
Please Steal These webOS Features - ugh
http://ignorethecode.net/blog/2012/02/21/steal_webos_features/
======
firefoxman1
>(On task switching) _"Nothing else I’ve seen comes close."_

So true. It just _feels_ SO much more like multitasking than any other
platform.

And notifications? I agree, amazing.

I wish the article had covered the Gesture Area. I know the Touchpad did away
with it, but the Gesture Area made everything so fluid, easy and intuitive.

Another interface feature I LOVE is the swipe-to-delete. The super-hot iOS
ToDo app "Clear" has that exact behavior and people love it.

And how about TouchStone charging? Sooo nice. Pretty sure Palm was the first
mainstream phone maker to have this functionality built-in.

One more feature that was amazing was the ability to bump-to-sync with other
newer webOS devices. It's like the popular app Bump on steroids.

...And of course we all know how the apps were HTML/JS which was a brilliant
idea. Why make everyone learn a new language just to write apps?

~~~
rboyce
The gesture area definitely made things fluid and easy, but unfortunately, it
was absolutely _not_ intuitive. If you haven't done (or have forgotten) the
first use tutorial, it takes some luck to figure out how to navigate webOS. (I
think that Clear has the same problem: swipe to mark as done/delete is not
discoverable; it only works for people who already know of swipe to delete as
a system gesture.)

~~~
firefoxman1
That is true, but I'd say swiping backward is about as intuitive as the now-
famous "pinch-to-zoom" gesture: once you know it, it makes sense. It just
takes warming people up to the idea; a luxury Palm didn't really have.

------
fragsworth
I know lots of Apple fanatics are extreme minimalists but I really think iOS
should also steal the _back button_ from the Android. I very much dislike when
one app causes another app to open, and then I have to press the home button
and find the original app to go back to it. And if I'm lucky, it's still in
the same state as before.

~~~
masklinn
> I really think iOS should also steal the back button from the Android.

There are many potentially interesting things in Android (although I think
WebOS would be a far better source of ideas to steal, it's always been).

But not the back button. The back button is probably the worst part of
Android's UI, it's the embodiment of "mystery meat" navigation and interface:
a hardware button which behaves in a completely arbitrary and essentially
random manner without providing any clue as to what will happen when it's
tapped.

~~~
barrkel
Android's back button is its single best feature. Without it, I might not
still be using Android. What it should do: go back to the screen you were
previously on. Android apps are generally full-screen apps; there's little
mystery there (IMO).

Unfortunately, Google is mandating that it acquire "up button" semantics
rather than back button semantics - for many apps, it's supposed to go to the
"top" level before it exits out. That I'm not a fan of, and I'm afraid it's
going to encourage its "mystery meat" nature, because it'll no longer act like
a browser back button.

~~~
drivebyacct2
>Unfortunately, Google is mandating that it acquire "up button" semantics
rather than back button semantics - for many apps, it's supposed to go to the
"top" level before it exits out.

You have a source on that? I know of only one Google app that does this if
called from an outside Activity or notification.

~~~
barrkel
<http://developer.android.com/design/patterns/navigation.html>

"If your app was reached via the system mechanisms of notifications or home
screen widgets, Up behaves as described for app-to-app navigation, above.

" _For the Back key, you should make navigation more predictably by inserting
into the task's back stack the complete upward navigation path to the app's
topmost screen._ This way, a user who has forgotten how they entered your app
can safely navigate to the app's topmost screen before exiting it.

"For example, Gmail's Home screen widget has a button for diving directly to
its compose screen. After following that path, the Back key first returns to
the Inbox, and from there continues to Home."

(Emphasis added.)

~~~
drivebyacct2
Thanks, wasn't aware of this and frankly am quite disappointed by it.

~~~
akkartik
I got bitten by it just yesterday. I was setting an alarm. I pick the alarm,
click on 'Time', set the time, hit the 'set' button. Then the time goes away
and I'm back on the alarm screen, and I hit the back button to exit the app.
But that 'cancels' my change and the alarm goes back to the old time.

