Reminiscing over WebOS

In my previous posting I stated that I charged up my old Palm Pixi WebOS smartphone to use as a Sprint RF signal tester. First of all, I immediately noticed how small the screen is on my Pixi versus my current Nexus S 4G. Secondly, I started playing around with the WebOS system again and ran the calendar and email app and I forgot how good that OS was. If you introduced it today, running on better hardware I think it would be a big success.

After using the Apple iOS and Android OS, I still think WebOS is superior. Apps popup up as animated cards which you can minimize and shuffle around, and flick off the screen. It has true multitasking, while with iOS and Android apps are suspended or stopped if they are in the background. Everything on the screen looked fresh and clean. It’s really a shame that Palm couldn’t continue with their phone line and was instead bought by HP and completely abandoned. Sure, WebOS lives on in Open Source land, but that really isn’t the same as a fully promoted smartphone operating system.

I think that OS failed because Palm didn’t have appealing hardware, and they took too long to come out with these new phones. If they had better phones and produced them quicker, things may be different now.

Those were the days…

Pondering switching cell phone carriers

Up until 10 months ago, I’ve never owned a personal cell phone. I did have a phone, but it was a company phone which I used for both business and personal use. I started with a LG candy bar phone back in 2000 on Sprint, migrated to a popular Nokia phone, then a few Motorola phones, then over to my first smartphone, the Motorola Q running Windows Mobile 5 OS. At that point, my employer switched from Sprint to Verizon, and I finally got an iPhone 4 to use for about 6 months before I left that job for new one. My current position with my new employer doesn’t provide a cell phone, so I needed to venture out in cell phone land and make some decisions on which phone and carrier I should choose for my first personal cell phone purchase.

Since my wife had been using Sprint for the last 10 years or so, it made sense for me to just add a 2nd line to her account and get a shared minutes family plan, especially since Sprint offers offers unlimited data on smartphones. So I made my first cell phone purchase to be a Palm Pixi WebOS phone (mainly because I had planned to do some WebOS app development on the side). That worked out great, and I loved the cool animated windows popping up, and swiping them off the screen when done. I stuck with the Pixi for almost 2 years, and when Palm started to falter as a company I decided to switch to an Android smartphone (again, so I can do some Android app development) and I chose the best at the time which was the Nexus S 4G.

The Nexus S is a good phone, being speedy with a great screen. The big problem I have is the terrible RF radio in that device. The cell reception is really bad, as the number of bars for signal strength varies wildly at most locations in the Seattle area. I can go from no bars to 3 bars just driving a few hundred feet. I rarely get all 5 bars, but mostly get 1 or no bars. At my new employer location in Everett, WA I get 1 or 2 bars at the most, while my co-workers who are on AT&T get 4 to 5 bars easily inside the office building. So what’s the deal? Is it my phone, or Sprint’s cell coverage?

I also noticed this while on travel in Phoenix, and my GPS receiver seems to be really slow to reacting to my position when driving. I’ve missed turns on my navigation software because of the slow directions. So in all, it seems my Samsung Nexus S has a poor radio and GPS receiver for my use. Thus, I’ve been looking at switching carriers.

Sprint has the best priced plans in my opinion, especially for me having a 2nd line on my wife’s account costing me $19.99 + $10 (smartphone fee) + $8 (insurance) = $37.99. I don’t want to go with Verizon, since they seem to be the highest priced carrier. I like AT&T, because they always have the best phones available the earliest, you can switch between phones by simply inserting your SIM card, and with their GSM technology you can use the voice and data simultaneously. Also, AT&T has the HSPA+ network in my area for fast data speeds, and they are in the middle of upgrading their system for LTE service. If I switched to them, I could get the new HTC EVO One X (LTE ready) for $199 and probably go with their 450 minutes (rollover) plan for $39.99 + $30 (3 GB data) + $9.99 (insurance). With my 25% employer discount it would cost me around $69.99/month to go with that service. So that’s about $32/month more than what I’m paying now with Sprint.

My dilemma is that AT&T is known for having a poor network system. But as you can imagine, things change over time and it really depends on your location. A bad cell carrier in Florida doesn’t mean it is equally bad in Chicago or Seattle. I’ve got some anecdotal evidence from fellow co-workers that shows AT&T service at my work site is good, while Sprint is bad (at least with my Nexus S 4G). But, I’ve read on numerous forum postings that the Nexus S 4G is known to have a poor radio. So what to do?

