HP Turns WebOS Open Source, Could Offer Manufacturers Alternative to Android

[AppleScruff1]

Not anymore. "Open" does not = "true competitor" to a successful, closed, controlled vertically-integrated platform.

It's basically a piñata now. Everyone will try to break it open and grab whatever falls out.

Windows 8 will solve that. iOS market share has only way to go in the future. The question is by how much. Will Windows 8 only cannibalize Android or will it eat in the iOS market to any degree of significance? Stay tuned. Your worst nightmare may be starting soon.

 

[Oletros]

Without really knowing the specifics of developing apps for android I can't imagine it being that difficult to port one program to run on different versions of the operating system.

If you develop for 2.1 upward you reach 95% of all handsets and is not difficult to develop taking into account the API differences

 

[rmwebs]

I don't know why everyone is so excited. Open-sourcing WebOS is a nice gesture, but just slightly better than killing it off altogether.

For a mobile OS to succeed one needs a strong (preferably multi-billion dollar) entity focused and committed to its development and enhancement. It also needs hardware manufacturers backing and commitment.

Who is going to develop for WebOS now, beyond a small hacker community experimenting with their $99 TouchPads?

You could say the same about Android...

webOS - backed by HP.
Android - backed by Google.

In addition, HP is going to be working on hardware too, so its in their interests to keep it going.

 

[KnightWRX]

I certainly would read it that way. In Mac OS X, only the core OS is Open Source - the entire GUI level is as proprietary as it gets.

If you read it that way, then this announcement would be about nothing. webOS uses a Linux kernel already. If only the "core OS" (ie, the kernel) was being "open sourced", then frankly that would be as much of a non-story as it ever could be :

News flash, Linux already is open source.

 

[rmwebs]

I really hope Web OS (Even though it isn't a web os ) does extremely well! I loved the layout of the os ever since I first saw it but it's sad how little support it's gotten. Hopefully this becomes a highly used alternative to android, because I would much rather have the competition come from a source that used theyre own ideas to make a mobile os than one that pretty much copied all of them. But iOS will still win, best app store, fastest, best music video etc, best multitasking, best web browser, best security, best voice recognition (I have used androids and it is C.R.A.P) and well just best everything, which is impressive when you look at it's first release in 2007 that only did very basic things.

FYI its called webOS because all the apps are written in pure javascript, html and css

Also, webOS multitasks way better than iOS, theres no competition there.

 

[KnightWRX]

Negative. All marketing aside, the HP Touchpad was roundly considered cheaply-made, underpowered, and all-in-all janky.

And frankly, that was all due to HP's insistence on rushing it out before the software was properly optimized. Using community patches (or novaterm from the SDK to get into a shell on the device) you can disable many of the horrid defaults HP chose for the Linux kernel and make the device into what it should have been.

And since upgrading mine to 3.0.4 or whatever the latest version shipped in october, it's been running butter smooth. It's far from underpowered.

The problem was HP introduced it, barely marketed it, and price dropped it 4 weeks into being on shelves, making customers take a "wait and see" approach.

 

[rmwebs]

Negative. All marketing aside, the HP Touchpad was roundly considered cheaply-made, underpowered, and all-in-all janky.

That may be the way its considered but as an owner of one running webOS and Android (CynogenMod) I love it. The only negative parts are the lack of removable storage, and the crummy camera. Other than that it works pretty damn well. It's powerful enough to run flash video and flash games, plays most android apps I've thrown at it.

A lot of the negative publicity about the Touchpad is actually false. You should try one

 

[Kaibelf]

And frankly, that was all due to HP's insistence on rushing it out before the software was properly optimized. Using community patches (or novaterm from the SDK to get into a shell on the device) you can disable many of the horrid defaults HP chose for the Linux kernel and make the device into what it should have been.

And since upgrading mine to 3.0.4 or whatever the latest version shipped in october, it's been running butter smooth. It's far from underpowered.

The problem was HP introduced it, barely marketed it, and price dropped it 4 weeks into being on shelves, making customers take a "wait and see" approach.

I agree that they screwed the pooch with rushing it out, but every single article I read about them said that they were about the equivalent (hardware-wise) of a first-gen iPad, and that it was odd since the iPad 2 was coming out around the same time. It was enough to spook me away from ordering one. As for dropping the price, they really needed to face facts. They could drop it then and spare themselves the embarrassment, or keep the price and wait until Kindle Fire and then not even be able to move them for 99 bucks.