It's a combination of setting alarms having too many screens, and android
having trained me to hit back-back-back when I'm done with an app.

~~~
barrkel
Hmm. When I'm done with an app, I usually hit the home key. I usually use
'back' when I'm taken to another app by some other means: an email
notification, a link starting the browser, opening a file in a file browser.
Perhaps the confusion lies in different usage behaviours?

And FWIW, I just tried doing what you describe with the ICS clock / alarm app.
It worked as expected for me: after tapping "set", the alarm was set, and Back
took me back to the clock, and another Back exited the app.

One practical way the new semi-broken approach affects me is with
JustPictures, a photo viewing app. I use it in conjunction with ES File
Explorer. It used to be that when you launched a photo from the file explorer,
it would come up in JustPictures, and then you'd return to the file browser
when you tapped Back. But now, after JustPictures was updated to better
conform with guidelines a month or two back, it goes into its own "tile" view
of the folder before sending me back to the file browser. This behaviour is
according to the new guidelines, but I find it quite upsetting. I launched
JustPictures not because it has its own top screen and file system navigation
etc., but because it has more reasonable photo viewing functionality
(specifically, file-based rather than media library based) than the gallery
app.

The new Android approach seems focused on becoming more like iOS, where each
app is its own silo, rather than how it started out, with activities blurring
the distinction between apps and enabling a higher level of integration. But
the more Android becomes like iOS, the less reason I have to prefer it over
iOS.

There's actually a similar dynamic going on with Firefox. Firefox is slowly
cloning Chrome's look and feel, and I have to work harder and harder to get
the menu bar, status bar etc. back in place. The day I can no longer do that,
is the day in which I might as well give up on Firefox and use Chrome. (Well,
that and Chrome's text selection algorithm. It's absolutely hideous for this
compulsive text-highlighting reader.)

~~~
akkartik
_"I just tried doing what you describe with the ICS clock / alarm app. It
worked as expected for me: after tapping "set", the alarm was set, and Back
took me back to the clock.."_

Are these the screens you see?

\- Clock with alarm time

\- 'Alarms' page with list of alarms and 'add alarm' button

\- 'Set alarm' page with time, repeat, ringtone, etc. and cancel/delete/ok
buttons at the bottom

\- Set time - with the dials for hour and minute, and cancel/set buttons at
the bottom

I'm talking about adjusting the time dials, hitting 'Set', returning to the
'Set alarm' page, hitting back, which simulates hitting 'cancel', throws away
my change (without asking for confirmation), and returns me to the 'Alarms'
page.

Does this make more sense? I'm on Ice Cream Sandwich if that helps. (Being
forced to upgrade a device with a smaller viewing area to an OS that assumes a
galaxy-sized screen, that's a whole separate rant.)

~~~
akkartik
I'm starting to realize it's partly because backing out of an app was a way in
my mind to close the app. But ICS doesn't seem to pay attention to that
anymore, so you're right, I should just hit the home key.

------
untog
I never got to try WebOS, and I really wish I had (I know I can download an
emulator, but you can't emulate day-to-day usage).

That said, I'm using a Windows Phone these days, and it's fantastic. No,
really. The UI is amazing, and going back to my old Android phone feels
incredibly clunky by comparison. I wouldn't recommend one just yet- there's
still work to do. For one, third party apps can't interface with native apps-
for instance, the Messaging app seamlessly combines SMS, Facebook and Live
chat, but I can't hook in GChat. If/when they get that set up they'll have a
very loyal customer in me.

~~~
freehunter
I would really love them to put in more apps for the chat[1]. GChat, AIM, etc.
Some of this may be up to the developers of the application in question:
Google may not allow Microsoft to do the GChat. Google doesn't even supply a
Google+ app, nor a truly working web interface for Windows Phone.

I'm using ICS on my Touchpad. It's nice as a tablet OS for a power user, but
after using WP7 I don't know how much I would want to go back to Android on my
phone. There's just not that much I do on my phone where I need to sacrifice a
slick and intuitive interface for the sake of deeper access to the system. On
my tablet I need that and am grateful for it, but I'd rather not fiddle with
my phone.

