

This is Palm's chance - evancaine

Palm has always had a good relationship with developers.  I used to develop for the original Palm OS 3 using both the official tools and a GCC tool chain. It was a pleasure developing for the platform and virtually no part of the system was off limits.<p>Palm needs to start courting developers again. They have a state of the art mobile operating system, a very open API, an excellent set of tools and terms of use that don't dictate how apps can be developed.  All of that makes for a fun development environment.<p>Palm hasn't sold as many devices as apple or android so they won't attract as many developers who are writing apps for profit, but what they <i>will</i> attract are hackers and tinkerers and creative types who like to push and poke and see what happens when they do xyz.  I think that in itself will attract higher quality apps and that will be key: quality not quantity.<p>As a user, would I really care that your platform has 150000 apps and mine has <i>only</i> 2200? No. As long as the major apps are there (which they are for webOS) it doesn't really matter.<p>Palm should stop trying to be Apple and start being Palm again
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amock
Palm also allows you root access on your device so that you can do whatever
you want with it. With the new PDK you can use C/C++ (or any language that
compiles with the same API) to develop your app and use SDL and OpenGL. With
Verizon's latest deal you can get a Pre Plus for $50 and the wireless hotspot
capability for free. The better development policies make WebOS a better
development platform and the Verizon deal makes it a great cell phone.

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Zev
_With the new PDK you can use C/C++ (or any language that compiles with the
same API) to develop your app and use SDL and OpenGL._

Which is awesome, if you're making a game. If you want to make any other kind
of application with a Mojo UI and a C/C++ backend, you're still out of luck.
Or if you want to access the microphone or camera directly, you're out of
luck, regardless of if you use the SDK or PDK. Or… for a lot of other small
things, that do make a difference.

Don't get me wrong; I have a Palm Pre with Verizon and love it. But, as far as
their SDK and PDK goes, there is a long way to go. Especially if they're
playing catch-up with Apple and Cocoa Touch.

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dsspence
Doesn't it still boil down to the willingness of users to spend money on
applications? The last research I saw still had the iPhone/iPod platform
exceeding Android and the competitors hands down. Regardless, paid
applications aren't everything and Palm can't out-Apple Apple, as you said.
Why does Palm need to beat Apple/Android in the first place besides not going
bankrupt?

