FAQ

This FAQ is meant to provide a place for you to capture knowledge as you begin working on Mozilla development. When someone answers a question for you, consider adding it below. Create new topic headings as necessary.

Building Firefox

1. Where can I get information on building Firefox or other Mozilla products?

   Start with the documentation on MDC: http://developer.mozilla.org/en/docs/Build_Documentation.

2. Where can I get more help building Firefox on Windows?

   See Building Firefox on Win32 using Visual Studio .NET 2005.

IRC

1. Where can I find a comprehensive list of IRC clients?

   Visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_IRC_clients for a list of IRC clients on various platforms. Two popular choices are Chatzilla and irssi.

2. Where can I ask for help on IRC?

   Use the #seneca or #firefox channels on irc://irc.mozilla.org.

3. What is the best way to share long error messages or other text that is too big to copy/paste into IRC?

   Use a pastebin at http://pastebin.ca/ or http://pastebin.mozilla.org/ to copy/paste your output. Then paste the resulting URL into IRC.

4. What is the best way to share long URLs in IRC?

   Use http://tinyurl.com/ and paste the resulting URL into IRC.

5. IRSSI + Terminal Server: Why use the IRSSI client on cs1 you ask? Well because then you don't have to be worried about being connected to IRC at all times. By using the screen porgram you can create a session in the backround and lunch IRSSI within that session. This way when you logout of telnet or ssh your session is still active and can be accessed later on.
   1. Obtain an account on cs1 (ask dave).
   2. Use a ssh or telnet client to connect to cs1. PuTTY (Windows). If you use linux or any unix based operating system you probably know what to do.
   3. Once you've connected to cs1 launch the IRSSI application within a screen session. You can do this by typing "screen" in the bash prompt. This will launch the screen application which should start a new bash prompt. Type "irssi" in the new bash prompt in order to launch IRSSI, the irc application. As a side note, if you want to exit a screen session just type "exit" in the bash prompt to return to the main prompt where you originally launched screen from.
   4. In the IRSSI prompt, type /server irc.mozilla.org in order to connect to the Mozilla IRC server.
   5. Once you're connected type in /j #seneca to join the official DPS909 irc chat room.

• If you would like to return back to the bash prompt without exiting IRSSI hit "ctrl+a" then "ctrl+d"
• If you would like to return to IRSSI type "screen -r" in the bash prompt.
• If you would like to see a list of screens that are currently running type "screen -ls" in the bash prompt.

Terminology

1. What does MDC or devmo refer to?

   Mozilla Developer Center - http://developer.mozilla.org.