Compatible By Default does not enable all extensions. The types not enabled include the following:

1. Add-ons marked to work with a Firefox version less than 4.0
2. Add-ons with binary components
3. Add-ons explicitly marked by the author as incompatible, i.e. opt-out of Compatible By Default
4. Add-ons tested and determined to not be compatible with a given version of Firefox, and marked as incompatible by Mozilla
5. Themes

UPDATE (See Blair’s comments below): Add-ons installed by 3rd party software are enabled if you opt-in, which is a feature introduced in Firefox 8.

The original aim of ACR, hence ‘Reporter’ in the name, was for users to inform authors if their add-on did or did not work. I would still encourage you to install it and if an add-on degrades Firefox in any way then please use the reporting mechanism (Compatibility button on the add-on listing) to let Mozilla and the author know.

Note that ACR also works with Thunderbird and Seamonkey.

Related articles

• Firefox 10 Is Here. Is it Worth Your Time? (mashable.com)
• Thunderbird 10 Fixes Add-On Compatibility, Adds Right-Click-to-Search and More Keyboard Shortcuts (lifehacker.com)

Wordpress Browser Update

Well, it is not a surprise really, as WordPress has been doing great things for the Web to move it forward since it’s inception. They are Open Source. The platform gets better and better with each release. They have a viable business via Automattic. WordPress and Firefox have always played nice together. There are plenty of add-ons available to enhance your WordPress experience. I could go on…

I don’t know what they are doing with old versions of other browsers, but am sure it is something similar and equally sensible.

I have quite a number of reps whom I mentor, and I’d like to talk about all of them at some stage in the context of the work they do in the community. In the meantime, here are my reps who were present in Berlin.

Alex Lakatos

Mozillians Profile

Alex Lakatos at MozCamp (photo by mozillaeu on Flickr)

Not only does Alex do QA maestro work for Mozilla during the day, but in his free time he does web development and is involved in other ways in the project. He is a member of one of the most vibrant communities in Europe, in Romania.

Valentin Gosu

Mozilians Profile

Valentin Gosu at MozCamp (photo by nitot on Flickr)

Also from Romania, Valentin has been helping students for a while especially in his area of interest which is add-ons development. Recently, he ran a successful add-ons competition in Bucharest. Valentin was impressed by the Mobile and B2G projects at MozCamp and is looking into opportunities to help out with those projects.

Laurian Gridinoc

Mozillians Profile

Laurian Gridinoc at the Mozilla Festival (photo by mozillaeu on Flickr)

My next rep, also from Romania (spot a pattern), is based in the UK. I worked with Laurian previously in the Jetpack for Learning contest where he was among the winners. He is a man of many talents, but his current focus in Mozilla is with the Knight-Mozilla News Technology Partnership. Recently Laurian was chosen as a Knight Mozilla fellow, and he will soon begin a work placement at the BBC. Good luck!

Aleksandar Savić

Mozillians Profile

Aleksandar Savić at MozCamp (photo by nitot on Flickr)

Aleksandar is one of the most active members of the Mozilla Bosnia community, and a key driver in the wider Mozilla Balkans group. One of Aleksandar’s big initiatives currently is an Internet Security and Firefox event that is upcoming in his home country. If it is successful, the concept can spread and used elsewhere in the community.

Nino Vranešič

Mozillians Profile

Nino Vranešič at the Mozilla Balkans Meetup in Sofia (photo by William Quiviger on Flickr)

It would be easy to call Nino the new kid on the block in the Slovenian community, but he has been working hard for a few years spreading the word first as a student rep and now a Mozilla rep. Recently Nino wrote a paper entitled ‘Business models based on open source software: case of Mozilla‘ (pdf), which he presented at a conference in Slovenia.

Kálmán Szalai

Kami at MozCamp (photo by nitot on Flickr)

Last but not least, no post about Mozilla Reps would be complete without talking about Kami. It seems Kami gets to do the fun stuff like wear the fox hat and attend rock festivasls, all on the name of FOSS. Yet we must not forget the other work that he does in the robust Hungarian community, including translations, web work, blog posts, and more.