My plan now, is to charge up and take with me my old Palm Pixi phone (on Sprint). Although I don’t have service for it, it does still connect to the Sprint network (for emergency calls) and I can test the signal strength using its radio. If it shows equally poor signal strength, then I can probably conclude Sprint’s service in the area of my work office truly sucks. I could then get a AT&T account and test out the HTC One X for 30 days and decide if that phone and cell strength at my work site is better than Sprint’s. If so, then I’ll have to decide on whether to keep the AT&T service and cancel my Sprint 2nd line (and pay the termination fees), or just hope Sprint will upgrade their network soon at my work location over time. Another option, is for me to just tough it out for the next several months and see if Sprint’s new LTE system will help improve signal strength at my work site location.

Is WebOS officially Dead?

HP certainly did their best to abandon the Palm WebOS devices, and it seems the OS is going also. If you check out the HP-Palm web site, you’ll see just a splash screen of WebOS running on a Palm Tablet (now, discontinued). The new CEO of HP is supposedly to announce the direction of future WebOS development within the next two weeks, which would affect 600 people currently working at HP-Palm. With no new hardware being sold or developed, it seems the writing is on the wall. In my opinion, WebOS is an elegant mobile operating system, but it seems that no one wants it. As a developer, I found writing WebOS apps using Javascript under the “Mojo” system very easy to do, but the new “Enyo” system that was implemented in the WebOS 3.0 version was a bit too awkward for my tastes. Sure, there still are a very few hardcore WebOS developers still developing apps, but for the most part developers have moved on to the other mobile platforms (e.g., iOS, Android, and Windows Phone 7).

As time goes on, I think the stagnant WebOS will become more and more behind the times and will never catch up to the other mobile OSes. That is quite a shame, as I’ve always like Palm as a company and wished they could have continued on (outside of HP) with their hardware and OS development work.

The death of Palm WebOS

Last week, HP announced that they were discontinuing the sale and development of HP/Palm WebOS devices. This includes both WebOS smartphones (Pre, Pre2, Pre3, Pixi) as well as the recently released Touchpad). The timing of this announcement was absolutely shocking, as even the direct Palm employees and management in the Sunnyvale, CA office didn’t see this coming. Aside from this, HP also is dumping their PC division which is also a shocker.

As a WebOS apps developer, I’m very sad to see this happen. I’ve been to two Palm Developers Day events in the Sunnyvale office, and I have to say that the Palm employees are great to work with. Palm really treated their developers well with support and hardware, so it’s a shame to see all of that disappear. HP is backpedaling a bit now, saying that WebOS will live on, but I highly doubt that. With no existing hardware, app developers jumping ship to Android, iOS, or Windows Phone 7 development, and Palm employees leaving for greener pastures, how will WebOS survive? It might go into hibernation, but over time that will most likely make it an extinct product.

This is unfortunate, as I believe that WebOS is the best smartphone OS currently available. It does do true multitasking, and their card concept works very well. Personally, I stopped my WebOS App development when Palm switched to the new Enyo SDK which required a fundamental shift in programming methodology from the previous Mojo SDK. In hindsight, it was a good move as it gave me time to spin up on Android OS development and get a head start in porting some of my existing apps to the Android platform.

Sorry to see you go, WebOS. RIP.

Syncing Apple iCal with Google Calendar

Now that I’m back to using my Palm Pixi smartphone, I’ve got to re-evaluate my personal and work calendar syncing options. I’ve got my Apple iMac (running the iCal app), my Palm PIxi smartphone, and two different calendars to sync (along with my contacts). So, what’s the best solution?

After exploring several different options, it seems my best solution is  product called SpanningSync for the Mac. This app runs in the background on my iMac system and periodically syncs my personal and work calendars in the Apple iCal app with two different calendars in Google Calendar in the cloud, of which my Palm Pixi has the ability to sync with. What’s nice about SpanningSync is that I can control which specific calendar in Apple iCal will sync with which specific Google calendar. I’ve setup 2-way syncing, so wherever I make an addition, deletion, or change all the calendars are updated. SpanningSync also will sync my contacts between Apple Address Book and Google Contacts, and subsequently the contacts on my Palm Pixi.

This system works surprising well. I’m currently running the 15-day trial version, but if all continues to go well I’ll pay for the $25/year subscription.

iPhone no more!

I recently resigned with the company I was working for and had to return my company-owned iPhone 4. So, I’m now back to using my old Palm Pixi (WebOS) smartphone on the Sprint network.  After using the iPhone 4 for the last several months, I’ve really grown accustom to the great apps (a lot of them missing from the Palm Pixi). In addition, I really loved the virtual keyboard of the iPhone 4, especially the auto text correction. My Pixi has the physical keyboard, and it’s a pain to click away on those bubble keys compared to the iPhone.

