Enterprise Application Development for Palm OS Grows

PalmSource today announced the number of registered enterprise Palm OS developers has surpassed 100,000, with over 12,000 new enterprise developers registered in the last six months.

"We believe Palm OS is driving greater adoption of smart mobile devices in the enterprise market, " said David Nagel, president and CEO of PalmSource. "Combining Palm Powered smart mobile devices and enterprise applications offers a powerful solution for enterprises to stay connected to mission critical information."

The power and flexibility of the Palm OS platform continues to attract a large and loyal following of third-party developers looking to optimize their Palm OS application development for the growing mobile market. Registered enterprise developers building mobile applications for Palm Powered mobile devices span essential business processes, including customer relationship management (CRM), sales force automation (SFA), supply chain management (SCM) and mobile field service.

"The stability, familiarity and ease with which third-party applications can be developed for the Palm OS platform make it an extremely viable choice for enterprises looking to go wireless," said Alex Klyce, executive vice president of Sendia Corporation, a wireless application developer based in Santa Monica, Calif. "Our Wireless Salesforce Automation application, which extends salesforce.com's CRM solution to the mobile environment, has performed flawlessly when extended to the Palm OS platform, and we've received very positive feedback from Sendia's enterprise customers who are currently using our solution on the Treo 600 smartphone from palmOne."  

Mobile computing has emerged as one of the key priorities for businesses seeking to facilitate mobile workforce productivity and ensure a higher return on investment (ROI). Palm OS is the most widely accepted mobile data operating system, appearing on 88 percent of enterprise mobile computing standards lists1. Today's next generation Palm Powered smart mobile devices are helping companies in vertical industries improve the way they do business. Palm Powered mobile devices meet user requirements for ease of use, personalization and elegance while delivering on enterprise demands for flexibility, security, and interoperability with existing IT infrastructure.

Approximately 33 million Palm Powered handhelds and smartphones have been sold to date and Palm OS has attracted a large and loyal following with approximately 320,000 developers building applications for Palm Powered products.

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I'll echo this...

RoadKnight @ 6/30/2004 2:46:12 PM #
...In the past 4 months or so, all the handheld project proposals that have crossed my inbox or voicemail have been for the Treo and none for the PocketPC or MS smartphone platform. I usually get at least a couple inquiries about feasibility/suitability of Microsoft offerings or at least a quavering "...But isn't Palm dead and on it's way out?"
Now what they're saying is "We'd like you to do this on the Treo first, then we'll see if it makes sense elsewhere".

RK

RE: I'll echo this...
Fammy @ 6/30/2004 3:10:55 PM #
My old manager half-jokingly asked if I could create a Palm (Treo) version of our timesheet app. In the past, we looked at some PPC development, but the Treo 600 is the favorite of management at my company. Woohoo!

-- Fammy

Keep up the Palm-Powered Juice Going.....

vesther @ 6/30/2004 4:27:35 PM #
Palm-Powered handhelds has always been good for enterprises IMO mainly because it's pretty much a trusted handheld to use. I'd like to see all Pocket PC-crazed enterprises to convert to Palm-Powered machines PDQ because they'll be sorry if they don't start learning how to use Palm-Powered machines sooner or later.

On the smartphone world, Nextel, Verizon, and even US Cellular might be sorry if they don't deploy any innovative Palm-Powered Smartphones in the future. I definitely need to see a Palm-Powered Walkie-Talkie in the future. Now that would be a great Palm-Powered idea.

A Palm-Powered Handheld is the bread and butter for many people. Without a Palm-Powered Handheld, your progress is all for naught.

Yawn

tthiel @ 7/1/2004 12:59:44 PM #
Nbody cares and it doesn't matter.

RE: Yawn
benamy @ 7/3/2004 2:31:52 PM #
You are right it does not matter unless you own a Palm powered device.

And with 40% of the US smartphone market share being the TREO 600 it does matter for those Palm owners.

And the TREO is only the first of the line.

Have fun programing your PPC and Symbian applications on your own because I am going to buy the latest application that is ready to be used today not after I read a 400 page C++ manual, 500 page Symbian development manual, and then spend the next year working on it myself.

100,000 developers matter!!! Because it is those 100,000 that make the device more useful than the manfaucter intended it for my specific purpose which could be different than yours.

So your right, who cares. Symbian has 2000 developers than have made a few hundred applications that are not compatible with v6.0 or v7.0 and Mobile 2003 SE is only compatible 2003 lacking the backward compatility with the 2002 application and only has a few hundred developers that have made 600 applications, so good luck on finding something that really mets your needs because one size fits all if you like wearing bad fitting stuff that does not work.



RE: Yawn
RoadKnight @ 7/4/2004 10:57:33 AM #
All very good points, but please, don't feed the trolls.
RE: Yawn
futureT4user @ 7/6/2004 1:29:49 PM #
from those 100k developers how many enterprise apps are there? any estimates or figures on that?

this stat is one they like to quote but seems meaningless.

