Last week I posted on my blog asking for input on issues around application distribution on the Palm platform. The post got a number of responses from developers (mostly via email), as you would expect given the size of my readership (low hundreds). Then it got linked on Daring Fireball and metafilter, and traffic took off – I got 11,000+ readers in a day and a half. There was also a flood of comments and private emails. The tone of the conversation was extremely constructive and I learned a lot from reading what people had to say.
But when folks at Palm saw how much the post had taken off, there was concern that people would think I was speaking for and promising things on behalf of Palm, even though I had issued a number of disclaimers to preempt that effect. Honestly, I can’t blame Palm people for being concerned – there were a number of people who linked to the post saying things like “isn’t it great that Palm is doing this”. The difference between me doing something as a Palm employee and me doing something as a representative of Palm is a subtle one, but it is something I’ve run into several times as a blogger – in my previous job lots of people used to attribute things I wrote as being the official word of Adobe despite my disclaimers to the contrary.
To Palm’s credit, though, after reviewing my post and the feedback it had received, there was a general recognition internally that the conversation was a great thing and that we’d like that conversation to continue. But rather than have it be a conversation between me and the developer community, we decided that it would be better if we could widen the conversation to include even more people at Palm. And so here we are.
This is your chance to let Palm know what you would and would not like to see on the webOS platform, in particular in areas related to:
- Application installation and updating
- Ecommerce (purchase, trials, coupons, etc.)
- Security (code signing, testing, anti-phishing, malware, etc)
- Browsing and searching for applications
Now we need to establish some rules of the road:
- Software features are pretty much locked down for the Pre – this discussion is primarily longer term in nature
- That said, there are no guarantees or implications that anything you ask for is or will ever be part of webOS
- The opinions expressed here are not necessarily those of Palm or its employees
- If you tell us your super great new idea, you give Palm an irrevocable worldwide right to use your super great new idea without royalty, acknowledgement, or any other form of compensation. Click here to see the relevant legalese.
- Be nice!
Please note that if you’ve already posted your comment on my previous blog entry, you do not need to post it again. I’ve saved all comments and shared them with the team already. But feel free to post again if you have more to say.
Why don’t you setup a uservoice.com account to collect all these suggestions and let people vote on them? http://www.uservoice.com/
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As a user (not a developer,) I can’t live without a PDF viewer App called ‘PalmPDF’(Henk Jonas, metaviewsoft.de) I assume a single guy (or small group) in Germany created a single, free app that makes my Treo invaluable. -And an iPhone unthinkable. I keep years worth of handwritten notes on a SD card, with me at all times.
Please consider allowing us users to have access to these small, ‘home-brewed’ apps that have always made the Palm platform unique, open, and versatile.
From a current iPhone Developer:
- Let developers upload apps without having to wait for Palm to check them like Apple does. It’s very frustrating having to wait for Apple when you have a fix that you need to get release ASAP.
- Release the SDK as soon as possible.
- Don’t be like Apple and take complete control of the store. Google’s model is much better. Give developers freedom.
- Provide devices without having to sign for a Sprint contract/plan (like Google does)
Keep up the good work. From what I’ve seen the Pre looks like a real winner.
I would just like to echo what other developers have said: As a user I don’t like “stores” that I HAVE to use. I used to buy from a really large “store” until they “forced” me to install their store on my 755p. Actually I would prefer to buy directly from a developers site. Been a Palm user since the III and want to keep using Palm’s due to their great ability to use what I want to use on MY phone.
This has probably been mentioned, but just in case it hasn’t, I’d like to see some sort of device emulator available for the PC so that I can develop and test most of my application there instead of having to load it on the device itself every time I make a change.
1. Ability to connect a bluetooth keyboard, similar to the capability present in devices like Palm TX. This feature is lacking in the iPhone. It’s so simple to add this feature, and will greatly increase the productivity of the device for those people that want to enter text of more than, say, 1 paragraph in length.
This bluetooth keyboard capability is also present in Nokia phones.
First,thx u guys bring this excellent gift to all palmfans! I come form china, Use Palm PDA and treo over 10 yaers.
I have a few questions to ask right here which is the idea(thinking) of majority chinese users.
