Desktop-Enabling Web Applications

The focus of this workshop is creating a Site Specific Browser (SSB) for an example web application. An SSB is an application with an embedded web browser designed to work exclusively with a single web application. An SSB can also have tighter integration with the OS and desktop so the web application feels more like a desktop application. The workshop will use Mozilla's WebRunner SSB to create a desktop-enabled version of a typical web application. Examples include adding popup notifications to Google Mail or file drag and drop integration to Google Docs / Zoho Office or even making Google Reader work as on offline feedreader.

Mark Finkle, Platform Evangelist, Mozilla Corporation Mark is a Platform Evangelist at Mozilla Corporation. His primary job is to make it easy for people to develop extensions for Firefox. He assists developers building applications on XULRunner and embedding Gecko in native applications. Mark also contributes to the XUL Explorer and WebRunner projects. Before Mozilla, Mark worked at several commercial software companies building Windows-based applications.

Cesar Oliveira, Developer/Student, Seneca College Cesar is a 4th year student in the Bachelor of Software Development (BSD) program at Seneca College. He is also a developer with the Mozilla project. Over the summer of '07 he did an internship at Mozilla, which started the snowball effect that is currently occupying most of his time. Yes, more time than school.