Mozilla gives up on Firefox OS, lays off 50
- Thread starter froggyboy604
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Not good for the resume if you have a failed OS on it.
I agree, it does not look good on a resume to have a failed and short lived OS which is only a few years old.
At least, Firefox OS launched, and was installed on phones which were sold at stores in different countries for a few years.
A lot of operating systems never launched to the public, and are too unpopular to be installed on consumer phones, PC, and laptop.
They just tried to tweak Android, add some custom apps and call it a new OS. It was bound to fail.
Firefox OS was not based on Google Android except for the HAL(hardware abstraction layer) in Gonk Linux which Firefox OS uses to run its mobile web browser and web apps. The HAL is needed for things like the camera, gps, and speaker to work. Firefox OS apps are mobile websites built using HTML, CSS and JavaScript, so app makers don't need to customize their Firefox OS App to work only on Firefox OS. I think app makers can use their existing mobile web apps to publish in the Firefox app store.
Firefox OS is a OS which is mostly based on the Firefox Mobile web browser, and the operating system which runs the Firefox mobile web browser and web apps in Firefox OS is a Linux OS called Gonk.
Source
I think Firefox OS failed because cheaper $10-40 Google Android phones are more common in developing countries like India, so there is less of a need to buy a cheaper Firefox OS phone with fewer apps. Users also wanted to use apps like Hangout, Skype, other web browser apps, and social networking apps like Instagram and games like Temple Run and Asphalt 8 which were not available on Firefox OS.
People who don't need to use a lot of apps will be unlikely to switch to a cheap smartphone like Firefox phones and cheaper Android phones, and continue using their basic cell phone and flip phones which has a few basic apps like camera, dialer, texting, games, clock, calculator and calendar.
Firefox OS also failed because they hired the wrong people which made poor decisions on how to promote Firefox OS as a good alternative to other mobile operating systems, and how to improve Firefox OS, so more people will want to use it.
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iOS and Windows Phone don't use that. My point still stands. It was based on Android or Chromium or whatever it's called, even though they worked on modifying it. They didn't code the OS from scratch.
Firefox Gonk Linux probably needed to use the Android HAL, so it would work on the most models of smartphones and smartphone parts which are Android based, and to save time by not needing to code a HAL from the beginning to end which may take months to years.
The Firefox Mobile web browser in Firefox OS is based on the Mozilla Gecko web browser rendering engine which runs Firefox OS, and the apps except for Gonk Linux's Android HAL which is used to control the basic hardware parts' function like GPS, Camera, Bluetooth.
Firefox OS can only run web apps in the web browser. The apps are made with HTML, HTML5, CSS, JavaScript. The Gecko browser is older than both Android and Chromium because Gecko was used in the Netscape web browser which got released in 1997 when Google was not a browser or OS maker, so Gecko does not use any code from Chromium web browser and Android.
Firefox OS most likely use the Android HAL because Firefox OS was designed to be installed on as many somewhat modern smartphones which are mostly designed for Android.
Firefox OS can be installed on Android phones like the Nexus 5 which uses phone parts which are designed to be compatible with Android's HAL.
It would cost a lot of time and money to make custom firmware which work with most phones instead of using the Android HAL which already work on most phones except for iOS phones where the CPU and a few other chips are designed only for iOS.
Making Firefox OS compatible with Android phones let phone users use Firefox OS without needing to buy another phone just to use Firefox OS. It also gives users the choice to go back to Android if Firefox is not working well on their Android phone.
Mozilla probably hoped that some people with Android on their phones would install Firefox OS on their Android phone, and give Firefox OS a try.
Firefox OS may not have lasted as long if Firefox OS did not work with existing Android phones, or it took too long to make a custom HAL, and now there are tons of cheaper Android phones like the Motorola Moto E which run Android at a decent speed.
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triforceguy1
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Mozilla had an OS? I had no idea... all I know is that Firefox trashed my last computer haha
how so?
triforceguy1
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I have no idea, that's the issue lol
sometimes a bad update can wreck things.
Yeah never really caught the attention of people, especially not the mass market. Was kind of bound to fail after the recent failures of BlackBerry's operating system and the struggling Windows phones.