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The line between applications running on a desktop and in a web browser just got fuzzier
Or maybe it just got bent a little, like a ray of light.
Mozilla, those nice people who brought you the Firefox browser, have introduced Prism, a way of refracting web applications onto the desktop so they look like regular programs.
Facebook or Google Mail can therefore show up in your Windows Start menu and opening them creates a window devoid of the browser clutter of forward and back buttons.
Mozilla say that unlike Adobe’s AIR, formerly codenamed Apollo, or Microsoft’s Silverlight , of which Popfly is a demonstration, Prism is not an attempt to build a proprietary platform that can replace the web.
“We think the web is a powerful and open platform for this sort of innovation, so our goal is to identify and facilitate the development of enhancements that bring the advantages of desktop apps to the web platform,” they say, in a blog note.
Eventually, Prism could have one-click “Make this a desktop app” functionality in Firefox.
Mozilla is also seeking to match the remaining advantages of desktop programs, with future Firefox features such as offline storage of data and giving Web apps access to 3D graphics capabilities.
What this all means for users is a more holistic experience. In future, we may not think about accessing the internet to perform tasks. It will just be there, in the background, like the electricity powering our machines.
David Gelles, Joseph Menn, Chris Nuttall and Richard Waters in the FT's San Francisco bureau upload their views - plus tech insights from writers in New York, London and Tokyo
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