• It smells of a gold-rush, a way to make a quick buck. I was brought up with an ethic to go and do your day’s work, work hard, get paid, and play your part.
• This is inter-twined with rush to commercialise the Internet. This is not new, but it is eroding into the idealism of the early days of the Web when it was supposed to be the great equaliser in society, the open information platform.
• To scale, you really need to get investment, which means compromising and handing over rights to your business and ideas.
• I’m a software engineer, and solve problems presented by others. I don’t see myself as an ideas person, or at least don’t have the urge to act on ones I do have.

To make an analogy, startups to me are like young footballers who dream of playing for Manchester United or AC Milan or Real Madrid. Or indeed, even to play professional football at any level. How many make it? I don’t know, but I’d say less than 1%. I suspect the number of startups who are successful comes in at around the same percentage.

But in the last couple of years my thinking has changed. To counter the points above:

• Startups are hard work, well if you are doing it right they should be.
• If we strive to keep the Web open, then making money is fine. We all need to, right?
• If you are smart, you can negotiate a good investment deal. The sheer number of investors out there means choice. Or, bootstrap and scale at your own pace.
• Sometimes engineers come up with the best ideas, because they understand some of the real-world problems that need solving and find opportunity in that.

Image by King Molan via Flickr

I could name other reasons, with their counter arguments, but you get the picture. A couple of weeks ago I attended the Dublin Web Summit, very much a startup event. After not living in Ireland for over 10 years and being completely out of touch with the tech scene, I was greatly encouraged by what I saw. The tech sector is one of the things keeping the Irish economy afloat. But it’s foundation is foreign investment by large companies, usually American. Companies like Microsoft, Dell, and Intel have had a presense there for a number of years. Newer comapnies like Facebook and Twitter have setup their European headquarters there. They do so because of a young, skilled workforce and incentives provided by the Irish government including a low corporate tax rate.

Yet now, there is a realisation that this is not a solid foundation for the future. Large companies can move out at any time, pulling the rug from under you. People are starting to do things for themselves, setting up their own companies more and more. Irish people have always been resourceful but there is nothing less than a culture shift happening. There is a real energy. Even the government, who have shown before to be notoriously short-termist, have many initiatives to help small and medium-sized businesses. Yet more work needs to be done. For example, the bankruptcy laws need a major overhaul to shield entrepeneurs more from risk. I definitely like the direction things appear to be going in however.

In this spirit, I applied to be a WebFWD scout and have been accepted. The application form posed the question “Why do you think you would make an awesome WebFWD Scout?“. Here is what I wrote:

I have been an Open Source enthusiast and supporter all my career. I speak at Open Source conferences. In Slovenia, we have a thriving Web and Startup scene, and I attend events and keep up to date. I have mentored at Seedcamp events. Moving further east, I am a member of a group called New Europe Startups that covers Central and Eastern Europe. There is a real hunger here, something that has been observed less in Western Europe. This is something that can be tapped into for the advantage of the Open Web. I’m a firm believer that our future economic health will be based on entrepreneurial talent that challenges and ultimately usurps incumbents who have a stranglehold on many industries. Last but not least, I have faith in people which drives everything I do, and have a knack for connecting people to do interesting and I hope great things.

So I urge you all, if you have a passion and think you have something that will make people’s lives better, go out and start something, work hard, and keep dreaming.

Related articles

• Eastern Europe’s Startups After the Seedcamp: Zemanta, Brainient, Codility and UberVU Revisited (goaleurope.wordpress.com)
• Y Combinator Challenged By Growing Seedcamp (forbes.com)

I’d like to invite you along to a Mozilla Meetup in Dublin, Ireland on November 2. Mozilla products have been translated into Irish for many years (thanks to the great work of Kevin Scannell and others). Unfortunately as Irish is spoken only be a small minority, this does not provide broad coverage country-wide. The majority would use English versions, and while there is a strong user base, the last time I checked the Firefox market share was much less than countries and regions in mainland Europe.

We want to move things to the next level, getting more active contributors on board in other areas of Mozilla and setting up a permanent community (aka Mozilla Ireland). See how you can get involved[1].

EVENT DETAILS

When: Wednesday, November 2 · 6:00pm – 10:00pm

Where: The Odeon, on Harcourt Street.

