B2G SDK (?)

Current State ( April 16, 2012 )

Currently the simplest thing to do is run gaia using Firefox nightly builds, but this leaves the developer with an imperfect situation:

• apps open in pinned app tabs instead of the same viewport
• many JS apis are not available currently
• on the plus side, you can use the Firefox dev tools and Firebug with Gaia.

Web developers who want to hack on Gaia either with hardware or using the desktop client are required to build Gecko ( and in the case of hardware, Gonk ) using a fairly elaborate set of steps:

Building the B2G desktop app

• Steps to hack on Gaia: [1]
• Related community member blog post: [2]
• related B2G bug to get nightly B2G/Gaia builds [3]

Building and flashing B2G to compatible hardware

• wiki:
  • Build environment: [4]
  • Galaxy SII build procedure: [5]
• state of heavy flux, B2G is being ported to ICS right now
• 2 currently compatible phones: Samsung GSII & Nexus S
• lengthy, error-prone build process
• legal restrictions on redistribution of the resulting builds
• need a better experience, & need to help the team be more transparent

Gaia hacking process

• clone the gaia repository from github
  • create a new repo branch to hold any changes: git checkout -b my-gaia-hack
• make your changes and test them with Nightly & the devtools
  • running on Nightly:
    • DEBUG=1 make && firefox -profile `pwd`/profile http://homescreen.gaiamobile.org:8080
• device testing:
  • run b2g desktop ( if available ): b2g -profile /path/to/gaia/profile
  • update gaia on a B2G device: cd /path/to/gaia/profile && make install-gaia