[1]I should add, this is a sticking point for WebOS for me as well. Very nice
chat app, but no Facebook chat drops it down the drain for me. There's no way
to integrate Facebook chat into it without Facebook doing it themselves, and
they aren't planning on doing so.

~~~
untog
_Google may not allow Microsoft to do the GChat_

Well, GChat is openly accessible via XMPP, so it's quite possible to do it
without Google's permission. The question is whether MS would want to do it,
at the risk of marginalising Live chat.

I'd like to believe they've moved on from that mindset, but I'm not quite
convinced. Certainly, I'm not sure if they'd want to provide user support for
GChat through official WP channels. What I'd love is for WP to provide hooks
for developers to make their own GChat XMPP service, and slot it into the OS.

Services as opposed to apps makes a lot of sense for WP, because it's already
deliberately non-app centric.

------
atourgates
This article is a wonderful articulation of some of what I've been feeling
since I replaced my Palm Pre with an iPhone 4 nearly a couple years ago.

There are simply some things that WebOS's UI got better than iOS - and nearly
two years later, using what is generally lauded as being the best mobile UI in
the industry, I still miss some of those things.

I have a recurring daydream where Android incorporates the best of WebOS into
its next release, and it's suddenly far-and-away the best mobile OS.

~~~
p1itopre
"I have a recurring daydream where Android incorporates the best of WebOS into
its next release, and it's suddenly far-and-away the best mobile OS."

Its happening already. Matias Duarte (
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matias_Duarte> ) has been working his magic for
sometime now.

~~~
smacktoward
The problem is that ICS is the only Android version for phones that includes
any of Duarte's magic, and getting ICS out to the huge population of users of
existing Android devices is a major problem. Most won't get it at all, and the
few devices that will get it are getting it verrrrry slowly. And even if you
go to buy a _new_ device today, odds are that it won't come with ICS, and
there are few guarantees that it will even get an upgrade later on.

That's not really Google's fault -- it has much more to do with the various
(crappy) carrier- and device-manufacturer specific customizations having to
all be carted over to ICS -- but it does mean that for the vast majority of
users the "Android experience" is going to be stuck at 2.x quality until 2013
at least. Which is a shame.

 _Edit: clarified that first sentence refers to versions of Android available
for phones. You know, the versions of Android people actually care about._

~~~
oflannabhra
I agree with most of what you said, except "That's not really Google's fault".

I think it is Google's fault, they created the ecosystem that allowed carriers
and manufacturers to lazily update devices (or not do it at all), and all of
Google's stern talk about timely updates seems to have not affected the system
at all. A secondary result of that ecosystem is the lively ROM community, but
that seems like a poor gap-fill to me.

I think Google made too many concessions (or gave too much power) to carriers
and manufacturers and is now paying the price in a fractured OS landscape.

~~~
MatthewPhillips
> I think Google made too many concessions (or gave too much power) to
> carriers and manufacturers and is now paying the price in a fractured OS
> landscape.

How are they paying the price?

~~~
oflannabhra
By having the latest version of their OS running on 1.12%[1] of Android
devices?

1\. <http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2400206,00.asp>

~~~
MatthewPhillips
In what way does this negatively affect Google?

------
Xuzz
One of the cool parts of webOS being released under the Apache license is that
it makes patents much less of an issue. The Apache license's patent grants
mean that Apple, Google, Microsoft, or anyone else can freely take the best
parts from webOS without having to worry about HP suing them. (Palm had a lot
of valuable patents on mobile/smartphone UI, which are now essentially off the
table.)

~~~
ConstantineXVI
Provided they "take the best parts" by re-using their code. The license
doesn't kick in if you reimplement their patented functionality in your own
code.

~~~
koenigdavidmj
Chances are that somebody giving you a patent license via the Apache license
is also going to be quite reasonable about letting you reimplement it.

~~~
ConstantineXVI
You still don't legally get a patent license; if you don't have one and HP
decides to drop a patent suit on you (say their printer business flops and
they need cash), you're toast.

~~~
koenigdavidmj
You don't _get_ a patent license, I know. What I meant was that if a company
is willing to license a patent by putting a so-patented bit of code under the
Apache license, then they are likely to be willing to explicitly give a patent
license to reimplementors as well.

~~~
Xuzz
However, can you incorporate a minimal portion of the HP code to get the
patent license? Maybe just use one function or something, just to make it a
derived work?

------
51Cards
I still feel that WebOS's GMail application is one of the best yet on a mobile
device. I have a TouchPad, an Android Tablet and an Android Phone. When I hear
the email 'chime' go off, I always grab the TouchPad first. The sliding panes
UI design to me is brilliant.

~~~
j_col
Worth pointing out for non-webOS people that the mail application on
Touchpad/Pre is for _all_ email providers, not just GMail.

~~~
51Cards
True, good point. I sometimes forget that as I only use it for Gmail.

------
Hovertruck
"The cards UI for switching between apps in webOS is such an idea. I don’t
think I need to elaborate."

