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Question by ILoveJesusChrist (Sarah Palin 2012!): What knowledge and software/applications would I need to make my own web browser?
I am setting up a web browser can be downloaded from the crowds and enjoyed like any other web browsers planning. I just want to feel just how it is to make a web browser. If anyone has any experience you can tell me, what knowledge / skills, I would also include the software / applications I would need to create a Web browser. I would appreciate if you could be descriptive and tell me very much. Wish me luck = D
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Answer by answrer
“downloaded by the masses”
GOOD LUCK WITH THAT
each of today’s popular browsers was built by teams of many people over lots of time
i dont’ know; maybe i underestimate you, this is not easy stuff you can just buy a book about
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What your trying to accomplish is pretty much impossible by only yourself…a person of no programming skills and only by your self. Its very possible for your to make a simple web browser but there is no way you can make it be used by the masses. The simplest way would be using visual basic, but that uses internet explorer functions as a basis so your really not creating any thing new. If your browser ever got out there and big there would be some copyright issues. The software also costs alot of money and the knowledge does not come over night. You will also need to keep up with updates, security fixes, new features, tech support, compatabilities, maintained a web server as a basis of operation/way to find information download your webbrowser. There is a lot more than clicking some buttons and throwing it our there.
Shortly, to do what you want requires lots of money, research, learning, people, computers, servers etc.
Here’s some data that will sober you up:
http://msquaredtechnologies.com/m2rsm/rsm_software_project_metrics.htm
Firefox 1.5 had almost 11,000 source code modules, and 2 million lines of code.
That makes it smaller than Linux, but bigger than MySQL, PHP or Apache.
And that was 1.5. I don’t imagine 3.6 is smaller.
The numbers seem a bit high to me, but they do seem in the right ballpark.
It’s just not something 1 person can do anymore. Not even close.
Building a major program such as a browser takes a lot of knowledge and time and can’t feasibly be undertaken by just one person. If you want to create a popular web browser, it has to obviously compete with the major browsers out there today. Teams of brilliant minds work continuously on these browsers, as there are so many aspects that must be considered when developing such software: performance, stability, security, user interaction, extensibility, standards compliance, and much much more.
Rather than trying to make your own browser, instead consider developing an add-on to a popular browser. Firefox has always been popular for the countless number of add-ons available, and often these are written by just one person.
First, browse through the library of add-ons available for Firefox. Get to know what kind of features users like, and come up with an idea for a feature that could be high in demand (or not, it doesn’t have to be). Then, search for tutorials on making your own add-on for Firefox. This will probably require competence in XUL and JavaScript. You can search for tutorials on those too.
This is just a starting point of course. If you can accomplish such a task, then you may consider modifying portions of the browser code itself. But start small.
If you want to make a web browser then try to lean C#.net.
It can make the browser but based in Internet Explorer.
For masses download, the fastest way is using iMacro, the Firefox addon which is similar programing something but faster and better for web browser job.
Don’t listen to these people, it’s EASY. Just download EZ-Browze, it’s a drag and drop browser builder! One click and it crafts a JavaScript engine, HTML rendering engine, anything you want. It’s even CUSTOMIZABLE! You can change the default margins and paddings of
or even the default font size of
. You could be just like the kind folks at Microsoft and make your browser have a quirks mode that is a huge pain and doesn’t conform to any standards. Or if you’re too lazy for all this stuff, just check the box “Conform to W3C” and make us web developers happy people.
Forget about the fact that web browsers typically have millions of lines of code and hundreds of dedicated programmers, everyone here is forgetting the truth about computers: they are run by magic and blue smoke! Your computer was BORN understanding Javascript and CSS and all you need to do is give it a little bit of instruction.
Let me know when you finish making your browser… although, I guess you won’t have to because if it is being downloaded by the masses, I’ll probably hear about it by word of mouth. I’m glad you’re taking this on because with years of experience in both programming and web design, I’ve just been too lazy to make a browser that was a smash hit! I guess that’s why there are only like 4 or 5 well known browsers, despite the fact that they are sooo easy to make.
Good luck!