Foxconn Joins the Firefox OS Eco-System
blog.mozilla.org
blog.mozilla.org
They just need to get this thing moving. I am planning to buy a tablet this Christmas and I want FFOS to be a very good choice by then. Come on Mozilla.
But I agree, it's very exciting!
Microsoft pursued a strategy that enabled people to make web apps in HTML5/Javascript as first class apps in Windows 8. Why is it not being adopted/praised as much as Firefox OS is? Is it because it's Microsoft? Is it because the Win8 HTML5/JS apps are more closed-system-esque than Firefox OS apps will be?
A lot of people denounce Windows because of its lack of app ecosystem. Does everyone think that Firefox OS will have a better chance at solving this problem and thus deserves praise for creating an ecosystem exclusively for web-based apps?
I agree that this pretty much seems like another Windows Phone, that won't really make huge competition for iOS or Android devices. I hope I'm wrong though because I hate Java.
Yes, basically. At least for me. It comes down to trust. I trust Mozilla that they want to do good for the community. I trust Microsoft first and foremost wants to make money for their shareholders and only after that for the community. This is fine, they're a for-profit company. It's just that doing good for your shareholders doesn't always lead to doing good to the community.
Not to mention Microsoft doesn't exactly have the greatest of reputations when it comes to vendor lock-in issues.
I took it all a bit personally :)
I am a fan of JS on windows 8 and winphone 8. However, I own a win7 phone and got burned by their non-backwards compatible upgrade to 8. So I have no love for MS, although I am a big fan of the tiled UI.
I think that FFOS will provide a better place where I can put together an app in Linux with vim. I don't want to install eclipse to write for Android, buy a macbook to write an iOSx app or install visual studio.
I hope that FFOS can be an easy to fiddle playground for me. We'll see.
Well you don't need eclipse to write for Android
I suppose there is some maven support for building Android. An even better reason to hope for the best for FFOS.
As far as Google is concerned, Java does not run on Android and you might be bearing witness to something that Google disclaims.
Firefox OS doesn't need an app ecosystem, they just need developers to make good web apps. Hence their tools like Javascript, Emscripten, and Asm.js... I've been testing the Aurora browser on Android, and it's already impressive how well interactive web apps work on their browser, I could definitely see Firefox OS taking off...
> while MS has held back web development
Judging from past sabotages by Microsoft, I really, really doubt their "HTML5/JS" apps will be portable/cross-platform (eg, just wait until they start "deprecating" standard functions in favor of their "safe" Windows specific library calls).
That by itself is a concept absolutely no one has any problem with.[1]
The problems people have are either with Windows 8 itself and/or Metro sucking, and in some cases seeing parts of it as the first step in turning a previously-open ecosystem into an iOS-style walled garden.
[1] Well, OK, I think JavaScript is a scourge on par with PHP, bubonic plague, and small children, so I guess I do have a problem, but it's not one anyone else cares about.
1. Does it work. 2. Does it work well (ie fast, do what it is suppose to do). 3. Does it not cost anything (or if it does cost anything, an amount which is appropriate). 4. Do his friends have it.
That's really all they care about. At the end of the day, nobody cares if it's Firefox OS, Android, iPhone. So long as they can do what they want to do at a cost they can afford. Their friends have a similar device or allow transplatform communication. And they can get all them fancy stuff their friends show them (ie amazing apps, themes, custom phone skins, etc).
The people who care about the other stuff don't make up most of the market.
And that is something Microsoft as well as Google, and Apple get. The goal is to have a cool phone, with stuff that is cool, at a cool price. That's why people like Microsoft pay app developers to port their "cool apps" to MS App Store. As well as give "celebrities" free phones. All in the name of coolness!
Plus Windows 8 RT isn't selling.
I hope so, too, and I write books about Android programming. Without competition, especially competition from systems that will try to differentiate by being more open than Android, there is a substantial risk that Google will become increasingly closed and conservative about developing Android.
Windows lacked competition for more than a decade. That created mind-set that couldn't disrupt it's own business, and consequently missed both handsets and tablets.
