Categories
main mozilla tech

Slides from eLiberatica 09 talk

Today I had a pleasure to give a talk at eLiberatica 09.

It was one of the most complex and most challenging talks I ever had to give. It was about the Mozilla. It was about who we are, and how we try to describe ourselves. About how we think of ourselves and the challenges we face.

The rationale for doing such talk is to do what we have to – to over-communicate. To manifest ourselves and explain ourselves to people who care about the web. To rephrase some questions that people pose – about the goals, about how to measure a success, about how to make sure we stay meaningful while staying true to our mission.

Explaining Mozilla and explaining the kind of semantic space in which we brainstorm these days is an extremely complex goal. It’s harder than speaking about new experiments and features that we work on. It’s even slightly against what people want to hear about. But I believe it’s vitally important. We have to express ourselves and explain ourselves and I decided to give it a try at eLiberatica.

Bonus points goes for the fact that I wasn’t speaking in my native language, and also the audience listen to such a complex talk in a foreign language.

Despite all of that, I believe it went well. I feel thankful that people bared with me through all those topics, and I hope the deck may be useful for other speakers willing to mix and mesh it 馃檪

I definitely recommend a keynote version for the best experience, but pdf dump provided for those who don’t use keynote:

Categories
main mozilla tech

MCT: Style guide

It’s been a while since the last update on MCS but things were moving on and it’s time to catch up with the progress in the project.

picture-1Description

Today, I’d like to introduce you to a new Mozilla Community Theme style guide. MCT Style Guide is a document that explains the design decisions made by the theme authors that allows people who use the theme to extend it following the original concepts and keeping their new elements in sync with original one.

Rationale

Mozilla Community Theme was created to give us a fresh theme that can make it easier for communities to set up a professionally looking website without having to look for a designer or crafting something on their own. Three months after the release, MCS is becoming a popular option among opicture-2ur communities when they’re making their choices with regard to the website. We like to think that the reason is because we offered maximum freedom and flexibility with this set, letting people do what they want, while providing high quality of the design itself.

One element that we did not cover very well until today, was how to extend the theme. How to move forward. Not only modify what we gave you, but also add new elements, theme new websites, or T-shirts, or posters… That’s where the Style Guide hits.

Style Guide

Style Guide is a short book that presents the concept choices together with list of modification options that, in the theme author’s opinion, will match the theme and let you keep the unified look and feel no matter where you’ll go.picture-3

What’s exciting about it, is that it opens communities to a new level where they have all the tools and resources that usually professional web agencies have and they can develop their skills and get accustomed to the new concepts. While working on our hobbies, we’re getting real experience that translates directly into our portfolio.

 
 

picture-5This Style Guide lets you dig into:

  • color palettes
  • typography decisions
  • layout and grid models
  • branding options
  • methods of preserving space and light between text blocks that influences readability of the text
  • texture options that influence how the website looks
  • and others…

picture-4We hand this to you, so that you can experiment and develop the theme further or just customize it to your needs. What’s really important and exciting is that as all other parts of this project, the style guide is open! You can download Indesign document or editable PDF document and hack the Style Guide itself.

I’d also like to use this moment to thank Tara Shahian and Seth Bindernagel who have worked together with the theme authors on this 1.0 release of the guide. 馃檪

So, grab it here and… we’re accepting patches 馃檪

Categories
main mozilla tech

Silme 0.5 released

silme logoProjects need releases. It’s important. It’s like a birthday for a project – they get a milestone to mark the progress.
On the other hand we have developers. They need unlimited time and no deadlines. When one meet another, we have an interesting arm-wrestling battle between those two, but ultimately one has to obey to the Oath of the Bazaar, if you know what I mean.

Release

So, here we are, Silme was asking for a release for long enough and I postponed it over and over so it’s time to make the cut. Today, I’m proud to announce the very first official release of Silme – python l10n library. Silme has been announced to mozilla.dev.l10n long time ago, and since then it has been continuously developed in a small, but quite interesting project structure with support from Adrian Kalla, Stefan Plewako, Ricardo Palomares, Sta艣 Ma艂olepszy and management guidance from Seth Bindernagel.

It’s very, very hard to explain Silme concept to those who never tried to work on localization development.

Let me try: It’s like a DOM API for localization.

Works? Probably not… Well. Let me try the descriptive way. Silme is a toolset for a developer who wants to work on localization tools. It can read localization files, it can write them, it can modify them, it can search through them, it can process them, merge, split, localize and help you get some statistics out of the localization files. It probably can juggle them, although support for this is rather experimental.

Categories
main mozilla po polsku tech

Mierzmy to co si臋 liczy – pakiet SEC

Ludzie chc膮 by膰 pewni, 偶e kiedy surfuj膮 po sieci, s膮 bezpieczni. Istnieje wiele wa偶nych r贸偶nic mi臋dzy przegl膮darkami internetowymi w zakresie bezpiecze艅stwa, zatem naturalne jest, 偶e coraz wi臋cej grup stara si臋 por贸wna膰 przegl膮darki przez pryzmat ich bezpiecze艅stwa. To 艣wietna wiadomo艣膰; nie tylko pomaga to u偶ytkownikom, ale tak偶e autorom przegl膮darek wiedzie膰 na czym stoj膮 i co mog膮 poprawia膰.

Bardzo wa偶ne jest, aby kiedy mierzysz bezpiecze艅stwo oprogramowania, mierzy膰 faktycznie to, co si臋 liczy. M贸wili艣my o tym ju偶 nie raz, ale warto powt贸rzy膰: je艣li mierzysz nie to co si臋 liczy, namawiasz autor贸w oprogramowania, aby kombinowali i obchodzili zasady zamiast faktycznie poprawia膰 sytuacj臋.