Well that really sucks for people reading the article who have never used
webOS...

~~~
masklinn
The whole task switcher of WebOS looks like (iOS) Safari's tab-switching (with
apps instead of pages of course), except with more goodness: the applications
stay live (à la Android) and can be seen updating in the switcher, you flick
applications off-screen to close them, it's possible to group application
cards to make switching between a group faster, etc...

It's all very neat, and very easy to understand. You can see the WebOS 1.0
cards demo here: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUSui3rH1a8>

~~~
ernesth
Is app switching different on other smartphones? I only have a symbian which
does quite the same.

~~~
zbuc
On iOS the app switching is handled via a list of recently open applications
accessed by double tapping the home button.

You don't get a view of the app's window contents like you do in WebOS.
Probably because 1) it wouldn't visually fit with the way the app switching is
laid out on iOS and 2) iOS doesn't let apps run in the background, their state
is frozen to disk and their process terminated when you switch.

edit: it looks like this [http://cloud.addictivetips.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/11/Lo...](http://cloud.addictivetips.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/11/Lock-Screen-Multitasking.jpg) \-- the app contents
push up and the bottom of the screen gets a list of apps inside it.

------
rogerbinns
Android also has a central place for your accounts, and there is an
AccountManager API to get access to them. You'll find your Google, Skype,
Facebook, linkedin etc in there (and apps can add their own.)
[http://developer.android.com/reference/android/accounts/Acco...](http://developer.android.com/reference/android/accounts/AccountManager.html)

Since iOS doesn't have this, and many developers did their apps on iOS first,
they ignore the functionality and ask you for credentials etc again. It is
extremely annoying. I regularly contact app developers to point out they could
do better.
[https://plus.google.com/110166527124367568225/posts/bz1pN3az...](https://plus.google.com/110166527124367568225/posts/bz1pN3azC21)

I encourage other Android users to do the same. You should never have to re-
enter credentials the system already knows about.

------
vibrunazo
I never used webOS. But I have the impression the author isn't familiar with
Android. It seems most of the features the talks about webOS having better
than iOS are alredy on Android. Better multitasking -- showing you screenshots
of running apps and tabs. App intercommunication (intents). Shared account
info. Etc.

In fact, the only time the author wrote about Android was when he said Android
notifications sucks and he loves how he can drag notifications away in webOS.
But you can do that same thing in Android 4.0.

Then again, I never really used webOS myself, so this could be just an
outsider's misconceptions. Is the author really missing Android features or is
webOS really all that much better in doing what Android already does?

~~~
commandar
Mattias Duarte, who was the lead UX designer on WebOS, is now head of UX
development for Android. ICS has lifted a _lot_ of ideas from WebOS as a
result.

That said, WebOS multitasking is still _much_ better than even ICS. The
thumbnail menu in ICS is an improvement over the old Android task switcher,
but it doesn't even come close to the fluidity of swiping up to bring up the
card view and then flicking between running apps (which aren't thumbnails;
they update in realtime as you're looking at them).

>App intercommunication (intents). Shared account info.

These are definitely areas where Android is still ahead. The account
integration in WebOS is okay, but works far better in Android. And intent are
_the_ killer feature of Android, IMO.

~~~
nieve
The live update is good enough & the viewing quality sufficient that with the
homebrew patch for larger active cards (and the patching is another feature I
miss on ICS) I'll flick up, drag over slightly to read a number or address off
another card, and drop back rather than bothering with copy & paste. I do the
same for an irc notification out of wIRC or a repository address for wTerm..
webOS is the only tablet UI I've used that made working on something in one
app while referring to 2-3 web pages & emails fluid and comfortable. The
cognitive load is lower, the act of switching faster, and the gestures more
natural (you don't have to aim for finger-sized targets, most things take
advantage of Fitt's Law). It's not visually stunning, but you miss it on
anything else.

