WebOS 2.x and the comming phones and tabs.

All you webOS fans already know this but I want to share with the people not reading all the webOS blogs. HP released the Pre 2 in December 2010 on a limited set of operators. It includes webOS 2. But all old webOS phones have been left out of the update to webOS 2.x, until a month ago when O2 Germany got a webOS 2.1 release to deliver to customers using Pre+. But this release is not delivered over the air(OTA) as everything so far has been done. You have to download it and doctor it to your phone. What then happened is that the homebrew community have created scripts to apply this release on a number of different version of the Pre phone. It seems to work great, even for the older versions of Pre. I have not tried this my self yet. Do not have the time, especially if something does go wrong. Biggest problem when it goes wrong is your account/profile on the phone. You might loose your apps or other things. I do not have any apps since I am not on an approved operator.

What has also happened is that HP has announced 2 new phones and a pad. They will be released this summer, actually one of the phones will probably release already in April or May. If it release that early it will most likely run webOS 2.1 or maybe 2.2. webOS 3 is probably ready and a must for when they release the pad. If that is the same for Pre 3 I do not know. Pre 3 is like the earlier Pres but with better hardware and a bigger screen. So that one looks like a must have for me. So I hope it is an early summer release.

So now HP finally is coming with some new hardware. But is that enough?? NO, HP have to make the developers happy. Because without developers there will be no webOS. And I am not talking about the developers at HP making webOS. I am talking about the application developers. webOS need more apps. So what does the developers need? Most, or at least many, need to see that there is money in making apps for webOS. And with no users there is no money. What can be done to make more users? I guess one thing is to make the phones/pad available world wide with an application catalogue that is available to ALL users. At the moment you can use your Pre in many places of the world. But it is almost impossible to buy an application if you do not activate your phone in the 'correct' way and live in the countries that is supported. This really limits the sales of the applications.

Anyway, I hope developers will start making new apps, and updating old ones, NOW. Not wait for the release of webOS 3 or the new hardware. We need to get the application ecosystem growing and healthy. And we as developers need to tell HP we want global access of the application catalogue, NOW.

WebOS application catalog now world wide!

Yes, it has finally happened. Everybody, not only phones with the approved operators, can now access free applications in the application catalog. Even if it is only a small step and a very late step I actually felt happy to notice it. No need to use other tools to insert the free applications to the phone.

I guess readers here have already noticed that there is a Palm Pré 2. It is available at two operators. One in Canada and one in France. And, at least in the US of A you can buy it unlocked from the HP store. The Palm Pré 2 already have WebOS 2.0. But we with older phones are still on 1.4.5. Bummer. And the information from HP Palm is  still, "in the coming months". I have not checked the developer download of WebOS 2.0 if there is better support for other characters then latin. Thai is not there in 1.4.5, and I have not managed to get it working, even when following the steps of the forum at PreCentral.net. I guess I should try some more fonts. And I really hope that old phones will experience better performance not worse with WebOS 2.0.


Now everybody is waiting for CES to see if there are some other phones on the way from HP Palm. What seem to have been leaked so far is a WebOS based pad. I hope there will be some phone with a lot better hardware then the Palm Pré 2. But I really do not want to have a bigger phone then the Palm Pre.

Official features in webOS 2.0

OK, I know, I am not fast. This was new one week ago. But now I write about it. Palm has announced that webOS 2.0 is on its way. Palm has the feature list here. There might be more, this is what is in the beta.

Just Type looks interesting. But it might get flooded with to many hits when you type. And the Quick Actions part might be more fitting the pixi then the pre. Do you really want to pull out the keyboard all the time.

And Synergy needs to get better. So this is welcome. Support for more IMs would be nice. So far I have not really used the phone for IM. But it could happen if support for 'my' IMs get in there. Maybe I could leave SMS for good. Actually this on Precentral shows a lot of more IMs in the list. And it would be nice if Synergy could be used to sync contact between different services. Not only collect them. More pictures here.

PDK plugin, JavaScript Services and better HTML5 support is great for me as a developer. But I guess that JavaScript Services can be a real battery drainer. Actually some of the Just Type and Synergy features might also be big battery drainers.

PDK plugins I hope will give us applications like a port of keepass. I actually have an application on the way that will be a lot better if using PDK plugin. So I really looking forward for the release. I have not applied for the early access program yet. I have to much to do anyway.

Most likely there will be a virtual keyboard. I like the virtual keyboard in the iPhone. You can change between different keyboards very easy. And also I would like for world wide support for the app catalog and fonts for more regions than available right now. And where the phone is, or is registered, does not have to decide what you want to use the phone for. This is a global world. People come from all around the world to different places but want to use tools from home.

So, what everybody is waiting for now is an announcement for a new device. OK, HP has been talking a lot about a tablet. But I just want a new pre with better hardware.

Update: More pictures and a video.

webOS 1.4.5 is now in all regions

I'm not 100% sure it is really for all operators. But as 10 of August Sprint has had it in the US. And O2 Germany did get it already in 1st of July. And if I understand correct, everyone is getting 1.4.5. There was said that there was a bug in 1.4.5 that some operators said they where waiting for 1.4.5.1.