 

[SandynJosh]

Yes, it had the same multitasking framework since the beginning
G1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1m4j676BCc

"True Multi-tasking" is also known as "Background Battery Draining." It's highly desirable by users who want to fully exercise their battery every 4-6 hours.

 

[Kaibelf]

You can repeat the times you want, it won't be more right.

P.S. A little secret, Fire is not the leading Android device and it even is not sold outside USA (remember, there is a whole world outside its borders)

Are you asserting that there's another Android tablet that has moved more units than the Fire has already? The poster you responsed to clearly said pad space, not device.

 

[thenerdal]

"True Multi-tasking" is also known as "Background Battery Draining." It's highly desirable by users who want to fully exercise their battery every 4-6 hours.

That's not true. Touchpad has true multitasking and great battery life.

 

[Michael Scrip]

I blame HP's crappy marketing for that.

WebOS failed to gain traction even before HP got ahold of it.

Palm launched the Palm Pre during a very tough time in the mobile market... against the Android invasion and the iPhone.

Hell... even Blackberries sold more than the Palm Pre and Pixi.

Sadly... not enough people were interested in WebOS for phones... and that translated into not enough demand for WebOS on tablets either.

If WebOS phones were popular... that could have helped promote WebOS tablets. But in the tablet space... the TouchPad was going up against the wildly successful iPad.

WebOS may be considered the greatest mobile OS ever made... but it wasn't a commercial success. You can blame Palm, HP, marketing or whatever.

Or the fact that there were many other devices out there as well. It's a crowded market.

 

[iSayuSay]

After having an iPad 2, touchpad and samasung galaxy 10.1 I can say the following:

iPad2 kicks ass
Touchpad sucks but webOS is better than iOS (needs more apps though and better hardware)
Galaxy 10.1 is nice hardware but Honeycomb is horrible and it ruins the whole experience because the key capabilities of the tablet (browser etc) are poorly executed

Agreed, obviously Apple's engineers is not the only one that can write up a good software and OS.

Problem is hardware design, other people tend to neglect hardware design and build quality, focusing only on spec numbers and low (read cheapo) price.
Who doesn't love cheap price? Even Apple's devotee still love bargain price, but please don't cheap out things just to make some people happy Do the best as you can and show people it's worth the extra money.

 

[thenerdal]

WebOS failed to gain traction even before HP got ahold of it.

Palm launched the Palm Pre during a very tough time in the mobile market... against the Android invasion and the iPhone.

Hell... even Blackberries sold more than the Palm Pre and Pixi.

Sadly... not enough people were interested in WebOS for phones... and that translated into not enough demand for WebOS on tablets either.

If WebOS phones were popular... that could have helped promote WebOS tablets. But in the tablet space... the TouchPad was going up against the wildly successful iPad.

WebOS may be considered the greatest mobile OS ever made... but it wasn't a commercial success. You can blame Palm, HP, marketing or whatever.

Or the fact that there were many other devices out there as well. It's a crowded market.

No, I blame HP for the bad marketing. Palm did pretty well when they had WebOS.

The Palm Pre became the fastest selling phone in Sprint's history.

 

[Oletros]

"True Multi-tasking" is also known as "Background Battery Draining." It's highly desirable by users who want to fully exercise their battery every 4-6 hours.

And that's the reason that "true multitasking" is in e of the ways, the standard is the she that iOS has, suspending the background application. Or having a background process and nt the whole app or using timers and waking the app in at predetermined times.

 

[hitekalex]

WebOS has serious potential, someone will pick it up from where it left off and do something with it. I think it has a good potential to be a contender in the market.

Or not.. which seems a lot more likely.

You could say the same about Android...

webOS - backed by HP.
Android - backed by Google.

In addition, HP is going to be working on hardware too, so its in their interests to keep it going.

I could say that, but that would be utterly wrong. What would be true is:

Android - developed, invested in and supported by Google.
webOS - abandoned by HP, backed by one one (right now)

And HP is certainly NOT going to be working on any new WebOS hardware.

 

[thenerdal]

Or not.. which seems a lot more likely.



