Slashdot Mirror
Firefox Demos Prototype Metro Interface
In order to provide an alternative to IE on Windows 8, Firefox needs a Metro UI. Luckily, development of a Metro interface for Firefox is well underway. The current build reuses the Android interface XUL (by virtue of being based on Fennec). The latest test release features lots of platform integration support: "We have Metro snap working, you can snap another Metro app to the right or left of Firefox and continue browsing.
We also have HTML file input controls tied up to the Metro file picker. ... implemented the Windows 8 search contract, you can use the Search Charm from any screen on Windows 8. If you enter a URL, it will be loaded. If you enter anything else, it will be searched in your default search engine. We also implemented the Windows 8 share contract, you can use the Share Charm from any Firefox page to share that page to another application. Once you select the Share Charm it will list the applications you can share to, for example: Mail, Twitter, or Facebook." If you're interested in following development, the team has made a Mercurial repository available.
Further background is provided by the first and second posts in the series.
Will Metro Firefox share information with desktop Firefox? Currently, Windows 8 has a Metro IE and a desktop IE that don't share cookies or bookmarks. It's pretty hilariously bad.
Well they won't on the ARM edition...
I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
Windows 8 won't allow any browser to become the default unless it's accessible through the Metro UI. It's still the same firefox and can be accessed from the non-Metro interface too.
Nice trolling.
Normal programs will run just fine in Desktop mode on Win8. However, if you want your program to be on the new default dashboard interface (Metro) then it has to be a Metro app. And since both IE and Chrome can appear there, it makes absolute sense that FF should have the feature included as well.
If you want to be a full replacement to IE, you need to be a full replacement to IE, and that means showing up in the system wherever IE can show up. If you actually RTFA, you'll see they're talking about hooking into Win8's built-in browser search and sharing hooks, as well as showing how easy it is to add a Metro interface to FF because of the already existing theming layer within FF.
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
Because a normal desktop UI doesnt work so hot on a tablet, which in the future are bound to replace a big portion of the desktop market. Hybrids (like the Transformer Prime), with a 2 mode tablet/desktop interface, like Windows 8, could seriously replace lap-tops for everyone except serious developers and graphic designers/3d artists/CAD/etc that need a lot of horse power.
Sticking to desktop-only UI would be suicide for Microsoft. Metro works quite fine if you look at it from a tablet point of view.
What is going to be the alternative for people like me who like the WIMP model in a desktop OS?
Work really hard so you can retire before Windows 7 goes EOL.
Sure does seem like that, doesn't it. There was a reason I switched to Chrome as my surfing browser.
But that's the problem. I've used Chrome and it's just not as good as Firefox. As much as Firefox pisses me off with all the incredibly bad design decisions they've made, Chrome has too many things that don't work as well as Firefox, or don't exist at all.
Anyone else notice that in one of the screenshots of the new interface the browser is showing slashdot?
(You'll have to read TFA to see it though)
All the world's a CPU, and all the men and women merely AI agents
You seem to think that the Desktop paradigm will survive the RTM.
It won't.
Have fun with Metro, Windows guys.
--
BMO
It will. Microsoft will not make existing apps incompatible with Windows 8.
Stop spewing lame FUD.
This space for rent.
You're wrong. Windows 8 does allow any browser to become the default, same as before. The catch is that it has only one global (per-user) setting for "default browser" without separation into desktop and Metro. So, if you make some browser default, and that browser does not support Metro, then all URLs in Metro apps will open the desktop app, which is not very convenient - so if someone is heavily using Metro, they will likely only make browser default if it supports Metro.
Regular Metro apps can only be distributed via Windows Store, and, yes, that includes Apple-style app approval model (though it doesn't have some of the more nasty Apple rules, such as "no competing apps" - so other Metro-only browsers are fine).
That said, browsers are special-cased. More specifically, if a desktop application is installed and registers itself as a handler for http: URI schema, and the user selects that application as the default browser, then that app is given the opportunity to also provide a Metro version. Basically, it can provide a tile that appears in Metro home screen, can pin secondary tiles there (for bookmarks, web apps etc), and when launched, can detect if it's being launched from the tile or from an URL in another Metro app, and can decide whether to launch in desktop or Metro mode (e.g. IE10 has that as an option - always desktop / always Metro / same as invoker). This is called a "Metro style enabled Desktop Browser" - this document (.docx) covers the details.
Now, because this is still a desktop app, it is installed by usual means - an MSI or other kind of installer, or even just copy it over (so long as it can register itself to handle http:/// URLs on launch or something). So, it's not subject to Windows Store app approval policy. It's also much less limited with respect to what it can do, compared to a Metro-only app - the sandbox mainly restricts it from doing stuff that only makes sense on the desktop when it's in Metro mode, but otherwise it has same permissions as a desktop app. This means that they can JIT-compile code - kinda important for JS - and share bookmarks and history with desktop.
