Palm Hosting webOS Developer Day

palm webos developer day Palm Inc. has announced that the company will be hosting a Developer Day on April 23-24 at its Sunnyvale, CA headquarters. The two day session will include developer focused presentations and tutorials around webOS. A $25 preregistration fee includes all sessions, meals, and a commemorative gift. Registration for the event will begin April 5th.

Join us for the first in a series of Palm Developer Days and get world-class training on developing applications for the Palm webOS platform.
This is your chance to learn from and exchange ideas with the Palm developer team, including engineering, marketing, and management. Sessions will cover everything from the basics of webOS architecture to creating 3D games.

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Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good

Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/5/2010 1:31:09 AM # Q
It`stoo late totry to kiss and make up to developers. The savage beatings Palm gave developers over the past 5 years have not been forgotten. iPhone OS and Android are the only way to make money.

Let`s see: Palm has sold less than 1.5 million WebOS devices to end users. If only 10% of them buy apps that gives developers a potentiol customer market of 150,000. Divide that among the total number of developers and see why Palm`s app ecosystem died out dinosaur-style. The twin asteroids of iPhone and Andriod starved toothless Palm T-Rex to death.

I just got an email advising that tryda - one of the main reasons I still carry a PalmOS device - has been released for iPhone OS and has extra features compared to the PalmOS version.

One by one iPhone and Android are peeling of the remaining PalmOS users. I wonder if there`s a WebOS version of tryda...

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
jca666us @ 4/5/2010 3:03:04 AM # M Q
Lol!!!!
RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
ardiri @ 4/5/2010 1:47:42 PM # Q
It`s too late totry to kiss and make up to developers. The savage beatings Palm gave developers over the past 5 years have not been forgotten. iPhone OS and Android are the only way to make money.

when i finally got hold of a Palm Pre and downloaded the PDK - it took only around 2-3 hours to get all of my iphone games running on the device. the device is quite interesting and i do not believe the market is over for it yet. i am hopefully going to be able to attend this event - it is never too late.

there is room for a device like the Palm Pre - you may eat your words eventually. A closed ecosystem is a good thing, something android lacks. android will never be a money making environment for developers because users expect everything for free.
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
jca666us @ 4/5/2010 5:16:27 PM # M Q
Aaron, unless they can generate consumer excitement for their devices, they're toast.

Ease of development only goes so far...

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
LiveFaith @ 4/5/2010 7:33:10 PM # Q
Hey Aaron,

What's with bringing reality and experience into this discussion. We're doing just fine round here with innuendo and opinionology thank you. :-D
Pat Horne

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/6/2010 8:41:17 AM # Q
"there is room for a device like the Palm Pre - you may eat your words eventually. A closed ecosystem is a good thing, something android lacks. android will never be a money making environment for developers because users expect everything for free."

I'll take that bet anytime. Palm is dead and you know it.

FJH
The original releaser of HaCkMe

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
ardiri @ 4/6/2010 9:09:05 AM # Q
i still got the sources to |HaCkMe| lying around somewhere *g*

i don't think they'll come back as they were - but they can still sell phones. look at nokia, symbian is a dying platform yet it suits the needs of the mothers and "i just need a phone" type people out there..

having trouble? ... yes, dying? ... no.
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/7/2010 1:16:49 AM # Q
Aaron, as usual you are spewing B.S. Also as usual, you don't know know when to lay off the crap. Remember how you acted like a little shite with the Liberty nonsense? Fast forward a decade and you still haven't changed. And keep shilling you recompiler - eventually someone might bite.

Palm is DEAD as an independent company.
Consumers buy based on:
1) aesthetics/what they think will impress others
2) what the see/read others are using (herd mentality)
3) what their job supports/mandates
4) price
5) features
6) applications

OS is irrelevant to the average Joe. Palm's problems are that their hardware is plasticky, unappealing junk, no one is actually using the Web OS devices in public, Blackberry and Windows Mobile leveraged corporate email to entrench their respective OSes in the hearts and minds of the IT nerds that make the corporate architecture decisions, the competition has been selling better quality phones for less money than Palm, the competition has been selling better featured phones than Palm, the competition has more applications than Palm andball this has created momentum for the competing platforms and inertia for Palm.

