Palm is Executing (In a Good Way) 39
During Palm's Quarterly Conference call, CEO Jon Rubinstein said that Palm had four main areas of focus:
- Make a family of products
- Establish Palm webOS as a premier development platform
- Build greater awareness of the Palm brand
- Ensure outstanding execution
Palm's hitting all these points. Let's take the points out of order, because we feel like it. Follow us after the break for thoughts on all four plus some tidbits on how the Thursday launch for Paid Apps and webOS 1.2 is coming along (hint: very very well)
Point the first: With the Pixi (and with more carrier pickup in the coming months), we have a family of devices here. In point of fact, assuming Palm hits their targets for releasing the Pixi and the GSM Pre, it's probably fair to say they're releasing multiple devices more quickly than a casual observer might expect.
Point the third: Palm has some more work to do here, but they made a small splash at the Emmy Awards and, well, they've got those TV commercials. It's also obvious that the tech-set is talking about Palm in a way they haven't ever seen before.
Now let's take point two: Only three-ish months after release, Palm is moving their App Catalog out of Beta and will begin selling paid apps. You remember this leaked PDF of the schedule for the paid app update to the App Catalog, don't you? We're anxiously awaiting not only paid apps, but also the webOS 1.2 update that seems necessary in order to run the updated version of the App Catalog.
Right on schedule, our anonymous tipsters tell us that their new developer portal will indeed be ready to rock at noon Pacific, meaning developers can (and should) upload their for-apps today so that eager users can download them on Thursday. Unlike what the document states above, Palm has made it easier by not requiring free-apps be re-uploaded to the new system. Palm's team looks to be running like a well-oiled machine.
Heck, it even looks like our readers don't mind laying down a bit more than our cheapskate thrifty iPhone-toting friends.
All that leaves is point four: execution. Palm's favorite response to impatient users and interviewers is to emphasize that they're being "methodical." It's a good response. It hints that people need to be patient, sure, but it also says "We have a plan and we're going through that plan as we speak."
We can quibble about the details of that plan (tying themselves so closely to Sprint at the beginning, for example, seems like a mistake to us), but the point remains that Palm is executing on it. With a little luck (and a little bit more cash), they should be able to continue to do so for a long time.
39 Comments
Yes, they're making good progress, but... We're still waiting for a JVM for the Pre/Pixie. Yes, WebOS is very nice, but Java is too, and will attract a LOT of developers. For instance, we have Java apps for the Blackberry/WM platforms that we are NOT going to completely re-write in WebOS just for the Pre (or for the iPhone, for that matter)
This article is right on-point. Have we've ever experienced a faster pace of new products, new os updates, new apps (official and homebrew), new channels of distribution, new ads, and new markets in any other phone as fast as Palm has done?
It almost makes Dieter's and Derek's jobs easy. With all this action these articles practically write themselves ;-)
Not totally convinced about numbers 2 and 4. There are still real limitations to the SDK when it comes to low level functions and high performance code. Time will tell, but so far what's available is all pretty light weight stuff. Will we ever see the kind of productivity ehancing apps that made Palm great?
As for executing, I'm even less convinced. The Pre still has serious QC and build issues. It's hard to tell what percentage of phones really have those issues, but based on what people post here it's too many, too long into the production life of the device. There should be zero phones reaching consumers with significant Oreo problems this far into the production cycle. That people are getting phones that start fine, then get sloppy, tells of either poor manufacturing and quality control, or poor materials choices, or both. You don't read about the same QC problems on either BB or Apple products.
Web OS still lacks a great many capabilities, and I'm far from convinced Palm will ever address some of them. How much time have they spent trying to fool iTunes, while many other issues go un addressed.
Time will tell, but I remain less than impressed with Palm's efforts. WebOS has great potential, but it has yet to live up to it.
Um.
iPhone 2G had significant issues when it first came out. Dropped calls were the biggest reports.
The iPhone 3.1 OS update has caused massive battery related issues that Apple has now ever publically addressed.
The Tour has had a consistent issue with the track ball just stops working (check crackberry).
Honestly...1st gen version of the phone, they are in line with every other phone company at this point. Hell, I'm the only one of my 6 friends with Pres that had to swamp one out.
Good point. I had not thought of it, but out of the 6-8 people I know with Pre's, only one (not me) had a defect (battery placement causing sporadic rebooting). I've recommended that he wait until after Thursday to return it: he has lots of bookmarks that he doesn't want to manually replicate. webOS v1.2 is supposed to change that and have "Backup" include bookmarks.
