Bell and his team were responsible for the Palm PRE and the Palm PIXI.

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The company slashed its guidance a few weeks ago, and today confirmed that its Pre and Pixi smartphones are simply not selling very well.

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As far as we can tell, this isn't the same as that WiFi Pixi (wouldn't it be confusing if it was?), so we should probably expect at least two webOS models on Verizon over the next few months.

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Firstly, and most interestingly, Palm has confirmed that the PDK now works on all of its handsets (instead of just the Pre and Pre Plus), which means Pixi buyers can stop hating themselves pretty soon.

ENGADGET: Palm's webOS PDK beta adds Pixi native development, PDK'd apps will hit the Catalog mid year

Palm's not saying whether this new era for the App Catalog (anyone being able to release PDK apps, and those apps working on the Pre and the Pixi) will accompany a full-on webOS update, but it seems logical to us.

ENGADGET: Palm's webOS PDK beta adds Pixi native development, PDK'd apps will hit the Catalog mid year

First, he mentioned that they're working "fast and furious on new handsets" with a "strong pipeline" of new goodies, which gives us great hope that we're finally going to see something that doesn't look like a Pre or a Pixi soon.

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This is functionality that wasn't available even to Palm's early PDK partners like EA and Gameloft, so we should be seeing versions of existing games make the jump to the Pixi when the time for PDK beta-developed apps to hit the Palm App Catalog.

ENGADGET: Palm's webOS PDK beta adds Pixi native development, PDK'd apps will hit the Catalog mid year

It's sort of interesting -- Palm similarly extends the touch area beyond the screen on the Pre and the Pixi, but not quite like this -- but we can't see how touching the bezel next to an on-screen label is much better than just pressing the screen.

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