Compatibility/Mobile
Mobile Web Compatibility
What Are Web Compatibility Issues?
A person should be able to use the Web whatever the device and the browser they are using.
Unfortunately, some developers by choice or negligence will make their Web sites unusable by some specific devices or browsers. We need to open up the Web to any rendering engines (Gecko, Presto, Trident, etc.) and/or browsers, when used on mobile devices.
There are 4 key problem areas that must be addressed:
- user agent (UA) detection
- specific CSS prefixes (such as WebKit)
- specific DOM/JS/content (such as WebKit)
- Gecko limitations (for Mozilla)
Goal
The vague goal for this project is to open up the mobile Web to all browsers. A specific project goal is being defined by the market insights, product, and project management teams.
Scope
- In scope
- Any site with a mobile version
- Any locale
- Out of scope
- Site enhancements
- Trivial site layout or functional bugs
- Firefox Marketplace app testing
Get Involved
Fixing the Web will only be successful with the efforts of everyone (Web site developers, Volunteers, Partners, and Mozilla employees). Mozilla can't do it alone.
- Web Compatibility 101 (@@TODO@@)
- Subscribe to Web Compatibility (Archives)
- Read the previous meetings minutes
- How to participate?
- Reporting Web sites issues
- Analyzing Web sites issues
- Contacting Web sites for solving the issues
Projects
Wipe Out User Agent (UA) Overrides
UA override mechanism has been created for giving the possibility for users to access a Web site, when the Web site filters them out. The project Wiping out User Agent (UA) overrides has for goal to drive the B2G UA override list to zero.
Fixing UA detection libraries
User Agent detection libraries sometimes do not take into account Firefox OS and/or Firefox for Android. We (Mozilla and the community) try to contact them for fixing the libraries.
90% Mobile Compatibility for the Alexa Top 1000 Sites
90% Mobile Compatibility for the Alexa Top 1000 Sites to achieve 90% compatibility in terms of mobile content sent to Firefox for Android and Firefox OS by the Alexa top 1000 global sites.
Evangelism
Part of the Evangelism effort, the Web Compatibility Guide helps individuals to report, analyze and contact Web sites for issues with Web Compatibility. (work in progress)
(Mobile) Library and Framework Investigation
The ongoing goal of this project is to "audit" source code and issues/bug trackers of popular mobile frameworks to identify bugs, workarounds, or performance issues that need increased attention from Mozilla.
Gecko improvements
Webkit CSS/DOM/JS property aliasing
Spade
Spade is an automated tool that will provide guidance as the the scope of the mobile Web problem. Note: this tool may be obsoleted by Seif Lotfy's work and is not being actively developed as of Nov-2013.
Video project
The Video project aims to get an overview of and improve the compatibility state of video watching sites.
Communication
| Communication Type | Mechanism | Audience |
|---|---|---|
| Announcements | compatibility and dev-planning lists | all |
| General discussion | compatibility list | all |
| Meetings | Mondays 1pm PT
|
all |
| Meeting summaries | this wiki and Lawrence Mandel's blog | all |
| Evangelism status | arewecompatibleyet.com report | all |
Press & Blog Posts
- Mar 1, 2013 - Lawrence Mandel: Help Wanted: Firefox OS UA Detection
- Oct 30, 2012 - Website Evangelism: Mobilizing Mozilla (Gerv Markham)
Minutes and Progress Reports
| 2013 | |
|---|---|
| |
| 2012 | |
|---|---|
| |
People
Mozilla Corporation
| Project Champion | |
| Program Management | Lawrence Mandel |
| Engineering | Brad Lassey |
| Product Management | Vishy Krishnamoorthy |
| Incoming Bug Triage | Jason Smith, Aaron Train |
| QA | Tony Chung, Jason Smith, Aaron Train |
| Analysis and Contacts | Hallvord Steen, Mike Taylor, Karl Dubost |
| Dev Engagement | Ali Spivak |
Volunteers Leading Web Compatibility efforts
You can be part of it. Check how-to start your own local community, read the Guide, be an ambassador for the project, and take a free space down there or create a new locale if it doesn't exist yet. It's really up to you on making the Web more accessible by anyone. We can help you to start.
| Activities | Leader | Joined on (Left) |
| Brazil | Leo Balter | October 2013 |
| Brazil | Daniel Filho | October 2013 |
| Brazil | Fabricio Zuardi | October 2013 |
| Colombia | Free | |
| Germany | Free | |
| Greece | Thanos Lefteris | October 2013 |
| India | Abdul Rauf | October 2013 |
| Mexico | Alex Mayorga | November 2013 |
| Poland | Free | |
| Serbia | Free | |
| Spain | Free | |
| Venezuela | Free | |
| Infrastructure | Seif Lofti | October 2013 |
| Communication | Kohei Yoshino | October 2013 |
References
- Firefox goes 2-digit, time to check your UA sniffing scripts
- Vendor Prefixes Are Hurting the Web
- DOM properties that pose potential compat issues
- IE srcelement bug 453968
- Gecko CSS vendo-prefix Compatibility
- Analysis of the use of vendor-specific CSS property prefixes on the web bug 708406
- Google Web fonts
- Gecko user agent string reference
- Changing the UA string
- Fennec User Agent
- Writing forward-compatible websites
- Site Evangelism Letters from previous evangelism effort
- Site feedback from input.mozilla.org
- Add device info to User-Agent bug 625238
- CoreMob (www.coremob.org): Mobile Web App Profile (from W3C)
- Firefox bug-a-thon
- QuirksMode JavaScript library poll results
- Vladimir Vukićević: Using a Caching Proxy Server for Web Demos
- bug 666041 CSS Flexbox Layout Level 3
- Web Compat job descriptions etherpad
- Gecko Improvements from Mobile Web Compat Effort