I have said this before about a month or 2 ago but I had to replace my iPhone 3G 5 times and my girlsfriends once. 3wice because the 2 halves were splittinh open and dust was collecting on the screen as a result, 1 because a permanent 'connect to itunes' msg appeared, and once because of a hairline crack that ran from the headphone jak to the apple logo. My girls also split down the 2 halves allowing dust to settle on the screen. I had to replace both my GF's and my Pre on june 9th and have been using those replacementd with no issues since. Palm + Apple + many other companies have these issues its not only Palm. Go to iPhoneblog.com and see people talking about overheating, about the white 3GS turning yellow, about leaked lighting and dead pixels. People gather in dedicated forums to state their problems that is why you see it here a lot.
I am not saying this to 'defend' Palm or the Pre. I am only stating the opposite side of your coin.
"There are still real limitations to the SDK...": Yes, I will agree with you here. However, you must remember this is a BRAND NEW OS with BRAND NEW CODE BASES. It will take a while to fine tune the heavier API's and get them into the SDK. If you think back, Palm had posted a hiring position for Game Development Manager of the WebOS platform. I would consider that a sign of most the deep code level API's have yet to be written and/or planned. Palm's main goal was to release a stable product that was ready for market. Which they, for the most part, did. The SDK will come along as all SDK's do, steady at variable speeds. I would rather them spend time tweaking an API to make it perfect than to release a bug-filled API they will just revamp in 6 months. The point of this is, the SDK is right where it should be. A year ago, there wasn't even an SDK at all.
"Will we ever see the kind of productivity ehancing apps that made Palm great?": Yes, absolutely. However, as stated above, the SDK is still being developed. The phone has been out 3 1/2 months today. Give it some time. The SDK has to crawl before it can walk and then walk before it can run.
"The Pre still has serious QC and build issues." Show me facts. I want you to show me the document from PALM or SPRINT showing the amount of returns on the Pre. You show me that, and I MIGHT agree with you.
"...but based on what people post here it's too many...": Estimates are Palm has shipped over 400k Pre's? Are there 400k users here (just PC.net alone, not all the sister/brother sites)? It is safe to say a percentage of the people found this site because they "Googled" a phrase about their "problem" with the Pre. I.E. the "oreo effect". This is the #1 Palm Pre site and it is in the top 10 of most searches involving the Pre. Of those, and the others, that are here, I would venture to say most are Pre enthusiasts anyway and will post everything. On top of that, how many Pre owners are there out there that are completely satisfied with their Pre's and don't want/need to change anything about it? I know 5 of the top of my head. In fact, I have told those 5 on several occasions to "check out precentral.net, it's got all the goods on the Pre. You'll be amazed at what you can learn/do with the Pre." Well, they have yet to show up. So using this site as your basis for "poor production QC, parts, etc" is foolish.
"How much time have they spent trying to fool iTunes...": Probably not long. They probably have a couple guys that know iTunes sync process inside and out and make it easy to change things. I HIGHLY doubt they devoted all their programming expertise to "beating iTunes". Did you forget who is the lead developer of WebOS? Oh yeah, the iPhone extraordinaire.
"...while many other issues go un addressed.": Such as? What issues that haven't at least been "fixed" or "in the works for 1.2" are there?
"WebOS has great potential, but it has yet to live up to it.": Nonsense. WebOS has lived up to every bit of the 1.0 and 1.1 status it should have. I have never seen a BRAND NEW OS get released as "perfect". Heck even iPhone has had 3 major revisions, working on a fourth. Go get an iPhone G1 and compare it to a Pre. No contest, period.
Sorry for my rant on this. I feel your opinions were a little one sided. Everyone is entitled to them, but please keep in mind what the other side of the coin looks like.
I wish more posts were like this. Well written, fairly objective, and most important of all, respectful of the person you disagree with. Well done Decibel.
1++
I agree totally!
I agree with you on all but the QC and build issues. I am on my 4th Pre in 3 months. The phone is phenominal but the build is terrible.
Do you think there is any chance they will release WebOS 1.2 update on Tuesday or Wednesday?
That way the load on Thursday will "primarily" be just on the App Catalog.
I don't think it would be the wisest thing to release an OS update along with "potentially" a massive amount of apps on the same day. Just has the makings for a nightmare on the download/access scene.
Either way I have my phone at the ready (removed all patches)
WebOS 1.2 is the only way into the Pay Catalog. So latest for WebOS 1.2 is Thursday. Could be any day before that, but Thursday is most likely, since it talks to the Beta Pay Catalog.
Right... I full understand that Thursday is the most likely, and must be out by, date to enable the "updated" App Catalog.
