New Linux Desktop Environment Built on Firefox

IL-CSIXTY4 writes "'Pyro is a new kind of desktop environment for Linux built on Mozilla Firefox. Its goal is to enable true integration between the Web and modern desktop computing.' This looks like an interesting marriage of the web and the desktop. In Pyro, Web apps run in windows on the desktop, right alongside desktop apps (through compositing). Features expected in a desktop environment, like task/window selection and an Expose-like function, are written in Javascript." "

Re:slashdotted after the first comment

[jkrise]

Already slashdotted after the first comment, so ... this is what the future web-desktop will be like huh?

Not if the server is within the intranet. Here's the text from the site:

What is Pyro?

Flickr Add-on

Exposé-alike

Window Picker

Pyro is a new kind of desktop environment for Linux built on Mozilla Firefox. Its goal is to enable true integration between the Web and modern desktop computing.

By merging the Web with the desktop, Pyro offers the first big step toward a new future for the Web and the applications built for it.

In Pyro, Web content is no longer confined to the browser's window. Instead, trusted Web sites and extensions are given access to the full range of interactivity and control enjoyed by native applications today.

Imagine...
Rich Web pages running side-by-side with native applications
Single programming environment for the whole desktop
Desktop-wide mashups, killer Web integration
Novel desktop effects

Pyro enables a desktop that tracks the latest in Web technology, and helps mold the future of the integrated Web.
[edit]
NEWS

From Ars Technica

July, 20 2007:
Pyro project offers Firefox-based desktop environment on Ars Technica, by Ryan Paul.
Pyro delivers Web apps to the Linux desktop on DesktopLinux.com.

Check out the slides!

July, 18 2007:
Pyro Announced during GUADEC '07 Conference Keynote Speech.
[edit]
How does Pyro work?

Pyro works fundamentally by drawing your entire computer screen as a Web Page, all from within Firefox. Indeed, at the core Pyro is simply a window manager which renders Web content alongside existing native applications.

By leveraging the trusted Firefox Add-On system, all the capabilities of dynamic HTML, JavaScript, CSS, SVG, and Adobe Flash are available to enable incredible applications, extensions and themes.

Bringing all these Web technologies together with the newest generation of Linux display technology, called window compositing, allows Pyro to integrate native applications as an intrinsic part of the overall Web Desktop, seamlessly merging the two.

Re:Does this mean...

[Anonymous Coward]

Would require either a XPConnect SAPI for PHP [mozilla.org] or a PHP compiler that emitted javascript (or compatible bytecode).

Basically the answer is yes, Tamarin has the potential to be everything parrot promised. But for now, you're probably better using javascript.

See also ByzantineOS (Mozilla Desktop)

[Anonymous Coward]

This idea has been around for a little while. See the ByzantineOS [sourceforge.net] has had releases on Distrowatch since 2003 [distrowatch.com].

It was a pretty cool idea. Basically the whole desktop is a web browser and you write apps as XUL extensions. There is possibly a future in this as corporate and institutional thin client platforms to run custom apps.

Google Cache

[Eddi3]

Here's the Google Cache:

http://72.14.253.104/search?q=cache:6EoAZGSE90IJ:p yrodesktop.org/+http://pyrodesktop.org&hl=en&ct=cl nk&cd=1&gl=us [72.14.253.104]

Coral got it

[Anonymous Coward]

Yay for coral! [nyud.net]

Re:Haven't we done this before?

[gbjbaanb]

I don't know, but (the article is /.ted) but it sounds more like MS's HTAs - their web-as-a-desktop-app system. (HTA = Hypertext Application). They used IE as a client front end to a local (or remote) web application. It was hosted in IE but without titlebar, buttons etc. It also ran in an increased security environment (as you'd expect a desktop app to interact with the filesystem, for example, that normal web apps hosted in a 'normal' browser would not get acess to).

It semed like a good idea, and enabled you to write desktop/web applications, but it never quite caught on, MS moved to Jav, sorry .NET, and lost interest in it.

Active Desktop was just a way of putting content on your dekstop instead of a static image. I think it was a little before its time due to everyone using dial-up modems instead of always-on broadband. If someone did it today, we'd have the advantage of a lot of experience in using web applications, faster networking and better security. Imagine what it could be in an Ubuntu environment, it could easily be a new desktop paradigm that makes Window's taskbar-based system look old and boring.

Re:slashdotted after the first comment

[paulatz]

Yes, it is slahdotted, but coral cache is working: pyrodesktop.org [nyud.net].

Re:Does this mean...

[Kalriath]

No, it ran as the currently logged in user. The problem is that Windows insists during setup that the user create an administrator account for everyday use. It's the same scenario. (Well, minus the horrible ActiveX crap - noone really likes that)