On eve of Chrome store launch, Mozilla touts own Web app plans

From InfoWorld: Hoping to steal a little thunder from rival browser maker Google, Mozilla late Monday said its cross-browser Web app store would launch early next year.

Google is expected to announce the launch of its Chrome Web Store, a Web app marketplace aimed at users of its Chrome browser and upcoming Chrome OS, during a press event later today.

On Monday, Mozilla said its Open Web App Ecosystem would be ready in an "integration release" in the first quarter of 2011 -- the company wasn't more specific than that -- with support for the most popular browsers, an app dashboard to locally manage the programs and stable APIs (applications programming interfaces) for developers.

As it did last October when it released a developer prototype, yesterday Mozilla stressed the "open" part of its app concept.

"The Web needs support for the co-existence of multiple Open Web App stores, and to enable users to use applications from these stores in a consistent manner," said Pascal Finette, director of Mozilla Labs, in a post to the company's blog. "People buy their shoes, food and music from different stores on the Web today, and we see the same need for diversity and choice with Open Web Apps."

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