My question was a generaly one of feedback, whether people think that Palm could/would release the WebOS 1.2 update earlier than Thursday to help mitigate bandwidth/traffic usage.
"Palm is moving their App Catalog out of Beta"
Dieter, I don't think they are moving their App Catalog out of beta, they are adding Pay Apps to the Beta Catalog or opening a Beta Pay Catalog.
Its moving to paid app beta. Still will be beta though. I am so excited, thursday is like Christmas. 1.2 + new paid apps. Omg what a big day. The 199.99 I paid for my Pre is worth this excitement!
@Dieter -- small typo:
"...meaning developers can (and should) upload their for-apps today so that eager users..."
I think you meant to write "...for-pay apps...", no?
I wonder if the OS 1.2 is going to fix another recently discovered issue that I found: SPACE LIMITS
Now that there are more apps available, many are discovering that they get a message saying that they are out of room and need to remove an application before more can be added.
This is EXTREMELY frustrating. I had less than 50 adds (to include the ones built into the deault OS). I guess the storage space for WebOS apps is small compared to the available space.
They need to have a way to allow the owners to adjust the space available for apps and USB drive storage.
I think Palm is going to have a real user problem if this isn't fixes on WebOS 1.2. I still have not successfully downloaded survivor, due to space I guess. No errors, just fails.
It has nothing to do with "disk space" limitations. It's an "App limit". Sources close to Palm tell me they are aware of the issue, but are not considering it for fix in the 1.2 release. They have much larger tasks at hand first. However, they are aware and will be making efforts soon to take care of it.
So it has nothing to do with the amount of space dedicated to Apps and to USB storage. It's simply (well, in a way) just # of App's installed.
It has nothing to do with an app count. When I uninstalled one app, it freed up enough space to install a couple of more smaller applications.
I wasn't able to install an upgrade either, until I uninstalled another application.
To me, this is a VERY serious issue, if they want to keep people using it. Friends using the iPhone can have page and page of apps, and we are forced to budget our resources, deciding what we should keep and what to throw away. I know, personally, I like having a good mixture available.
Let me rephrase it then. The "App Catalog" and older versions of FileCoaster (I don't know about newer versions, as I use PreWare mostly now as it bypasses the APP limit) have a restriction of 50 Apps installed. Try it. Install 50 apps FROM ANY SOURCE, then try to install one app with the App Catalog, it won't let you. I have had this happen many times. Even though my "/var" partition was sitting at 40% used. So it was by far not a "space limitation" it was an app limit. I could continue to install beyond the 50 with PreWare. PreWare circumvents the App Limit restriction. However, the App Catalog will only allow 50, regardless of space. If you are installing all your apps from PreWare or other means, you can possibly go past the 50 App limit and start to reach the maximum usage of the "/var" partition. However, this is a little more unlikely. I believe the /var partition is set to 248MB. Of which only 60MB or so is used by the system Apps. So you would havce to install 180MB worth of apps to get to the limit. WIth the average size being around 2MB, that would be 90 apps. You got that many?
I was simply stating most of the "install problems" is the limit of 50 Apps, not usiing all 248MB of /var.
Thanks for the info. I will certainly look into it.
It would certainly be nicer to just use whatever we have on the flash drive part of it, or at least allow us to choose the size. I would be more than happy to give access to over 2-4GB of space for applications. I don't need to use my phone as a flash drive.
That's the clearest explanation thus far I have ever read on this topic. You are 2 for 2 decibel. Where is the 'thanks' button? ;-)
Yeah, I actually just created a thread on this topic. It should explain it in even better detail:
http://forums.precentral.net/web-os-development/204215-application-insta...
I wish I could remove the unwanted apps. For example. Sprint and nascar. I have a web browser why have a sprint link as an app?
Run QuickInstall and you can.
I just went from a 650 to a 755p this weekend and love all the little enhancements to the interface, and the new features and software available. It makes the Pre look even more sad with all it is lacking. Palm needs to step it up.
You can't compare the Pre to those. The 650 is ALMOST 5 years old. Then the 755p is 2.5 years old. On top of that, the TREO line itself is much older. Treo 300 anyone? Even more important here, you are referring to PalmOS devices. The PalmOS is older than dirt itself. You are talking about an OS that STARTED the handheld craze. Palm Pilot anyone?
Of course the PalmOS devices have more capabilities right now, the software has been here forever. Oh yeah, grab your 755p and open more than one application at a time, or show me the TouchFlo(i know, WinMo terminology) scrolling on it like the Pre has.