Z czego sk艂ada si臋 dobry test bezpiecze艅stwa?

Nie istnieje jedna zmienna statystyczna kt贸ry pozwoli艂by pokaza膰 w ca艂o艣ci sytuacj臋 bezpiecze艅stwa przegl膮darek. Ka偶dy szanuj膮cy si臋 model pomiar贸w musi bra膰 pod uwag臋 wiele czynnik贸w. Jednak z ca艂膮 pewno艣ci膮 istniej膮 3 kardynalne czynniki, kt贸re powinny le偶e膰 u podstaw ka偶dego dobrze zaplanowanego modelu. Nazywamy je zestawem SEC:

Wa偶no艣膰 (Severity) : Dobry model pomiar贸w b臋dzie k艂ad艂 nacisk na wa偶ne, pozwalaj膮ce na automatycznie wykorzystanie, b艂臋dy bardziej ni偶 na malutkie b艂臋dy lub takie kt贸re wymagaj膮, aby u偶ytkownik wsp贸艂pracowa艂 z napastnikiem w konkretnej sekwencji. Mierzenie wa偶no艣ci zach臋ca autor贸w do naprawiania od pocz膮tku najwa偶niejszych b艂臋d贸w, a nie nadrabiania dobrego wyniku przez poprawianie ma艂o istotnych zostawiaj膮c te najwi臋ksze i najwa偶niejsze z boku.

Okres nara偶enia (Exposure window)聽: Niezbyt przydatne jest policzenie absolutnej liczby b艂臋d贸w. Natomiast niezwykle wa偶ne jest dowiedzie膰 si臋 na jak d艂ugo ka偶dy z nich wystawia艂 u偶ytkownika na ryzyko. Mierzenie okresu nara偶enia zach臋ca autor贸w do naprawiania b艂臋d贸w szybciej oraz do dostarczania poprawek do u偶ytkownik贸w.

Pe艂ne ujawnienie (Complete disclosure)聽: Wszelkie inne formy mierzenia liczby b艂臋d贸w s膮 prawie nieistotne je艣li nie widzisz wszystkich poprawionych b艂臋d贸w. Niekt贸rzy autorzy w celu zani偶enia swoich wynik贸w, upubliczniaj膮 jedynie b艂臋dy znalezione przez zewn臋trzne 藕r贸d艂a, ukrywaj膮c te, kt贸re odkry艂y ich wewn臋trzne zespo艂y bezpiecze艅stwa. Mierzenie wy艂膮cznie zewn臋trznie wykrytych luk nagradza autor贸w, kt贸rzy s膮 czysto reaktywni i, co gorsza, nie nagradza tych, kt贸rzy buduj膮 silne wewn臋trzne zespo艂y bezpiecze艅stwa. Takie zespo艂y cz臋sto wykrywaj膮 wi臋kszo艣膰 b艂臋d贸w; istotne jest, aby modele statystyczne rozpoznawa艂y i wynagradza艂y takie podej艣cie.

Jakie jest rozwi膮zanie?

Je艣li da艂oby si臋 艂atwo zbudowa膰 model kt贸ry w艂膮czy艂by wszystkie informacje w spos贸b uniwersalny, ju偶 by艣my go u偶ywali. Kiedy rok temu pisali艣my o naszym projekcie mierzenie bezpiecze艅stwa, mieli艣my na celu rozw贸j tych idei oraz zmian臋 tonu dyskusji.

Je艣li praca nad nim czego艣 nas nauczy艂a, to jest to fakt, 偶e nie da si臋 tego rozwi膮za膰 w jeden dzie艅. Pierwszy krok to ustalenie i jasne wyra偶enie czego powinni艣my si臋 spodziewa膰 od ka偶dego pomiaru bezpiecze艅stwa. Je艣li nie skupia si臋 to na zestawie SEC: Wa偶no艣膰, Okres nara偶enia i Pe艂ne ujawnienie, zapytaj siebie czemu. A nast臋pnie zapytaj tych, kt贸rzy ten test wykonali.

Johnathan Nightingale
Ludzka Tarcza

t艂umaczenie z blogu johnathana

Categories
main mozilla po polsku tech

Samo艣wiadomo艣膰 przegl膮darkowa – living on the edge

S膮 takie dni kiedy cz艂owiek musi spojrze膰 sobie prosto w oczy i przyzna膰 si臋, sam przed sob膮, jak u偶ywa przegl膮darek.

browser geek

taka ju偶 pewnie natura tego co robi臋, ale mam… sporo… przegl膮darek. Ile pytasz? No… jakby to…

iCab, Opera 10a, Amaya 11.1, Camino 2.0b2, Seamonkey 2.0 nightly, Flock 2.1 nightly, Firefox trunk nightly, Fennec nightly, WebKit nightly, Shiira, Arora nightly, Chromium nightly, Safari 4 alpha…Czy to normalne panie doktorze?

Co ciekawe, w艂a艣ciwe wszystkie obs艂uguj膮 nowoczesne standardy (tylko Amaya jako艣 tak inaczej聽 ;)), wszystkie s膮 szybkie rozwijaj膮 si臋 dynamicznie i ka偶da posiada jakie艣 unikalne cechy, kt贸rych nie ma inna.

rozszerzenia

Podstawow膮 przegl膮dark膮 jest dla mnie Firefox, aktualnie u偶ywam czego艣 co nazywa si臋 Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.5; en-US; rv:1.9.2a1pre) Gecko/20090306 Minefield/3.2a1pre ale pewnie zmieni nazw臋 w zwi膮zku z planowan膮 zmian膮 Fx 3.1 na 3.5.