Sure, I could always run out and buy my own iPhone 4, but I won’t for these reasons:

1. The iPhone has some great apps, but the phone itself isn’t the greatest. On the Verizon network I often dropped calls for absolutely no reason.
2. The Verizon Navigator app wasn’t very good compared to the Sprint Navigator on my Palm Pixi. The Verizon app would often take me to the wrong location or would simply give up on an address and close down.
3. Although the iPhone 4 had great battery life, it is pretty heavy and somewhat fragile with glass on the top and bottom surfaces.
4. Verizon has expensive cell and data plans compared to Sprint.

As such, I’ve decided to possibly get an Android phone on the Sprint network. Sprint has better voice/data plans and their service seems to work better in my area. The two current candidates for phones are the Samsung Nexus S and the Samsung Galaxy S II. The Nexus S seems to be a really fast phone but there are lots of reports of weak and bad radios for phone reception. Unless this can be fixed soon (either via hardware or software), I’m afraid I’ll need to exclude the Nexus S from my consideration list.

That leaves the Galaxy S II ( named “Within” for Sprint) which is rumored to be released sometime at the end of July. The specs on the GS II look great, so I’ll have to hold out with my Palm Pixi until later next month and read the reviews on the Sprint version of the GS II. Hopefully it will be good, and I can replace my aged Palm Pixi with a faster, more modern Android smartphone.

Calendar mayhem!

I have trouble remembering appointments, family events, birthdays, etc. so I rely heavily on a calendar to keep my life in order. This is true for both my personal and business life, so like to keep two separate calendars to keep things compartmentalized. The issue I’ve been struggling with is finding the most efficient way of dealing with these two calendars and keeping them synced with my computers and mobile devices.

So here’s what I have available:

1. Personal calendar for my personal appointments and events
2. Business calendar for my work appointments, travel dates, etc.
3. An iMac at home running Snow Leopard Mac X OS
4. A Dell laptop running Windows 7 for work
5. An Apple iPhone 4 as my smartphone
6. Microsoft Exchange Server for my work email, calendar, and contacts
7. Apple MobileMe for Calendar, Email, and Contacts
8. Google Calendar and Contacts

My goal, is to be able to view and edit my calendar appointments (personal and business) on my iMac desktop computer, Dell laptop, and iPhone device. I know there’s all kinds of 3rd-party freeware and commercial software for syncing calendar data between applications and the cloud, but I wanted to minimize that as much as possible to eliminate any chances of “foul ups”.

I ended up using this solution: Create two calendars with my MobileMe account that allows me to create,view, and edit appointments. If you’re unfamiliar with MobileMe, it is Apple’s cloud-based system which allows for centralized email, calendar, contacts, and offline disk storage. Using this method, I can always access my calendars via a web browser with an Internet connection. Because the majority of my devices are Apple-based, it made sense using this method for syncing purposes. So, I now use the Apple iCal application to access both MobileMe calendars on my iMac desktop computer, and the built-in Calendar app on my iPhone for doing the same. For my Dell laptop (running Windows 7), I use the Microsoft Outlook application along with a MobileMe syncing utility (provided by Apple) to sync my two MobileMe calendars with Outlook for local access. This method seems to work well so far, but I need to always make sure I’m viewing the two MobileMe calendars in all my apps and not the default local calendars (which should be empty).

I’m a new Verizon iPhone owner

For the last year and a half I’ve been using a Sprint Palm Pixi WebOS smartphone as my daily companion.  As a WebOS developer, I understand the internal workings of the Palm Pixi and really like a lot of its features. For my primary day job, my employer recently upgraded my cell phone to a Verizon iPhone which I gladly accepted. I’ve owned a iPod Touch for the last year and really like it, so I pretty much knew what to expect in a iPhone. Here are some quick observations:

In my opinion, WebOS is a more “polished” OS for smartphone users as it has a lot of small useful features. For example, in WebOS you can define multiple email accounts in the built-in mail app each of which can have a unique signature text block. On the iPhone, you can only have one signature block used for all email accounts.

WebOS has a very nice notification system where incoming emails, phone calls, messages, etc. are displayed in a small strip at the bottom of the screen. So, you can quickly at a glance identify when you have any new messaging. With the iPhone, you don’t have such a notification area except for a popup dialog window in the center of the screen as a message comes in.

When the screen is blank (or turned off) in WebOS, I am notified of new messages by a small flashing light. There is no such thing on the iPhone when the screen is turned off or blank. To check for new messages on the iPhone, you need to turn on the screen, unlock it, then look at the Email icon to see if there are any new messages (displayed as a number on the icon indicating the number of unread messages).

I sorely miss true multitasking with my WebOS phone. Being able to minimize a running app in the background and fire up another app is a great thing. The iPhone supposedly has “multitasking” but who knows what that really means. Does the app continue to run in the background, or is it suspended until you fire it up again?

