Remember when we were growing up and we'd see those ads for the "kitchen of the future"? You remember: the gleaming countertops with the stainless steel sinks and the single box in the middle of the counter that served as oven/stove/dishwasher that would cook a full-course meal in minutes?

I'm still waiting for mine, just so we're all clear.

Sure, you say, we already have that now. Just look at the microwave oven. And that certainly is true, except the only foods my microwave can consistently cook at the touch of a button is popcorn, water for tea, and bean burritos. Where's my pot roast? Where's the chicken cordon bleu?

But here's one future prediction: one day in the near future, you will not be going to the local computer superstore to get your software applications. You will be downloading them from the Web. And it will be coming to a computer near you sooner than you think.

During the LinuxWorld Expo in New York, I sat down with David Boswell and Pete Collins, two key players in the Mozdev.org group, a developer's group closely related to, but not the same as, the Mozilla Project.

For those of you who were not with us a few years ago, the Mozilla Project is the open source organization that sprang into being after Netscape Communications made its announcement that it was releasing the source code for its Netscape Communicator 5 application in 1997. This collection of code is referred to as Mozilla, and the open source community that manages it is the Mozilla Project.

Mozdev.org is a separate open-source project, but it is tightly integrated with the original Mozilla Project. While the Mozilla Project focuses on changes and improvements to the base Mozilla code itself, Mozdev.org creates a collaborative development envirnoment for applications that can be developed from the Mozilla code.

And if you think that browsers are all that's coming out of Mozilla, you're in for a surprise.

Next: Organizing Mozilla from the grass roots »