[b]1. [/b]Can new Webos support any Asian language,such as Simplified Chinese、traditional Chinese or Japanese?by which way to make it come true? original unicode?
[b]2. [/b] I konw u guys have already pulled out of china market,if the new webos support chinese, when u guys would come back to china as the #1 sellphone market of the world? form 01-01-09,china already to release 3G licenses,include CDMA2000 and WCDMA, I think the network is not a problem.
[b]3.[/b] The new Webos can’t run any oldOS prc,maybe the only way is use simulator.Do u guys have any plan to make one which simulator can support chinese and let us run old app-old PIM and read personal information?
As for supporting an application infrastructure:
1) A central app store is quite welcome to ensure ease of distribution for low cost applications. Apple does it mostly right, the only improvement on their model would be to provide both a vetted area and a non-checked area, so that approval processes would not need to delay the release. This would also allow bug fixes to be released quickly.
As for the payment models that should be supported for applications, single app, bundling, upgrades and money-back are the only important ones that need support (trials are the same as money back).
2) There needs to be a way to distribute applications outside of the app store, especially for in house applications. For these, there should be a way to sign phones as company phones, and provide them with a link an in house app store. This would also enable applications to be locked down to in house phones, if so desired. (And on the other side, provide a company white list of approved apps for use on the phone)
A further use of company certified phones could be to support volume deals on applications, a company could use their in house software to buy licenses in bulk, and the normal app store could then use the company certificate to distribute these applications and provide the license management.
For testing applications, direct download would be the easiest way to support it.
3) For updates, there should be some kind of update service that checks the download location of each application for updates automatically. For this you might need to define the format of an update file to provide the update information, to be maintained by the application provider. This update check should be able to do automatic updates.
4) All applications should be signed, so that specific signatures could be blocked from the phone. There would be an opt-in palm blacklist, and you could block them yourself on either the phone or the in house store. There would be two classes of signatures, one free without any checking, and one where you have to pay a small fee, but where the contact details are verified. This is essentially security by auditing, you do not prevent people doing harm, but you know who they are to punish them later if they misbehave.
5) Since applications cannot be checked thoroughly in an cost efficient manner, there should be three access levels to the functions of the phone:
green: cannot do much harm, has web access, can add/change information to synergy (I imagine synergy to provide a join of multiple tables, and applications can add/maintain their own table to be included in the shared synergy view), have their private database, can exchange information only via cut and paste, and have access to rough location information only (at the county level).
yellow: more dangerous, gain access to detailed location information, can read all shared databases, but not modify these
red: access to everything there is available on the phone.
In addition, an application should be able to permanently gain read or read/modify access to a database by asking the security manager for permission. The permanent permission is key here, you should be bothered by the security only once during installation.
Please make two emulators:
1. For us to test Pre Apps on the computer.
2. For us to run old apps on the Pre.
These are my only prerequisies to buying a Pre
Will there be any functionality similar to Microsoft’s System Center Mobile Device Manager?
http://www.windowsmobile.com/MobileDeviceManager
- security/password policies, file/device encryption
- remote management
- OTA deployment
- application dependency management
- allow/deny only certain applications etc.
Maybe it would be wise to make everything adaptable. With this I mean: real dynamic contacts. Most people have about 5 contacts they call or text most. These contacts should have some sort of speeddial function, or be at the top of the list automatically. So the people you call/text the most should always be on top of the list automatically.
First of all… VERY excited about the potential of the WebOS platform. I’m an enterprise developer and agree 100% with the point made by comment #13. We investigated being able to use iPhone’s to deploy an internal mobile client solution, but the AppStore model made that impossible for us, including the learning curve for our developers. So… we had to stay with our Windows Mobile based devices
It would be a very desirable feature if we could be able to deploy our own Enterprise App Catalog for WebOS based solutions.
It would be wise, Palm and developers alike, not to underestimate the WebOS platform for internal enterprise solutions. This is potentially a huge market being dominated by Microsoft at the moment, but as we all know, domination doesn’t necessarily mean superiority. Using web based technologies is a smart move, since this can potentially enable even our group of web developers to easily extend their expertise to a mobile platform.
Sorry, struggling to stay on point here, but a question was raised earlier regarding database support. Please could this be answered, as it would obviously make a big impact on the viability of Pre in the Enterprise.
