It has long been known that in addition to the N900 port of Firefox (released just 49 days ago) Mozilla have been targeting Windows Mobile, drawing ever nearer to a release. They have now decided to put the port on hold, following the news of Windows Phone 7 Series at MIX (and what that holds for Windows Mobile 6.5). “While we think Windows Phone 7 looks interesting and has the potential to do well in the market, Microsoft has unfortunately decided to close off development to native applications. Because of this, we won’t be able to provide Firefox for Windows Phone 7 at this time. Given that Microsoft is staking their future in mobile on Windows Mobile 7 (not 6.5) and because we don’t know if or when Microsoft will release a native development kit, we are putting our Windows Mobile development on hold.”
I did want to make this a pg.1, but I don’t have the time right now, and I’m weary of overloading the home page with web news (rather than traditional OSes).
I just want to add that this is sad, but a clear sign that the web browser is becoming a core part of the operating system and that the vendors don’t feel that it needs to be replaced (which would prevent them from from getting the tightest integration with the system).
It’s like when TCP/IP stacks used to be separate, and now they’re just an expected part of the OS, embedded very deeply.
Mozilla are unfortunately being denied access to the mobile world and I really don’t see this changing unless they make Gecko more fun to port. WebKit is owning this space.
Denied only by MS and Apple, not the whole mobile world.
Everybody is being denied access, until a native SDK is released. Saying it like that makes it sounds like a conspiracy.
Nope, I don’t think it’s a conspiracy at all. I literally think that the browser is becoming such a core part of mobile OSes that allowing alternate browsers only undermines the value of the platform (that is, in the vendor’s eyes).
Nobody would want to run Firefox in a tab inside Chrome OS when Chrome OS itself is already a browser, and if Firefox could be offered it would undermine the APIs Google have added to to integrate the web with the device / UI.
Hmm, integrating a browser right inside the OS.. I wonder what the EU would have to say about that?
Edited 2010-03-23 16:00 UTC
Since Google aren’t using a monopoly on operating systems to deny other browser makers a market, absolutely nothing, I should think. Including a browser with your OS isn’t illegal in itself. Doing so to drive your competitors out of business, that’s a different matter.
Assuming that is the case; from what Microsoft has said, they’re going to have native API’s but they’re going to be a very small subset when compared to 6.5 – so it’ll be enough for the likes of Flash to get their stuff working but if you’re expecting the operating system to provide a lot of API’s then you’ll be disappointed. In the case of Firefox there is a good chance that many of the API’s they rely on in 6.5 will be unavailable thus require them to implement the feature themselves instead of relying on the operating system.
Yes, thank God we have moved past those dark ages and it’s all for the better for the user.
Hmm, I couldn’t help but think Microsoft are shooting themselves in the foot, when I first heard that they are planning to lock out unauthorized apps with WP7. I am a long standing Win Mobile user, not because I really like Microsoft, but because there was a lot of applications for it, which I really used. These are from games, media players, TomTom, etc.
When the iPhone came along, I was wary, and when I realised that Apple had locked out unauthorised apps, I was pretty set against it.
I love the ‘idea’ of Android. It being an open system and all, and although it has Market Place, I know that I wouldn’t be tied to it, and I can still ‘install’ applications the old fashioned way if I need to. The problem with Android for me, is the lack of support for what I need; good navigation app (I tried the Win Mobile version of Co-pilot Live, and it’s poor compared to TomTom, and I can’t use Google Nav here in the UK), and there is still no support for gapless music playback as far as I know, which really sucks for me. I really want to go over to Android though, but I just need it to do what I want it to.
If Microsoft are going to lockout apps like Apple, then they will be removing the one big selling point for me, and they’ll be making my move to Android all the quicker, IE my next phone. I guess Windows Mobile, PocketPC, Windows CE, Windows Phone etc will end up going the way of Palm, and look where they were 10 years ago.
Just my rant for the day.
Regards,
Toonie.
Edited 2010-03-23 11:05 UTC
In terms of worldwide market penetration, targeting Symbian^3 would make sense, but in sheer market momentum, why not Android? Not that the N900 isn’t flying off the shelves, of course… 😉
(I say this quite tongue in cheek – and yes, I *own* an N900 with Firefox Mobile.)
Didn’t MS already say they plan on keep the windows mobile 6.x line going for their corporate clients? And there are tons of users of windows mobile 6.1/5 handsets out there that would adore a mobile FF, if it’s done right. I was looking forward to it and I plan on using windows mobile 6.1 for a long while.
Unless, of course, some epically awesome new phone and OS come out. But as of right now, none of the current options offer me any compelling reason to ‘upgrade’ from my Treo 800w.
Opera Mobile, Opera Mini, Skyfire, Bolt… who needed FireFox anyways? Their alpha barely ran on the Touch Pro and it was huge, even when compared to desktop browsers. Iris browser will be missed but Fennec??? Not at all.
Edited 2010-03-23 13:38 UTC
I can see why, having a native application like firefox with all its memory leaks on a mobile device would be a nightmare, maybe is FireFox the one getting obsolete.
I hate to be picky and all, but it really annoys me when people write FireFox when in fact it’s easier to write it correctly: Firefox.
From Firefox’s 1.5 Release Notes FAQ:
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/releases/1.5.html#FAQ
Get a life.
Only retards write FireFox.
“Fx” is their preferred abbreviation? O_o That sounds just silly and illogical, everyone I know of uses FF or Ff.
Oh of course, because pocket IE is just so great at memory management. For that matter, wm 6.x is just so awesome at it in general. Seriously, give me a break. I’ve had more memory leaks in wm than I’ve seen in Firefox for at least a year now. Wm 6 is a massive memory leak.
Try to add some extentions to it.
Till now, the “Fx” team haven’t been able to sandbox their addons. why? I don’t know.
But I wouldn’t trust it in my mobile device.
Because I should trust the various wm 6.x apps out there which, btw, also aren’t sandboxed and can bring the whole device crashing right down. Bad apps, bad extensions, it doesn’t matter. When it comes down to it, your annoyance isn’t with Firefox but with extension writers, so what’s that got to do with Firefox on windows mobile? If you don’t trust extensions, don’t use any. No rocket science involved there.
I still don’t understand this cry against Microsoft decision to just allow .Net based applications.
If the hardware is performant enough for running JITed applications and .Net Compact+Silverlight+XNA provide the required APIs, who cares?
Of course the only people complaining will be the ones not able to port their beloved C/C++ applications to Windows Phone, but professional software houses won’t care that much.
Are you aware that on the IT world most applications are now coded in .Net/Java. Even the game studios are starting the transition to develop most of their engine
tools in Managed environments. For example Unreal engine SDK, http://www.gamedev.net/columns/events/gdc2010/article.asp?id=1822