Palm's window of opportunity for Web OS closed the day Apple slashed the price of the base iPone in 2009 and that window was bolted shut when the 100 billion (so it seems) or so new Android phones with killer specs started coming out over the past 6 months.

Palm pissed off its only significant customers - Sprint and Verizon.
Verizon is about to get its own iPhone and almost no one is going to choose a Pre or Pixi over the ubiquitous iPhone
Sprint is getting the HTC EVO as its new flagship; the Pre was a disaster as Sprint's flagship device over the past year.
Palm's glacial design cycle and limited resources can't compete with Apple's yearly iPhone releases and the avalanche of feature-stuffed Android phones in a variety of form factors.
Apple has sold 35 million iPhones compared to Palm's less than 1.5 million Web OS phones sold; any intelligent developer - especially one already burned by Palm's/PalmSource's abandonment of PalmOS 5, Cobalt and Foleo OS - isn't going to waste time backing a platform that is moribund, lacks carrier support and is under attack by multiple other more intelligently managed companies.

Who and where exactly are Palm's customers? Hardware hungry geeks? Soccer MILFs? Sprint? Verizon? Old Palm OS fans? International carriers? The average Joe? Corporate email serfs? Hackers? Every major niche seems to be much better served by several other mobile OS right now. With Web OS still essentially in beta status and lacking any compelling hardware, it's not surprising to see that the carriers can't even give away Pre and Pixi. Pre "Touch" and a Web OS "Centro 2" should have been part of the hardware mix from Day 1. April 2010 finds Palm too far behind and lacking any momentum whatsoever for the Web OS platform. Neither an advertising blitz nor a price war can help Palm. What might save Web OS is for a company like Nokia to purchase Palm this quarter, finish the development + fix the Cobalt-style speed issues, and release half a dozen stylish, well-specced, well built Web OS phones before the end of 2010. Web OS has the potential to become a differentiator in a market glutted with generic Android, Window Mobile and Blackberry OS phones. Nokia has the resources to pull this off. Motorola was smart enough to dump its feeble Linux initiative and go "all in" with Android. Their main problem is that HTC can trump their hardware at any time, so sticking with Android is akin to making a deal with the devil. Too bad HTC didn't merge with Palm in 2009. An EVO running a fully developed Web OS would have been a worthy competitor to the iPhone.

FJH
PW-Patcher Overlord

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
ardiri @ 4/7/2010 5:04:34 AM # Q
why are you still visiting PIC if you think the platform/company is dead? nothing better to do? jebus man - your the one that has to grow up. when i grew up, i was taught that if you have nothing nice to stay; say nothing. but, you just have a big mouth. oh well.
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer
RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/8/2010 1:24:34 AM # Q
"why are you still visiting PIC if you think the platform/company is dead? nothing better to do? jebus man - your the one that has to grow up. when i grew up, i was taught that if you have nothing nice to stay; say nothing. but, you just have a big mouth. oh well."

I was there at the beginning, son and I'll see it through to the bitter end. At this stage in some ways it's almost like watching a car crash in slow motion. Impossible not to watch, yet nothing one can do to stop the carnage.

[personal attack removed]

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
jca666us @ 4/8/2010 4:36:20 AM # M Q
Consumers buy based on:
1) aesthetics/what they think will impress others
2) what the see/read others are using (herd mentality)
3) what their job supports/mandates
4) price
5) features
6) applications

And **USABILITY** - which Apple has in spades!