~~~
commandar
>the homebrew patch for larger active cards

I had missed this one. Thanks for the heads up.

~~~
nieve
For anyone else who's looking it's actually "Bigger Active Screen when
minimized" and also moves the cards closer together. It's marked as
3.0.2-3.0.4, but installs and works fine for me on 3.0.5:
[http://patches.webos-
internals.org/?do=browse&webosver=3...](http://patches.webos-
internals.org/?do=browse&webosver=3.0.4&category=Misc)

------
MetalMASK
I echo with this post greatly. I've tried out ipad and transformer (Android),
the touchpad is really indeed the most intuitive to use. I use it daily for
browsing the web, writing Emails and playing some games -- and I leave the
frequently used app only, switching between the windows is intuitive and very
snappy, making multi-tasking not only possible but very usable.

I didn't even bother to install Android on my touchpad (even it's dual-boot)
cause the lag on android is a huge let down.

WebOS's UI is similar to iOS in a lot of ways, it's like iOS (once you open
the app/home screen) with an additional desktop/workspace. I look forward to
some open-source development for the Touchpad. (First request would be a good
pdf viewer)

------
goatslacker
webOS is far from perfect but damn it is still the best mobile OS out there. I
would trade off some performance to have these features in my mobile phone.

It's sad the general public doesn't feel the same way and I really hope other
mobile OSs can learn from webOS and innovate on those problems that webOS has
solved really well.

------
prophetjohn
I don't understand how Android's notification system is supposed to be a
cluttered mess relative to iOS. Looking at screenshots, it looks they're both
pretty similar, but iOS having more stuff in there.

~~~
LukasMathis
I think part of the problem comes down to application behavior. On my Android
phone, tons of applications generate notifications that really shouldn't, so
the notification widget constantly fills up with needless stuff.

~~~
prophetjohn
Well, I haven't used iOS since version 3, but I see screenshots with
notifications for weather, stocks, words with friends, pretty much everything
on your phone.

Maybe I've just got notifications turned off for other apps, but on
Gingerbread, I only get notifications for texts, emails and updates.

~~~
LukasMathis
Weather and Stocks aren't notifications. I guess the idea there is that you
can see the weather forecast and your stocks at a single glance, but I've
turned them off. They're annoying, I agree.

As for everything else, apps that want to send notifications are forced to ask
for permission the first time you open them. Presumably, you'd want to grant
this permission to Words with Friends, since otherwise, you never know when
you have to play :-)

But other than that, you just hit "no" every time, and that's that.

------
skat_et_dieu
Ah!!! Its so awesome to get some recognition on my beloved huevos!! (webOS)

I've been a huge supporter since the original Palm Pre. Now I carry my Pre3,
TouchPad and iPhone. iOS has nothing on webOS!!

I think devs should at least give Enyo a try at learning to make apps for
webOS since they can port them to Android and iOS with Phonegap. And if webOS
takes off after it is open sourced they will be set with skills to make apps
for webOS!!

------
larrik
The article is great, but I don't really understand why you bought an iPad 2
if you never used your original iPad.

~~~
LukasMathis
I have no excuse. I just like gadgets.

------
phren0logy
webOS seems to have the opposite problem of most open source projects: great
interface but could use some work on the technical side.

An OS with a great interface is one hell of a head start for open source on
tablets.