Powy偶sze daje mi du偶o mi艂ych udogodnie艅 i powod贸w do dumy (jak ostatnie nowo艣ci w TraceMonkey, interfejsy do <video/>, acid3 na 94% etc.) , ale skutkiem ubocznym jest ograniczona mo偶liwo艣膰 korzystania z rozszerze艅.

To czyni mnie ma艂o aktywnym ich u偶ytkownikiem, i jak na browser geeka, plasuj臋 si臋 pewnie na do艣膰 dalekiej pozycji z moimi 4 rozszerzeniami:

  • Ubiquity – na razie to dla mnie troche jak gesty myszy. Wiem, 偶e s膮 przydatne, ale ci膮gle zapominam korzysta膰. Jak sobie przypomne, to pomaga 馃檪
  • Weave – d艂ugo u偶ywa艂em jedynie eksperymentalnie ale od powrotu do domu mam desktop i laptop (i na obu r贸偶ne systemy) wi臋c zacz膮艂em korzysta膰 masowo.
  • Firebug – zmienia spos贸b tworzenia stron
  • About:tab – najnowsze nabytek. Eksperyment w stron臋 rozwi膮za艅 z Opery, Chrome i Safari ale w po艂膮czeniu z podej艣ciem znanym z Ubiquity

Du偶o? Ma艂o? Nie wiem… oczywi艣cie wszystkie w wersji nightly.

Jednym z ciekawych efekt贸w takiego u偶ywania przegl膮darek (i nie tylko, testuje MacOS Snow Leopard, KDE4.3, Android nightly, Thunderbirda 3 nightly, Ubuntu 9.04, Windows 7…) jest to, 偶e wszystko wydaje mi si臋 stare. Kumpela u偶ywa “najnowszej” wersji? heh… Firefox 3? Heh… Ubuntu 8.10? Heh… wszystko jakie艣 takie

stare? 馃檪

Ten typ tak ma. Ale jakby kto艣 szuka艂 czego艣 do potestowania to polecam eksperyment z About:Tab.

Categories
main mozilla po polsku tech

Mozilla nie chce wyrzuca膰 IE z Windows!

W ostatnim czasie nabra艂a tempa dyskusja na temat IE i Windows. Przyczyn膮 by艂o wystosowanie przez Komisj臋 Europejsk膮 wst臋pnego Stanowiska Obiekcji聽 (Statement of Objection).

Poni偶szy post ma na celu sprostowanie pewnych nie艣cis艂o艣ci kt贸re pojawi艂y si臋 w polskiej blogosferze w zwi膮zku z tym wydarzeniem.

1) Gracze

Komisja nie “oskar偶y艂a” Microsoftu, a jedynie wys艂a艂a do firmy Microsoft list w kt贸rym opisa艂a swoje wst臋pne stanowisko. To jeszcze bardzo daleko do postawienia zarzut贸w.

Teza Komisji brzmi: “Z艂膮czenie przez Microsoft Internet Explorera z systemem operacyjnym Windows szkodzi konkurencji mi臋dzy przegl膮darkami internetowymi, os艂abia innowacyjno艣膰 produktu oraz redukuje wyb贸r u偶ytkownika”. (“Microsoft鈥檚 tying of Internet Explorer to the Windows operating system harms competition between web browsers, undermines product innovation and ultimately reduces consumer choice.”). Wybaczcie tak surowe t艂umaczenie, chodzi mi tylko o podstawowe brzmienie wypowiedzi.

Jak wiecie pewnie, kilka organizacji zdecydowa艂o si臋 poprze膰 stanowisko Komisji – takie firmy jak Google i Opera (kt贸ra zg艂osi艂a temat do KE w zesz艂ym roku) oraz Mozilla Foundation. Oznacza to, 偶e trzej producenci przegl膮darek internetowych konkurencyjnych wobec Microsoft Internet Explorera, trzy firmy 偶ywotnie zainteresowane rynkiem internetowym wspar艂y stanowisko KE w tej kwestii.

Nie oznacza to jednak, 偶e wszyscy zgadzamy si臋 co do natury problemu czy te偶, 偶e b臋dziemy naciska膰 na KE z jakim艣 wsp贸lnym rozwi膮zaniem. Na dzie艅 dzisiejszy w powy偶szym zagadnieniu wyst臋puje przynajmniej 5 podmiot贸w – KE, Microsoft, Opera, Google i Mozilla.

Ka偶de z tych pi臋ciu podmiot贸w reprezentuje swoje stanowisko. Nie ma stanowiska wsp贸lnego i obawiam si臋, 偶e jeszcze troche potrwa zanim (je艣li) wypracujemy je. Trudno mi wypowiada膰 si臋 w imieniu kt贸regokolwiek z podmiot贸w, mog臋 jedynie opisa膰 jak wygl膮da dyskusja wewn膮trz samego projektu Mozilla, cho膰 i to co dzieje si臋 wewn膮trz projektu jest niejednorodne.

2) Jest 藕le

Zacznijmy od tezy stawianej przez Komisj臋.

