Episode: 1444
Title: HPR1444: What is Firefox OS?
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr1444/hpr1444.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-18 03:03:27

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Greetings, HPR listeners. My name is James and today I'll be talking about Firefox OS.
Now as far as I know, I don't think anyone has made an HPR episode on Firefox OS. So if
I'm wrong about that, please do let me know with my checking that episode out. It's a
new technology that I'm very interested, very excited about. So please let me know if I'm
wrong saying no one's done any episodes on it. But anyway, Firefox OS is a new mobile OS
developed by Mozilla. The idea is using the open web as the app store. And that's not to say that
apps are strictly websites because they're not, they're two primary types of apps. One is hosted apps
which they are essentially websites that are hosted somewhere else and you have to have continuous
connectivity to be able to use them. And the other are package apps. And package apps are what
most people are used to on, you know, iPhones or Android devices. And they're apps that are
packaged with everything they need to run. They can be run offline. And the primary difference
between the two is what APIs they have access to. For instance, hosted apps would be more
limited into what APIs they can hook into and package apps. We'll have a little more leeway
on that. This is part of Firefox's Firefox OS's security model, which I plan to go into
it on a later episode because they use a layer to process security. So you have different levels
of access to APIs. But that's beyond the scope of this episode. I want to do episodes later on that
and episodes of apps work and app development for Firefox OS. But this episode is basically an
overview of what Firefox OS is. Now Firefox OS itself has three layers or core technologies.
The layers are Gaunt, Gecko, and Gaet. Gaunt is the kernel and hardware abstraction layer,
or as most people call it, the how. The kernel itself is a Linux kernel, so it's very similar
Android, all based on the Linux kernel. And then the next layer, Gecko, which that's the layout
engine and application runtime. Now you may know Gecko is also the layout engine for the Firefox
browser and the Thunderbird email client. It includes a networking stack, the graphics stack,
the javascript, virtual machine, and the porting layers. And the final layer is Gaia, which is the
user interface or UI. It also controls everything drawn on the screen. Gaia includes, by default,
all the apps that we're all familiar with on mobile devices, the lock screen, phone dial,
text messaging app, calendar app, et cetera, et cetera. Gaia is written in HTML5. I should point
out when I'm talking about HTML5 that I'll talk about a group of technologies as a collective,
HTML, usually encompasses HTML, CSS, also known as cascading style sheets, and javascript.
Now what about apps? Well right now Firefox OS is pretty new. It began development as boot
to Gecko in 2011, and a year later it was renamed to Firefox OS. So it being new, obviously there
aren't as many apps as there are on other platforms. If you think back to where Android was approximately
2009, there weren't a lot of apps, but this is kind of where Firefox OS is right now as far
number of apps. However, this is changing. More apps are being developed and added regularly.
For example, Google has just released an official YouTube app for it. Many other widely recognized
names are making apps for the platform. And right now there is currently a Firefox marketplace.
You can check it out at marketplace.firefox.com. You don't have to have a Firefox OS device to
try it out either. All you need is the Firefox browser, and you can browse the marketplace.
Not only can you browse, some apps are installable into the browser, similar to the way you can do
on Google's Chrome browser. Also, if you have an Android device that's running the Firefox
browser, you can install some of the apps on your Android devices as well.
There are free and paid apps in the marketplace. And of course, there are web apps available
across the web that can be used. And I know that Amazon recently is now accepting HTML5 web apps
into their app store and for the Kindle Fire and Android devices. I don't know if they will work on
Firefox OS at this time. Technically, they should, but I'm sure at the moment whether or not they
put up any kind of barrier or limiting access only to Android. I'm assuming so since the Amazon
marketplace has to be installed from an APK which runs only on Android devices. Maybe in the future,
as Firefox OS grows, they'll provide access to the HTML5 apps there. As right now,
don't see that. I haven't heard anything as far as whether or not they're going to do that.
And I know what you may think, though. Hasn't the whole web app I did have been tried for
failed miserably? Yeah, you're right. Apple has tried this approach with the original iPhone.