~~~
LukasMathis
That's a great point. Never occurred to me to look at it like that, but you're
right. Open source projects often fail to reach mass acceptance because
they're designed by and for the people who work on the project - programmers,
that is. webOS has a huge head start in the design area, so it neatly
circumvents open source's achilles heel.

~~~
phren0logy
That's what I'm hoping, because the tablet space seems begging for
competition. It's clearly the future of much of main-stream computer use. I
don't even care if it gets all that much adoption. As long as the market isn't
locked in by one vendor focused on native apps, it makes a strong argument for
focusing on the HTML/JS open web experience a top priority.

On the flip side of the native app argument, he fact that native WebOS apps
are HTML/JS also makes it a much more attractive target than it would be if it
required learning another language. Even a modest percentage of that market
would make that effort worthwhile for a web-based product.

------
byproxy
I feel that you missed an opportunity to mention the gesture area, probably my
favorite part of interacting with my Pre 2. It seems so intuitive and it's
something I miss when using my iPod Touch. Though, I suppose that's more of a
hardware feature than a software one.

------
jejones3141
I moved to Android solely because Sprint and then HP itself had thrown webOS
under the bus, but every day I wish I had the webOS UI. With webOS it's
obvious which apps are running: it's running iff it has a window, and flicking
the window upward is guaranteed to stop the app. Under Android, there may or
may not be a way to explicitly stop an app, and if there's a way to find out
which are running, I haven't found it yet. Yes, ideally I shouldn't have to
worry about it, but with finite resources (including battery as well as RAM) I
do, and with Android I'm in the dark.

------
nailer
Playbook OS stole the cards feature, OS 2 includes the number row keyboard for
all password inputs (this is super useful), and email tabs.

It also gets 354 on html5test.com, the highest of any tablet browser,
including Chrome Beta.

------
hughc
This talk of contracts sounds to me just like Android's intents, which have
been in there forever - one example being a app having a share button that
then pops up a list of all apps that offer an endpoint for a particular data
type (ie share this photo by email / sms / dropbox / google plus / facebook /
any other app you may have installed) - the hosting app has no idea about the
endpoints, it just casts around and offers them to the user.

It's in scenarios like this where the back button makes perfect sense, where
you change context midstream, and then wish to return to the original one. I
recall on an iPhone in a similar scenario (emailing a photo) that there was no
obvious way back to the place the photo came from - once you switched the mail
app, it felt like a UX dead-end. Change your mind about sending the mail and
you're stuck. Back works intuitively by comparison. It can even work in
chains- snap a photo, share via an app that does image resizing, share the
result again via email; back -> back -> and you're back in the camera app.

------
SudoSamurai
Don't know if fanboy troll article or just ignorant...

You can do basically everything he outlined in Android.

1\. Plethora of app switchers including the one that's always built-in.

2\. Gmail and the built-in email app make switching to other emails to
reference from pretty easy.

3\. Android has this for apps, internet windows/tabs, and homescreens.

4\. Again, Android already has this. Pretty much every app has a "share"
feature that opens a universal list of applications you have
installed/configured on your system. If they have a way that something can be
shared to them, they show up in the list.

5\. Android finally seems to be getting some nice things with the ICS
keyboard. But oh, by the way, you can install OTHER keyboards on Android.
Including my favorite: Swype. Look it up if you've never heard of it. Takes
getting used to, but amazing once you do.

6\. I love how this article passes over the fact that Apple stole Google's
notification system from Android. It's a pull-down tray with centralized
notifications including weather and stock objects that Apple (after swearing
never to include these in their system) has the gaul to call "widgets." Most
Android phones now have the option to clear notifications individually or en
mass. ICS has implemented the "swipe away" feature and that feature has been
around for a long damn time in the Android universe.

7\. Depending on the phone you get, this differs. Unless, of course, you
install an app that does it for any version of Android. Like Quick Settings or
the pain version: Quicker. These apps can be brought up as overlays over any
app or game and can be bound as either an ongoing notification in your tray to
click on or as the long-press action on your search button (numerous other
apps can share that functionality as well).

------
skrebbel
Maybe I'm missing something, but doesn't my Android Honeycomb tablet have half
these features? Quick access to common settings _check_ , system-wide
accounts, _check_ , decent keyboard _check_ (just install your favourite
keyboard app to replace the default). Admittedly, the task-switching is awful
on it though.

------
xtrimsky_
I have a Touchpad myself, my wife has an iPad. I do prefer using WebOS than
iOS. Love the multitask.

Only problem are the apps :(

------
Osiris
I absolutely love the way webOS does task switching. It's so easy and simple
to switch between apps. Even ICS's new task switch requires pressing and
holding, then scrolling through a list of apps. WebOS needs only a single
quick press and swipe left or right. It's fast and easy. I love it.

~~~
joenathan
Pressing and holding? I don't think you are using a phone designed for ICS...

------
webjprgm
> Splitting document management up into two parts, the way Windows and the Mac
> do it (with parts of it happening in the Finder, and parts of it happening
> in applications’ open/safe dialogs) is one of the dumbest things desktop
> systems do.

On that note, my workflow for web apps is "touch <filename>" followed by a
command to open it in the desired editor. This applies to anything that I want
to place in a deeply-nested hierarchy which I already have open in Terminal or
Finder but that would require effort in the open-save dialog. In some cases I
do copy+paste+rename+double-click in the Finder, then select-all+delete and
start editing.

On the other hand, when I want to jot down some notes I usually go to TextEdit
or TextWrangler and just start typing, then worry about where to save it
later.

------
stfu
I wish they had put the same effort in creating some basic apps that actually
work. There aren't that many must-haves, a decent text editor, presentation
and video player, browser and ebook reader would have gone a long way. But
just the Pdf reader itself was a complete disaster. When basic things like
slightly larger file sizes (6+ MB pdfs) bring the app to a hold, or basic
functions ( search within a pdf, mark/copy text) are completely absent, all
the beauty of the system itself won't help. But at least CyanogenMod came to
the rescue.

