to improve the Web experience by participating in usability related tests.

As a Test Pilot, you will not only be able to try out the newest features and user interface ideas before anyone else, but also see and learn how those results may contribute back to the product design.

For now, we will start the Test Pilot program with a survey to understand what type of Web users this pilot community represents. Soon, we will roll out the first tests on specific Firefox features and other Mozilla Labs experiments.

Visit the Mozilla Labs site to learn more about joining the Test Pilot team and see how you can get involved.

Last week, we took the International Mozilla Store offline as a precautionary measure after being notified of the GatewayCDI security breach that impacted the North American Mozilla Store. After verifying the security of the International Store, we brought it back online earlier today and it is now completely operational again.

During the downtime, the IT teams from both Mozilla and Merchandise Mania, the operating vendor for the International Mozilla Store, performed diagnostic tests and confirmed that the appropriate security procedures were in place. The International Store was not affected by the GatewayCDI breach and no personal information was exposed at any point.

We’d like to thank Merchandise Mania for their cooperation and prompt response to this matter, and want to assure customers that the International Store has our continued confidence.