You know you can't publish anything for Metro without Microsoft's express consent, right? I
Hybrid desktop/Metro browsers are an exception to that rule - they can be installed from regular installers outside the store, and don't require approval. I've described that in more detail in my post above.
Desktop version of Firefox is not going away.
As for your question, it's answered right there in TFA:
If a browser is awesome on Metro, the only way to use this awesome browser in Metro is for it to become the default. If a browser is default on Metro, it will also be default on the Desktop.
If a browser does not support Metro, it is seriously at risk of losing the default browser status, and therefore significant market share. A browser without support for Metro, if default, would be taking away a Metro browser completely from the user's computer.
Even if a user spends most of their time in the Desktop interface, having a really good Metro browser may be enough for the user to change their default browser. A browser with great Metro support can gain significant browser market share for this reason.
It is extremely important that we deliver an awesome Firefox experience on Metro, one that is tightly integrated with the platform, fast, and feature rich. Windows is by far the platform with the most users and which has the biggest effect on market share.
I'm almost certain I don't want to use anything that has a "Share Charm".
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
You know what really irks me? Software. It's like these corporations are telling me that I don't have the BRAIN to program my own machine. People these days are so fucking lazy! Whenever they want something done on their PC, they just look for some software that SOMEONE ELSE wrote, whose done all the THINKING and LEARNING for them. The end result? We get these bloated, rigid messes known as "graphical user interfaces", extremely limited customisation, and huge lags in computer speeds. All because people's time is too "precious". Less precious than their own brain development apparently.
Goddamn right that using computing equipment is not a right. Only the people who earned their chops, like in the computing's very earliest of days, should be allowed to use them. They're the ones who know what they're doing. They'd be disgusted with 99.99% of the people who use computers these days.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
the real problem being that there are two entirely separate use contexts in use at once whose only link is via what used to be the start menu. this asinine design is the root problem.
Hybrid desktop/Metro browsers
If an app goes both ways does that make it Metrosexual?
Don't they also need to be 'approved' by Microsoft? ( or is this no longer the case?) I was actually half expecting them to do what Apple does and block other browsers. The precedent seems to have been set.
Microsoft has actually been behaving themselves recently. They offered assistance to the Mozilla folks to make sure Firefox would be supported on Windows Vista, they moved Windows Update into the control panel so you no longer need to browse to a web site in IE to update your OS, and Windows 7 gives you the option to remove Internet Explorer (although the rendering engine is still there, since lots of apps rely on it). Each version of IE since IE7 has been less awful, and when they wanted to add an RSS reader (which Firefox already had), they actually flew down to Mozilla headquarters to discuss using Firefox's RSS icon in IE because they figured it would cause less confusion for users if they cooperated. Microsoft refused to participate in WHATWG while HTML5 was being developed, but once W3C officially adopted HTML5, Microsoft got on board.
Does IE still suck? Hell yes, but it sucks a lot less than it used to, and Microsoft is playing by the rules now.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
which would be fine if it was a selectable option in the control panel or install time. tablet interfaces suck with a keyboard/mouse, whether it's a powerful cadstation or a student's school computer.
Furthermore, I have a question.
I doubt you will answer it seeing as you are a "paided" poster.
Why does Metro make you guys so defensive? Isn't it supposed to be superior to the Desktop? Isn't it the latest and greatest from Microsoft? Wouldn't you /rather/ have such a superior interface take over as the premier interface of all operating systems ever?
As a Windows booster, you must think that Metro is the cat's balls.
Well....
Isn't it?
--
BMO
WTF is a "paided" poster? At least get your grammar right.
Metro is good for things like browsers and casual consumer apps and is perfect for something like a portable tablet., but is unsuitable for many productivity apps like Photoshop, AutoCad, Office or Visual Studio, thus the Desktop lives on.
This space for rent.
because desktop computers != tablets.
Because a normal desktop UI doesnt work so hot on a tablet, which in the future are bound to replace a big portion of the desktop market.
Replacing the desktop is like end times prophecy. We've been hearing drumbeats of marketeers with their death to * predictions since the dawn of civilization yet >1bn PCs are still here.
Regular Metro apps can only be distributed via Windows Store
That is horrifying.
Required reading for internet skeptics
Microsoft has actually been behaving themselves recently.
I would suggest not being quick to accept that. Microsoft has always been quick with the "embrace" in "embrace, extend, extinguish". Lest we forget.
Have you got your LWN subscription yet?
Windows the family has 85% marketshare. "Windows 8" has 0%.
And remember the pattern:
Windows 98 SE
Windows Me
Windows XP
Windows Vista
Windows 7
Windows 8
Metro is a Windows 8 exclusive.
This has been known for close to a year now.
Anyway, after Apple is swimming in cash in their walled garden, what did you expect? Everyone wants a piece of that pie now that they've shown you can make it.
This is NOT true in the consumer preview. You could disable Metro in the developer preview via a registry setting, but it is NOT possible to disable metro in the consumer preview via a registry setting. The only way to disable it in Consumer preview is with a 3rd party application hack.