Description: Do you want to know more about Mozilla, the organisation behind the groundbreaking Firefox browser? Do you want to become involved in the global Mozilla movement? No coding skills required, though folks with them are of course welcome. Come along and find out more.

Format: It will be an evening of presentations and discussions, with drinks and snacks provided.

Sign up on the Facebook event page[2], or if you are not on Facebook just get in touch with me or drop a comment here. We need to get a feel for numbers attending. Note also the wiki page[3]. We’ll be updating these pages with more information in the coming days.

SPEAKING

The schedule is still open, so if you would like to speak about a Mozilla contribution you made or a project you worked on, let me know. If you are attending the Mozilla Festival in London, this is a great opportunity to hop across the pond beforehand.

DUBLIN WEB SUMMIT

I’ll be at the Dublin Web Summit the week before the meetup. If you want to meet me for more details, get in touch. Tristan Nitot of Mozilla Europe will be making a keynote speech on Thursday 27th.

GOAL

Plant the seeds for a permanent active community in Ireland.

See you there!

[1] http://www.mozilla.org/contribute/

[2] http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=249984621718594

[3] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Mozilla_Meetup_Dublin_2011

Image by jmtosses via Flickr

Last week saw Firefox updated to version 7. I’m not sure if other communities party any more with the rapid release cycle, but we used it as an excuse not only to party but to talk about the latest happenings with Mozilla. Web Hour (Spletne urice in Slovene), our beloved technology meetup that happens every Wednesday, was hijacked for this purpose. We moved location for once to try something different, and were graciously welcomed by our hosts Zemanta in their fancy new offices in the middle of Ljubljana. Big shout out to Rok and Gasper for going the extra mile in organisation.

For the schedule, we wanted to cover the latest important happenings and projects in Mozilla. Even though it was Firefox release day, the general theme was that the Web is evolving fast, and so is Mozilla to meet the challenges. While 5 years ago focus in Mozilla shifted almost wholly to Firefox, the wheel has turned again and Firefox is just one tool of many (though still the most important) to keep the Web open and fight for users.

SCHEDULE

Nino and I split the speaking duties. Nino, the youngest Mozilla Slovenia member showed off why he makes a fine Mozilla Rep.

• Firefox Release Channels
• New Developer Tools
• B2G
• WebFWD
• ReMo

SUMMARY

In short form, it went like this…

• Good turnout, standing room only for the presentations
• The topics we chose were spot on, lots of interest and questions
• Dev tools demos wowed. Thanks Matjaz for helping me get them set up
• Nice conversations after
• We didn’t recruit anyone new for mozilla.si or ReMo, but maybe a seed was planted that will grow later

RANDOM COVERAGE

If I missed anything here, let me know. I’ll update this post once I dig up some pictures. The video of the talks will pop up on Kiberpipa Video soon.

Tweets

• We tried with “first 5 RTs get a T-shirt at the event”
• This tweet alone generated 19 RTs: https://twitter.com/#!/mathjazz/status/118320392275374080
• https://twitter.com/#!/alesrosina/status/119101494711697410
• https://twitter.com/#!/wwwh/status/119103552344961024
• https://twitter.com/#!/skrat/status/119097755984601088
• https://twitter.com/#!/friedcell/status/119097123055747072
• https://twitter.com/#!/wwwh/status/119101800371585026
• https://twitter.com/#!/connectslo/status/118771581983014912
• https://twitter.com/#!/alesrosina/status/119104063274094592
• https://twitter.com/#!/wwwh/status/119110863176212481
• https://twitter.com/#!/brianking/status/119786869159510021
• https://twitter.com/#!/brianking/status/119170118180806656

Blog Posts

• http://mozilla.si/2011/09/21/ze-spet-novi-firefox/
• http://www.zemanta.com/blog/firefox-party/
• http://wwwh.si/spletne-urice-180-firefox-7-release-party-at-zemanta/
• http://www.kiberpipa.org/sl/event/180-firefox-7-release-party-zemanta-1429/

Related articles

• Mozilla Firefox 7 Comes with Memory Handling Improvements (news.dice.com)

Picture by Peter ?uhalev

There are other reasons why I talk at and attend events:

In the spirit of making something a little more permanent from all this, I’ve made an Events and Speaking page to catalog what I hope will not only act as a memory for me, but that others can stumble upon to find something useful. I’ve linked slides, videos, pictures, and other relevant materials.