“Z艂膮czenie przez Microsoft Internet Explorera z systemem operacyjnym Windows szkodzi konkurencji mi臋dzy przegl膮darkami internetowymi, os艂abia innowacyjno艣膰 produktu oraz redukuje wyb贸r u偶ytkownika”

Wszystko co wyda偶y艂o si臋 do tej pory, to to, 偶e Opera, Google i Mozilla zgodzi艂y si臋 z powy偶sz膮 tez膮. Nic wi臋cej. To bardzo, bardzo wa偶ne, dla zrozumienia aktualnej sytuacji. Trzech graczy zgadza si臋, 偶e z艂膮czenie IE oraz Windows szkodzi rynkowi.

Dow贸d empiryczny jest taki, 偶e w efekcie tego z艂膮czenia nie istnieje dzi艣 rynek przegl膮darek, kt贸ry mogliby艣my nazwa膰 zdrowym. Istnieje jedna przegl膮darka, kt贸ra ze wszech miar powinna utrzymywa膰 oko艂o 90-95% rynku 艣wiatowego. Powodem dla kt贸rego tak nie jest, jest to, 偶e jej producent przez 6 lat zignorowa艂 wydawanie nowych wersji, a nowe wydania ra偶膮 katastrofaln膮 wydajno艣ci膮, stabilno艣ci膮 i wygod膮 u偶ytkownika. Jednocze艣nie pojawi艂 si臋 otwarty projekt, kt贸ry stworzy艂 przegl膮dark臋 i dzi臋ki pracy setek tysi臋cy wolontariuszy wypromowa艂 j膮 do takiego momentu, 偶e zdoby艂a 20% rynku 艣wiatowego.

Wiele uda艂o si臋 dzi臋ki temu odblokowa膰. Jest jasne, 偶e dzi臋ki temu, 偶e Firefox ma 20% 艂atwiej jest innym graczom – Chrome, Safari czy Opera mog膮 wzgl臋dnie 艂atwo oferowa膰 wysokie UX poniewa偶 serwisy internetowe nie mog膮 by膰 ju偶 “IE only”. Oczywi艣cie niekt贸re staj膮 si臋 “IE&Firefox only” ale to raczej dotyczy tych, kt贸re wcze艣niej by艂y “IE only” wi臋c nie pogarsza to sytuacji pozosta艂ych. Natomiast wiele innych staje si臋 zgodna ze standardami i otwarta. Ba! Stworzenie dzi艣 przegl膮darki jest po prostu 艂atwe dzi臋ki Mozilli. Bierzesz Gecko czy Firefoksa i tworzysz K-Meleona, Galeona, Epiphany, Flocka, Seamonkey… mo偶esz wzi膮艣膰 te偶 WebKit (czy istnia艂by gdyby nie Gecko? Czy by艂by otwarty?) – jest 艂atwo.

Jednak nie oznacza to, 偶e rynek jest dzi艣 normalny. Co by si臋 sta艂o gdyby Mozilla wycofa艂a si臋 z rynku przegl膮darek i skupi艂a na, np. edukacji czy komunikacji? Co by si臋 sta艂o gdyby Microsoft wypu艣ci艂 nie wspania艂膮, ale “normaln膮” przegl膮dark臋 nie odstaj膮c膮 5 lat za innymi w standardach, pr臋dko艣ci itp?

Twierdz臋, 偶e w ci膮gu 2-3 lat IE zn贸w osi膮gn臋艂oby 90-95% rynku. I osi膮gne艂oby go nawet b臋d膮c “przeci臋tnym” produktem. Czy to jest normalny rynek? Czy normalna, zdrowa konkurencja polega na tym, 偶e jeden gracz ma 95% cho膰 nie posiada 偶adnych atut贸w czy przewag nad, np. Oper膮?

Powt贸rze wi臋c, obecne z艂udzenie, jakoby rynek przegl膮darek by艂 “normalny” wynika z reakcyjnych wysi艂k贸w ogromnej spo艂eczno艣ci oraz niskiej jako艣ci produktu dominuj膮cego. I usuni臋cie jednego z tych czynnik贸w ustawicznie “normalizuj膮cych” rynek przywr贸ci艂oby absolutnie nienaturalny i niebezpieczny stan. Stan, w kt贸rym “oknem na 艣wiat” kieruje i kt贸re kontroluje jedna firma, kt贸rej interesem jest zysk akcjonariuszy.

Mozilla jest projektem organicznym. Istniejemy tak d艂ugo jak d艂ugo mamy sens istnienia i udaje nam si臋 zorganizowa膰 wewn臋trznie. Chcemy istnie膰 i mie膰 wp艂yw na Internet za 50 lat, wierzymy, 偶e b臋dziemy za te 50 lat potrzebni, ale nie wiemy czy akurat w przegl膮darkach. Nie wiemy jak za 50 lat b臋dzie wygl膮da艂 艣wiat, nie wiemy jak b臋dziemy realizowali nasz膮 misj臋, ale uwa偶amy, 偶e mamy obowi膮zek pracowa膰 nad tym, aby Internet by艂 zdrowy. Rynek przegl膮darek nie jest i diagnoza KE jest naszym zdaniem absolutnie s艂uszna.

Rynek przegl膮darek jest niezdrowy i z艂膮czenie IE z Windows jest jedn膮 z najwa偶niejszych przyczyn tego stanu”.

3) Nie znamy rozwi膮zania

Teraz, zupe艂nie czym innym jest okre艣lenie problemu, a czym innym jest znalezienie rozwi膮zania. Ludzie lubi膮 tworzy膰 skr贸ty, dziennikarze lubi膮 chwytne tytu艂y. Niestety 艣wiat nie jest prosty, a operowanie na rynku, kt贸ry staje si臋 coraz wa偶niejszym 艣rodkiem edukacji, komunikacji i prowadzenia biznesu jest niezwykle z艂o偶onym tematem w kt贸rym nie istniej膮 艂atwe rozwi膮zania.