Back to deployment… An App Catalog is not a bad idea, but app distribution should definitely not be limited to just that model. That having been said, lack of regulation or control could potentially lead to a whole bunch of nasty apps breaking my Pre. If I want to download and install an app, I’d like to know if there’s a degree of risk involved. This is where security certificates issued by Palm to approved apps can prove helpful. That can give developers the opportunity to develop a partnership with Palm and be rewarded for writing good apps. But, if you still want to write bad apps, or couldn’t care less about that program, no one will stop you from writing apps… but your users will be notified that your app is not certified.
Just a thought to throw in the pool.
Now… where’s that SDK!?
The RSS feed has been fixed, thank you!
Please. PLEASE. Write a “Palm Card” application that allows old Palm OS software to run on a Pre card. Yes, I know. Most old Palm stuff will not take advantage of the cool features of the Pre, and some will probably not run under any compatability feature, but if you want to attract current Palm/Treo/Centro users, you had better allow them to keep their familiar things. Then, as new software is developed for the Pre, we can drop the legacy software.
** Bundle StyleTap or provide the feature asked for in post #119. The Pre as presented appears to violate the promise of a path forward for Garnet users on Palm’s next OS.
** If apps are html, can they be written in php? If the pre supported php which in turn had access to the filesystem, I would think there is not much an app could not do.
** Also some means of source obfuscation is required to securely distribute apps.
** Even if apps can be written in php, which reduces source code exposure to “view source” in the browser, is there a way to make sure users can’t view the php source in some sort of file viewer on their Pre? I can’t see a developer spending a lot of time and $ writing an app if it can only be distributed as plain text without any protections. For instance, a user could easily comment out the trial period or copy protection portions of the javascript, php or html.
1. Strongly request to release the SDK to community as soon as possilbe even a beta version
2. We need to see what can be done with Mojo to decide whether we are going to support palm pre or not.
3. Don’t emulate the legacy plam software on palm pre , this will affect new software sale, that eventually affect the altitude of programmer to support palm pre or not.
In some ways this is putting the cart before the horse.
I’d rather see the SDK before I even worry about app distribution. Allowing the use of native code would make the SDK much more useful and could solve, for some people, the point raised in #2 (yes, I am one of those people). Provide a alternate SDK that would allow developer’s to chose the best tool for the job or allow the development of alternative tools/languages. It should not be as straitjacketed as Apple or Android platforms (what remained nice about PalmOS).
Well OK:
1) allow installation of code directly on the phone: do not require it to be loaded off a server.
2) Make it clear at installation that software is not “certified” and the risks involved.
3) Make it possible for software developers to use the technology of your app store on or from their web site for both limited distribution (e.g. internal enterprise, specific customers, trials, etc.) and retail distribution.
4) make optional, the use of your app store.
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1) Do NOT stick your nose in eBooks as Apple did. Books have been established longer than tech. Tech guys should stay OUT of judging eBooks.
2) I’d like to see a Twitterfeed for new apps. That would be helpful while at the desktop.
3) Have a web-accessible version of the store. This is a huge shortcoming of both Apple and Google. Again, this is great when at the desktop (or even on the road, using a netbook!).
Will “Palm Mojo” be available for desktop website construction as well ?
I ask this as a Chinese Palm fan, please please please make the webOS have a good support on Chinese(display and input), and please please please make it sell in China. we want nothing more…..
As a developer and User;
1. Update the public site to explain how the multiple Calendar/Email services work. What I want to know is can I have an Exchange (Work: Email, Contacts, Email), POP Email, Imap Email, A desktop app that syncs my home Outlook calendar and contacts but keeps them all in their own playground. With the ability to select what i want to overla[p and to add items and pick from a drop down where to save them.
2. The ability to download and install personaly written apps. The ability to self sign or have no signature and let them run once I have click on the am I sure box. (Would be great for internal apps for companies who support this device)
The SDK should be a fully functional simulator including the ability to dial phoen # and have the phone go thru the motions in making a call (Even though it is just going thru the motions)
If it doesn support now it should in the near future
1) Ability to at least open and view Word, Excel, Open office versions also.
