12 ms·

Introducing node-firefox

287 points by cleverjake 12y ago

revskill 12y ago
The site is terribly slow. I don't know how a software could be good if its main site is in that slow quality. Bad developers or bad policy ?
yeldarb 12y ago
Can anyone sum up what this is? I got through the first 6 paragraphs and still don't have a clue.
- wodenokoto 12y ago
  It's a command-line / programmatic interface for deploying FirefoxOS apps to your test environment. Before the easiest way to deploy an app was clicking a button in a piece of software called WebIDE, but now you can do that from the command-line, inside your test-case script or where ever you want it.
_almosnow 12y ago
v8 powering Firefox, who would've known...
- serve_yay 12y ago
  Yeah. There's an idea.
- Ygg2 12y ago
  Actually, v8 powering a Firefox OS simulator IIUC.
- aikah 12y ago
  ... IIRC , there is a node-spidermonkey version,but Mozilla doesn't seem to be interested in working seriously on that project. Which is crazy because one would expect Mozilla to do exactly that.
  - Ygg2 12y ago
    I'd rather see the node-servo version ;) As far as I understand, Servo will come with a WebKit embedding API, so the possibilities are pretty much endless.
    - fabrice_d 12y ago
      Servo uses spidermonkey as JS engine, so I don't think it brings anything in a "run js headless" context.
      - servobut 12y ago
        Although it's possible that some of the changes required to integrate Spidermonkey and Servo might make the former easier to embed?
      - Ygg2 12y ago
        True, but mostly because writing a JS engine from scratch is hard although not impossible.
  - phpnode 12y ago
    Sadly dead - https://github.com/zpao/spidernode https://github.com/zpao/spidernode
  - fabrice_d 12y ago
    Last I heard, the node guys were quite adverse at maintaining both node-v8 and node-spidermonkey. I don't blame them ;) And that doesn't help that the people who started node-spidermonkey left Mozilla and afaik can't contribute to open source projects that are not explicitly vetted by their current employer.
recibe 12y ago
For the record, I want nothing to do with Mozilla after what happened to Brendan Eich. And to you little nazis that downvote this: ANYONE who thinks its just to remove a CEO because of their personal beliefs on same-sex marriage is no better than anyone else who "discriminates" for any other reason.
- phpnode 12y ago
  at least get the guy's name right if you're going to take such a principled stand, it's Brendan Eich
- Ygg2 12y ago
  Well, in Mozilla's defense, they did want him to stay, but not as CEO.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
adrusi 12y ago
Maybe this isn't the best place to ask, but how is the performance of Firefox OS? Its mostly marketed for low-cost devices, how well do apps based on web tech actually run on these relatively slow SoCs? Firefox for android performs admirably for webpages on my nexus 5, but I have yet to find an interactive web app, whether in Firefox or packaged as a Cordova app (and therefore WebKit+v8), that doesn't feel very sluggish. I love the concept and philosophy of Firefox OS, but none of that matters if its too slow to use. If performance is actually acceptable on these devices, then what tricks are they using to make it faster than on higher end android devices?
- mackwic 12y ago
  The performance is very acceptable for what I saw (basic usage of all of the provided apps). I am no expert, but the FirefoxOS stack is really lean and simple compared to the Android stack. Some would say that Android is an huge undocumented bloat with all the layers added during its lifetime (just check the AOSP build system to understand this opinion). As I see it, FirefoxOS, by being ten years younger and less used, is doing million things less than Android (from the system point of view), and that's how things can get reasonably fast and responsive (that, and the blazing fast SpiderMonkey vm).
- daleharvey 12y ago
  I work on Firefox OS so probably worth taking bias into account. On low end devices fxos runs reasonably well but with noticeable lag, we have put in huge amounts of effort on the low end to make that possible. On high end devices the 'native' fxos application are incredibly snappy and there has been very little done to improve performance on high end devices. Most of the stuff we have done is common sense, some you will see a lot of people doing, some almost no people do. 1. Shorten the path to rendering first screen, dont block on reading some data, load all scripts async etc. 2. Never animate top / left, use CSS transitions for everything. 3. We use 'will-change' to ensure that the graphics are properly layered for when they do animate (https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/will-change https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/will-change) 4. Offline assets, in fxos we use packaged apps for various reasons, however one of the benefits is that reading from the filesystem is faster than reading over the network. If I had one performance tip for web developers, look into how far you can use appcache to store resources offline (or if your feeling fancy, service workers). Offline capable web apps have a night and day difference.