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
ardiri @ 4/8/2010 10:34:41 AM # Q
I see you're still the mouthy twerp you were 10 years ago... plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

it is amazing how much you can saw when facing a keyboard and posting anonymously. i couldn't care less about your attitude - just wasting space on a great site light PIC. it is a pity one cannot filter posts/messages from certain people; but you would just re-register with another fake nick.

regardless what you or i personally think - people are entitled to their opinion; even if you are a moron. instead of being an ass; why not do something to contribute to the community? you are a lost cause i guess.. oh well.
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: Palm`s battered wives (developers) have left for good
Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/17/2010 1:48:59 PM # Q
Nice ad hominem, Aaron. I see you haven't changed one bit. Cowardly little twerp.

FJH

Reply to this comment

iPhone OS 4.0

mikecane @ 4/5/2010 11:15:21 AM # Q
Apple's iPhone 4.0 OS to be revealed Thursday
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/04/05/apples-iphone-4-0-os-to-be-revealed-thursday/

Man, Palm can't get a break at all.

RE: iPhone OS 4.0
richf @ 4/5/2010 12:21:07 PM # Q
Yeah, Can't anyone out apple Apple?
Have a nice day!
Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->Pilot Pro->IIIe->IIIc->M500->M505->M515->T3->T5->Treo 650P->Treo 700P->Droid
RE: iPhone OS 4.0
jca666us @ 4/5/2010 1:55:20 PM # M Q
if apple adds multitasking, there goes palm and androids lone advantage.
RE: iPhone OS 4.0
hkklife @ 4/5/2010 2:26:24 PM # Q
Android's multittasking is pretty clunky and nowhere near as seamless as WebOS, to be perfectly honest.

What Android DOES have is everyone & their brother onboard as far as a hardware licensees (truly a double-edged sword), tons and tons of momentum + goodwill from both carriers, consumers & handset manufacturers, lotsa free/cheap apps, and the support ($ & otherwise) of the almighty Google.

What does WebOS have other than multittasking? A closed ecosystem (seeing the Android fragmentation, this is a nice thing to have as Aaron stated before), Palm's patent portfolio, the Touchstone, and slightly better PIM apps than the competition.

I see the domestic market quickly settling down to Apple firmly in 1st place, RIM & Google fighting over #2 & #3 slots, and Microsoft picking up whatever scraps are left at the bottom. There's no room for Palm, Nokia or anyone else at this stage of the game, at least in the US market.


Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro

RE: iPhone OS 4.0
abosco @ 4/5/2010 3:28:53 PM # M Q
What Android DOES have is everyone & their brother onboard as far as a hardware licensees (truly a double-edged sword), tons and tons of momentum + goodwill from both carriers, consumers & handset manufacturers, lotsa free/cheap apps, and the support ($ & otherwise) of the almighty Google.

Careful! Windows Mobile has had this for years and it hasn't done them much good.

RE: iPhone OS 4.0
mikecane @ 4/5/2010 4:04:58 PM # Q
>>>Yeah, Can't anyone out apple Apple?

That wasn't the point. The point was *timing*. Here Palm hoped they'd be able to generate some dev excitement and 4.0 from Apple will grab all that.

RE: iPhone OS 4.0
LiveFaith @ 4/5/2010 7:44:24 PM # Q
** Man, Palm can't get a break at all. **

This is how it functionally plays out when you walk around in circles for four years and leave the gate open to the "PC guys". When / If you get your act together (In many ways Palm has) you have so many enemies in the game that bullets are flying from every direction and your head is on a swivel.

If Palm waits a month, then Android will do a demo of movies in 3D and then a month later WP7 will release on the first hardware and the next month BB will show off the iPhone killing browser, then a month later Apple will ...

Had Palm pulled all this (or most of this) 2 years previous, they would be in a power position. But, that would have probably meant one less name change or merger for them. And after all, who wants to give up such milestones. Ugggh.
Pat Horne

RE: iPhone OS 4.0
hotpaw4 @ 4/7/2010 2:15:37 PM # Q
>> Careful! Windows Mobile has had this for years and it hasn't done them much good.

After grinding away (for, what was it, 6 years or so?) they finally achieved the goal of topping PalmOS in the market...