2) Ability to view PDF (As an extra feture would be advanced support for PDF forms processing)
Allow developers to run Parrot Virtual Machine on your machine!
www dot parrot dot org
The perl comminuty is eager to do stuff on new platforms(i include myself)
A “official” palm post on perlporters could do the trick. Besides, is right on time, being that Parrot (the VM that runs Java, .NET, Python, PHP. Perl, Perl6, Basic, and many more) is about to be released to 1.0 in march.
Giving the WebOS that kind of power will open the gates to a HUGE number of apps, still keeping the advantage of reusing the skills that are more popular, and adding more (A lot of people knows BASIC, a lot more PHP, etc etc)
Hi, I jus have a couple of suggestions. I currently us a Samsung Instinct. It’s an ok phone. The problem is that there is no mobile broadband. So I will really need wi-fi. Also, my wife has an HTC Touch. I honestly have to tell you that something that I wish my Instinct had is the copy/cut and paste function from windows mobile.
I’d like to see another post or follow up to this one, to be honest at this point.
I would also like to re-re-re-stress that Palm needs to start Day Zero full on developer relations; I cannot begin to go into the horrific nightmare some other platform is causing, on MANY levels, and the seeming outright contempt that is being shown to developers…a lot of which the general public has no clue about (yet).
We need more information, and preferably, before March. We need tools, guys.
auto-update: I see apps not as installations but as update streams, so a robust auto-update, to keep all apps in one’s phone in sync with latest revs, and with any OS revs.
segment app store: people self-organize into tribes so cater to more than one ‘Palm tribe’: ‘experimental’ apps, vetted apps, ‘private’ (enterprise/organization) apps, etc.
WebOS demo is really fantastic! But it still have a long way to go to success. It’s a good opp to interact with WebOS developers to show my opinion here. I really want Palm to success!
As an user in China, I care more about internationalization of WebOS. A very important reason that Palm is not as popular in East Asia (China, Japan, Korea) as in North America is bad support for Double Byte Character Set (DBCS) support. Even latest unreleased OS6 never mentioned build-in DBCS-support. We have to process & display based on 3rd party software. Althrough iPhone is not officially release in China, its build-in local language interface & display support lead to its popular in China (In my office, 5 out 30 staffs use iPhone, that is more than 15% market share. It’s amazing considering about 600 million+ cell phone user, twice number of US population, in China!).
1. Build-in support for unicode is bottomline for a success mobile OS in East Asia. Extended support for other encoding system (such as GB2312, GBK, BIG5,JS-???) will be perfect!
2. Good develop enviroment for input method programing is also very important. Besides high-efficient PIM & rich software resource, an excellent input method with perfect keybord support (like MacroHard & HandEase) is a key reason for choosing treo according feedback from treo forum. But based on existing information, programer can’t develop an input method with only HTML, CSS & Javascript.
3. Local installtion for non-Sprint (or rumored Vodafone) user.
Previous Palm devices used to support device locking (JackFlash, JackSprat, FlashPro, etc.), but the new architecture has closed out the user who wants to modify their device (say, to start up with a particular program, or have a program always running, even if the device is reset to (now (assuming these things are possible)) factory settings) to fill a particular need (but really, this could be for ANY purpose). What I am getting at is that (referring to the Centro/Treo x) programs like Warden Security, TealLock, or SecureX cannot be put built into the operating system’s image on a device except by a Palm insider! It would make the devices much less desirable by thieves (and more desirable to customers) to make device encryption >and< locking standard on all Palm Prē devices, not to mention give us peace of mind (this means using a good encryption algorithm, like Twofish, and not a decrepit one, like DES). Don’t promise anything too early, either; take as long as is needed to implement these features (webOS, the developer SDK, etc.). If it takes until later this year, or even until next year, it’s fine. It’s okay to hurry sometimes, but not to rush.
Also, it seems as though people abominate cloud computing (myself included). Dummy terminals in internet cafés and in huge organizations/corporations or banks are really the only places for such technologies. Just think of cheap people like me who pay for per kilobye cent usage of the internet on their phones (which makes downloading a megabyte’s worth of data cost 10 dollars); I have a pretty good idea where this HTML/CSS/Javascript thing is going.
I also think that the built-in trial functionality would be a very good idea, as Anderson (poster #3) describes.