Mostly I talk about Mozilla, and I am very grateful that Mozilla has sponsored me so many times. You can get involved too. If you want to become a more active Mozillian, or just solidify your role in the community, please consider joining the Mozilla Reps program. There has never been a better or more interesting time than now in the evolution of the Web to get involved, as outlined in recent posts by Tristan Nitot and Gervase Markham. Game on indeed!

One of the short brainstorming sessions was for the ReMo add-on that I will be starting shortly. Let me know if you want to get involved. There are plans for a Mobile version and perhaps a native Mobile app, but here I will talk only about the desktop Firefox add-on. The basic idea is to use Jetpack technology and split development into 2 phases. The add-on is primarily aimed at Mozilla Reps but I can see it being useful to anyone who is interested in the program.

Add-on Whiteboarding

Version 1

Version 2+

Pretty Install

USAGE:

• It only works for remote installs. For local installs, the current dialog shows.
• Clicking anywhere outside the doorhanger dismisses it and cancels the install.
• Switching to a new tab or window when the doorhanger is open cancels the install.

If you feel like it is an experiment worth pursuing further, the source is available on github.

Huge thanks to Sylvain Pasche for his work on the original patch and help in turning it into an add-on.

If you don’t know what Mozilla and Firefox are all about, watch this video.

Watch with subtitles in some languages here.

Can’t see the video? Get Firefox! Alternatively, watch here.

Collections in Firefox 4

Can’t see the image? Click here.

Myk’s post is long but well worth reading fully. However, I want to hone in on this part related to why the SDK is not good for updating traditional add-ons:

First, but definitely not foremost, the SDK is still in beta, which
means it is not yet at a level of quality and functionality that is
appropriate for many developers.

More importantly, the SDK delivers not just Firefox 4 compatibility but
also, and primarily, a new way of building add-ons, and that means that
using it to upgrade a traditional add-on means rewriting the add-on to a
significant degree (at least the parts that touch the Firefox user
interface). And that’s a lot more work than it would take to make the
minimal changes necessary to make that add-on compatible with the
changes to Firefox 4′s user interface.

The latter is talked about in more detail. Of course, there are always exceptions and those that come to mind for me are add-ons that use the Greasemonkey compiler to build an extension based on a user script that provides functionality for a particular site. The page-mod module in the SDK is a good alternative for this.

At Briks we’ve been using the SDK recently, for fun projects and for client work. We’ve been using the cfx driven command line tool, which is solid and easy to use. The last time I checked the Builder was broken (but it is getting more solid by the day). We’ve been updating other traditional add-ons for Firefox 4 and David and I recently had this conversation (paraphrased):

Brian: Stepping back, what is the win from using the SDK?
David: forwards compatibility?
David: easier maintenance?
Brian: I’m not convinced of either, because this is such a XUL/overlay heavy add-on
David: yeah me too. hence the question marks :)
Brian: unless at some stage in the future it loses a lot of XUL, but I doubt that will happen because …
David: aye.
Brian: if https://jetpack.mozillalabs.com/sdk/1.0b1/docs/#guide/xul-extensions works, we could have our cake and eat it
Brian: i.e. use the SDK for packaging, but update the code as we like isolated in a directory inside
Brian: maybe we should try that with the exisiting code as an experiment
Brian: and hack install.rdf to support 3.6 and try it there first
Brian: thoughts?
David: hmmm.
David: 1 sec
David: just reading up on that.
David: could try with a test addon
David: i’m not sure of the advantage of just using the sdk to package?
Brian: me neither
Brian: Ok, lets ditch it

So to summarise:

• If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. If you have a XUL based add-on take the path to least resistance and get it ready for Firefox 4. The chances are you won’t get some of the things you are looking for, such as no restart.
• If you have a user-script driven add-on, or a XUL-less Web focused add-on, consider the switch.
• If you are starting something new, try the SDK first.
• The SDK is still in beta, beware of rough edges but at the same time try to play a role in making it stable and moving it forward (see Myk’s post).

Related articles

• Firefox’s Jetpack add-ons taking off soon (news.cnet.com)
• The Add-On SDK is pretty slick (jonoscript.wordpress.com)

So @fosdem on Twitter reminded me today that there are 38 days to go to the 2011 edition. It’s approaching fast.