...just before RIM, Apple, and Android came along and made both Palm & MS irrelevant for what's left of PDAs (iPod Touch? iPad??) and smart phones.


Reply to this comment

mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone

ardiri @ 4/6/2010 3:15:15 AM # Q
so what if webos devices don't meet *your* requirements?

i have been in this space for well over 10 years and i have written applications for almost every device out there. i started with Palm OS, realized that they wouldn't be the main market player and then did some Windows Mobile, Symbian, iPhone and some Android applications - both as a hobby and for corporate customers (enterprise). if anything is clear; the first thing i know is that there is not a single device that will suit everyone - fragmentation is here to stay.

different users will want to have different devices, because they have different needs. just because you are a bratty 15 year old who expects high quality 3D gaming like on the xbox 360 or PS3; it doesn't mean that a 7 year old would not die to have a Nintendo Wii. the same rules apply for handheld devices. why are so many companies using BlackBerry devices? why does Windows Mobile still hold the market share for enterprise solutions?

start to think outside of "YOUR OWN" world.

sure, palm has lost its edge when it came to developer relations - i remember the good old days of Palm Developer Conferences where developers would get passes into Oktoberfest and free devices to help us with the development process. unfortunately; my experiences in 2001 vs 2010 are completely different - i got duped by a Chinese dude for a Palm Pre but eventually got one via Germany (why didn't i get one from Palm direct)?

the developer day is a good sign that they are making an effort to turn around the support for the developer community. the announcement of the PDK is great news, because it means the platform has become some use for my applications at least.

i look forward to this event - and networking with many developers. i hope to see some people there.
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
abosco @ 4/6/2010 7:12:32 AM # M Q
Your point is valid, but from a developer's point of view (and I can't believe *I'm* the one saying this to you and not the other way around), the real money is made when you get the everyday consumer pulling out their wallets and purchasing software. Palm and Microsoft had the infrastructure decades in advance, but it took Apple to put it all together in a streamlined process on a device that consumers wanted to buy for it to become a roaring success for developers.

Of course everybody has different needs, and I won't argue that RIM has easier enterprise deployment. But you're kidding yourself if you don't look at the numbers and see that Blackberry users simply cannot get away from the platform quickly enough. They all want to flock to Apple or Google, and very shortly, these are going to be the only two mobile OS's with any sort of full-circle ecosystem.

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
ardiri @ 4/6/2010 7:30:14 AM # Q
the real money is made when you get the everyday consumer pulling out their wallets and purchasing software

you are 100% right - the thing is, the only reason why apple has success is because they are forcing users to access applications through a single portal. this drives an economy. palm and windows mobile (and even android); allow the user to download applications from anywhere and the developer then has to ask himself; how the hell do my users get the applications i write..

secondly; a more subtle issue is that unless you provide a restricted ecosystem where you can control the availability (big brother effect, yes - but, there are benefits) - you wont get the big players involved. for example; if developer X writes a clone of a very popular game and the copyright holders cannot enforce the removal of such games - why should people invest in brands and concepts for the device? i was on the short end of the stick in this case; i had some game and watch games that nintendo sent apple a request to remove them.. while nintendo wont ever do anything; just think about bigger brands that franchise their labels for developers.. if it is easy to copy and get away with it; why would they as a company bother.

closed ecosystem = important to making monkey.

i've been selling applications for years now and this is really the reason why apple is such a strong market place more than anything else. companies like handango/palmgear et al just eventually started ripping off developers but provided very little value. i hope palm keeps the distribution system closed or it will just end up like it was before.

windows phone 7 is going the same way as well.. which means there is a chance to make money as a developer on that platform as well. android is a lost cause; i have written enterprise apps for android; but i do not see any value doing shareware/commercial paid applications with the mentality that users have on that platform.

