The Inside Track on Firefox Development.
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January 31, 2005
LOL
"Netscape claims to be the No. 2 browser company"
LOL... if they hadn't laid off their entire browser department it would be less funny.
Posted by ben at 8:42 PM
January 30, 2005
More Detail on 1.1 Plan
I've updated the Roadmap with more detail on the 1.1 Plan... please note the bolded sections about naming and dates.
And, to correct a common misconception: Firefox 1.1 and onwards is developed off the same trunk codebase as other Gecko based apps such as Mozilla 1.8, Camino etc. Residual changes from the long lived Aviary development branch (5/15/2004-11/9/2004 and on for point releases for Firefox 1.0) have been merged back into the main line development trunk and all future releases will happen off of that. While we will branch for stability for future releases, we will try to avoid future development branches.
Also, the slippage from March is not due to my move to Google, it is due to us needing to ensure the 1.1 release is of identical quality and scope as the 1.0 release - that means a period of testing, the localization system needs to be brought back online, etc. These things are done by more people than just myself, so quit with the wacky speculation.
Posted by ben at 8:49 PM
January 29, 2005
Bring On The Open Source Debugger
Slashdot has a story today about Microsoft talking about Linux security or some such. I didn't read anything other than the slashdot blurb but one point in that blurb that resonated with me is the complaint from Microsoft (and Windows developers in general) about the lack of a solid integrated development environment for Linux/GNOME apps.
I mean come on. There are sixteen thousand email clients, twenty-four thousand clocks, every man and his dog as a half-assed window manager, but why has no one sought to take on the King of Visual Debuggers - Visual C++/Studio?
I use Visual C++ 6.0 for most of my development work. I have generally preferred it to the newer .NET versions when it comes to compiling and debugging code since it was always much faster due to less fancy UI (although I use .NET for editing) - and it works, pretty much flawlessly. I can count on one hand the number of times it has screwed up. I bought my copy back in 1998. I think it came out in early 1998. Let's think about that a little. What other software came out in or close to 1998?
When Visual C++ 6.0 came out, people were using Windows 95, SR2 and NT4. Netscape 4.0 was still the browser du jour - having been released only the previous year. By mid '98, Netscape 4.5 was out - offering few improvements to browsing (but a lot to email). Real Player was still small and free of clutter.
That's old.
Doing a quick audit of my system, VC6 is probably the only piece of seven year old GUI software that I run and rely on every day. Try using Netscape 4 lately? Ew.
So why is it so hard for open source developers to create something as good? XCode is a nice looking graphical front end in a lot of ways, but it still relies on gdb, it still has far too many bugs, and is still way too slow. I expect to be able to hold down F10 and have line-by-line execution proceed at the same speed. With XCode, I fancy I can hear the program counter struggling to increment.
Come on folk, respect Microsoft for the good software they've created, use it as a benchmark in the cases that it really is. That's what we've tried to do with Firefox - if more projects did the same I think the Linux Desktop would be in a much happier place.
Posted by ben at 3:46 PM
January 26, 2005
Welcome Darin!
I just want to extend a big "Welcome!" to Darin who joined me at Google this week. 2005 is going to rock!
For any interested media agencies wanting to talk about anything about Google, I'll reiterate - please contact Steve Langdon, not me. For stuff relating to Mozilla, it's probably easiest to contact Rafael Ebron at the Mozilla Foundation for now.
All I'll say now is that this place kicks ass. The thing that has always struck me is how friendly, helpful, and enthusiastic the people are here - that's across all aspects of the company too.
Posted by ben at 9:23 PM
January 25, 2005
1.1 Schedule Update
In a move that I would hope should surprise exactly nobody, we're pushing back 1.1 by a little bit because of the realities of the work remaining to be done (I have a lot of patches that need to be landed, tested, bugfixed, there are other patches from other people to which the same applies; also we need a reasonable stabilization period and a resurrection of the l10n infrastructure in order to do a release of similar quality and range to 1.0.) Asa is working on an updated roadmap graphic, which will offer more details. The likely possibility is a 1.1 Developer Preview (= alpha, NOT for general consumption), followed by a 1.1 Preview Release (= beta, wider consumption, feature complete), followed by RCs and a 1.1. We're not fixed on dates yet, but this is just a heads up.
