XULrunner, the technology behind projects such as Firefox, is both powerful and obscure. Even getting started with XULrunner is tricky, and even more so from dynamic languages such as python. pyxpcomext addresses these issues, and does so from the perspective where the developer creates a "bundle" which is registered with XULrunner. XULrunner is then started by the user, and the user opens a magic URL which triggers loading of the pyxpcomext-based application.
Thanks to the OLPC Sugar team, there is now another way, starting from the python prompt. "import hulahop" is where it begins. This article will show and explain the voodoo magic incantations necessary to bring up a window where you can begin to gain access to the DOM model of the XULrunner technology. In this way, you can begin to use technology which was designed for web browsers but has become something much much more powerful than originally intended by its designers.