another thing to consider is that the apple platform is saturated. you have every dog and his cat doing fart apps and copying each other left right and center. palm currently has 2000+ applications; i have 10 applications already running with the PDK.. if i get them on the store; i'll make money. getting 10 applications in a store with 120000+ applications? i might as well be throwing away my effort.
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
abosco @ 4/6/2010 8:14:42 AM # M Q
I agree with your assessment of the last few things. While there are very few apps in the App Catalog, there are also very few users. You've got 1.5 million users for 2,000 apps or 50 million users for 150,000 apps. Less competition, but fewer buyers. And I completely agree with your assessment of Android. I like open source, I really do, but I dislike the mentality that goes with it. You end up with a group of consumers with a sense of entitlement who don't want to drop a dime on an app. Don't get me wrong, I love freeware, but I have no reservations buying a $9.99 app if it looks useful and has good reviews. And I feel like there are more iPhone users who are willing to do that than Android users.

Bottom line, closed distribution is king for developers. If you buy a gaming console, you're subscribing to the same developer/content screening process.

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
ardiri @ 4/6/2010 8:27:40 AM # Q
it is good we agree then :)

i will be going to the event; even if it is just for nostalgic purposes :) i'll be there to communicate to other developers how to port their stuff to the palm pre.. it didn't take long; which means it is a small investment of time in the worst case.. it may kick off; or palm stock may just fall beyond survival.. anyone got a dice? :)
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
mikecane @ 4/6/2010 9:59:46 AM # Q
>>>you are 100% right - the thing is, the only reason why apple has success is because they are forcing users to access applications through a single portal.

And if they didn't, there'd be complaints that you had to use *Apple's* SDK.

This one-portal stuff will eventually go away. It's unsustainable.
http://ebooktest.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/why-the-itunesapp-store-model-will-ultimately-fail/

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
abosco @ 4/6/2010 1:26:57 PM # M Q
So you're claiming that the single-distribution method will fail because sellers can't collect trending data on repeat customers? There are ways to identify users from the app itself - you don't need Apple to do that. Commenters already made the point that it's exactly like retail! Buy two shitty Dan Brown novels. He'll never know the difference between one person buying two and two people buying one each - all he knows is that he sold two more than he would have if he wasn't in the retail store in the first place.

Mike, we've had fragmented stores and side-loading forever. Palm, Microsoft, Symbian, RIM, Android, etc etc. Apple is, by far, the most successful. You actually couldn't be any more wrong. Everything Apple does is with the intent that you will buy their hardware, then get stuck in a never-ending cycle of buying new software and upgrading to new hardware, all the while shoveling money in their direction. So far, it seems they've done it 125 million times. How is any of that remotely unsuccessful?

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
mikecane @ 4/6/2010 4:19:05 PM # Q
abosco, just finally STFU on this one, OK? You're a goddammed kid who has no idea wtf goes on in grown-up businesses.
RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
e_tellurian @ 4/6/2010 4:33:13 PM # Q
Are children our future? Will it be the children of the world that interact with the thoughts of today?

This is why war is such a bad consequence. War puts ones future at risk. War is a consequence not a choice. Children do not need to grow up in war, yet we send our children to battle and ask much of them. A sad dam consequence of other people's choices. We do not choose to send our future to war, as a consequence we have done that.

Children do have a say and their thoughts do matter.

E-T
e-tellurian

Completing the e-com circle with a people driven we-com solution
WiFi & BT? No strings attached
we_tellurian@canada.com

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
abosco @ 4/6/2010 6:02:42 PM # M Q
abosco, just finally STFU on this one, OK? You're a goddammed kid who has no idea wtf goes on in grown-up businesses

Yes, you're right. People have made TONS of money over the years betting against Steve Jobs, right?

Idiot.