W tym konkretnym przypadku trudno nawet o stanowisko “Mozilli” gdy偶 jako projekt jeste艣my wewn臋trznie r贸偶norodni i niejednomy艣lni. Spr贸buje wi臋c opisa膰 kilka z zagadnie艅, kt贸re wy艂aniaj膮 si臋 z dyskusji na ten temat.

a) Primum non nocere

Absolutnie nie zgadzamy si臋 z “prostymi rozwi膮zaniami” typu – “usun膮膰 IE z Windows” czy “zmusi膰 Microsoft, by do艂膮czy艂 kilka przegl膮darek i da艂 wyb贸r podczas instalacji”. To by艂oby chore. Jeste艣my przekonani, 偶e usuwanie przegl膮darki z systemu operacyjnego by艂oby kaleczeniem do艣wiadczenia korzystania z komputera przez u偶ytkownik贸w i jako takie by艂oby ruchem wymierzonym przeciwko u偶ytkownikom.

Mamy te偶 bardzo powa偶ne w膮tpliwo艣ci co do implikacji w艂膮czania przez Microsoft jakichkolwiek produkt贸w poza w艂asnymi. Wi膮za艂oby to cykle wydawnicze, tworzy艂o precedensy w zakresie bezpiecze艅stwa, praw patentowych, szkodzi艂oby wreszcie samemu u偶ytkownikowi zmuszaj膮c go do kolejnego wyboru.

b) Rz膮d nie powinien ingerowa膰 w technologie i wybory technologiczne prywatnej firmy

Nawet je艣li techniczne mo偶liwe jest, aby KE zmusi艂a Microsoft do jakiegkolwiek ruchu w zakresie oferty systemowej (jak zrobi艂a to z odtwarzaczem muzycznym), to by艂by to ruch niebezpieczny i ryzykowny. Po pierwsze sam zamys艂, jakoby rz膮d m贸g艂 jak膮艣 odg贸rn膮 dyrektyw膮 dotycz膮c膮 wybor贸w technologicznych uzdrowi膰 konkurencyjno艣膰 rynku jest bardzo w膮tpliwy, po drugie za艣 tworzy niesamowite pole do nadu偶y膰 z obydwu stron. Nie wierz臋, aby Microsoft wykona艂 ruch zgodny z liter膮 decyzji KE w spos贸b, kt贸ry b臋dzie wspiera艂 konkurencyjno艣膰 rynku. Je艣li Microsoft nie b臋dzie partnerem w tej dyskusji to raczej spodziewam si臋 “ogrywania systemu”, sztuczek i obchodzenia decyzji.

c) Czy Mozilla powinna by膰 stron膮?

Za偶alenie z艂o偶y艂a Opera, podj臋艂a je KE i wystosowa艂a list do Microsoftu. Na ile racjonalne jest w艂膮czanie si臋 Mozilli w to? Wierz臋, 偶e jest. Mozilla stawia sobie za cel realizacj臋 wizji otwartego i konkurencyjnego Internetu jako miejsca do pracy, nauki, zabawy i rozwoju. Nie mo偶emy sta膰 z boku i biernie czeka膰 na decyzje Komisji. Na dodatek, mamy prawo uznawa膰 si臋 za jednych z wi臋kszych ekspert贸w w dziedzinie przegl膮darek i rynku przegl膮darek. Problemem wewn臋trznym jest jak zapewni膰, 偶e ca艂a spo艂eczno艣膰 Mozilli ma wp艂yw na nasze stanowisko. Czy ka偶dy kto ma opini臋 na ten temat bloguje o tym? Czy ka偶dy komentuje posty Mitchell, Tristana, Marka? Czy ka偶dy bierze udzia艂 w spotkaniach Mozilli Foundation gdzie dyskutuje si臋 ten temat?

d) Czy jest ju偶 za p贸藕no?

Czy ma sens budowanie jakichkolwiek rozwi膮za艅, gdy rynek jest od co najmniej 10 lat ska偶ony tak膮 sytuacj膮 i sam, powolnie i nieudolnie pr贸buje reagowa膰?

e) Czy firma traci jakie艣 wolno艣ci lub prawa staj膮c si臋 monopolist膮?

W nawi膮zaniu do punktu b), pojawia si臋 pytanie czy Microsoft maj膮cy sw贸j system (jak Apple, Red Hat, Canonical itp.) staje si臋 kim艣 innym tylko dlatego, 偶e jest monopolist膮 na rynku przegl膮darek? Czy powinien musie膰 zachowywa膰 si臋 inaczej? Czy powinien musie膰 stosowa膰 si臋 do standard贸w (i czy standardy w贸wczas nie staj膮 si臋 przedmiotem gier politycznych – patrz ISO i OOXML), czy powinien odpowiada膰 za rynek kt贸rego jest monoopolist膮 je艣li nie widzi w tym celu biznesowego?

Czy mo偶na m贸wi膰 o “nieodpowiedzialnym liderze”, kt贸ry nie umie lub nie chce przyj膮膰 na siebie pewnego kontraktu spo艂ecznego zwi膮zanego z dominacj膮 na takim rynku i czy brak tej woli powinien wi膮za膰 si臋 z penalizacj膮? Czy zachowanie Microsoftu w zwi膮zku z przegl膮darkami w latach 2001-2007 powinno by膰 nielegalne? Czy w ten spos贸b my艣l膮c nie tworzymy paradoksu monopolu w kt贸rym dominacja na rynku wi膮偶e si臋 z obowi膮zkami szkodzenia w艂asnej pozycji?

f) Czy istnieje rozwi膮zanie?

