Some wind has passed that we are soon going to be seeing the Firefox OS for smartphones and the tablet computers.
For those of us wondering what on earth that is, let me bring you up to the tempo.
What is Firefox OS?
“Firefox OS is a new mobile operating system developed by Mozilla’s Boot to Gecko (B2G) project. It uses a Linux kernel and boots into a Gecko-based runtime engine, which lets users run applications, developed entirely using HTML, JavaScript, and other open Web application APIs.” – Mozilla Developer Network.
The engine behind Firefox OS is a slightly customized version of Gecko which runs the current desktop browser. This customized version introduces new JavaScript APIs required to create a phone-like experience which comprises of WebTelephony to make phone calls, WebSMS to post text messages, and the Vibration API to vibrate stuff.
In deed the Firefox OS is a web device and that means it requires lesser hardware. This does not imply lesser performance since all the phones needs to do is to run the web. It is clear that people are price sensitive in emerging markets and that is what Firefox OS promises to achieve. The phone has been demonstrated on several android compatible smart phones. This new mobile OS promises;
Freedom from proprietary mobile platforms
Developers write apps for one platform which they have to rewrite using new standards in other platforms. They will no longer need to learn and develop against platform-specific native APIs.
Users who want to buy smartphones and tablets from different manufacturers have to purchase apps for each device. To address this, users who use devices that shall be running on open web based platforms like Firefox OS will be able to access easily and download their own content regardless of the operating system they use.
SOURCE:Mozilla Developer Network
