HP saw that webOS was great and wanted to major player in the mobile world. 
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HP Turns WebOS Open Source, Could Offer Manufacturers Alternative to Android
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Definitely, they hired him when they knew he had zero hardware experience - just running a software services company. Secondly many of the board members did not even personally meet him during the interview process - ludicrous consider the position he was being considered for
No, it was that HP couldn't sell it because it sucked. Performance was lousy, there was a serious case of app-lack, and reviewers had panned the device from nearly all angles (not by accident.)
HP churned out a piece of unoptimized crap. This is how you ruin what is otherwise a good OS.
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Apple is holding back updates just as bad as android, IMO. (iphone4 siri
Its funny that you cannot even differentiate b/w the two categories of updates. :slowclap:
Sad but true, but you cannot just lay blame to HP. Palm in releasing the Pre produced a cheap under-powered phone that was too plasticy.
So while the hardware was awful, the OS was ground-breaking and this news of being open-sourced is great news.
It's pretty amazing how incompetent leadership, red-tape, and suit-driven bureaucracy can kill a great OS in the market. Trying to get consumers to notice WebOS *again* after Palm fumbled it was difficult enough, only to have HP destroy whatever positive mindshare it had left.
Dragging it out into the market once again under some other licensing scheme? Please. This is like a Mike Tyson's 15th comeback extravaganza. How many more times do unimaginative, undifferentiated OEMs want to pull WebOS out of the grave? It had two big chances to make a huge splash in the market. In its current form, WebOS as WebOS is finished.
What is more surprising is that it was an apple executive who left apple and went to palm who failed on the design of the phone itself. The OS was great but it was an incomplete package because of the hardware. HP just mismanaged what could have been a great opportunity.
I think its too early to make that pronouncement. If a couple of hardware vendors gets behind webOS, it could start generate some critical mass.
What's with all the plastic hate around here ? Hello, it's called the iPhone 3GS and it's sold wonderfully. Polycarbonite MacBooks (a fancy word for plastic) and all the other plastic products Apple have put out and still do...
This plastic hate is so irrational.
What's with all the plastic hate around here ? Hello, it's called the iPhone 3GS and it's sold wonderfully. Polycarbonite MacBooks (a fancy word for plastic) and all the other plastic products Apple have put out and still do...
This plastic hate is so irrational.
It is not irrational; but I would agree that people forget that not all plastic products are the same.
I've used a number of so called 'plastic' phones that feel great. But some that don't include SGS2, etc. iPhone 3G was all right; so was Mozart 7.
What's with all the plastic hate around here ? Hello, it's called the iPhone 3GS and it's sold wonderfully. Polycarbonite MacBooks (a fancy word for plastic) and all the other plastic products Apple have put out and still do...
This plastic hate is so irrational.
I blame Aqua!
Actually, no. Most of Android's gain in market share comes from owners of cheap (or not quite so cheap if they look nice) dumb phones to inexpensive smart phones. There is a high end market, and that is where Apple is playing, and Android doesn't take any of Apple's share away in that area.
Open source... although I doubt this Os will get very far, making it open source will certainly help. I hope it does get far actually, the more diversity and competition in mobile operating systems the better.
What's with all the plastic hate around here ? Hello, it's called the iPhone 3GS and it's sold wonderfully. Polycarbonite MacBooks (a fancy word for plastic) and all the other plastic products Apple have put out and still do...
This plastic hate is so irrational.
It wasn't just that the Palm Pre was made out of plastic... it had general build quality issues too.
The slider wasn't very good... the keyboard wasn't so hot either... the MicroUSB door can snap off... the power button can fail. And there were even some reports where the screen twisted around. It's not supposed to do that!
While the iPhone 3GS is made of plastic... it's also a solid unit with no moving parts. Big difference.
My iPhone 3GS suffered a mute switch break down, a "common issue with this model" like the Apple genius put it before replacing it.
All electronics have "build quality" issues it seems, Apple's and the competition. But that wasn't the comment made, the comment made was it was "plasticy".
Again, I don't get the hate against plastic, a comment offered uttered around these parts. It would seem some people think nothing made of plastic can be well made...
Maybe "plasticy" isn't the correct word... but whatever. That's what he said.
You're right... there are lots of things made of plastic that are well made... the Palm Pre apparently was not.
