Firefox: Mainstreaming Open Source Ben Goodger Software Engineer, Google Inc.

Outline Building a Product Building a Brand Building a Community Successes and Failures Changes for 1.5 The Technology Platform The Future of Firefox Success in OSS Distribution

In the Beginning… The promise: Small Size Web Standards Next Generation Browser …In less than 6 months!

In the Beginning… …and a 12 MB download size! The reality…

Phoenix Rising Dissatisfaction among engineers, later users Offshoot browsers: Manticore, Chimera, Phoenix One common theme: Make a great browsing experience first. “Mozilla Browser” is born in XUL in April of 2002.

Phoenix Rising Remove less-used components Polish the user experience Market it! On top of the Netscape / Seamonkey core:

Phoenix Rising Late 2002: “Phoenix” 0.1 Early 2003: “Firebird” 0.6 Late 2003: 1.0 roadmap drafted Early 2004: “Firefox” 0.8 Late 2004: Firefox 1.0

Order to Chaos Understand our target audiences Specify requirements Establish design direction Design components Allocate resources Execute!

Order to Chaos Adhere to Mozilla’s module ownership policy Say no a lot Deal with being unpopular Understand that you can’t please everybody, and that the target audience is king!

The 1.0 Roadmap Lower the barrier to entry: Distribution Site Installers Data Migration Improve the Browsing Experience Find Toolbar Download Manager Password Management …and so we don’t shoot ourselves in the foot: Extension Management Software Update Help System

The 1.0 Roadmap Other Firefox-specific features: Integrated Search Customizable Toolbars Form Auto complete Live Bookmarks … and improved default settings

Building a Brand Integrated brand identity The Visual Design Team Legal requirements A new look

Visual Design Quality, Consistency, Simplicity across: Logos Product skin Web site and documentation

Building a Distribution Machine Top half of Mozilla homepage updated to have a consumer focus One click to download featured products Highly optimized download and install experience, as few user clicks and decisions as possible

Building a Community Testing, coding, localization and documentation Release early and often Provide useful feedback mechanisms Provide a good set of developer tools Provide a good set of collaboration tools Provide a hackable, extensible codebase!

Community Marketing SpreadFirefox.com New York Times Campaign Referral Campaigns Individual Initiatives by piro & inugamix design by mya leigh art by rakaz art by rakaz

Challenges Source management leading up to ship was painful Consumer focus contentious among contributors Security update distribution Extension distribution site Extension authoring Too much serialization of effort

Success Nearly 100 million downloads ~10% marketshare Many happy users Lots of recognition and attention for the Open Source model & community

Changes for 1.5 Retiring Seamonkey Consolidated tree management Better tools for developer documentation and communication New update system New extension site New extension installation system

Improvements in 1.5 Much Faster More Privacy Tools Streamed Security Updates Additional Tabbed Browsing controls For Developers: SVG,, CSS columns, easier extension development

The Technology Platform Scalable Vector Graphics Programmable Image

Firefox into the Future Document Management Search Bookmarks and History Enhanced Platform (SVG, XULRunner, etc) Better Graphics (Cairo) source: Robert O’Callahan

Successful OSS Distribution Understand your users Plan, plan, plan! Use wikis Track bugs Optimize the delivery process Be resolute

Q&A