Mozilla Labs Geode: Follow up
On Tuesday, we launched Mozilla Labs Geode. It’s had great response, and we’ve seen websites embracing the standards-based geolocation all across the web.
There’s also been a bit of confusion about how Geode + Firefox 3.0 is related to what’s coming up in Firefox 3.1, as well as why location is a useful thing to have on a laptop/desktop computer.
One of the reasons for Firefox’s popularity is that it is so respectful of the user’s privacy and safety. With something as important as location, no amount of failure to respect the user’s desires is acceptable.
What’s the Difference Between Geode and Firefox 3.1?
There are a two main moving parts in implementing of geolocation. Let’s break them down.
Javascript Geolocation API: The Javascript API is what allows any website to request and process geolocation data. It’s a W3C standard, so the the API will be constant across all browsers, as well as between Geode and Firefox 3.1.
Location Provider: The location provider provides geolocation data to the Javascript API. In the Firefox 3.1 beta, there are currently only two providers: one to let the user enter their location manually, and another for any GPS device connected to the computer via a serial connection. It’s possible to add more providers, or to remove them. We aren’t sure what providers will come by default with Firefox, and we are looking for feedback.
Why Geode?
Geode is meant as a temporary solution to allow websites to experiment with geolocation today. Unlike Firefox 3.1, it doesn’t afford the user a choice of geolocation provider. Skyhook is built in. A side effect is that Linux isn’t supported for the simple reason that Skyhook hasn’t implemented Linux drivers. Although not ideal, it’s okay because Geode is only a temporary add-on.
Uses: Why Geolocation on the Desktop?
There are two parts to this answer.
(1) We shouldn’t allow the web to fragment; the web shouldn’t have fundamentally different abilities on a mobile device than on the desktop. That leads us back to WAP versus HTML thinking. Geoocation, address book, and access to the camera may be seem more apropos to mobile devices on first blush, but removing them entirely from the desktop nips entire areas of innovation in the bud forever. That has a chilling effect on the web as a whole, as well as continuity of experience across all devices.
(2) There is an entire gamut innovation that geolocation enables, from obvious to obscure.
There are first-order experiences enabled by geolocation in the browser. These are of the variety, “I am here, so I should see content that is filtered by my location.” Outside.in, Everyblock, and Food Finder are examples.
There are the social aspects of geolocation. These are of the variety, “I am here, and so are/were my friends.” Brightkite, Pownce, and Twitter are examples.
And then there are the second-order experiences of the variety, “I am here versus there, so alter my experience.” This is where most of the unexplored areas in geolocation on the desktop come in.
We’ve already mentioned an RSS reader that knows the difference between home
and work and automatically changes it’s behavior appropriately, and Web site
authentication that only allows you to login from certain physical
locations, like your house. But there’s a lot more. Like virtual capture the flag. Or different playlists for different parts of the house. Or having your computer automatically turn off the lights (if you’ve forgotten to) at home when you plug in at work. Or phoning home if you computer gets stolen — with the location of the thief. Or…
If location was stored in the Places system, Firefox could modify the browser’s behaviors to be optimized for home versus work. It might even not list, in the Awesome Bar, a certain site that you visited from your bedroom after 11pm. Firefox could let you search for sites you’ve been to by remembering where you were when you did the search, or have smart bookmarks for “bookmarked at home” and “bookmarked at work”, or show a map of your browsing history. (Thanks to Dietrich Ayala for these ideas).
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Tomer Cohen
I’m not sure how good will be the GPS reception inside of buildings (my GPS receiver have no reception at all!), so please don’t count on it. The best solution I see is to keep in memory the last location signal received, and use it until another signal is received – and it might be impossible to track location inside of buildings.
Also, keep in mind that location is something the easy to spoof (or use the ‘manual’ option to place yourself in the right place), so geolocation won’t be helpful as websites intruder preventation.
Pseudonymous Coward
I’m very glad that Mozilla is doing this.
I think the best option is to let the user do it *manually*, perhaps asking the user to do it visually via something free such as OpenStreetMap.org. Of course, the user should be informed of the option of curating a local list of geolocations, giving the same visual-friendly process each time.
[ICR]
A couple of other uses:
Web maps automatically start centred on your current location.
Notifying people where you are (e.g. at work, at home, at uni) automatically.
Andrew
Wow. The comment thread on the post over in Mozilla Labs is…incredible. Try to improve browsing experience, and half the world laments, “But it’s not the way it was before!” Not to mention all the hue and cry about privacy, which you have very, very carefully designed around.
