Firefox3/Firefox Requirements Meetings/Content Handling
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Contents
Dial-in Info
- +1 650-215-1282x91 Conf# 8602 (US/INTL)
- +1 800-707-2533 (pin 369) Conf# 8602
Agenda
The following list is taken directly from the Firefox 3 Detailed Feature List. If this list does not match the other, the Google Spreadsheet version takes precedence (I may have made a copying error).
- P1 - Improve content handling, add support for web services to act as content handlers
- P1 FR - Support web services as MIME type handlers
- P1 FR - Remove local MIME type database for local applications
- P1 NFR - Simplify content handling UI
- P1 NFR - Create an easy-to-use MIME type handling configuration system
- P1 - Robust plugin support for Flash, Acrobat, WMV, Quicktime, Java
- P1 FR - Should be able to play all popular media formats when plugins/codecs are installed
- P1 FR - Embedded rich content areas should function when plugins are installed
- P1 FR - It should be easy to locate and install missing plugins
- P1 NFR - Plugin crashes should not crash the entire application
- P2 - Improve download handling across multiple sessions
- P2 FR - Support pause/resume for downloads
- P2 - Microformat detection framework
- P2 FR - Create document-parsing framework for detecting microformats
- P2 FR - Create API for developers to leverage this framework
- P2 - Microformat handling
- P2 FR - Display microformats in content area
- P2 FR - Allow user to configure microformat handlers
- P2 FR - Support hCard, hCal, and geo
- P2 FR - Provide API/Data format for adding additional microformat types
- P2 FR - Allow web developers to override microformat display attributes
- P2 NFR - Must not affect page load time
- P3 - Extended download history management
- P3 NFR - Easier retrieval of files that a user has downloaded in the past
- P3 NFR - Simplified (non-modal?) UI for managing downloads
- Px - Revised downloads manager
- Px - Add new microformat detectors
- Px - Register new microformat handlers
Note
Item
- P1 - Improve content handling, add support for web services to act as content handlers
- P1 FR - Support web services as MIME type handlers
- P1 FR - Remove local MIME type database for local applications
- P1 NFR - Simplify content handling UI
- P1 NFR - Create an easy-to-use MIME type handling configuration system
Notes
- "Remove local MIME type..." - change to "minimize/remove" - this actually means that we'll pass it up to the OS rather than directly to an application. Seems fine as-is.
- "Simplify content handling UI" - is ugly, needs to be less ugly. Leave as-is.
- ADD: "P3 FR Ability to show or sniff content on demand and view in plaintext or html or somesuch instead" -- find a non-scary way to present that to users.
Item
- P1 - Robust plugin support for Flash, Acrobat, WMV, Quicktime, Java
- P1 FR - Should be able to play all popular media formats when plugins/codecs are installed
- P1 FR - Embedded rich content areas should function when plugins are installed
- P1 FR - It should be easy to locate and install missing plugins
- P1 NFR - Plugin crashes should not crash the entire application
Notes
- "Play all popular media formats when plugins are installed" - Yep. This line item is here to very carefully track and ensure we do these things. Will not ship without it.
- Is this a cross-platform requirement? Acrobat on Linux, VLC on Linux, etc.?
- ACTION & ADD: "P1 NFR Support all platforms with this as best we can"
- Is there a functional requirement that users can play media files without installing additional software? IE: should we be investigating bundling. Further investigate the bundling options and possibilities.
- "Embedded rich content areas should function when plugins are installed..." - Not entirely sure what this means. Move to DELETE as it's not useful as written.
- "Make it easy to locate and install missing plugins" - CHANGE to NFR,
- Vista-specific issue with plugin installation, but this req is a little more general than that and refers specifically (?) to the plugin finder service.
- Not really the PFS...
- Not sure if we can truly solve this ourselves. "Make it possible for a well-behaved plugin author to do the right thing" - facilitate the installation of plugins. Stays a P1
- "Plugin crashes should not crash the entire application"
- This is a huge, hairy task. Worthy of investigation to be sure, but...probably not a P1 if we want to ship Firefox3 this year. Is this an actionable NFR? This is probably not doable. There are some things we can do to make plugins less of a risk, but there's not a whole lot we can do when a plugin actually crashes. REPHRASE: "Identify ways to mitigate plugin crashes." CHANGE: to P2.
- We do not currently have the engineers in place to do this.
- ENSURE THAT THIS IS ADDED TO MOZ 2: Add this to Mozilla2 to ensure it's tracked outside of this process.
- If we want this for Moz2 we should get this under development ASAP so we can get it landed and in testing ASAP. This needs a whole release cycle to get into any sort of shape that we want to ship.
- "Improve dload handling"
- Pause/resume = yay!
- This will definitely require support on the Gecko side. We need to investigate with the Platform team. REQUIRES FOLLOWUP
- NEW! What about a pluggable download manager?
- Lots of design implications, possible security implications.
- Need to have a dload manager that handles more than FTP and HTTP.
- Possible just need to add protocol handlers. Current architecture is amenable to it, just no one's done the work to add it...
- ADD: "Px FR Download manager can be extended in a way that feels tightly integrated" - including passing off to third party apps
- Requires further investigation and discussion - FOLLOW UP REQUIRED
- P2 - Revised downloads manager
- Lots of ideas thrown around for this - this is a very generic catch-all for a bunch of different possible FRs.
- Current dload manager is clunky
- Express this as "PX FR "
- Use case: keep a long-running history of downloads
- Use case: clean up my downloads area
- Use case: assign handlers for "Open with..." or "Send to..."
- Figure out WTF people do with the dload manager window and make it suck less.
- ADD: "P2 FR Integrate download manager with third party virus scanners and malware protection"
Item
- P3 - Extended download history management
- P3 NFR - Easier retrieval of files that a user has downloaded in the past
- P3 NFR - Simplified (non-modal?) UI for managing downloads
Notes
- "non-modal" = not window
Item
- P2 - Improve download handling across multiple sessions
- P2 FR - Support pause/resume for downloads
Notes
- OK - leave as-is
Item
- P2 - Microformat detection framework
- P2 FR - Create document-parsing framework for detecting microformats
- P2 FR - Create API for developers to leverage this framework
Notes
- OK - leave as-is. This is backend stuff.
Item
- P2 - Microformat handling
- P2 FR - Display microformats in content area
- P2 FR - Allow user to configure microformat handlers
- P2 FR - Support hCard, hCal, and geo
- P2 FR - Provide API/Data format for adding additional microformat types
- P2 FR - Allow web developers to override microformat display attributes
- P2 NFR - Must not affect page load time
Notes
- This is the front-end stuff.
- First stage is Detection
- Next stage is Notification & Display
- Third stage is Manipulation & Dispatch - this is a harder problem that we don't know how to do yet.
- Should this just be strict microformats or a more generalizable system of inferred pieces of data, meta-data, etc. "Any type of structured information available in the page"
- Aiming at increasing awareness at the end user level as well as the API level.
- Detection stays as-is
- Split "Handling" into Notification+Display and Manipulation+Dispatch
- Notification = Px
- Manipulation = PF ?
- STRUCTURED DATA, NOT MICROFORMATS
- This requires further investigation and follow up, including a revamp of the NFRs/FRs
Item
- Px - Add new microformat detectors
Notes
- This is covered in the previous topic
Item
- Px - Register new microformat handlers
Notes
- This is also covered in the previous topic
Further Additions
- ADD to first section "FR Properly handle streaming content types - embedded or handed off to a helper app" - Priority??
- RSS enclosure handling -- what to do with videos, photos, etc.? Hand off to third-party programs. This is currently a mess.