Wasn't there like 136k Treo 600s sold last quarter? is it just me or don't the dev numbers seem outrageously high? are downloads for updates counted again that 100k number so one developer could count 10 times for the 10 updates he installed over time?

RE: Yawn
Winter_ @ 7/6/2004 1:43:01 PM #
I would like more details too. How are those developers counted, what do they exactly mean (they could be developing in-house apps), and how does this compare to other platforms?

On Pocket PCs, you don't need to register as anything with M$ to develop for the platform. In fact, since they can use more standard code (and even proper Java apps), I guess developers don't even need anything specific.
(if they already have an internally developed desktop application they use, they could just port/adjust it for PocketPCs and start using it...)

Meanwhile, looks like to develop for Palm OS you need to go quite specific...

Enterprise Development(Was RE: Yawn)
RoadKnight @ 7/6/2004 5:02:04 PM #
Enterprise development is going to remain murky and obscure for the most part because it involves dealing with the internal applications and data formats of a particular company. Can you say "trade secrets" boys and girls?

There's no reason to publicize what exactly the app does or how many people are working on it or anything like that because it either is of totally trivial internal interest(the secretaries have their own special meeting-minder app...oooh, Gartner's gonna care about that!) or involves working with proprietary,trade-secret-related internally developed apps or internally generated data.

The most you are likely to get out of any of these surveys is the broad general category of work that is being done on a handheld, such as database retrieval, sales force automation, POS/CS, inventory management, etc.

The people who these kinds of information are important to know what's really being said and how to read between the lines. Everybody else is going to have to guess and you will probably guess wrong.

RE: Yawn
Winter_ @ 7/7/2004 6:35:23 AM #
Enterprise development is going to remain murky and obscure for the most part because it involves dealing with the internal applications and data formats of a particular company. Can you say "trade secrets" boys and girls?

So looks like a lovely way to brag about the platform without having to give details. (*chuckle*)

There's no reason to publicize what exactly the app does or how many people are working on it or anything like that because it either is of totally trivial internal interest(the secretaries have their own special meeting-minder app...oooh, Gartner's gonna care about that!) or involves working with proprietary,trade-secret-related internally developed apps or internally generated data.

The most you are likely to get out of any of these surveys is the broad general category of work that is being done on a handheld, such as database retrieval, sales force automation, POS/CS, inventory management, etc.

The people who these kinds of information are important to know what's really being said and how to read between the lines. Everybody else is going to have to guess and you will probably guess wrong.

So, this data about "2 zillion more enterprise developers registered" means next-to-nothing for us normal users, huh? That was my guess.

Someone should now tell benamy that he surely won't be able to buy whatever these suspected developers are suspected to develop.

RE: Yawn
RoadKnight @ 7/7/2004 12:55:53 PM #

So, this data about "2 zillion more enterprise developers registered" means next-to-nothing for us normal users, huh? That was my guess.

For the average retail-buying, gadget freak with money in his pocket to burn, you're right, it means close to squat.

To Palm themselves, potential enterprise customers, marketing groups, Palm partners, etc. it actually means a bit more.
It means a certain level of interest and effort being expended on developing PalmOS apps for Enterprise use, which means people/companies are signing click-wrap agreements, downloading the SDK, buying copies of Code Warrior or Falch, buying books, sending their staff to PalmOS-related training, buying PalmOS-based PDAs and phones, maybe licensing the OS in part or in whole, etc. This is of course, money in pockets of PalmOne,PalmSource, 3rd-party ISVs, consultants/developers like me, etc.


Someone should now tell benamy that he surely won't be able to buy whatever these suspected developers are suspected to develop.

Well, that's not entirely true either. Remember that in business, money and 24 hours heals all wounds and forgives a multitude of sins. If Palm is *REALLY* interested in something, they'll make it worth it for somebody and vice versa. One only need look at things like PrintBoy, the Think Outside keyboard, The DateBk or DataViz apps for proof of that.

Likewise, if somebody is *REALLY* interested in what database(Oracle, MySQL, SQLServer, etc.) enterprises are using with their handheld apps, there is a price that can be paid and NDAs that can be signed to get access to that information.

No unattended deployment of Palm Desktop = no "enterprise"

aardvarko @ 7/12/2004 1:48:30 AM #
Honestly, how can they expect Palm handhelds and software to be used in any kind of enterprise system when their Desktop cannot be installed without clicking Next, Next, Next, Next, Next, Next, Finish? It is absolutely ridiculous that I have to write an AutoIT script to install the Palm Desktop unattended.

(Not to mention that the installation doesn't appear to copy its Registry keys to default_user, meaning that it must either be installed during the T-13 minutes stage of unattended XP install, or installed FOR EACH USER! Shameful.)

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