Getting Started with Mozilla Gaia

Mozilla recently announced FirefoxOS, an innovative project for mobile devices that uses Open Web standards to write UI and applications in HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. The team at Mozilla has done an incredible amount of work connecting a version of Gecko made specifically for the mobile operating system, to Gaia, the web technology-driven UI of the phone. They’ve also been working to create a full suite of applications to drive the capabilities of the phone.

The Mozilla Gaia project makes the Open Web a first-class citizen on mobile phones – an important endeavor considering that mobile is the only option in many parts of the world. We’re incredibly excited to join this project, and to augment the Mozilla team’s work with our expertise in solid application architecture, unit tests, and developer workflow. Our early work focused on getting acquainted with the project, improving the test suite, and digging into bug fixes and code review processes. As a set of fresh eyes on the project, this time allowed us to see possible pain points for new developers who want to build or work on Gaia, and create good documentation for developers new to working in Gaia.

In our gaia-notes repo, you can find documentation for getting started, debugging Gaia on desktop B2G, and building your first app. Mike Pennisi has also created a screencast to walk developers through getting started with the Gaia project. These resources have already proven very helpful to those involved with the project, and we’re looking forward to adding to the documentation and helping this project grow.