So after beating up the iPhone, what do I like about it? First, there’s tons and tons of great apps written for the device. For business travel, I’m using one called TripTracker by PageOnce which is an excellent app for tracking all your travel reservations. I’ve got a lot of news-related apps (e.g., USA Today, Engadget, Macworld, Fox News, NBC Nightly News, ABC News) which come in handy for keeping me busy in-between appointments. Of course there’s Pandora for listening to free Internet radio stations, and Netflix video streaming.

Since I have an EyeTV HD device connected to my iMac for recording TV shows, I can use the associated iPhone app called EyeTV which allows me to fully control the EyeTV HD hardware remotely as well as stream recordings (and live TV) to my iPhone.

Of course, I have the ability to play music and videos through synced files from iTunes. So in all, I’m happy with my iPhone and think it will be a great business companion but I do miss some of the small features found in WebOS.

HP/Palm Bombshell

After the big HP/Palm shindig on Feb 9th, it seems that HP has been cooking up a few new devices for the masses. They announced a few new WebOS smartphones as well as the Touchpad device. Although the new smartphones still look like slight variations to the original Palm Pre phone, they do offer some interesting features. The HP Pre Veer is an incredibly tiny smartphone but seems to run very fast with a quicker processor and updated OS. The HP Pre 3 is the bigger cousin to the Palm Pre, with a larger screen and improved OS speed.

Finally, the Touchpad is HP/Palm’s entry into the growing world of tablet devices, and I think they have the best shot at competing with the Apple iPad. Sure, there’s numerous Android Honeycomb OS tablets about to be released, but I think the Touchpad running an improved WebOS (Enyo) is going to be a real winner. Of course, Apple isn’t sitting still and I’ve read rumors of the impending release of the iPad 2 and future developments on the iPad 3.

In my opinion, pricing is a big deciding factor in what devices a consumer purchases. A lot of the announced tablet devices are prices well over the current price of an Apple iPad, which I think is ridiculous. Are these competing devices better than the iPad? I can’t imagine that they are, so how are they going to get people to spend the extra money for them? In my view, the Apple iPad is a great product and the incumbent tablet to beat in this industry. So, it will be interesting to see what HP charges for their Pre and Touchpad devices.

HP hasn’t announced any firm release dates for any of these products, so we can assume they’ll be out sometime after the summer 2011. Also, I’m curious to the battery life of these smartphones and tablet device as that is a big factor in deciding what device to purchase. Apple has been really awesome with battery life for their MacBooks,  iPhones, iPods, and iPads so they are stiff competition in this area. We’ll have to wait and see what HP can offer.

What’s up with Palm WebOS?

Since HP started the process of acquiring Palm, there has been little activity in the release of new Palm smartphones. Palm came out with the Palm Pre and later the Palm Pixi, but the next few releases were just enhancements of those two models. More memory, slightly faster processor, the inclusion of WiFi is nice, but users want NEW handsets released on a regular basis. Six to eight months seems to be the usual life cycle for smartphones these days, and Palm is way behind in that respect.

What’s even worse, is that the big cell phone carriers (Sprint, Verizon, AT&T) have all but stopped selling the Palm WebOS smartphones (no doubt, because they are “old” in the consumer’s eyes). Sure, Palm has release the Palm Pre 2 to some carriers, but that phone is just a slight variation of the original Palm Pre.

As a developer, I find that I want to write apps for the smartphone platform that I currently own and carry around with me. For the last year and a half that would be the Palm Pixi smartphone. But I’m coming up on my 2-year contract date and will need to decide what to do. At this moment, I’m waiting for Microsoft to release versions of the Windows Phone 7 smartphones on the Sprint network (CDMA). The WP7 OS looks really fresh to me, and I think there’s a lot of opportunity in selling apps for that platform. Microsoft announced last month that CDMA versions of their WM7 phones will be out sometime in  the “first half of 2011″, and I’m hoping it will be sooner rather than later.

The big red herring is what HP/Palm will be announcing next week on February 9th. They have some big news they plan to release, which has been speculated as new smartphone handsets and/or WebOS tablets. The HP CEO stated that people will “drop their iPhones and iPads” when they hear the big announcement, so we shall see. I’m hoping they don’t simply announce a WebOS tablet since that is something every electronics company has already announced and would be a big disappointment. Nor, do they announce another WebOS smartphone which is simply a repackaged Palm Pre design. If they come out with some revolutionary, new hardware with a revamped WebOS that would really catch my attention. Especially if they have plans to sell the hardware through several different cell phone carriers and within 4 weeks of the announcement. That, would be truly remarkable.