XUL

Was the FireFox extension framework.

Now deprecated

XUL's on my list of things I really really really want to get into (and it's a fair-sized list ;). Although I did start the tutorial again a couple of months ago, and it looked really neat - functionality in one directory, layout in another, and styles in another. I'm excited about it because it has effectively the same cross-platform premise as Java, but already has all the "software infrastructure" for a lot of network functionality. So rather than design an entire system to achieve a new way of getting people to communicate, I just have to write what's basically the link between the protocol (which will probably be based on one of the supported ones, e.g. XML or E-mail) and the interface that the user sees. The protocol can be relatively simple and high-level, and if it's open then I can leave other people to write other clients however they like. And people already using Mozilla should be relatively comfortable with the interface, as most of it will be unchanged. (Plus if they don't like it, they can just uninstall my app while leaving Mozilla in place.)

Oh, and my app should all install from the browser in a single click. Nice. From a user's point of view, it's extremely polished when done right.

I kept an eye on Forumzilla all morning - not sure how often it checks for updates, and I don't think the config is that advanced yet ;) I noticed a few new BBC articles coming in. Not perfect by all means, but I'll give it some time, see if I can get used to checking my mail, rather than my bookmarks one-by-one ;) I think there could be some intriguing offshoots of having all the feeds, links and content available from within my mail client, like being able to just forward it onto people, or move/copy it into another folder. I'm already seeing if I can train Mozilla's Bayesian spam filter (which I'm not using for spam) to work out which BBC news articles I like and don't like...

– GrahamLally