If you have inspiration for a Mozilla related talk, we would love to hear from you and there is still time to submit a proposal here.

Here is hoping we are not foiled by the snow!

But I don’t want to talk about that.

I live in Slovenia, which is or is not in the Balkans depending on what definition you use or who you talk to. Over the past couple of years I’ve been fortunate enough to travel around the region (Croatia. Romania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Bosnia, Bulgaria) and every time I visit a new place, I’m amazed by the warmth, culture, food, nature, and most of all the people. There is a very real energy that rises above everything else, whether it be pre-conceived or experienced.

The Mozilla community is just that, a community. And we want to harness that energy. Within the Mozilla community are sub-communities, such as Mozilla Asia and Mozilla Europe. Within them there are further sub-communities. Mozilla Balkans is one. And within Mozilla Balkans there are even more communities, such as Mozilla Macedonia or Mozilla Serbia. And in the end we have individuals. Communities bring people together for a greater goal. And that brings us back full circle to Mozilla, it’s mission and goals.

Mozilla Balkans Community Meetup

This week in Ljubjana we’re having a couple of special Mozilla events.

Degustacija Firefox 4 (Tasting Firefox 4)

This is public event tomorrow night (Thursday, 2 December 2010) to show off Firefox 4. We’ll be talking about the Web, Add-ons, Drumbreat, and more. There will be drinks and conversation after. All is happening in the great (all your code is belong to us) Kiberpipa venue.

More details at Mozilla Slovenija and the Facebook event page.

Come one, come all. And bring a friend.

2nd Mozilla Balkans Community Meetup

For the 2nd Mozilla Balkans Community Meetup in Ljubljana, lead contributors from Balkan communities will be invited and sponsored by Mozilla Europe to participate in a 2-day workshop. The aim of the workshop is to enable Mozilla communities in the Balkans to share and learn from each other’s experience working on the Mozilla Project, improve collaboration in the future, and work on specific tasks, based on the 5 goals defined previously and in light of the upcoming Firefox 4 release.

There will be a couple of surprises along the way, and if it is even half as successful (though we aim for double) as the 1st meetup in Skopje, then it will still be declared a success.

1. Wladimir Palant is always on the ball when it comes to informing us about best practices (especially security), new developments, and leading the way trying new things out. His post ‘How many hacks does it take to make your extension install without a restart?’
   does exactly what it says, in reference to traditional extensions and not ones using the new SDK where it comes out of the box. And although his hack-o-meter exploded, it is very informative and perhaps can help other with different types of extensions. Expect at least a few happy users, if not developers.
2. The Error Console is hidden by default in Firefox 4 betas/nightlies leading to final. While this will have little impact on devs as it can be shown easily via a pref, for the curious user it will be harder to track down problems and make decent reports to extension authors. There is also the task of running test code. But Edward Lee points out that giving users code to run and test quickly is another advantage of of the SDK. Again, not ideal for all add-ons (yet), but a nice trick.
3. Extensions are now installed packed to help Firefox startup time, great work by Michael Wu. This is transparent to users, 99.5% of whom won’t even see the profile directory and probably should not poke around in there. Extensions devs sometimes do have to poke around in there post-install from time to time, for example check the integrity of their package if something is not working. This only means an extra ‘unzip’ and is not much of an inconvenience. Upside — no more jars needed inside your XPI, though that is still supported which means you can package up things nice and tight to support Firefox 4 and previous versions.
4. Remote XUL/XBL support has been blocked / turned off (gory details in the bug). It was buggy, and a security hole so this is right thing to do. While some ‘Dark XUL’ deployments out there are hurt by this, no doubt some add-ons will be affected. Also note is it is blocked for file:// urls as well.
5. Justin Scott informs us that the shiny new Discovery Panel is now turned on in the almost shiny new Add-ons Manager. Go forth and try it.
6. The Add-ons blog informs us that the Collections feature on the site has been overhauled. I Heart! Create and share.
7. Last but not least, developers should keep an eye on Jorge’s weekly reports on the Add-ons blog wherein amongst other things he gives us the last Firefox 4 compatibility news