Czy warto zmusza膰 Microsoft do stosowania standard贸w poprzez prawo a nie rynek? Czy to zadzia艂a? Co si臋 stanie gdy w prawie b臋dzie wym贸g stosowania CSS2 a wyjdzie CSS3? Co je艣li wyjdzie XHTML2.0 oraz HTML5? Kto decyduje? Co je艣li pojawi膮 sie niezgodno艣ci mi臋dzy decyzjami KE a na przyk艂ad rz膮dami azjatyckimi?

Czy mo偶na za偶膮da膰 od Microsoftu, aby nie wi膮za艂 mo偶liwo艣ci korzystania z Windows z IE (np. aby mo偶na by艂o aktualizowa膰 system bez u偶ycia IE, albo zakaza膰 mieszania u偶ycia IE w celach zwi膮zanych z systemem operacyjnym z celami przegl膮dania sieci)

Czy mo偶na za偶膮da膰 od Microsftu, aby zagwarantowa艂, 偶e w przypadku korzystania z innej przegl膮darki, wygoda i funkcjonalno艣膰 systemu nie b臋d膮 ograniczone?

Czy mo偶na zabroni膰 Microsoftowi ukrywania element贸w API wy艂膮cznie dla swojej przegl膮darki?

Czy ma sens zobowi膮zanie Microsoftu, aby prezentowa艂 inne przegl膮darki podczas instalacji systemu lub aktualizacji wersji przegl膮darki domy艣lnej?

Czy IE powinno oferowa膰 zostanie zast膮pienie domy艣lnej przegl膮darki je艣li zosta艂 zainstalowany z systemem?

Czy Microsoft powinien by膰 zobowi膮zany do zapewnienia neutralno艣ci technologicznej swoich narz臋dzi deweloperskich (tak, aby wynikowe programy dzia艂a艂y w innych przegl膮darkach?)

Czy mo偶na zobowi膮za膰 Microsoft do edukacji u偶ytkownik贸w o innych przegl膮darkach i ewentualne kary za nierealizacje przeznaczy膰 na promocj臋 wolnych standard贸w i edukacj臋 u偶ytkownik贸w?

4) Podsumowanie

Microsoft ma wszystkie atuty, by w kr贸tkim czasie odzyska膰 sw贸j monopol. Mo偶e to zrobi膰 na setki spos贸b贸w i jedn膮 z najwa偶niejszych przyczyn dla kt贸rych to si臋 nie sta艂o teraz jest brak motywacji, a nie brak mo偶liwo艣ci. Rynek w takiej sytuacji jest w nieustaj膮cym napi臋ciu i nie ma dzi艣 najmniejszych szans, aby 3-5 du偶ych graczy dzieli艂o si臋 r贸wno rynkiem i mog艂o zdrowo konkurowa膰 w d艂ugiej perspektywie.

Poruszony przez KE temat wywo艂uje dyskusje, dyskusja ta tworzy nowe pomys艂y na rozwi膮偶ania, ale jeste艣my bardzo daleko od konsensusu i jedno co wiemy to to, 偶e musimy by膰 niezwykle ostro偶ni, aby nie zepsu膰 bardziej.

Nie wiemy czy kt贸rekolwiek z tych dzia艂a艅 maj膮 sens. Nie wiemy jak mog膮 pom贸c, a jak zaszkodzi膰. Wielu z nas ma obawy przed d艂ugofalowymi destrukcyjnymi konsekwencjami kr贸tkowzrocznych dzia艂a艅 i zastanawiamy si臋, czy KE w og贸le ma mo偶liwo艣膰 zrobienia czego艣 co nie zaszkodzi rynkowi. Zgadzamy si臋, 偶e problem istnieje. Zgadzamy si臋, 偶e powinni艣my znale藕膰 rozwi膮zanie. Jakie? Czy istnieje?

Je艣li ten temat jest dla Ciebie wa偶ny, przy艂膮cz si臋 do dyskusji, w komentarzach tutaj, na blogu Mitchell, albo swoim!

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7 Things You May (Or May Not) Know About Me

I got tagged. It happens, nothing to be worried about. I found enough excuses not to obey that I was able to delay this moment for almost 2 weeks. But now I feel pressed to go.

The rules

  1. Link to your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
  2. Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
  3. Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
  4. Let them know they鈥檝e been tagged.

Seven things

1. I was a shrimp.

hawaii-shrimpI’m rather not a very spiritual guy and I have serious doubts regarding all religious concepts, but one thing is damn sure. I was a shrimp. I don’t know how, or why, but in previous life (or pre-previous) I had to be a shrimp.

Some people feel they can think like a cat. That they can easily switch their thinking and understand other sex. I have similar feeling about shrimps. I can think like a shrimp… of course it’s impossible for me to explain that to you because you cannot, so trust me. Shrimps are smart.

I feel some concept of emotional response whenever I see a shrimp, I find them uterly cute and innocent, I easily impersonate, I feel I understand how they spend their lives, I never, ever eat them and I tend to think of people who it them as being cruel. For safety and sanity reasons I have a simple rule of not eating anything that has amoung of “legs” different from 2 or 4 and in case of seafood I’m limiting my food to fishes.

It causes several issues while hanging out with my Mum who loves shrimps.

