What You Can Do with webOS: A Few Examples
Now that the Palm® Mojo™ Software Development Kit is available to the public, you don’t just have to take Palm’s word for what it offers you. Not to go on about it here, but perhaps you’ve read – say in Palm CTO Mitch Allen’s book – that webOS provides capabilities that set it apart from previous mobile operating systems. Or that webOS development offers a shorter, more gradual learning curve than other mobile platforms, because it is based on standard web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. And maybe you heard that webOS – through its multitasking and gesture-based interactions – enables mobile apps to employ an outstanding user interface.
But again, you don’t have to take our word for it anymore. Now, you can see for yourself. Download the Mojo SDK 1.1, install it, and poke around the Beta version of the webOSdev web site for the information you’ll need to develop for the webOS platform.
One of the easiest ways to get an idea of what you can do with webOS is to have a look at some of the first apps and their features and user interfaces. Here are a few examples:
 GoodFood restaurant listing |  Handmark stocks |
 Match.com home scene |  Zumobi Sporting News Pro Baseball |
 Pandora Now Playing scene |  New York Times news |
 Luminosity Speed Brain |  Today Show home scene |
 LinkedIn Connections scene |  FlightView Status scene |
Another good place to look for examples of webOS application elements is in the User Interface Guidelines, where you can see many of the features expected in successful webOS applications and learn what it takes to add them to your own application using a handy set of widgets and other techniques. You can also find examples at the Palm customer site.
We think you'll soon be writing your own apps and building your own examples of what webOS can do. To encourage you, we leave you with the words of two of your colleagues who have already worked on webOS development projects. First, this from Lawrence Davison, head of engineering at Mark/Space:
The innovations of the webOS platform and Palm's support made it a snap to implement the Proximity Sync feature of our Missing Sync product. The willingness of the engineering department to listen and fix bugs and provide features was equally impressive.And, finally, this from Dejay Clayton, manager of Client Technologies, NYTimes.com:
The Palm webOS is based upon strong and tested technologies that are known well by developers, allowing organizations to efficiently prototype applications in an agile and cost-effective manner.
Happy developing!