The early access program, one week in

21 BY Gray Norton

It has been a week since we announced our expansion of the early access program for the Palm Mojo SDK, so I wanted to give you a quick update and thank you for your interest!

We’ve been thrilled and, frankly, awed by your response. As you may have seen on Twitter, @palm_inc recently tweeted that we’d received about a gazillion applications for early access, and that’s not far from the truth.

We let our first batch of developers in late last week, and another batch early this week. These folks are getting started, and we’re taking their feedback and learning from their experiences as we work to get the SDK ready for the rest of the world.

We expect to accept additional developers into the program each week. The SDK is still in active development, so we’re starting slowly — we need to make sure that our tools and support systems are ready before we scale. But we are eager to get the SDK into everyone’s hands, as we know that third-party applications will play a huge role in the success of webOS and Pre.

For those of you who have already applied, we thank you for your patience as we come up to speed. As noted in the program FAQ, we can’t provide status updates on individual applications, but we’ll do our best to give frequent public updates on this blog. If you haven’t applied yet, it’s not too late — you can submit your application here.

Thanks again!

Gray Norton
Product Manager, Palm Mojo SDK

Comments (21)

  1. Austin says:

    Still waiting patiently. Can’t wait to get the SDK also. Are games like last on the list of priorities probably. Feel like I should of submitted something else instead of a game.

    Did we get an email if we got denied?

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  5. finid says:

    Thanks for the update, but I don’t think it will hurt to give updates on the most exciting applications already submitted by devs. Give us something really juicy to talk about

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  9. Gothy says:

    it is a bit unfair i guess to provide an SDK for some and nothing for others. call it alpha\beta version and release with all those bugs :) but for everyone

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  12. Chuq Von Rospach says:

    To answer a few questions:

    Games are definitely NOT last on the list of priorities. They’re actually fairly high on the list; they’re also a very popular option for people submitting applications, which makes our life tough choosing — which is a good thing. Lowest thing on the priority list? Probably applications that emit noises that represent various bodily functions. But that’s just my opinion.

    How many is a gazillion? It’s — lots! more than three, even. But less than infinity.

    Release this as a beta? Well, life is unfair. To be honest, one of the main reasons we’re limiting access now is to make sure that those that do get the SDK get really good support. It does nobody any good if they can get the code but can’t get their questions answered. We want to make sure that developers LIKE programming for the Pre, not just that they can.

    We will talk about what’s being developed when we can. there’s some really interesting things happening! Stay Tuned!

    chuq
    Developer Community Manager

  13. Anonymous Coward Pretending to Be Ruby says:

    “Release this as a beta? Well, life is unfair. ”
    That’s obnoxious. Don’t blame ‘life’ for your arbitrary decisions.

    You don’t care about whether developers like working WITH Palm. It’s fortunate that you don’t have to interact with people.

  14. unwired says:

    I have a great idea for a location-based application that would be a killer. However, I’m no developer. Happy to share my idea, feel free to contact me via email.

  16. andraz says:

    As someone else said:
    developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers, developers,developers, developers, developers, developers,

    with a smelly ocean under armpits.

    3fs has enrolled in this pre-launch SDK craze too, looking forward to the developing kit.

  17. Scott Bradford says:

    With the Pre coming out in a short 2 1/2 weeks, I hope the full SDK release is coming soon…it’s not just for software developers, after all. We web professionals need to make sure that our web sites work properly in the WebOS browser too!

  18. Rick says:

    six weeks since a mention is _not_ a frequent update.

    News of any kind would be appreciated.

  19. Scott Bradford says:

    Two days until release, and still no full-release SDK so webmasters can ensure the proper functioning of their sites in the WebOS browser.

    I don’t get it.

  21. Arun says:

    Gray, it is now a couple of days after the Pre release and there is still no dates for the SDK availability. Here is a good article that asks “Where are all the Palm Pre apps?” – http://www.fiercedeveloper.com/story/where-are-all-palm-pre-apps/2009-06-08.
    Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal says “I consider the Pre to be potentially the strongest rival to the iPhone to date, provided it attracts lots of third-party apps, which it sorely lacks at launch.”. ( http://ptech.allthingsd.com/20090603/palms-new-pre-takes-on-iphone/).
    We submitted our early access application the day of the announcement and didn’t even get an automated acknowledgement! There is positive energy surrounding the Pre and it would be a pity to take advantage of it.
    We hope you’ll release a full SDK very soon.