So I hope there are five or six viable mobile technology platforms and ecosystems.
Foxconn is providing enough value building devices that they could produce their own and if they can figure out the marketing/branding, would have a good shot at it. At the very least they could partner with retailers to co-brand a store brand like Best Buy does with insignia. Make a special store brand at each big chain - Radio Shack, Best Buy, Target, Wal-Mart. It's a little surprising this hasn't happened yet now that I think about it.
If so, good job by Tim Cook to pressure them into greatness in worker treatment. Right?
[1] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuKylin
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UbuntuKylin
Business relationships make for strange bedfellows, and I'm sure Mozilla has some serious preconceptions about working with Foxconn, however it should be comforting that we're moving beyond the world of Microsoft/Apple/Google dominating consumer electronics.
I don't think the parent was making a comment about either China, or FOSS, but about Foxconn, Apple (their most well-known and largest customer), Mozilla, and people's perceptions of partnership with Foxconn seeming situational.
The fact that you could turn a story like that into an occasion to attack Apple critics makes you look like some Apple fanboy with delusions of persecution.
Oh sure, anyone could be a fan of FirefoxOS, that wasn't the point of my comment. I was just pointing that one would have to be twisted to turn this story into an Apple fanboy fight.
With the massive sales and the high margins that are in every analyst's wet dream Apple could double what it pays for assembly with ease and without huge hit on the bottom line. But they don't care enough.
This will be low margin/low volume devices initially with which mozilla - a non profit organization that wants to open the door to the internet on the poor people of the third world while preaching platform openness and standards. So maybe people are ready to cut them some slack for some time.
Also maybe they are produced in (slightly) better conditions than iphone just based on the fact that the volumes and pressure are quite lower than on the iDevices assembly line.
Then there are the newer competitors, like Tizen and Ubuntu Touch, that it'll still have to face off against. There's very little, if anything, to put it above even these.
On a personal level, many people chose their friends/acquaintances based on these sorts of things. On a consumer level, there are many examples of popular boycotts (for example see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nestl%C3%A9_boycott or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Apartheid_Movement ). On a company level, many companies consider things such as environmental or social duties when deciding who to do business with.
In all cases, it could be because you hope that such a decision will cause change (e.g. organised/promoted boycotts) or it could be simply that you don't want to support something bad, even if knowing that refusing to spend $1 on some Nestlé chocolate (for example) probably won't change a thing.
Nobody fight for everything, choose a niche and fight for that.
My point is that just because human rights is not their goal, it doesn't mean it can't be a consideration. And if Foxconn, rather than being a company with a somewhat poor track record regarding its staff, was a company known for funding terrorism, arms sales, etc. then I don't think anyone would be arguing that people shouldn't do business with them.
Ubuntu Phone has this nice webpage for "Operator and OEM partners" [1], but do they actually have any? I doubted Firefox OS a lot more than Ubuntu Phone, but it seems I was wrong.
Also, Javascript is not Mozilla's language. It was originally invented at Netscape, and is a standardized language. Yes, Mozilla does great things with Javascript, but is no more Mozilla's language than it is Microsoft's.
However, I am curious, has mozilla published any docs or emulator for developers to write applications and test before launch?
EDIT: Found it: https://marketplace.firefox.com/developers/docs/firefox_os_s...
I've got a Keon I'm playing with and it is pretty cool. It needs a lot of polishing to be sure - but it works - on a cheap phone, which in many ways is remarkable when you consider it is running that too slow, not so good, aint my favorite language, Javascript! LOL.
I'm betting on technologies that are open web standards, have the fewest barriers to entry/exit and offer less cost/risk.
I remember back in the dark ages (2000) having the discussion about biz apps in Delphi/VB/etc vs the web. The web won - at least for business apps, imo.
I think FFOS has a chance and wish it the best.
Don't get me wrong, I really really want this to work out... but someone like Mozilla shouldn't be in bed with the likes of Foxconn.
Even my old Lenovo T61 had most of the parts stamped Foxconn.