I could say that, but that would be utterly wrong. What would be true is:

Android - developed, invested in and supported by Google.
webOS - abandoned by HP, backed by one one (right now)

And HP is certainly NOT going to be working on any new WebOS hardware.

Whether you like it or not, HP is still backing WebOS.

 

[MacAddict1978]

How can they say its the only os built from the ground up for the mobile platform? That seems so incorrect to me.

I think the comment is excluding now defunct Home Brew solutions that handset makers used to make on their own. However, those too probably were based on something else.

Even IOS, Android, Windows Mobile... are all desktop operating systems that have been modified, not TRULY built from scratch. IOS has done the best job. Androids biggest pitfall is that the user is basically running a program on top of Linux. (Yes, I know, it's more technical than that, for for laymens sake I say that).

IOS was almost a Linux based product as well, which most people hear have most likely read that story.

I think this is the best thing for WebOS.
It suffered from 2 problems:
1. Awful hardware (under both HP and Palm(
2. No developer support

This would fix both those issues pretty quickly if other manufactures jump on board, and with Google getting into the hardware business, many companies have been rumored to be looking at alternatives to Android now.

HP even has a win in this. By hanging on to WebOS in part, it positions them to be the gate keeper of an echo system ala Apple or Google, raking in a commission on what's sold and giving a steady revenue stream.

Its the echo system that makes the money, not so much the hardware. Device makers have done well with Android because what they save in in house costs on developing software makes up for the difference and has helped them get more market share.

I'm excited about this. WebOS I always did like... I just hated the hardware and there was nothing for the platform I wanted besides Facebook and few other must haves.

 

[hitekalex]

Whether you like it or not, HP is still backing WebOS.

They only place HP is "backing" WebOS is in their corporate double-speak filled press releases. If you paid any attention recently, you would know that majority of HP's WebOS engineers have left the company, and what's left of the team is being laid off.

You can delude yourself all your want, but HP is done with WebOS.

 

[waldobushman]

Non-decision decision

HP should just have admitted WebOS is dead and be done with it. HP open-sourcing says that HP will put only minimal resources into it and depend mostly on the "kindness of strangers".

As Jobs said, HP is now run by suits, not engineers. Just like Xerox, HP has become a one-trick pony.

RIP.

 

[thenerdal]

They only place HP is "backing" WebOS is in their corporate double-speak filled press releases. If you paid any attention recently, you would know that majority of HP's WebOS engineers have left the company, and what's left of the team is being laid off.

You can delude yourself all your want, but HP is done with WebOS.

Source?

 

[KnightWRX]

Even IOS, Android, Windows Mobile... are all desktop operating systems that have been modified, not TRULY built from scratch. IOS has done the best job. Androids biggest pitfall is that the user is basically running a program on top of Linux.

webOS is also running on top of Linux, like Android...

Your post thus makes no sense. Linux is a kernel, not a "destkop operating system". Android is as much "built from the ground up for mobile devices" as webOS is.

 

[*LTD*]

Windows 8 will solve that. iOS market share has only way to go in the future. The question is by how much. Will Windows 8 only cannibalize Android or will it eat in the iOS market to any degree of significance? Stay tuned. Your worst nightmare may be starting soon.

Windows 8 promises for sometime in the future? MS can barely get WP7 off the ground, never mind that awful Metro UI duct-taped onto another version of Windows (or rather, two versions in one!) Great plan.

$NEXT_VERSION is shaping up to be one heck of a product.

I am so excited about $NEXT_VERSION of Windows. It will go beyond just solving all of the problems with $CURRENT_VERSION, it will be an entirely new paradigm. Forget about security and UI problems, those are all fixed in $NEXT_VERSION. And they’re finally ridding themselves of $ANCIENT_LEGACY_STUFF.

Also, there’ll be $DATABASE_FILESYSTEM. It’ll be awesome!

I wonder how $NEXT_VERSION will compare to $NEXT_NEXT_VERSION.

 

[Wolfie Scooter]

Not a programmer, so this may be dumb...

That said, could you jailbreak an iPad and make it dual boot into either iOS or WebOS? I vaguely remember an article (can't find any link to it) that mentioned that someone got WebOS running on an iPad, and that it was actually better on it than on the Palm/HP hardware.

 

[reden]

Insane. Only positives will come out of such a good move. Hopefully this can help turn HP around. Good job HP.