On Wednesday 25 July 2007, Maciej Stachowiak wrote: > I sent this a while ago with not much comment. Any thoughts? Should I > post this on webkit.org somewhere?
I like both the goals and non-goals. Please put it onto webkit.org. Cheers, Lars > > - Maciej > > On May 10, 2007, at 3:34 PM, Maciej Stachowiak wrote: > > Hi Everyone, > > > > I recently watched a video on the topic of preventing poisonous > > people from hurting an open source project. One of the practices it > > recommends for a large open source project is to have a "mission > > statement", so it's clear to everyone what is and isn't in scope for > > the project. I'm not too fond of the name "mission statement" (it > > sounds a little corporate) but I do think it's important to write > > down our goals as a project. > > > > Ultimately I'd like to put this on the WebKit site, but I wanted to > > throw out some ideas for discussion. I'd like to hear if anyone > > thinks I have missed any project goals, if any of these are worded > > badly, or if it is worth calling out more non-goals. > > > > > > WebKit Project Goals > > > > WebKit is an open source Web content engine for browsers and other > > applications. We value real-world web compatibility, standards > > compliance, stability, performance, security, portability, usability > > and relative ease of understanding and modifying the code > > (hackability). > > > > Web Content Engine - The project's primary focus is content deployed > > on the World Wide Web, using standards-based technologies such as > > HTML, CSS, JavaScript and the DOM. However, we also want to make it > > possible to embed WebKit in other applications, and to use it as a > > general-purpose display and interaction engine. > > > > Open Source - WebKit should remain freely usable for both open > > source and proprietary applications. To that end, we use BSD-style > > and LGPL licenses. > > > > Compatibility - For users browsing the web, compatibility with their > > existing sites is essential. We strive to maintain and improve > > compatibility with existing web content, sometimes even at the > > expense of standards. We use regression testing to maintain our > > compatibility gains. > > > > Standards Compliance - WebKit aims for compliance with relevant web > > standards, and support for new standards > > In addition to improving compliance, we participate in the web > > standards community to bring new technologies into standards, and to > > make sure new standards are pratical to implement in our engine. We > > use regression testing to maintain our standards compliance gains. > > > > Stability - The main WebKit code base should always maintain a high > > degree of stability. This means that crashes, hangs and regressions > > should be dealt with promptly, rather than letting them pile up. > > > > Performance - Maintaining and improving speed and memory use is an > > important goal. We never consider performance "good enough", but > > strive to constantly improve. As web content becomes richer and more > > complex, and as web browsers run on more limited devices, > > performance gains continue to have value even if normal browsing > > seems fast enough. > > > > Security - Protecting users from security violations is critical. We > > fix security issues promptly to protect users and maintain their > > trust. > > > > Portability - The WebKit project seeks to address a variety of > > needs. We want to make it reasonable to port WebKit to a variety of > > desktop, mobile, embedded and other platforms. We will provide the > > infrastructure to do this with tight platform integration, reusing > > native platform services where appropriate and providing friendly > > embedding APIs. > > > > Usability - To the extent that WebKit features affect the user > > experience, we want them to work in accordance with good human > > interface design principles, and to mesh well with platform-native > > HI conventions. > > > > Hackability - To make rapid progress possible, we try to keep the > > code relatively easy to understand, even though web technologies are > > often complex. We try to use straightforward algorithms and data > > structures when possible, we try to write clear, maintainable code, > > and we continue to improve names and code structure to aid > > understanding. When tricky "rocket science" code is truly needed to > > solve some problem, we try to keep it bottled up behind clean > > interfaces. > > > > > > Non-Goals > > > > WebKit is an engine, not a browser. We do not plan to develop or > > host a full-featured web browser based on WebKit. Others are welcome > > to do so, of course. > > > > WebKit is an engineering project not a science project. For new > > features to be adopted into WebKit, we strongly prefer for the > > technology or at least the use case for it to be proven. > > > > WebKit is not a bundle of maximally general and reusable code - we > > build some general-purpose parts, but only to the degree needed to > > be a good web content engine. > > > > WebKit is not the solution to every problem. We focus on web > > content, not complete solutions to every imaginable technology need. > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > webkit-dev mailing list > > [email protected] > > http://lists.webkit.org/mailman/listinfo/webkit-dev > > _______________________________________________ > webkit-dev mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.webkit.org/mailman/listinfo/webkit-dev _______________________________________________ webkit-dev mailing list [email protected] http://lists.webkit.org/mailman/listinfo/webkit-dev
