XULRunner

Summary

XULRunner is essentially a runtime environment for XUL applications (Such as FireFox and ThunderBird). It will also allow Extension developers to create their extensions for use outside of the FireFox browser thereby allow the extension to keep running if the browser crashes.

Details

• XULRunner as it is a separate application will allow extensions to run in their own process separate from FireFox. This will also keep the extension independent of any themes and other extensions.
• XULRunner is not a browser, but it can be used to make a browser.
• XULRunner will allow developers to create their applications using HTML, XHTML, SVG, or XUL.
• It will allow the use of web services(SOAP), cryptography, XPCOM, history implementation (but no UI that will have to be part of the XULRunner app) and more Gecko Features (see HERE for full list of Gecko Features.
• It will have a user interface for the management of XULApplications (installing, deploying, upgrading, and uninstalling)
• Planned to be used by FireFox 3 when it is released Q1 2007. This will be version 1.9 and will be the first production version of XULRunner.

Code

Bare Bones Directory Structure for a XULRunner Application

/applicationName
   /chrome
      /applicationName
         your app files
      chrome.manifest
   /defaults
      /preferences
         prefs.js
   application.ini

Newsgroups

• XULRunner News Group

Links

• XULRunner Homepage
• ChatZilla Example
• XULRunner Tutorial
• XULRunner Examples
• IRC Channel on Mozilla.org