Firefox: Mainstreaming Open Source
Ben GoodgerSoftware Engineer, Google Inc.
Outline
• Building a Product• Building a Brand• Building a Community• Successes and Failures• Changes for 1.5• The Technology Platform• The Future of Firefox• Success in OSS Distribution
In the Beginning…
The promise:
Small Size
Web Standards
Next Generation Browser
…In less than 6 months!
In the Beginning…
…and a 12 MB download size!
The reality…
Phoenix Rising
• Dissatisfaction among engineers, later users
• Offshoot browsers: Manticore, Chimera, Phoenix
• One common theme:
Make a great browsing experience first.
• “Mozilla Browser” is born in XUL in April of 2002.
Phoenix Rising
• Remove less-used components
• Polish the user experience
• Market it!
On top of the Netscape / Seamonkey core:
Phoenix Rising
• Late 2002: “Phoenix” 0.1
• Early 2003: “Firebird” 0.6
• Late 2003: 1.0 roadmap drafted
• Early 2004: “Firefox” 0.8
• Late 2004: Firefox 1.0
Order to Chaos
• Understand our target audiences
• Specify requirements
• Establish design direction
• Design components
• Allocate resources
• Execute!
Order to Chaos
• Adhere to Mozilla’s module ownership policy
• Say no a lot
• Deal with being unpopular
Understand that you can’t please everybody, and that the target audience is king!
The 1.0 Roadmap
Lower the barrier to entry:• Distribution Site • Installers• Data Migration
Improve the Browsing Experience• Find Toolbar• Download Manager• Password Management
…and so we don’t shoot ourselves in the foot:• Extension Management• Software Update
• Help System
The 1.0 Roadmap
Other Firefox-specific features:
• Integrated Search• Customizable Toolbars• Form Auto complete• Live Bookmarks
… and improved default settings
Building a Brand
• Integrated brand identity
• The Visual Design Team
• Legal requirements
• A new look
Visual Design
Quality, Consistency, Simplicity across:
• Logos
• Product skin
• Web site and documentation
Building a Distribution Machine
• Top half of Mozilla homepage updated to have a consumer focus
• One click to download featured products
• Highly optimized download and install experience, as few user clicks and decisions as possible
Building a Community
• Testing, coding, localization and documentation
• Release early and often
• Provide useful feedback mechanisms
• Provide a good set of developer tools
• Provide a good set of collaboration tools
• Provide a hackable, extensible codebase!
Community Marketing
• SpreadFirefox.com
• New York Times Campaign
• Referral Campaigns
• Individual Initiatives
by piro & inugamixhttp://piro.sakura.ne.jp/ http://inu.imagines.jp/
design by mya leighhttp://myaleigh.com/
art by rakazhttp://rakaz.nl/
http://firemonger.org/
art by rakazhttp://rakaz.nl/
Challenges
• Source management leading up to ship was painful
• Consumer focus contentious among contributors
• Security update distribution
• Extension distribution site
• Extension authoring
• Too much serialization of effort
Success
• Nearly 100 million downloads
• ~10% marketshare
• Many happy users
• Lots of recognition and attention for the Open Source model & community
Changes for 1.5
• Retiring Seamonkey
• Consolidated tree management
• Better tools for developer documentation and communication
• New update system
• New extension site
• New extension installation system
Improvements in 1.5
• Much Faster
• More Privacy Tools
• Streamed Security Updates
• Additional Tabbed Browsing controls
• For Developers: SVG, <canvas>, CSS columns, easier extension development
The Technology Platform
• Scalable Vector Graphics
• Programmable Image
Firefox into the Future
• Document Management
• Search
• Bookmarks and History
• Enhanced Platform (SVG, XULRunner, etc)
• Better Graphics (Cairo)
source: Robert O’Callahan
Successful OSS Distribution
• Understand your users
• Plan, plan, plan!
• Use wikis
• Track bugs
• Optimize the delivery process
• Be resolute
Q&A