Show me a useful Calendar, Memos, and To Do functions, along with true Universal Search.
My calendar works just fine. As well as my Tasks (To Do's). And they even sync with my Exchange server without any issues at all, out of the box. I haven't really noticed a huge issue with those functions.
Memos on the other hand, a bit lacking. The "sticky note" app is a little "basic". But it does what it was designed to do. Keep a "note".
I like the Evernote app for this purpose. In fact, I like using Evernote (on the Pre) and my computers for just about anything I want to archive. Guy Kawasaki has a pretty good piece on it here: http://www.openforum.com/idea-hub/topics/the-world/article/14-practical-...
WebOS is to Linux, what the iPhone's OS is to FreeBSD/OSX...and is much more open! I'm looking forward to see more and more great products designed in this fashion.
Cheers,
crankin
Sure webOS has more potential and it WILL be better... but I miss DateBk EVERY DAY. The simplistic calendar on the Pre has been a major disappointment.
I'm not going back to my 755p, but until the Pre calendar can match what DateBk/GooSync did for me... I'll feel like I'm not completely 'whole' yet. There is no excuse for tasks to not be displayed in the calendar.
I use Quick Dialer but JEEEEZ is it slow compared to the shortcut phone number I had assigned to my wife on my 755p. We need an active desktop or some better way to link immediately to our most called numbers or at least IMMEDIATELY launch the Dialer.
I love my Pre... but I'm just sayin', as a phone and as a calendar (pretty major things IMO), the 755p has it whipped.
As long time PalmOs user let me echo the reply below (or above;) You cannot campare the 755P to the Pre for all the reasons he/she stated and then some - web browser, Wi-Fi, AD2P bluetooth, landscape views, piching/zooming, and on and on and...
dBsooner et al,
Defending the lack of basic calendar and phone features simply because the Pre has more "Gee Whiz!" features is simply putting your head in the sand. You are officially Pre fanboys (and I say that with as much derision as I have for Apply fanboys who ignore the shortcomings of THEIR devices too).
Don't get me wrong, I love the Gee Whiz features too. I'm not getting rid of my Pre quite yet. But Palm does need to get the basic PDA features up to par with SEVEN YEAR OLD devices that Palm/Handspring themselves made (my old Treo 300's stock calendar is better than my Pre calendar - that is pathetic). They have the technology, these features do NOT need to evolve the way they did with the Treo. Just implement the good stuff they already have.
In reference to the last paragraph - I was a little leery to switch over to Sprint from Verizon just for the Pre, but now that I did I absolutely love it and I'm very happy Palm went with Sprint as their "rebound" carrier. I'm sure many others felt the same as I did about Sprint though, which definitely reaffirms Deiter's point that it was a mistake.
Of course Deiter gets spotty service with Sprint in his area, so this could just be more whining like in the recent palm casts ;)
Glad to see some Pre love-dedication here! lol but Yes, I like what is going on with Palm, slowly but surely, things are coming together very "methodically". I hope that they make all the right moves in theirs "methods" to bring a great product, OS, and customer experience. I'm all in Jonny, let's do this baby!!!!!!!! PALM FTW!
i see an influx of apps after a sdk to use the GPU comes out.
wheres my cracked appz!
Hey I love the Pre but it's just a better version of the useless iPhone. Until they do whatever they have to do to either make the Calendar actually work and sync with the contacts or let someone else do it, it's just a cool phone not a PDA which what a lot of the real Palm die hards need.
Yes, I remember the Palm Pilot and even it was more useful in my daily work than the Pre is right now. And I understand that Palm needs to change its business model to go after the teenie-boppers who can spend their parents cash on their phones and I understand all the other reasons that Palm put out the Pre like it is but it's kind of like buying a Ferrari where you are limited to only running the motor in your driveway with the stereo turned up real loud. It looks cool and it's flashy but it isn't really of much use to you.
My calendar is totally useless to me because it takes so long to start, I guess because it needs to link with google and facebook and the space shuttle and maybe the Vatican and by the time it's ready to use, I'm on to something else. And then I can't even link any appointments to my contacts...LIKE THEY SHOWED IN THE PROMO VIDEOS!!!!! I agree that it's new and slick but it's like selling a Prius to an oil field worker...not very useful.
So after all that, I'm still lovin' the Pre but I'm still hoping that the new guys at the helm haven't abandoned all us old customers and they that they throw us a freakin' bone here...maybe some sharks with freakin' laser beams.
OH yeah...and I'll pay for an app that makes the Star Trek Communicator sound every time I slide open my Pre.