However, the difference is the API access. Apple made the API access on the original
iPhone so restrictive that most apps really weren't all that functional. Mozilla is allowing access
to some, as I mentioned before. So this way, they'll be more functional. They're not taking the whole
wall garden approach that Apple and Android and Windows RT are. The idea is to keep the web open.
That's Mozilla's primary goal. So another great thing about their approach is anyone can develop
apps for it. All you need to know is how to develop an HTML5 in a text editor and Firefox
browser. That's it. There's no huge barrier to entry, no fees to be paid, nothing like that.
It makes it, this will make it an ideal platform for institutions with limited funds.
You know, such as schools, nonprofits, small businesses, and library apps could be developed
much lower cost than they could on Android or iOS, for example. So I mean, it makes a good
for learning too if you want to learn how to develop an app or learn HTML5 and what you can do with
it. It's a good platform for that. Okay, so now if you're curious, how do you try out Firefox OS?
There's three primary ways. Obviously obtaining a device is the main way to go about it,
which I'll discuss more about shortly. There's also the freeway, which is installing the Firefox OS
simulator in the Firefox browser. Just go to addons.mozilla.org and search for Firefox OS
simulator and install it into the browser. It's also a handy tool for debugging apps and
and then trying out to actually create before actually trying to run the motor device.
Go more into that in future episodes where I plan on talking more about app development.
As far as devices ago, there are a few available. All of them are smartphones. However,
there are tablets in the works and also Panasonic is announced the Smart TV running Firefox OS,
but as of right now, the tablet and Smart TV aren't available. The devices available are
currently are the Alcatel One Touch Fire, the Geeks Phone Keyon, Geeks Phone Peak, LG Fire Web,
Huawei Ascend, and the ZTE Open. By far, the easiest one to get your hands on is the ZTE Open.
The specs are nothing they're right home about, but it is available. ZTE is selling through eBay
in the US, UK, and Hong Kong. In the US, it runs about 80 bucks with no contract. It's unlocked.
So that's it. 80 bucks. You get the phone. You own it. It's a GSM phone. So if you plan to use
it on a network, a phone network, you'll need to go with a GSM carrier and it will also need a SIM card.
And as far as I know, it'll work on any GSM carrier. As far as as I said, the specs are
nothing special. It's got a 1GHz Qualcomm single-core processor, a 3.5 inch HVGA capacitive touch
screen at 165 pixels per inch, a 2 megapixel camera with no flash, no front facing camera,
256 megabytes of RAM, and 512 megabytes of storage. Storage can be expanded up to 32 gigabytes
for the microSD card. Like I said, nothing special, but it gets a job done. They're primarily
aiming at emerging markets and people getting their first smartphones and are trying to compete
with feature phones. That's the low cost and low specs. But I have to say Firefox OS runs
quite well on it. There's some lag which is to be expected, but it's not a frustrating experience
to try to use it. The other way of trying it out is to build it and install it on a compatible
device. Right now, there are a few compatible devices, all Samsung Galaxy S2, and it's only the
I-90100 model, the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, the Nexus S models GTI-9028, and GTI-9023, and the Samsung
Nexus S4G and the only model to work on is the SPH-D720. Personally, I've not tried building
and installing on either of those devices, so I don't have access to one, so I can't speak to the
level of difficulty of that, but if anyone has, certainly like to hear about it, and of course,
5X is two of those devices. I'd definitely give it a go. That's all I have for this episode. I
intend on recording more episodes in the near future. I certainly do want to touch on app
developed and security for Firefox OS, but this was just an overview of what it is. I'm including
lots of links. Definitely do check out the Firefox marketplace links in the Mozilla developer links.
There's a wealth of information on the Mozilla developer network site. I spent many hours just
bringing through some of the documentation there. Lots of good stuff. If you're interested in
at all in Firefox OS development, I recommend signing up on the developer mailing list, which is
very active. You can find it at list.mozilla.org slash list info slash dv-btg. Hopefully I'll be back soon
with more information on this great new platform. Until then, goodbye and keep on hacking.
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