camhenlin 12y ago
I am kind of disappointed in the naming of this. There's another project named Node-WebKit: https://github.com/nwjs/nw.js/tree/master https://github.com/nwjs/nw.js/tree/master It allows you to build a native app using node and webkit. Reading the name of this project got my hopes up, thinking I was going to have the option of using Firefox instead of Webkit as my rendering engine. Oh well.
- Mahn 12y ago
  That would be node-gecko (if it existed), wouldn't it? But yes, it's a bit misleading, by node-firefox I was expecting the full blown browser written in javascript myself.
  - treeform 12y ago
    Or some thing like node-js but using SpiderMonkey instead of V8. Name really does not fit and blows up expectations. node-firefox-simulator would be more apt.
    - lastontheboat 12y ago
      https://github.com/zpao/spidernode https://github.com/zpao/spidernode
      - giancarlostoro 12y ago
        No longer maintained, sadly.
  - coldtea 12y ago
    >That would be node-gecko (if it existed), wouldn't it? Only if it followed exactly the same naming logic down to a t. But it didn't have to, node-firefox would also be a perfectly apt name for something like node-webkit based on gecko too -- and not suitable at all for what it actually is now.
- tga 12y ago
  It's worth pointing out that Node-WebKit got renamed recently to NW.js (as it's now based on io.js and Chromium). You are right though, I also expected to see a similar project to NW.js but coming from Mozilla. Another shot at packaging offline web apps would have been interesting, especially since I don't know of good alternatives to NW.js. As things stand, it's difficult to get excited about anything FirefoxOS since it has such a small number of users.
ArtDev 12y ago
"You can also install and run Web apps on your Windows, Mac, or Linux desktop using Firefox" This is brilliant.
binarycrusader 12y ago
I was hoping (sadly) that based on the name, this meant there was a port of node.js to spidermonkey by the Mozilla team. Other posters have mentioned this as well. This is sort of a "lazy web" request, but does anyone know why node.js needs v8 specifically? Would it really be that hard to support node.js on spidermonkey?
- mbrubeck 12y ago
  There was a "Spidernode" project started a while ago: http://zpao.com/posts/about-that-hybrid-v8monkey-engine/ http://zpao.com/posts/about-that-hybrid-v8monkey-engine/ I believe it fizzled out partly due to lack of contributor time and partly because the mainstream Node maintainers were wary of fragmenting the Node.js ecosystem/community.
  - cpeterso 12y ago
    In the name of competition and architectural flexibility, perhaps the io.js team will be more receptive. :) AFAIK, though, V8 is so tightly integrated into Node core that a third-party library, NaN ("Native Abstractions for Node.js"), was created to improve API compatibility for Node binary addons: https://github.com/rvagg/nan https://github.com/rvagg/nan
jtwebman 12y ago
Are people building Firefox OS Apps?
- gitaarik 12y ago
  I created a very simple Firefox OS App. You can look up the departure times of trains in the Netherlands: https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/ns-times?src=search https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/ns-times?src=search https://github.com/gitaarik/nsapp https://github.com/gitaarik/nsapp As it's just a webapp and it doesn't use any phone specific API's you can also run it in any browser. Here I just hosted is as a website so you can try it out if you don't have a Firefox OS phone: http://nsapp.televisionsmostpopularartinstructors.com/ http://nsapp.televisionsmostpopularartinstructors.com/ Of course it's meant for phones so the design doesn't really work out for desktop browsers, but you get the idea.
  - jtwebman 12y ago
    Thanks! I'll take a look.
- berbaquero 12y ago
  Well, that's the thing — if you're building "regular Web Apps", you're _almost_ building Firefox OS Apps, too! For instance, I built Reeddit [1] for The Web, and with just a couple of config files here and icons there, it's on the Firefox Marketplace [2]. Now, a "stricter" FFOS App would be one that uses FFOS' APIs for more specific stuff, I guess. [1] http://reedditapp.com http://reedditapp.com [2] https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/reeddit https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/reeddit
  - jtwebman 12y ago
    This is good to know, I'll have to take a look!
hitlin37 12y ago
that name is confusing.
josteink 12y ago
> Also, support on platforms other than Mac OS is largely lacking. I realize you have to start somewhere, but for a foundation which claims to value freedom first, it seems like first targeting a fully open platform like Linux with a cross-platform toolkit like Gtk or Qt would make more sense. TLDR: Not going to spend $1000+ to get a new machine which runs a lesser free Unix just to run Mozilla-tools.

