Mozilla Reveals Firefox OS IoT Projects

Mozilla may have given up on battling Android and iOS to find a firm position in the smartphone operating system market, but the company is affirming its growing interest in capturing a pie of the IoT space. The Firefox maker has shared details of several Firefox OS-powered connected projects it is working on.

The free-software community, led by the Mozilla Foundation non-profit organisation, has announced the first round of "connected" projects powered by Firefox OS that cover "a wide range of potential solutions." These programs are called Project Link, Project Sensor Web, Project Smart Home, and voice assistant Project Vaani.

Mozilla announced last year that it will be discontinuing Firefox OS for smartphones. Reaffirming its stance last month, however, it also noted that it will instead focus on connected devices and how these miniature gadgets could leverage on its technologies.

Project Link is a "personal user agent" that recognises your preferences and how you interact with devices in your home. The gadget will "automate" one's connected world. With Project Sensor Web, Mozilla is trying to make it easier for contributors to find open data in sensors. The open data will supposedly enable a detailed understanding of living environments.

Project Smart Home aims to provide a middle ground between the framework that facilitates communication between connected devices, and DIV solutions such as Raspberry Pi. "Combining modular, affordable hardware with easy-to-use rules, Smart Home empowers people to solve unique everyday problems in new and creative ways," the company wrote in a blog post.

Project Vaani is perhaps the most interesting among the four. It's an "IoT enabler package" that allows developers to bake in a voice interface to their devices in a flexible and customisable way.

To recall, a leaked document late last year suggested that Mozilla was working on bringing Firefox OS to a Firefox Pad tablet, a keyboard computer Firefox Pi, Firefox Hub, and Firefox Stick. The company at the time told us that these four products were just concepts by one of its developers.