I've handled a few Palm Pres in my life... and they were wiggly and not very solid is the hand. That's my opinion.
As for the "plastic hate" around these parts... I don't know what to tell you. You might just have to ignore it.
I often agree with your take on tablets, but not this one. See:
HP has been wishy-washy, that is the problem. The faults of the tablet are mainly that they couldn't keep the same plan for 10 minutes. What was it on the market, 6 weeks originally? They didn't have time to add a single feature. By your standard, the original iPhone sucked, too.
And then they end the tablet/PC division, then they say "oh, we didn't mean the PC part", and now she says they'll make tablets again. If I was on the board, I'd be asking wtf they are doing at all.
I found the worst part of that post to be the misspelling of the word. It should be "plasticky".What's with all the plastic hate around here ? Hello, it's called the iPhone 3GS and it's sold wonderfully. Polycarbonite MacBooks (a fancy word for plastic) and all the other plastic products Apple have put out and still do...
This plastic hate is so irrational.
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HE can't have been that good if he didn't see that the WebOS ENYO platform would have made a brilliant Enterprise software platform.
If rumours are true that ENYO apps run well on the iPad or any webkit/html5 browser then he should have been the one to realize that HP should have tied it servers not client devices. I mean as a corporate platform for Communication both within the company and with clients it would have been massive. Build once, Maintain centrally and run anywhere on almost any device.
Where did I say he was good? He clearly didn't execute on his (and the board's) plans nor communicate it effectively. I said he was a scapegoat, not that he was good.
From the standpoint of quality, a product's commercial success is of little merit. And vice versa. If Lamborghini goes bankrupt - would it imply to you that their cars are rubbish, compared to the very successful Hyundai? Well, not to me!
Another example: Gerard Corbiau's "Farinelli" has made a fraction of the profit the "Hangover" has made. Does it mean, "Hangover" comes close to comparing to "Farinelli"? To an american, I'm sure. Not to an aesthetically-inclined soul. Or, "Barry Lyndon"'s public reception was quite a bit of a disappointment. Does it mean it's objectively inferior to "Gone with the wind"? To a redneck it is, I'm sure. But not to a civilised man.
Likewise, David Daniels, Andeas Scholl, Philippe Jaroussky & Brian Asawa collectively earn (alas!) considerably less than some successful hiphop pleb alone. What does that say of their merit as singers? Nothing. Does that even mean the latter can sing at all? Well, absolutely not! All it says is that the crowd, supporting the hiphop pleb, lamentably, has not a modicum of taste (a gross understatement) or the slightest conception of Beauty. Or a grasp of Art (provided one does;t want to embarass himself by calling hiphop "Art").
There you go, mate! Under the rule of democracy - where everyone's opinion is commonly regarded as worthwhile (which is stupid, if you ask me) - commercial success of a product does not necessarily - often does not at all - reflect its quality.
Good points, but please. Lets not paint an entire nation of people with one very large brush. It's obnoxious.
That you think I'm wrong is turning into a perfect example of how awfully written the Android docs are.
onStop, onPause... it doesn't matter. NEITHER halt app execution.
Don't believe me? Attached is source code for a test. I wrote it and ran it on Android 2.3 emulator just now because I gave you the benefit of the doubt and wanted to make sure I wasn't reading the docs wrong.
It launches a thread in onCreate which sends a message to the log every 2 seconds. onStop and onPause both send a log saying that the events occurred. When you launch it, you'll see the messages in LogCat. When you hit the home button to background the app, onStop gets called and even then the thread's log messages still keep coming out afterwards. Therefore the app is still running.
I got my TouchPad for £89 - bargain of the century. However I didn't really use it until Cyanogen Mod was ported to the touchpad - even in alpha, it was far superior to WebOS.
The only way the WebOS platform will survive is if HP have a good developer programme - with tools and guides available to encourage developers to build apps. Without apps, there is really no content, and with no content the platform will be dead - open source or not.
The only way the WebOS platform will survive is if HP have a good developer programme - with tools and guides available to encourage developers to build apps. Without apps, there is really no content, and with no content the platform will be dead - open source or not.
I have a question. By open sourcing WebOS, does it mean that now Android (or iOS) can legally "copy" the whole "card multitasking" system of WebOS without paying any license fee to HP? Or they have to use the whole thing completely without breaking it apart?