287 points by cleverjake 12y ago

The site is terribly slow. I don't know how a software could be good if its main site is in that slow quality. Bad developers or bad policy ?

yeldarb 12y ago

Can anyone sum up what this is? I got through the first 6 paragraphs and still don't have a clue.

wodenokoto 12y ago
It's a command-line / programmatic interface for deploying FirefoxOS apps to your test environment. Before the easiest way to deploy an app was clicking a button in a piece of software called WebIDE, but now you can do that from the command-line, inside your test-case script or where ever you want it.

_almosnow 12y ago

v8 powering Firefox, who would've known...

serve_yay 12y ago
Yeah. There's an idea.
Ygg2 12y ago
Actually, v8 powering a Firefox OS simulator IIUC.
aikah 12y ago
... IIRC , there is a node-spidermonkey version,but Mozilla doesn't seem to be interested in working seriously on that project. Which is crazy because one would expect Mozilla to do exactly that.
- Ygg2 12y ago
  I'd rather see the node-servo version ;) As far as I understand, Servo will come with a WebKit embedding API, so the possibilities are pretty much endless.
  - fabrice_d 12y ago
    Servo uses spidermonkey as JS engine, so I don't think it brings anything in a "run js headless" context.
    - servobut 12y ago
      Although it's possible that some of the changes required to integrate Spidermonkey and Servo might make the former easier to embed?
    - Ygg2 12y ago
      True, but mostly because writing a JS engine from scratch is hard although not impossible.
- phpnode 12y ago
  Sadly dead - https://github.com/zpao/spidernode https://github.com/zpao/spidernode
- fabrice_d 12y ago
  Last I heard, the node guys were quite adverse at maintaining both node-v8 and node-spidermonkey. I don't blame them ;) And that doesn't help that the people who started node-spidermonkey left Mozilla and afaik can't contribute to open source projects that are not explicitly vetted by their current employer.

recibe 12y ago

For the record, I want nothing to do with Mozilla after what happened to Brendan Eich. And to you little nazis that downvote this: ANYONE who thinks its just to remove a CEO because of their personal beliefs on same-sex marriage is no better than anyone else who "discriminates" for any other reason.

phpnode 12y ago
at least get the guy's name right if you're going to take such a principled stand, it's Brendan Eich
Ygg2 12y ago
Well, in Mozilla's defense, they did want him to stay, but not as CEO.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

adrusi 12y ago

Maybe this isn't the best place to ask, but how is the performance of Firefox OS? Its mostly marketed for low-cost devices, how well do apps based on web tech actually run on these relatively slow SoCs? Firefox for android performs admirably for webpages on my nexus 5, but I have yet to find an interactive web app, whether in Firefox or packaged as a Cordova app (and therefore WebKit+v8), that doesn't feel very sluggish. I love the concept and philosophy of Firefox OS, but none of that matters if its too slow to use. If performance is actually acceptable on these devices, then what tricks are they using to make it faster than on higher end android devices?

mackwic 12y ago
The performance is very acceptable for what I saw (basic usage of all of the provided apps). I am no expert, but the FirefoxOS stack is really lean and simple compared to the Android stack. Some would say that Android is an huge undocumented bloat with all the layers added during its lifetime (just check the AOSP build system to understand this opinion). As I see it, FirefoxOS, by being ten years younger and less used, is doing million things less than Android (from the system point of view), and that's how things can get reasonably fast and responsive (that, and the blazing fast SpiderMonkey vm).
daleharvey 12y ago
I work on Firefox OS so probably worth taking bias into account. On low end devices fxos runs reasonably well but with noticeable lag, we have put in huge amounts of effort on the low end to make that possible. On high end devices the 'native' fxos application are incredibly snappy and there has been very little done to improve performance on high end devices. Most of the stuff we have done is common sense, some you will see a lot of people doing, some almost no people do. 1. Shorten the path to rendering first screen, dont block on reading some data, load all scripts async etc. 2. Never animate top / left, use CSS transitions for everything. 3. We use 'will-change' to ensure that the graphics are properly layered for when they do animate (https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/will-change https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/CSS/will-change) 4. Offline assets, in fxos we use packaged apps for various reasons, however one of the benefits is that reading from the filesystem is faster than reading over the network. If I had one performance tip for web developers, look into how far you can use appcache to store resources offline (or if your feeling fancy, service workers). Offline capable web apps have a night and day difference.

camhenlin 12y ago

I am kind of disappointed in the naming of this. There's another project named Node-WebKit: https://github.com/nwjs/nw.js/tree/master https://github.com/nwjs/nw.js/tree/master It allows you to build a native app using node and webkit. Reading the name of this project got my hopes up, thinking I was going to have the option of using Firefox instead of Webkit as my rendering engine. Oh well.