It seems as though people abominate cloud computing (myself included). Dummy terminals in internet cafés and in huge organizations/corporations or banks are really the only places for such technologies. Just think of cheap people like me who pay for per kilobye cent usage of the internet on their phones (which makes downloading a megabyte’s worth of data cost 10 dollars); I have a pretty good idea where this HTML/CSS/Javascript thing is going.
Previous Palm devices used to support device locking (JackFlash, JackSprat, FlashPro, etc.), but the new architecture has closed out the user who wants to modify their device (say, to start up with a particular program, or have a program always running, even if the device is reset to (now (assuming these things are possible)) factory settings) to fill a particular need (but really, this could be for ANY purpose). What I am getting at is that (referring to the Centro/Treo x) programs like Warden Security, TealLock, or SecureX cannot be put built into the operating system’s image on a device except by a Palm insider! It would make the devices much less desirable by thieves (and more desirable to customers) to make device encryption >and< locking standard on all Palm Prē devices, not to mention give us peace of mind (this means using a good encryption algorithm, like Twofish, and not a decrepit one, like DES). I hope you guys take this into consideration for FUTURE devices, because it still pisses me off (although I admire Palm) every time I look at my handheld.
Don’t promise anything too early, either; take as long as is needed to implement these features (webOS, the developer SDK, etc.). If it takes until later this year, or even until next year, it’s okay. It’s alright to hurry sometimes, but not to rush.
I also think that the built-in trial functionality would be a very good idea, as Anderson (poster #3) describes.
I would like to see the ability to distribute beta versions of my application outside of the App Store like environment (as in sending an install file as an attachment) so that I can iron out all the bugs with my dedicated base of fans before exposing the application to all webOS enabled devices.
Is there any way this WebOS can be ported to the Desktop or at least a NetBook version? That would be so ideal!
1. Please don’t ignore developers from various countries across the world. Provide some option to purchase unlocked “pre” for development.
2. A contest like “Android Developer Challenge” will be great to attract developers in huge number and starts with a bang.
3. Most of the developers can’t market the products themselves, so appstore going to be great help. Restricted installation ( allowing installation only thru store kinda ) will eliminate piracy completely.
I’m with Kai in post #131. I’ve been trolling this blog for weeks and no feedback,no new items, no updates on roll-out times. Come on Palm! If you’re really serious about a comeback with the Pre, you’re going to have to go the extra mile for us developers and give us GOOD reason to want to stay excited about your new platform. Enthusiastic developers WILL be the life blood of the Pre’s success. Get enough developers frustrated and you’ve lost the fight before it even started.
Let’s see a bit more bite to match up to the bark!
Every day you guys hold out that SDK from us you’re just shooting yourselves in the foot. We’re getting antsy. We getting tired of seeing nothing new on the blog or the developer site.
We’re ready to start building apps. What’s the hold up? A reply would be nice.
Make it possible to post applications for a client as a third-party developer: the iPhone app store won’t let me develop an app for a client, then upload it as the client from my location. The folks at Apple seriously told us we had to drive to our client’s location and do it from their site! Please recognize the difference between app ownership and app development.
I would like the “Universal Search” functionality to access built-in apps and be extensible to new apps. For example, you open the Pre and start typing. After searching the onboard databases and giving the options to search the web, additional options could be “add to tasks” or “add to calendar”. New apps should have the ability to add their own options to this list also. Thanks for listening!
Will there be a way for developers to extend the applications shipped with the Pre? So if I wanted to add a menu item in emails or camera, would I have the ability to do so?
dears sir may you have already answer, my question is: this OS could run on a treo 650? i.e. could this upgrade and relaunch most palm device on market? and become the real challenge to microsoft?
Bit more on non-European language support: Have it configured out of the box. Don’t make me go hunting for 3rd-part software or trying to figure out which fonts I need and how to install the correct IME – it’s bad enough on Windows Desktop and worse on Windows Mobile. Registry Editing just to be able to display a foreign language? Not cool!
Also, you really need to think about how searching will work for languages like Chinese. “But it’s easy,” I hear you say, “just match character for character!”. Well, no. Not quite.
Take Chinese for example. If someone has a rare character in their name, it could take 30 seconds or a minute or more to find it in the IME. That’s quite a long time if all you want to do is call them. What is far preferable in that case is to be able to enter the pinyin for their name – instead of (or in addition to) the characters – and have it come up with everyone whose name matches those characters. It’s likely this will produce a number of results, but it’s also possible to know multiple people with the same full name in English, though less common.