------
Tycho
I remember RiscOS/Archimedes on the 90s Acorn computer had a great feature -
the third mouse button, when used to click an item in one of the toolbar
menus, would cause the command/item to execute _but keep the menu up after the
mouse click._ So you could pick another item without navigating to the same
menu again.

I've got no idea why this hasn't been ripped off or licensed. The only similar
feature I've seen is Windows 7 letting you close windows from the task bar
while keeping the window list open.

------
newman314
All of these sound like arguments for continuing to use webOS =)

------
abruzzi
I agree with almost everything in the article, but for me, webOS's achilles
heel is speed. Even with my touchpad overclocked to 1.7ghz, it still feels
sluggish. But after a day of using it over my iPad 2, when I return to the
iPad, I find myself swiping things that don't swipe on iOS.

My one disagreement is on the keyboard. I like that it has the number row, and
behaves more like a real world keyboard, but on iOS my typing is much more
accurate.

------
damian2000
I felt like I hit the jackpot after scoring a $149 HP touchpad (32GB) in the
fire sale last year ... now I feel even better about it after reading this...!

------
vilterp
Hopefully we can hope to see some of this good design thinking in Android,
since the design lead of webOS, Matias Duarte, is now design lead at Android
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matias_Duarte>)

------
togasystems
Are any hardware manufacturers planning on releasing a tablet/phone with WebOS
baked in?

------
EGreg
I have to say, I really like WebOS and its paradigms. What will come of it?

------
d5tryr
>I’m pretty much only using it to consume content. I suspect that most people
use their iPads similarly:

And with that line it seems clear that this article is not about people like
me...

------
thinkcomp
I love WebOS. I just wish they'd fix the ampersand bug (where & becomes &amp;)
in the browser URL! It's still an issue in 3.0.5.

~~~
byproxy
Well, now that it has been open-sourced, you can fix the bug yourself!

------
lemieux
Why am I under the impression that Android has every single thing that is
mentionned in this article? ... Wait... because it does...

------
Yhippa
It sounds like he's mentioning almost everything great about webOS except the
lack of polished or first-party apps. Everytime I use my Touchpad I get sad
that I don't have the same experience on my WP7. webOS makes iOS and Android
feel like kludges to the solution of an OS designed for mobile usage.

~~~
joenathan
I have the opposite reaction, I love Android 4.0 on my Touchpad, while I very
much hate using WebOS. In particular I don't like the cards, I find them too
gimmicky and I always end up missing my home screens & my widgets and the
speed and flexibility of Android.

Here is a quick video I made yesterday of the latest Android build for the
Touchpad <http://youtu.be/qqn8etizQqY>

~~~
downx3
Enjoyed your video. Would be great to get hold of one of those Touchpads...

~~~
joenathan
Thanks. You can catch them(16GB) on eBay for around $220 used in good shape or
around $250 new, in my opinion for the price, this is the best Android tablet
at the moment, the next best thing is probably the Asus Transformer Prime @
about $550.

~~~
downx3
Sorry to ask, but why did HP stop producing these? Are they still sold new in
other countries?

~~~
joenathan
No, they aren't sold new anywhere.

HP stopped producing the Touchpad about 3 months after it was released due to
extremely poor sales. Why did it flop? I think it's because of a few things,
first a very late entry to the market, and they wanted $499 for a 16GB and
$599 for a 32GB. They were insane to charge iPad prices for the Touchpad
especially when coming from the inferior position of very small app catalog,
and an unknown, buggy OS.

~~~
downx3
Aha, cheers.

------
etomer
On a side note, blog authors; please don't stick your picture site-wide!

------
twodayslate
You can get some of these features on your iPhone _now_ if you jailbreak.
Jailbreaking makes iOS so much better.

------
gumpiko
I wish I understood all this, I have a good product where people are truly
making a lot of money but I am technically challenged. I did send a tweet with
"small business" but it didnt make it to the correct page.
<http://www.tarads.com>

------
thekevan
Most of these features exist in some incarnation or another in Android.

------
baddox
I still don't understand why people jab at the iPad by saying it's "only for
consuming content." You don't hear people leveling the same complaint against
TVs and MP3 players, which are specifically designed and marketed solely for
consumption of content. Heck, even personal computers probably spend most of
their time helping their owners consume content.

