Mozilla Developers Testing Mobile OS

MojoKid writes "Mozilla has been experimenting with an interesting idea called Boot 2 Gecko. Essentially, B2G (as it's called) is a mobile operating system based on the Web, as opposed to what the project's wiki calls 'proprietary, single-vendor stacks.' Mozilla has something here. Open Web technologies provide an intriguing platform for lots of things, mobile and otherwise. The B2G project is still pretty new, but according to the project roadmap, testing has already begun and will continue through the rest of 2011. Messaging, telephony, and battery management aspects of the OS are underway, and contacts, screen/power management, and settings are scheduled. A product demo is scheduled for sometime in the first quarter of 2012."

Memory footprint should be first priority

[Vandil X]

The more memory in use, the more energy Mobile devices burn. Mozilla's Firefox is a huge memory hog on personal computers. If they want a shot on the mobile market, they'll need to keep the memory footprint to a minimum.

Re:Memory footprint should be first priority

[Anonymous Coward]

No it isn't. Firefox uses about as much as Chrome or any other browser. For a long time now. So why don't you repeat some other old bs now, cause this is getting boring.

On another note, I'm interested in seeing this. Looks like a new idea.

Re:Memory footprint should be first priority

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, put down the Mozilla Kool-Aid, ease back on the weed.

Should be ok

[Spy Handler]

as long as they can restrain themselves from releasing a new major version every 2 weeks like firefox

Re:Memory footprint should be first priority

[gman003]

Listen - I have to restart my browser about once a day, because it gradually loses performance until it runs worse (Firefox 7.0.1 on a C2D w/ 4GB of memory) than my old craptop's copy (Firefox 2 on an Athlon 900 w/ 512MB RAM). And that it takes about 2 minutes to restart Firefox when it gets like that.

That's pathetic. That's the kind of stuff I'd expect from Internet Explorer, not Firefox.

I don't know precisely if it's a memory leak, nor do I care. It could be some renderer bug, or some problem interfacing with the OS, or whatever. All I know is that Firefox has severe performance degradation issues, and that the only reason I haven't switched to Chrome permanently is Live Bookmarks (I was primarily Chrome user for all of FF3, using Firefox only to check webcomics once a day).

Memory usage itself isn't necessarily the problem - I'm using half a gig right now, and I've got another two gigs free. But whatever the problem is, it acts a lot like a memory leak, so most people are going to just assume that's it.

I don't care if it uses a LOT of memory, as long as it uses it well. I don't expect to be able to alt-tab between Firefox, Crysis and Blender without delay. I do, however, expect Firefox to run properly when all the machine is running is Firefox, Notepad++ and MPC.

Re:Memory footprint should be first priority

[brentrad]

I beg to differ - my original Motorola Droid with 256 MB RAM runs like ass with 2.2 Froyo. It can take 20 seconds to re-draw my home screen after running even a semi-large app, and sometimes it just gets so unresponsive I can't do anything on it.

It just doesn't have enough free RAM to run very fast with newer versions of Android. When it's really lagging, I run a task killer and free up a bit of RAM, and it runs much better - but not what you could call fast at all.

It ran much faster with 2.1, but I do love all the new features 2.2 came with so I grin and bear it for now until I can get a new phone.

Re:WebOS All Over Again?

[rtfa-troll]

What advantages does this have over WebOS?

How about a) properly open source so it's likely to survive and b) hasn't just been cancelled?

What advantages does it have over running Android with FireFox mobile as the default browser?

How about a) controlled by an organisation which has a history of developing in the open and b) doesn't require all software to be written in Java?

Re:Versions

[Hentes]

The more versions out, the more difficult it becomes to build an app that works on every single one.

Re:Web OS Returns - all new and improved!

[migla]

I don't think the point is that it's a novel idea. The point is that mozilla is in it for your freedom. And while webos didn't slaghter the marketplace, it's not like everyone else is saying this web thing is not the shit. They're all saying it's the shit, aren't they.

Hence we might need for there to be a b2g, lest control of the information and communication technology is yoinked away fro us.