Anyway, now the big buzz is about new hardware and webOS 2.0. Yesterday HP answered a question about webOS-based tablet with saying it coming early 2011. I am not so interested in that. I more would like a slightly bigger screen Pre with maybe 2GB internal memory and maybe a dual core CPU. And a lot better battery. And most of all, I want the application catalog to be available world wide with no restrictions.

Palm now part of HP

So, now it is finalized. Palm is now part of HP. But for now it looks like Palm as a brand will continue. And Palm will be the center of webOS. HP will be there for the resources and the muscle.

I really hope this will make webOS and the application catalog available world wide. Not only for US and a very tiny part of the rest of the world. I also hope there will be better support for language and regional settings for the whole world. Full UNICODE fonts would be very nice.

I am guessing Palm already had some new hardware on the way before HP came along. But the HP contacts might give Palm/webOS a wider smartphone hardware base to run in. The small farm factor of the Palm Pré is great, for a phone. No problem at all to use it one handed. And for most use as a smartphone it is big enough. But sometimes I just wish the screen was a tiny bit larger. Mostly in number of pixels, but also in physical size. Then as usual, bigger memory and faster CPU is alway welcome. And better battery. Smartphones really need great battery.

webOS 1.4.5 is supposed to be about. And especially O2 Germany users have reported downloads the last 48 hours. But I am still without 1.4.5. And I actually have an O2 Germany phone, but not an O2 Germany SIM. webOS 1.4.5 is only a very small update. Not really any of the things I am waiting for. OK, better PDK is great. But PDK suck anyway when you can not download the applications.

More confusion from Palm.

First one application many GSM Palm Pre users has been waiting for, Classic the Palm Pilot emulator, re-appeared in the App Catalog. And for some of the O2 countries there where 20+ applications in the same night bringing it to over 200. But for us with a unlocked German GSM Palm Pre not registered with an O2 sim card lost all applications but the Classic application.

And this came after WebOS 1.3.5 was released for the Sprint network in USA, but not for the GSM Palm Pre users in Europe. When is there going to bee a world wide release. And when will the base WebOS with the base applications and the third party applications going to bee world wide if not specified differently, like the network specific from the networks. Stupid to only bring one network in on the game.

OK, so some of the updates in WebOS 1.3.5 looks promising for the future. First of all the possibility to run really demanding games, with good 3D graphics. And things like higher sampling rate for the gyro. I wonder what else they are going to present on the

App Catalog visible again

Now App Catalog show applications again. Since 1.3.1 it has only reported App Catalog unavailable. So registered with a SIM not 'supported' by palm, yet, I get 5 applications. And guess what two of them are texas holdem applications. Gambling and porn are quick to get global access.

1.3.1 out for the GSM Palm pre

This morning, Swedish time, the WebOS 1.3.1 update for GSM Palm Pre was made available. There is a lot of updates. But maybe not really the updates that many people wants. I just hope more is coming and that fast.

Some said before that 1.3.1 was supposed to be faster, but maybe the most speed gains was in 1.2.1 already. I can not say I really feel that it is a lot faster. OK, the calendar feels faster. Before it kind of froze while it reading from google.

The appstore is not working. I do not know if it is temporary or if it is because they blocking out unknown networks.

Another thing, in 1.3.1 you can manually edit the APN settings. But it does not accept the values I enter. And it is only a limited set of values you can enter. So it might not be enough even if the values I enter was accepted.

Palm Pre

Last week I bought a Palm Pre. In Sweden they are not selling it yet. So I gambled and bought the unlocked one from Germany and hoped it would work with my Swedish operator. And sure it works. But not really out of the box, and not without pain.

But now when it is working it is a really nice telephone. OK, I do not have that much to compare with since this is my first touch screen smartphone. So the basic is great. And the phone has potential. And when you read the forums you will see that many people is working on getting most out of the fact that it is based on linux.

But the applications mostly look like they are early beta or alpha versions. Missing a lot of settings and functions for being really use full. OK, I only have version 1.1.3, since it is the latest supported for the GSM compared to 1.2.1 in ths US.

And also, the battery is not really strong enough for last the whole day, if you are staying connected with WiFi and 3G all day. I read somewhere that there was a new better battery available. But I have not checked that options more.

The real problem I have hade with the phone is the fact that the phone have a database over all operators in the world and there settings for 3G internet, MMS, etc. And of curse a database like that can never be complete. And that mean that the Swedish operators are not correct. So first thing that happened was that the phone think you roaming on 3G. And then it will not let you activate the phone. And since you can not activate the phone you can not choose any other settings. The way I got it working was to step out of 3G into where only have 2G coverage. There are other options to solve the problem. For instance use Meta-Doctor to write an updated/modified version of WebOS to the phone. Actually, for updating the operator database you only need to use WebOS Quick Install to change the database files after you update them outside the phone.

So if you need help or want to read more about the Palm Pre you can visit precentral.net or everythingpre. Another insight to WebOS and the internals is WebOS Internals.

I hope I soon have time to write some nice apps for the Palm Pre. I know one that I have not found yet, unless you run the emulator for palmos.

I recommend this phone, even with all the problems with it being a new OS/platform and all.

Note: WebOS 1.3.1 is soon out in US. Is it about speed. Or what else is new. I hope it will be released here in Europe directly too.