Hi all,

As part of the B2G Transition Project
<https://wiki.mozilla.org/B2G/Transition_Project> we are deprecating the
legacy mozApps
<https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/B2G_OS/API/Navigator/mozApps>
runtime in favour of new standards-based web apps
<https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Apps>.

On the kanikani <https://github.com/mozilla-b2g/gaia/tree/kanikani> branch
of Gaia (soon to be merged into master) the core smartphone system apps
(system, homescreen, keyboard, search, settings etc.) have been turned into
system chrome. We are aiming to turn all the other apps into web apps. Real
web apps. On the actual web. With an actual URL :)

You can now find a list of those apps at mozilla-b2g.github.io/gaia which
allows you to load them in your web browser. You'll notice that none of
them currently work.

We need your help to modernise these apps with new web standards like Web
App Manifest <https://www.w3.org/TR/appmanifest/>, Service Workers
<https://www.w3.org/TR/service-workers/> and Push Notifications
<https://www.w3.org/TR/push-api/> and figure out how to get them working on
the web. This will require new approaches to some functionality that isn't
safe to expose to the web, we might need to run local web services on the
device to replace some legacy APIs for example.

If we can't figure out how to run these things on the web then we may
eventually remove some of the apps altogether. That's why I titled this
email "web or dead".

It's a testament to the work that we've done so far with B2G that we now
have the standards we need to build modern apps on the web which are
discoverable, installable and offline-capable. It's time to embrace that
future and leave behind the old B2G-only apps we created to "prove out and
prioritise the power of the system
<https://wiki.mozilla.org/Booting_to_the_Web>" when we started out on this
journey together.

Find us in #fxos on IRC, Discourse
<https://discourse.mozilla-community.org/c/b2g-os-participation>, or on
this mailing list if you're interested in contributing to this effort and
have ideas about how to move it forward.

Keep on rockin' the free web!

Ben
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