The webOS software is more polished than Honeycomb and overall the TouchPad is a better product than any Android tablet on the market.
But the webOS developers that have hung on are incredibly loyal.
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Going back to the webOS well (with its open source support) would allow the company to save a few dollars on the cost of a new handset.
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The change, which includes job cuts in what HP calls the webOS global business unit or GBU, is scheduled to be implemented by October 31st at the latest.
The PDK enables new functionality, including immersive 3D graphics, and gives developers who have built games for other platforms an easy way to bring their titles to the webOS platform.
Outside Palm's inner circle of trusted partners, the webOS SDK (playfully named "Mojo") won't be released to would-be app developers until we get closer to the Pre's launch, but we know a few key details.
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No matter how polished the WebOS variant will be, there will never be the support of legions of coders, the media partners to drive a store, or the advertising networks to supply extra income streams for everyone involved.
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"The Palm webOS PDK is extremely powerful and far-reaching, as evidenced by the number of titles we've been able to bring to the webOS platform in a very short time, " said Baudouin Corman, vice president of publishing, Americas, Gameloft.
Today's announcement paves the way for continued innovation on the webOS platform and on LG's roadmap of innovative solutions for many years to come, while allowing HP to focus its resources on strategic business opportunities such as cloud computing.
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Unfortunately, as described by Craig A. Hunter, a self proclaimed "pretty dedicated iPhone developer" who's been poking around the WebOS SDK, Palm does not provide the environment to develop serious games or the kind of sophisticated apps users now expect from their handhelds.
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To emphasize how Autonomy would transform HP into a software giant focused on high-profit business customers, and, perhaps, to forestall some nagging questions about PCs and the tablet failure, HP also announced that it was exploring the sale or spinoff of the PC business and that it was closing the WebOS device business.
The open question, though, is what company would be willing to give webOS the attention that HP wants while delivering the high volumes that webOS needs.
Palm Synergy(TM), a key feature of the new webOS, brings your information from all the places it resides into one logical view.
With its curved slider and gesture-controlled touch interface, Palm Pre fuses exquisite design with the revolutionary webOS software for fast access to content on the device or web.
Of all, the big news out of HP today, the death of WebOS was the most unexpected development.
When speaking casually about the future of webOS on non-HP handsets, he noted that the firm was looking to license webOS to various other hardware manufacturers.
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Take the now dormant WebOS. While the reasons behind its failure to become a driving force in the consumer market, one of the contributing facts was the lack of an ecosystem.
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Some webOS developers were irritated that HP did not upgrade the U.S. versions of the Pre and Pre Plus with the 2.0 version of webOS when the platform was updated last fall.
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In addition, HP reported that it plans to announce that it will discontinue operations for webOS devices, specifically the TouchPad and webOS phones.
Can the Pre and webOS live up to the hype -- the kind of hype we haven't seen since the launch of the original iPhone -- or do they snap under the pressure?
Rubinstein, a gadget guru who helped create the iPod, is viewed as the driving force behind the creation of webOS and all recent webOS products, such as the Palm Pre series of smartphones and the TouchPad.
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The possibilities have some webOS developers enthusing about the platform as though it is brand-new.
FORBES: HP webOS Developers Await TouchPad, Pre3 With Questions, Optimism
Unfortunately for fans of Palm's last hurrah, the project's webOS port died with the HP Touchpad.
The two-year life of webOS, the operating system Palm created for its first Pre smartphone, has been marked by uncertainty.
FORBES: HP webOS Developers Await TouchPad, Pre3 With Questions, Optimism
Holbrook says he's already started applying the same approach to webOS phones, in the hopes of providing doctors and researchers with an even more compact way to keep track of their patients.
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The downfall of webOS left more than a few canceled devices in its wake, but the most elusive of the bunch tends to be the WindsorNot: a touch-only smartphone.
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The device runs on WebOS, which it acquired when the company bought Palm last summer.
With HP's primary play in webOS being outside the smartphone market, it creates more room to license webOS in that high-volume category --a place where the OS really needs to attract developers.
The second was the news from the team working with the open source elements of WebOS, who have the former Palm operating system running on another Nexus device, the Nexus 7.
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