2. I used to have very long hair, was superskinny, dressed only black and played guitar in a power metal band

ironmaiden-ls02When I was thirteen I was absolutely sure I will be a heavy metal guitar star. I didn’t miss any Iron Maiden concert, had every Running Wild, Manowar, Rhapsody, Blind Guardian album and was suprt skinny. I don’t know how to explain that but I was the kind of a “too tall too skinny” kind of kid. I could not how someone could do sports and get a bit of muscles ever and what for.

Although I dress a bit differently now, I cut my hair and listen to different music most of the time, I still love to play heavy metal, and I definitely would prefer not to miss an oportunity to go for another Manowar concert or finally get to Blind Guardian one 馃檪

3. I love irish/celtic folk culture, scandinavian mythology and good fantasy.

stonehange_origiI love to read Tolkien and polish fantasy author Andrzej Sapkowski (who’s first part of the sage just hit the shelves for english speaking readers, and the game The Witcher based on his world received really warm welcome being the first solid polish game for PC. Console version is in works).

And I really mean in. I read a lot of books, I try to watch all the fantasy related movies, when I was fourteen I chose a nickname that somehow stayed, I play celtic/irish folk on a guitar, I play fead贸g, I can do a small talk in Sindarin – elvish language from Tolkien, I know how to handle a sword or use a bow (I’ve been in a brotherhood) and the only part that is missing is that I don’t ride horses. Once I lear this, I’m switching to being a knight.

4. I wrote a book when I was sixteen. And a dozen of poems.

They were a mixed bag of fantasy and drama. I’m really proud that exactly one year later I was able to recognize a pure example of teenager graphomania in my work. Well done, gandalf, you’re not an ego-maniac!

5. I’m a city boy.

If you ever watched my favorite series – Northern Exposure – you may remember challenges of a New York city boy in a small town in Alaska. I go through that all the time. I was grown in a world where the source of milk is a grocery store, not some wild animal. I received decent education, so I recognize a chicken from a pig, but you’d have to be there to understand my surprise when by the age of nineteen my friend explained me that nuts are growing on trees…

And don’t get me wrong, I was a scout. I know a lot about survival in the wooden environment. I can set up a tent, find wood in a forest (yup!), ignite a fire or shower in a river. Just don’t expect me to know all those little sneaky details about how exactly cow is different from its male equivalent and what are those different forms of farm creatures that runs around when your in a village. Or types of flower. Or trees. I recognize green ones and bald ones.

6. I train martial arts. UFC kind of stuff.

florian1So, please, avoid commenting the amusing coincidence of this with pact nr 2. I do train MMA in a pretty raw form. It all started when I was 18 and I spent literally 18 hours per day in front of the computer (rings a bell?). It caused me to start looking less skinny and it definitely wasn’t a favorable way of loosing your skinny status. The decision was to find “some sport” around my office and the nearest thing was Karate Kyokushin club. It was a fascinating experience, because the idea of hitting somebody in a face during recreation time wasn’t exactly what I was aiming for at the beginning, but you know… you’re getting used to it 馃槈

In fact, I became addicted and went for trainings aproximately 5 or 6 times per week with two or three hours of training per day for around 1,5 year. I did it all only to realize that the better I get the more constrains there are. Traditional martial arts are made of them – don’t do this, hitting like that is forbidden, you can’t block this way, clinch is forbidden, no choking… c’mon! Is it a fighting sport or a game?

6115-stpierreserraufc83So I started extending my scope of interests to Brasilian JuJitsu and boxing and finally met a guy who pointed out that there are training clubs where people fight without all those bounderies. And he didn’t have to repeat twice. Since then I’m doing MMA on all levels, I’m doing stand fight, ground fight, submision wrestling, bjj, I like thai-boxing, kick-boxing, boxing… everything. I’m an amateur, so I don’t get into “show me how good you are” kind of competitions, but I enjoy training and fighting, so if you want to spare, come to my club.

Oh, and because people are becoming confused at this point. To do MMA you don’t have to be a mindless meatmade tank. MMA requires different kind of intelligence (yes, there are many kinds, not only mathematical), reflex, speed and stamina, but gives you a lot of joy that is on the very opposite side of the universum from computer science and social science which makes it a perfect place to relax from former two.

I promise you that nobody from my club would ever mob anyone on the street. What’s interesting is that such kind of people are not used to hard and long training, technique, and they cannot survive in a friendly atmosphere of MMA clubs. So what they do instead is that they spend a lot of time on body building and then use quantity methods to attack in a bigger group. Don’t mix those two groups please 馃檪

7. I used to play in youth theatre and was a journalist.

When I was 10 I joined a youth theatre and played there for 6 years. Majority of my interpersonal skills, emotional inteligence, auditorium management, role taking comes from that time. I also found that to be the most inspiring and motivating environment a child can find. I have a strong belief that being in such environment has a great impact on the maturity and ability to maintain child in yourself and self-reflection skills. I recommend parents considering sending their kids for such thing. It was amazing 6 years of my life that shaped a lot of me.

Then I led an air show for teenagers in Radio WaWa for three years and did some internship in polish TV as a journalist. Ultimately I spent a year leading a TV show about computer games when I was eighteen. Its name was “Gamebox”. This one gave me even more confidency at public speeches, but it confirmed that I have a huge problem to act in front of camera when there’s a scenario I have to follow. I so much prefer live dynamic performances.