Posted by ben at 11:29 PM
January 24, 2005
Changes
Hi.
For those that don't know me that well, let me introduce myself. My name is Ben Goodger, and if you've found this page you've probably come here from some site talking about Firefox - since that's mostly what this page is about. My role with the Firefox project throughout 2004 and much of 2003 has been to plan, organize and execute on its development, up until recently with the goal of shipping Firefox 1.0 to the world - this has involved a great many things including project planning, estimation, resource allocation, working with various contributing groups, keeping some of our online documentation (web site, release notes etc) in order, poking my head in on some of our marketing initiatives every now and then, working with our visual design group and of course the small matter of writing code.
Well, it's been an interesting, eventful, and educational experience. I don't think any of us saw all of what has happened happening at the outset. I feel privileged to be a part of something like this, to work with the diversely talented, driven people that I do, to know that the work that I do is helping people everywhere. Anyway, as is the norm for a large project over a long period of time, when a major milestone is met, people tend to pause momentarily, take stock, look at the world around them and decide how to proceed. I have been doing this on many levels. I'm here today to tell you about some changes that apply to me.
As of January 10, 2005, my source of income changed from The Mozilla Foundation to Google, Inc. of Mountain View, California. My role with Firefox and the Mozilla project will remain largely unchanged, I will continue doing much the same work as I have described above - with the new goal of successful 1.1, 1.5 and 2.0 releases. I remain devoted full-time to the advancement of Firefox, the Mozilla platform and web browsing in general. I'm sure you have many questions. While I will be spending more time at Google, I will work out of the Mozilla Foundation offices regularly as the need arises. For all questions regarding Google, I ask that you contact Google directly, rather than myself.
For work related matter, my contact information will remain the same, email regarding Firefox and Mozilla should still be sent to ben at mozilla dot org.
Happy New Year,
Ben Goodger
Lead Engineer
Mozilla Firefox
Posted by ben at 9:00 AM
January 23, 2005
Prefwindow V Updates
Here are some updated screenshots of the new Preferences window that is getting closer and closer to being ready. Most notable new features include: Sanitize function, searchable group-by-host cookies, and a searchable download actions manager (now with integrated full page plugin support).
Posted by ben at 1:34 AM
January 22, 2005
Updates...
I have been incredibly busy this past two weeks taking care of some important matters, but am now back into 1.1 development. Work on the new Preferences system continues, with only a few things left to do before code review + checkin. A plan for 1.1 is forming in the Mozilla Wiki - any Mozilla/Firefox developers wanting any significant application features should update the plan to include a description and estimate of their intentions!
Posted by ben at 12:36 PM
January 14, 2005
Battlestar Galactica
Those of you that remember Netscape 4.x will remember the "undetermined" progress bar mode where the progress bar would wave back and forward, somewhat like this:
... anyway throughout the code, and into the new Gecko codebase while we were still using this thing, there were references to "Cylon"... having just watched the remake of Battlestar Galactica tonight, now I know why.
This in and of itself is somewhat unremarkable, unless you consider that often you saw the Cylon, it meant that the browser had pretty much fallen over and died...
Posted by ben at 1:01 AM | Comments (1)
January 5, 2005
Firefox 1.1
OK, the realization that March is approaching rapidly is dawning on us. This week or next we're going to get our acts together and draw together a rough list of things we need for Firefox 1.1. This is not a hugely ambitious release, but what it will see is:
- a resync with the Mozilla development trunk, and all the performance, stability and feature work that goes along with that,
- various other Firefox bugfixes (Firefox1.1 milestone)
and from me:
- default browser/Mac Shell integration work
- Safari and other Mac profile migrators
- better Preferences and other dialog types on OS X and other platforms.
I'm hoping we'll have a schedule put together within the next couple of weeks... there's remaining work to be done and a lot of code to land, but we'd like to get all the items identified.
Posted by ben at 11:43 PM
Bill Gates on Browser Development
No one benefits more in a competitive environment than consumers. So all I can say to Bill here is:
Bring It On
Posted by ben at 7:48 PM
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