Same for Japanese and possibly Korean as well (and any other languages I’ve not mentioned). And let it be customizable! Provide your own default implementation, sure (in fact, please do!), but let others install their own. This would, for example, make it possible for people to map Characters to Cantonese pronunciation rather than Mandarin if they’re in Hong Kong or Guangzhou or wherever.
This should also be applied to all core apps, and to 3rd part apps where applicable and possible. It would not be cool to have this functionality in the contacts listing but not in the calendar.
There’s been a few people on here requesting Chinese support, and there’s likely to be a lot more who’ll buy the phone if it was available in China (for a reasonable price).
Though I’m likely to be buying the unlocked GSM version, assuming there’s no major problems in the CDMA version and the SDK is sufficiently open and flexible. Oh, and assuming you’re going to be selling an unlocked GSM version in a timely manner.
Finally, where’s the next blog post? It’s nice to have this one, but making a single big post and staying silent isn’t what a lot of us were hoping for…
Palm, we’re waiting. Where’s the SDK?
Developers really need some info guys, the fire will die if you drag this out… you need to keep us excited and not let us forget how awesome this phone is.
Release whatever you have for the SDK TODAY, not tomorrow, not next week. Even if it’s handwritten notes from the Palm development team… we need to know so we can make plans to support this platform or not. Really. And if that is not possible… maybe you don’t have the handwritten notes yet… at least narrow the release date down… 30 days? 60 days? Come on guys… you KNOW how this works!
While I’m no serious coder, I have some strong opinions on the matter:
- Applications, once created, should be stored in a single zip file. The Palm should be able to recognize these zip files as programs (through an XML file stored inside) and automatically give the user options to install, upgrade, or remove.
- While having an official app store is important, the Pre should offer the same install options no matter how it receives a program: through a 3rd-party site, e-mail, or otherwise.
- Applications should be stored on the Pre in their own subdirectories, so that deleting ALL of an app is as simple as deleting the folder (or running an uninstall wizard that does the same thing in the background).
I’ve only made one program in Adobe AIR, but I love the way AIR recognizes an application, installs it, and offers to put links on the Desktop / Start Menu for you. Palm could do the same with their cards system.
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Here are some of my needs, some have already been said:
1- Possibility to install applications directly from the user’s PC (or at least the possibility to have our own store). Our applications are not for the wide public but rather for large corporations. They should not appear on a public store.
2- Possibility for an application to communicate directly with the user PC (thru the USB cable, not over the air) or if not possible, the possibility for the application to write to the mass storage drive that is visible to the PC.
3- Code hiding is imperative. We can’t have our source code visible. It must be protected somehow. Commercial applications need to be protected. If me code is visible, you can count me out.
4- A good simulator/emulator for debugging.
5- An SDK available ASAP (even a beta, to see what’s coming) or at least an API function list or help file.
6- An official developer forum (web based and/or NNTP based)
Thanks
Adding to my post.
7- A unique device id (serial number)
proper use of Synergy. I do not know if this has been covered or not, but I would like Synergy to ask me if which profile pic i would like to display on my phone to identify my contact. In other words, if it recognized that in both gchat and facebook my one contact has two pics, it would ask me to choose which pic to display. This way, whenever my friend updates their profile pic, it would dynamically change on my phone as well. Of course, still have the option to choose a pic saved on my phone, but that is old and boring.
Please, release the SDK as soon as possible. I can’t wait to start playing with it. It will be nice to have a virtual device to test the applications on the dev environment.
Not really Application Distribution related but, since you palm guys are supposedly reading this :
All this multitask multi app thing is great, but we NEED a way to close ALL or MULTIPLE apps at once.
After some normal activity I guess many apps will be open. For order freaks like me, that can be a problem. And there will always be the suscipion that active process will use juice and the need for the users to be reassured and that they can close the apps.
Now if 15 apps are open that’s really not pratical
Give us some gesture or shortcut to :
- select multiple cards that we can throw away at once
- kill all apps at once
Thanks!!
I can’t imagine myslef constantly throwing cards away which I’ll do..