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
abosco @ 4/6/2010 6:19:03 PM # M Q
Also, I noticed you didn't actually refute any of my response, which is a sure-fire way to prove that I'm right and you have nothing to say.
RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
ardiri @ 4/6/2010 11:17:28 PM # Q
now you guys see why there are sessions at events like mobile world congress talking about these types of issues - it was a pity at the tech crunch europe session that was held they didn't even talk about the real subjects at hand, was just some bozo advertising his own distribution channel.

it is never about a big brother environment - it is more about the users knowing where to get the applications so they can purchase stuff. just by being on this site; you are in the top 5% of all mobile users out there - you know how to find things on your own. what about the other 95%?

they need a big bad icon they can click on and have someone tell them "hey, check this out". why do you also think the big advertising campaigns are all about "there is an app for that" these days? you need to have more than that tho; and make it clear to users that there are paid things from the start (big mistake google did with android - everything was free)
--
Aaron Ardiri
PalmOS Certified Developer

RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
mikecane @ 4/7/2010 6:59:03 AM # Q
abosco, go to a frikkin business school or read some damned business books or get some *real* frikkin work. Your crap doesn't need refutation. Your crap is ignorance. And *education* and *experience* cures it, not debate.
RE: mobile fragmentation - there is a spot for everyone
abosco @ 4/7/2010 7:50:29 AM # Q
Once again, nothing but insults. You have given nothing in response to anything I've said. Here's a gem from your post: "The current Store model separates sellers from their customers. ... Who can run a business blind like that?"

All of retail. Clothing, refrigerators, cars, toys, video games, burgers, diamonds. None of these collect personal data at the point of sale, except maybe cars, but that's used by only the dealership for marketing purposes, not the manufacturer. By the way, what is with the rash of people cropping up telling me to get an education? I graduated already. Get over it. You're the one telling Apple to turn iTunes into Paypal.

Oh wow, an iTunes ID as a universal payment system. Paypal came up with that a decade ago, except it's with something even more universal - AN EMAIL ADDRESS. This isn't some novel concept, and it's not a profitable enough business for Apple to waste its time on it.

The company is wildly profitable with their current model. They have the third largest market cap, trailing only Microsoft and Exxon. They got there by offering good hardware and easy one-stop-shopping for content. Why would they change that? Simple, they won't.

-Bosco
m105 -> NX70v -> NX80v -> iPhone -> iPhone 3G

Reply to this comment

ATTN: Rubes - Can you comp me a ticket?

Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/17/2010 1:46:39 PM # Q
I'm on vacation next week + I'd like to drop by. You can leave me a ticket with security in the lobby. Thanks.

P.S. You can let them know I'll be wearing a PalmSource Developer Conference T-shirt, black leather mini and black pumps.

RE: ATTN: Rubes - Can you comp me a ticket?
Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/25/2010 9:59:18 AM # Q
Some of the stuff coming out from the conference is shocking. WebOS development has effectively been stalled for the past 6 months. Oh, and Rubenstein is not a pretty man (he popped in to say rumors of his demise have been greatly exaggerated). I'll give him some credit for showing his face here after having lied to developers so many times.

Bottom line is that anyone developing for webOS should not expect to see any money returned on their investment.

FJH

RE: ATTN: Rubes - Can you comp me a ticket?
hkklife @ 4/25/2010 3:47:41 PM # Q
Fake Jeff Hawkins wrote:
Some of the stuff coming out from the conference is shocking. WebOS development has effectively been stalled for the past 6 months.

Can you elaborate a bit more on that? Am I to take this to mean that WebOS 1.x is at a standstill and Palm are putting all their energies and $ into WebOS 2.0 and/or new hardware? Or has WebOS IN ANY FORMS hit a wall?

Also, should we assume that development was dead for the past 6 months BUT is ramping up again on the heels of "Project Jumpstart"? Or was the "big" 1.4 update with video recording, speed optimizations etc. basically the end of the line? I mean, there is still SO MUCH that needs to be done to WebOS, even after the APIs covered at Palm's event are brought out.

Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro

RE: ATTN: Rubes - Can you comp me a ticket?
Fake Jeff Hawkins @ 4/25/2010 7:56:02 PM # Q
Can you elaborate a bit more on that? Am I to take this to mean that WebOS 1.x is at a standstill and Palm are putting all their energies and $ into WebOS 2.0 and/or new hardware? Or has WebOS IN ANY FORMS hit a wall?