*sigh* Sometimes it makes you wonder if the human race is worth designing for.
D
This is horrible.
I am currently living in Spain, but I am from the US.
I hate pages, even if everything in my OS is set to EN_US, to force Spanish contents on me, or even restrict access to certain sites or services because I am not living in the US.
Geolocation only serves to fragment the web, you don’t get the same hits in google.es, for example (searching for software always puts a link to a scam-ish site named softonic or something like that). It is confusing, and makes the experience much worse, even if my profile is set to American contents, those based on my location are almost forced on me.
Stop this, please, it will only fragment the web further.
skierpage
FYI, Latest nightly FF3.1 20081013033718 + Geolocation 0.4 is broken again, I don’t see the banner and the callback isn’t called.
The manual case is very important in two scenarios:
1. Even in browsers with geolocation support, there must be a way to override your location. (“Show me stuff somewhere else than where I am”.) That could be a fourth button [Somewhere else...] on the banner
bar that appears.
2. Apps running in browsers with no geolocation should provide a fallback in JavaScript (“Tell Buzzword 2.0 where you are… (or install Firefox 3.1)”.
I hope the two scenarios can share code.
Commenter “D”, *try* geolocation out instead of spouting off, otherwise you just advertise yourself as clueless. When a site attempts geolocation, *you’re asked* what to do. Permanently disallow it and there’s no geolocation.
Amos
skierpage: D is obviously very clued in. He/she is already suffering the effects of geolocation based on IP address and is warning that there are negative consequences to a geo-location-aware web.
These are valid concerns. They don’t pertain directly to Geode or the JS Geolocation API since, as you say, the user will have control over what, if anything, gets sent using that API when using Firefox. But the concern that web sites will increasingly use your location to alter your experience to your detriment is legitimate.
Unfortunately, your scenario 1 is only going to work if the site you are talking to gives more weight to what you tell it than what it knows about your IP address. For restrictive sites, that isn’t going to happen.
Other than a Tor network that was large and vibrant enough to avoid being blocked itself, along with some sort of exit node location setting, I’m not sure how one would get around the existing IP based filters.
Anyhow, I’m happy that the voluntary location aware ability is coming, if only because it will save me typing in my postal code and will render those databases less valuable. Real geo info, despite some draconic access policies in some governments, is the way to go!
Fred
I find it funny that most recent innovations on the web boil down to a variant of “pr0n mode” ;)
That being said, geolocation in the browser can indeed spawn innovation, so I am excited about it. Yet I can be abused just as easily, so it is good to put privacy on top of the priority list here.
Fowl
I’m not sure how this could be a security feature…
Greg
First off this is awesome! I spent a couple hours playing with the API and integrating it into a GeoLocation website (www.gpstwit.com) and it’s fast simple and very useful.
- The system seems smart and puts the end-user in control so people should not be as concerned about privacy (as they seem to be).
- The current design works fine with WiFi but doesn’t work on wired desktops, that said great V1.
It’s a great idea and I’m excited to see it take off. This is the convergence of Mobile and Web. Bravo.
Robert O'Callahan
This API is actually great for user “D”. Because he/she can set the location to the UK, and sites that use the API instead of IP-address hacks will serve the UK content. Everybody wins.
Epicanis
I absolutely love the geolocation concept and am very pleased to see it being developed – but there is something bothering me about the use of “Skyhook”…and it’s not what you might think.
Basically – the problem with getting Skyhook™ on Linux seems to be that Skyhook™ needs low-level access to the system to command the wireless card drivers to scan for detectable access points and report back what they see, right?
Wasn’t the reason given for the fact that Ubiquity was only partially functional on Linux that (and I admit I’m ignorantly and grossly oversimplifying here in my interpretation of this…) the developers couldn’t decide on a way to get low-level access to window-control functions for certain features on Linux?
What disturbs me here is it makes it sound an awful lot like Firefox is turning into a new “Internet Explorer”, pushing towards requiring deeper hooks into the core system rather than running as an ordinary application. Am I mistaken?
(Still very much looking forward to geolocation functionality in Firefox 3.1 – without Skyhook™ or other proprietary platform-specific components – and appreciate Mozilla taking the lead on this…Thanks!)
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I’m not sure how good will be the GPS reception inside of buildings (my GPS receiver have no reception at all!), so please don’t count on it. The best solution I see is to keep in memory the last location signal received, and use it until another signal is received – and it might be impossible to track location inside of buildings.