[Project_owners] "moz" operating system

[Steve Moss]

Hi. My name's Steve, I live in Katoomba Australia. I'm not a
programmer but I'd like to ask a question about whether Mozilla could
be used as a free-standing Operating System. I've been chewing the
idea over for a year or so that there should be an entire Operating
System that is just one single browser program.

All the tasks you want to do would open up on new tabs within this one
browser, whether they be web browsing, email, music and movies, text
documents, games or anything else. I guess there'd be a sidebar with
icons for all the applications. Mozilla would be the ideal choice
because there's already a community of hackers writing all kinds of
additional tasks for the basic browser so I think fans would respond
to the sugestion that we could port every category of Open Source
program to the Mozilla platform.

I must say I feel a little silly floating such an obvious idea when
I'm not a programmer and my work with computers is mostly hardware -
I refurbish old computers for people on low incomes to cross the IT
divide. Needless to say I like the idea of any os that can make
an old pc both powerful and easy to use. I've given Freedos a try,
but while I think it's really great on principle, I know that my
clients, some of whom have intellectual disabilities or other mental
issues, would find even the revived dos environment rather difficult.

It just seems silly to me
that we have to put up with all the instability of a multi-tasking
system and all the memory it uses, not to mention the clicking
between all your apps on screen, when you only really need one engine
running with all your work right there in tabs. You wouldn't even
need a windowing system in a basic version for old low-powered
machines. Most applications these days have a browser interface, so
why duplicate?

I thought of the name "Moz" because unlike all the
other projects which expand the basic Mozilla program, my idea is a
contraction in the sense that it reduces all computer functions to
just the one program.

I suppose my question is not so much as "what do you think of my
great idea?" as "Why the blazes doesn't this thing already
exist?"

Thanks,

Steve Moss

[Ben Bucksch]

<http://www.oeone.com>

[Scott McWhirter]

Post by Steve Moss
Hi. My name's Steve, I live in Katoomba Australia. I'm not a
programmer but I'd like to ask a question about whether Mozilla could
be used as a free-standing Operating System. I've been chewing the
idea over for a year or so that there should be an entire Operating
System that is just one single browser program.

Ullo,

I'm trying to do this with a project called XEDE, where we are hoping to
build a gecko based X window manager. We're quite excited about the idea
of it, however unfortunately, we're all very very busy with our 'real'
jobs at the moment and don't have the time to work on it. However after
feburary, we'll be embarking upon doing it.

It's a tricky enough task, however i assume that we'll get there in the
end!

[Neil]

we are hoping to build a gecko based X window manager.

Sounds like Active Desktop for Linux :-)

[marius popa]

Post by Neil

we are hoping to build a gecko based X window manager.

Sounds like Active Desktop for Linux :-)

Now that's a monster inc :)