The current webOS is still essentially in public beta. Right now Palm is spread too thin to fix bugs while adding the missing features. The EXACT same problem happened with the Foleo. Palm is trying to fix the problems but have too many battles to fight and the engineers are getting demoralized.There is no webOS 2 - webOS 1.0 will ship in a Droid-like Pre replacement by mid-June on Sprint.

People are polishing up their resumes - expect a TON of vaccancies by Summer. It's a shame - guys like JT have been busting their asses for almost 2 years while the execs have been busy fleecing the company.

Also, should we assume that development was dead for the past 6 months BUT is ramping up again on the heels of "Project Jumpstart"? Or was the "big" 1.4 update with video recording, speed optimizations etc. basically the end of the line? I mean, there is still SO MUCH that needs to be done to WebOS, even after the APIs covered at Palm's event are brought out.

No, development has continued, but with the added burden of trying to fix all of the problems seen in the Pre.

"Project Jumpstart" has nothing to do with engineering. It's about moving the 4 month backlog of unsold Pre and Pixi through marketing and incentives like the domestic auto industry has traditionally relied on. And we all know what happened to GM and Chrysler...The software people are about as different from Palm's marketing and clueless executives as you can imagine. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that Palm is being sabotaged intentionally by someone at the top.

Despite all the problems with webOS it rocks with the Snapdragon proc on the new phone. The EVO is more tempting, but SF apparently won't get 4G for a while. I thought about giving Palm the benefit of the doubt, but I've been burned by Treos one too many times. I've turned down offers of "free" Pre and instead have backup Centro 2 (try to get one for use on Verizon if you can). Palm really need Nokia to step in ASAP and end this nightmare.

FJH


RE: ATTN: Rubes - Can you comp me a ticket?
hkklife @ 4/25/2010 9:28:15 PM # Q
I know that "Jumpstart" was a sales/marketing/awareness campaign....I was just trying to suggest (tongue in cheek, and perhaps unsuccessfully) that once Ruby's memo went out, everyone went "oh shit, these things aren't selling like hotcakes!" and they took the WebOS team out of semi-mothballs and started working away again at the OS.

So, the rumors being tossed around online about a "new" version of WebOS being optimized for 4G/WiMax seem to be true, eh? But I've read that the formfactor of the new device is going to be a "nicer, better" Pre and still have the portrait-style slider but with a larger screen. At any rate, the Evo 4G looks to have the lion's share of the buzz (and Sprint's marketing warchest as well). We ALL know what happened when the Droid beat the Pre Plus to Verizon (and the lame duck BB Storm 2 got absolutely crushed by the Droid juggernaut as well). If the C40 (or whatever it's called) hits Sprint any more than a few weeks after than the Evo then it won't matter how good Palm's hail mary effort is. And, regardless, we'll be back to the same shitty situation seen with the Pre last year---"Want our latest & greatest? Gotta jump to Sprint for it!" NO ONE in the industry commands that kind of respect other than Apple.

Alongside the Sprint launch, Palm needs to get a similar (but 3G of course) version of this Snapdragon-powered beast out ASAP for any carrier that will still give them the time of day (T-Mobile? AT&T? Just unlocked GSM sold from palm.com? Verizon's certainly out of the picture!)

I don't doubt one BIT that WebOS rocks with the oomph of a Snapdragon behind it, as the speed boost that an overclock to 800Mhz brings to a regular Pre.

P.S. Even in a non-4G area, the Evo looks like one helluva piece of hardware. Other than missing a d-pad/trackball (an unfathomable omission that make precise input & text navigation even harder but will also fragment the already scattered Android market even further) and an AMOLED screen, I cannot think of a single major shortcoming-at least on paper-of that device other than the usual battery life concerns. I'm spent extensive time with the HD2 and am absolutely amazed at the job HTC has done not only keeping the WinMob 6.x corpse alive but adding major functionality to it. These guys need to get their hands on WebOS in a major way!
Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro

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