Mahn 12y ago
That would be node-gecko (if it existed), wouldn't it? But yes, it's a bit misleading, by node-firefox I was expecting the full blown browser written in javascript myself.
- treeform 12y ago
  Or some thing like node-js but using SpiderMonkey instead of V8. Name really does not fit and blows up expectations. node-firefox-simulator would be more apt.
  - lastontheboat 12y ago
    https://github.com/zpao/spidernode https://github.com/zpao/spidernode
    - giancarlostoro 12y ago
      No longer maintained, sadly.
- coldtea 12y ago
  >That would be node-gecko (if it existed), wouldn't it? Only if it followed exactly the same naming logic down to a t. But it didn't have to, node-firefox would also be a perfectly apt name for something like node-webkit based on gecko too -- and not suitable at all for what it actually is now.
tga 12y ago
It's worth pointing out that Node-WebKit got renamed recently to NW.js (as it's now based on io.js and Chromium). You are right though, I also expected to see a similar project to NW.js but coming from Mozilla. Another shot at packaging offline web apps would have been interesting, especially since I don't know of good alternatives to NW.js. As things stand, it's difficult to get excited about anything FirefoxOS since it has such a small number of users.

ArtDev 12y ago

"You can also install and run Web apps on your Windows, Mac, or Linux desktop using Firefox" This is brilliant.

binarycrusader 12y ago

I was hoping (sadly) that based on the name, this meant there was a port of node.js to spidermonkey by the Mozilla team. Other posters have mentioned this as well. This is sort of a "lazy web" request, but does anyone know why node.js needs v8 specifically? Would it really be that hard to support node.js on spidermonkey?

mbrubeck 12y ago
There was a "Spidernode" project started a while ago: http://zpao.com/posts/about-that-hybrid-v8monkey-engine/ http://zpao.com/posts/about-that-hybrid-v8monkey-engine/ I believe it fizzled out partly due to lack of contributor time and partly because the mainstream Node maintainers were wary of fragmenting the Node.js ecosystem/community.
- cpeterso 12y ago
  In the name of competition and architectural flexibility, perhaps the io.js team will be more receptive. :) AFAIK, though, V8 is so tightly integrated into Node core that a third-party library, NaN ("Native Abstractions for Node.js"), was created to improve API compatibility for Node binary addons: https://github.com/rvagg/nan https://github.com/rvagg/nan

jtwebman 12y ago

Are people building Firefox OS Apps?

gitaarik 12y ago
I created a very simple Firefox OS App. You can look up the departure times of trains in the Netherlands: https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/ns-times?src=search https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/ns-times?src=search https://github.com/gitaarik/nsapp https://github.com/gitaarik/nsapp As it's just a webapp and it doesn't use any phone specific API's you can also run it in any browser. Here I just hosted is as a website so you can try it out if you don't have a Firefox OS phone: http://nsapp.televisionsmostpopularartinstructors.com/ http://nsapp.televisionsmostpopularartinstructors.com/ Of course it's meant for phones so the design doesn't really work out for desktop browsers, but you get the idea.
- jtwebman 12y ago
  Thanks! I'll take a look.
berbaquero 12y ago
Well, that's the thing — if you're building "regular Web Apps", you're _almost_ building Firefox OS Apps, too! For instance, I built Reeddit [1] for The Web, and with just a couple of config files here and icons there, it's on the Firefox Marketplace [2]. Now, a "stricter" FFOS App would be one that uses FFOS' APIs for more specific stuff, I guess. [1] http://reedditapp.com http://reedditapp.com [2] https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/reeddit https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/reeddit
- jtwebman 12y ago
  This is good to know, I'll have to take a look!

hitlin37 12y ago

that name is confusing.

josteink 12y ago

> Also, support on platforms other than Mac OS is largely lacking. I realize you have to start somewhere, but for a foundation which claims to value freedom first, it seems like first targeting a fully open platform like Linux with a cross-platform toolkit like Gtk or Qt would make more sense. TLDR: Not going to spend $1000+ to get a new machine which runs a lesser free Unix just to run Mozilla-tools.