Gecko 1.9 Roadmap

Introduction to the Gecko 1.9 Roadmap

This roadmap describes the planned capabilities of the Mozilla platform, often known as "Gecko", in the 1.9 release. The primary product delivery vehicle for this platform is Firefox 3, which will be explored, discussed, and refined elsewhere, likely in a manner similar to that employed for Firefox 2.

The work described in this document will be performed -- in several cases it is already being performed, as of February 2006 -- on the trunk of Mozilla CVS, with the 1.8 branch preserved largely intact. Some of the features listed below may be pulled forward into that 1.8 branch if needed for product releases off that branch, but you shouldn't count on it. We will preserve all API (declared-frozen or not) compatibility on the 1.8 branch, so only selected additional APIs are thinkable. (A Gecko 1.8 Roadmap is also needed, and it should be expected to describe the criteria by which necessarily-API-compatible changes may be selected for promotion to the 1.8 release stream.)

Much more information on the management of these branches, and post-1.8.0 releases of Gecko 1.8, is available in the branch plan.

Readers of this document will notice a conspicuous absence of bug lists, detailed schedules, or decomposition of development work into individual tasks. While this roadmap is intended to provide a statement of direction for the platform in Gecko 1.9, responsibility for detailed planning of such areas of development is necessarily devolved to the groups doing -- or, in the case of some larger tasks, leading -- the design, development, and testing of specific capabilities. We seek here to make clear the "whats" and "whys", but not to elaborate in meaningful detail on the "hows" or "whens".

As this roadmap describes the future, and not history, some revision is to be expected. The delineation of "planned" and "desired" work is hopefully made clear below; for work to be considered "planned", there should be credible understanding of the "hows" and "whens", as well as clear description of the "whos". We strongly encourage the leaders of such "planned" work to commit their understanding to a public document, and keep it updated and linked from appropriate project pages.

The owner of record for this document is Mike Shaver (shaver@mozilla.org), and all errors or omissions within it are first and foremost his responsibility. Brendan Eich (brendan@mozilla.org) continues to drive the vision and architecture of the platform in the large, and his influence on the platform roadmap is both significant and indispensible. In the case of a tie, disputes will be settled by single combat.