8. I have ADHD. Twice

If you didn’t notice yet, I love to do things. Any things. And a lot of them. I love to play soccer, read books, fight MMA, dance irish, code, learn elvish languages, study sociology, swim, sail (oh yea, I’m sailing for 8 years now). Except of that, I’m inline skating, biking, playing RPG games, passionate about Mozilla project, I translate software, do work on volunteer communities motivation models, hack Linux (I’ve been using Gentoo for years) and does some basic gymnastics. People tend to tell me I have too much energy and it takes me a concious effort to synchronize with the energy level of the group I’m in. So if you recently spent some time on a small talk with me and it was calm and relaxed, please appreciate how much effort I had to put in this. Thanks! 馃檪

Oh, and I write eight points when asked for seven. Don’t give me more coffee! My energy level is violating European Union standards.

Next people

I find it really hard to find people not tagget yet… so let me think about it a bit more 馃槈

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main mozilla tech

Thoughts on hybrid projects

One of the biggest challenges of all open projects is how to effectively manage the most precious and most crucial resource they have – people. We approach this by building a project cultures that are open and participative,聽 tools that allow us to operate in this open environment and we make whatever possible to make it easy for new people to learn how to blend in to work with others in the way that matches the culture of the project.

In fact, open project became extremely efficient with managing their projects with all the new tools, like trac, mantis, bugzilla, revision control systems, wikis, forums, blogs, planets, newsgroups. You can manage privileges, discuss in groups, build subgroups, work in a cloud, share code, brainstorm, and do this pretty efficiently. The only trick is that it works well on a smaller scale.

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MCS: Source files released!

Another milestone for MCS project has been reached! And its a big one!

If you open http://hg.mozilla.org/webtools/mcs/file/tip/theme/source/ you will find full source PSD files of the theme.

picture-41

What does it mean? Well, this is another step on the way of making sure that we have a really good theme that is open to everyone according to what we understand as Open. And understanding of it is not that common.

Think of it. How many open themes do you know. There are a lot of themes that you can download for free, but that’s not making them open, right? Next, there are themes that may provide sources, even on open licenses, which makes them technically open but does it make it easy to work with. Its almost like opening sources of a software, but not making the sources readable, not helping with hacking them, not providing documentation, and build environment… If you track all open projects out there, they usually take a lot of time to open their projects exactly because re-licensing sources is not enough. Because it will not make people want to use it and contribute to it.

Because in order to get this kind of activity around your project, there’s much more that needs to be done, and the source files for MCS are exactly doing this. It’s not only theme, it’s a theme with PSD files there, and the PSD files are licensed on Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution Share-Alike and it is ready to be modified. The source has all the layers properly grouped to make working on theme sections easy and natural. It has guidelines that help you keep the scheme in shape while modifying and it makes it easy to change colors or elements that you will likely to want to modify. It is a fully open source theme, and we have an example implementations there to show you, but you can change it however you like and come up with your own implementations.

We will provide tutorials on how to do this, and we hope to see people modify it in creative way and upstreaming their changes to make the theme look even better in result of community effort!

I would like to thank Legal Team in Mozilla (Catherine, Harvey), Tara and Seth for making this possible!

I may be wrong, but I think this is the first case ever of opening the theme this way. I would love to see other examples, but it I think we’re just opening a new chapter with both, Mozilla Community Theme and Mozilla Community Sites – since I think no other project is offering such powerful tools for its communities to develop themselves around their own websites.聽 Mozilla is leading聽 馃檪

p.s. if there’s someone who knows how to port psd file to gimp xcf without loosing… everything in the file, then I’d love to get your help!

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flock flockblog main mozilla tech

SMIL got sr+ !

I just wanted to share my joy with you! SMIL, animation multimedia integration language – a language that allows easy animations with SVG got superreview from roc a few minutes ago!

picture-32What does it mean? SMIL may find its use in UI animations and will be another step on the way from static UI’s to animated UI’s (which are more natural to human eye when made carefully).

What’s amazing about this project in Mozilla is its story. Brian Birtles started this project in May 2005 as a project for his studies, he quickly crafted basic code and first wiki article, and in November 2005 Brian submited initial patch to Bugzilla.

After that Brian worked on the project till the end of December, finished his term, wrote a paper about Animation in Mozilla and took a break. He picked it up around summer 2006 but did not push too much forward.

A year has passed since Brian sent his patch to bugzilla, and everything started to seem rather skeptical for SMIL. No maintainer, obsolete patch not compiling against trunk and no activity around it… At this point, tor, SVG magician, picked up the patch, cleaned it up, updated to trunk and kept updating for the whole 2007!!! Next, in April 2008 Chris Double picked the patch against and updated once again even adding new features!

In May 2008 Daniel Holbert took charge and started working on the patch to finalize the implementation getting gathering a lot of feedback and reviews from Brian and from Robert O’Callahan. The things started to move faster and around December Daniel proposed the patch for review and super-review. This caused several more rounds of reviews and finally, today, roc gave superrevew which means that he agrees for this architecture of this feature to be implemented into our code base.

While there’s still more work to be done, now we can expect SMIL to land on trunk very soon, and we have Brian back to support Daniel with work on SMIL project.

—-

It’s unique to such open project like Mozilla to have a full open access to working environment for an external student who can pick up his project of choice and lead it, get other peoples help to keep it alive while no leader is around and finally get it finalized by another community member with support from original author who additionally gets hired to work more on his project of choice.

There is such a tremendous variety of ways people are interacting with Mozilla project, such a huge flexibility of relations, its impossible to oversee everything and Mozilla could not operate in any top-down model. It’s such a different structure. Momentum, energy management, focus and global organization direction are being build all around the project on many levels, and being a leader in such organization means something very, very different. We have a huge luck that our l e a d e r s not only understand and incorporate it but also experience it together with us all.