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Mozilla Tests Integrated Desktop Browser

Posted by Zonk on from the interweb-on-your-desktop dept.

HelloDotJPEG writes "Mozilla Labs, the organisation's experimental arm, has launched Prism for interested Windows users to try out. Prism is a piece of software which integrates web applications such as Gmail or Google Reader into the desktop. The program enables you to run multiple such sites as though they were local applications, each in their own dedicated browser window. The product isn't entirely new, but is an officially adopted and rebranded update to the Site-Specific Browser project WebRunner (not to be confused with XULRunner upon which it is built). From the site: 'Web developers don't have to target it separately, because any application that can run in a modern standards-compliant web browser can run in Prism. Prism is built on Firefox, so it supports rich internet technologies like HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and and runs on Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux. And while Prism focuses on how web apps can integrate into the desktop experience, we're also working to increase the capabilities of those apps by adding functionality to the Web itself, such as providing support for offline data storage and access to 3D graphics hardware.'"

12 of 156 comments (clear)

  1. Hmm by somersault · · Score: 4, Funny

    "we're also working to increase the capabilities of those apps by adding functionality to the Web itself, such as providing support for offline data storage and access to 3D graphics hardware"

    And thus it was so, that viruses became even more abundant, and 3D accelerated.

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    which is totally what she said
    1. Re:Hmm by darthflo · · Score: 3, Funny

      I'm no expert in history, but couldn't that be the beginning of a completely new platform that'd allow developers to securely and consentually install real apps and in-browser controls that'd run natively on the user's computer?
      That'd be great! And with just a little bit of effort I'm sure it could surpass the feature-richness and security Microsoft's implementation of this process (they call it ActiveX).

    2. Re:Hmm by Fred_A · · Score: 2, Funny

      Ah but wait till you see ActiveY, it's going to be great ! It'll have synergy and virtualization !

      --

      May contain traces of nut.
      Made from the freshest electrons.
    3. Re:Hmm by MrNemesis · · Score: 2, Funny

      Well, at least this means that consumer desktops will finally catch up with Hollywood in terms of viruses being little more than 3D eye-candy. Witness Swordfish's superb 3D IDE where you write a virus by fitting transparent lego bricks together. Heck, in Independence Day Jeff Golblum even went to the effort of figuring out how alien monitors worked just so that he could project a spinning skull and crossbones on their screens just to let them know the mothership was hosed. I hear for his next trick he tried to get an open source mail client to talk to Exchange via MAPI, but couldn't find a video card powerful enough to power the 38-monitor workstation needed to hold all the alpha-blended hexagons.

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      Moderation Total: -1 Troll, +3 Goat
    4. Re:Hmm by somersault · · Score: 4, Funny

      I hear for his next trick he tried to get an open source mail client to talk to Exchange via MAPI

      Yeah, those movie plots are always so unrealistic
      --
      which is totally what she said
  2. Woohoo! by darthflo · · Score: 4, Funny

    As always, the innovation over at Mozilla is incredible. After only months of intense development they managed to build an application that's like a browser except it's only a Gecko control in a window. No tabs, no anything.
    I'm sure it would've taken years to build a similar application using .NET's Browser Control.

  3. Wow, people are sick by JeremyGNJ · · Score: 2, Funny

    Who would actually WANT something like this?

    2 of the main reasons to run an application locally is so that you control your own data.....and don't have to look at ads. This looks like the worst of both worlds....right on your desktop.

  4. Buzz-word compliance by mi · · Score: 3, Funny

    rich internet technologies like HTML

    But does it support DNS?..

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    In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
  5. Look, ma, no tabs by Ddalex · · Score: 3, Funny

    Let me say goodbye to positive karma: Welcome back, dear Internet Explorer 3 days...

    Mozilla head #1> Umm, MS copies our tabs in their so-called browser !
    Mozilla head #2> Ok, let's make a version without tabs... and while we're at it, let's remove that pesky Back button - and we'll have a fix for the memory leak too !!!

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    Carefully crafted sig.
  6. Re:I don't get it by Constantine+XVI · · Score: 2, Funny

    Wrong again.

    "This is the dumbest fucking idea I've heard since I've been at Microsoft"

    --
    "I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
  7. Good name by idiotdevel · · Score: 0, Funny

    Since I frequently refer to Windows as "prison", I think "Prism" is a good name for a Windows app.

  8. Re:And the point of this is.....? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    My prediction is that this is the beginning to something really big.

    Web 3.0? Or are we up to 3.5? 4? If it involves AJAX, I'm all over it...