TamsPalm – the Palm OS / web OS Blog

Dear Readers, I’m an administrator from the German version of Tamspalm (tamspalm-de.tamoggemon.com), but today I want to write an english article for you.

We have already talked about the new online features of PocketTunes 5. Now I wish to give an overview of the new functions, which you can also use in offline mode.

Probably the most interresting new feature is the synchronization with iTunes. Now, you can’t only sync with the Windows Media Player, but also with Apple’s iTunes.

I have got some problemes with the tool during my test period: After a time consuming installation process, the sync between iTunes and PocketTunes on PalmOS needs many hours as well. Approximately 5-10 seconds per song.
It takes a lot of time to sync large music libraries above 1 GB.

PocketTunes 5 also offers new Podcast-features. So, you can add new Podcasts from a list, chosen by Normsoft, the producer of PocketTunes. It’s also possible to add Podcasts manually.
I guess, the most useful feature is the possibility of automatically deleting Podcasts already listened to.

Further innovations :

• PocketTunes remembers the last position of songs
• Now PocketTunes support PNG-files as albumcovers
• A warning is shown if the muteswith is on

Version 5.0 is also available for Windows Mobile and iPhone/iPod.
Trialversions are available here.
4.x-version Owners are able to purchase it at a lower price. More information here.

According to Mark Belliveau, the vice-president of Normsoft, a German version has not been available yet might be issued in future.

MobiHand has just informed me of an important change in company policy which will allow their developers to compete more effectively in ultra-low-price markets. Their move comes at a crucial time as credit crunch and iPhone push application prices down – enjoy:

We are happy to announce a change of price limits intended to allow you greater pricing flexibility.

The current $3.95 minimum product price in the MobiHand Catalog is changed to a minimum selling price of $0.99 in MobiHand network stores and $2.95 in developer shopping carts.

Please do not set any product price less than $0.99 for sale in any MobiHand store.

If you use a MobiHand shopping cart in your website or application, please do not offer any price or discount that results in a net selling price in the shopping cart that is less than $2.95. If you need to sell any product for less than this amount, please contact us to arrange a modified shopping cart fee that allows us to meet your needs without incurring losses on individual transactions.

Even though I am not too motivated to lower my products prices as of this writing, the added flexibility definitely is nice to have. Congratulations to MobiHand…

Twitter is a social media site providing users with a “blog” where entries are limited to 140 characters each. While I struggle to find this service useful, many members of the “hip crowd” apparently do find value in it…and one of them has even leaked information on the Palm Pre.

MobilityToday has the full scoop – the most important bits are below:

@Zarabadoo It tethers, tho I’m going 2 try a BT hookup instead… #Palm Pre

BTW - heard frm source (not Sprint) that Pre price tag 2 be $299 with 2 year ctrct…bet it’s $100 or so after all the hype wears off

@fresh2death618 Battery’s going strong after 8 hours of mixed use

@darthpooh79 Sprint claims that 4/30 is a line in the sand, according to my acct mgr there…he’s usually right on #Palm Pre

From my personal point of view, this leak (which might be the first-ever smartphone leak via a microblog) clearly shows where Pre users sit: in the hip crowd…

Nevertheless, it’s good to see the device in action – stay tuned!

Long-term readers of TamsPalm probably still recall a small German company called Hagenuk: the boys licensed one of GSPDA’s Palm OS smartphones, and tried to sell it in Germany with moderate success.

A CeBit meeting with Hagenuk’s CEO revealed that the company left the smartphone market to pursue other, less crowded markets…and it looks like the boys are quite successful at it.

The image on the left shows the sales brochure of a large Austrian electronics retailer who is currently advertising a Hagenuk device called fono 3. It is targeted at customers who want to have an easy, large and feature-poor handset…and seems to do its job just great!

This is NOT an April Fool’s joke! Dear Readers, Our recent growth has caused major issues for our host Brainsware: there are now so many of you that our server architecture needs to be changed in order to allow us to serve all of you as good as we aspire to do.

In order to do this, a maintenance downtime will take place on the 1st of April, from 22h to 23h local time. This translates to 13h00 in San Francisco or 16h in New York. During this time span, the following web sites may not be accessible:

• TamsPalm – the Palm OS / Web OS blog
• TamsPPC – the PocketPC blog
• TamsS60 – the S60 blog
• TamsWMS – the Windows Mobile Smartphone blog
• TamsIJungle – the iPhone / iPod touch blog
• TamsBlackBerry – the BlackBerry blog
• TamsPalm Germany

Afterwards, the Tamoggemon Content team will be honored to welcome you again on our news services!

All the best
Tam Hanna for the Tamoggemon Content Team

Even though Teal Technology still does not make any statements regarding the upcoming demise of TealOS, I managed to get my hands on an insider who was willing to give us all a bit of further insight into what really happened.

Cutting a long story short: my initial analysis turned out to be spot-on. There were no “attack lawyers” involved…instead, it was all about future sales opportunities:

Without listing any detailed concerns, Palm politely but firmly asked us to remove it from our site and to stop distributing it. Since we eventually at some point want to develop for the Pre and webOS, we agreed to remove it to preserve the relationship with Palm.

This IMHO clarifies everything…let’s see how things will pan out for Teal Technologies in the future…

The Palm Linux hackers at HackNDev’s did not get too much press attention over the last few weeks: everybody was focused on webOS instead. However, the boys have made significant progress in the past – here is the latest status update:

I just managed to suspend and wakeup Centro and LifeDrive to mem. The problem was with bootloader which was corrupting memory. With this issue fixed, PalmLD, Centro (probably PalmTX too) can happily suspend to mem. I’m currently rewriting the suspend support for mainline merge.

Their Palm Linux ports will IMHO gain relevance in the near future: while the operating system running on the hardware of current Palms will be abandoned in the near future, I predict that the hardware itself will still be pretty useful two years from now.

If the work of the boys eventually ends up in an Android port, people who currently own Palm OS handhelds can look forward to a few extra years of product lifetime…

I have no idea why handset designers keep playing around with their handset’s keyboards…the latest victim is a device designed by Samsung for Verizon (who will peddle it as Alias2):

The image above hits us via PhoneArena, with Engadget Mobile claiming that the keys are “identified” via an underlying E-Ink display.

As of now, no tests have been performed to determine the usability of this new input method. While I personally fear that the usability will be bad due to sub-par materials (this is said to be a cheap handset), I dare to say that this is the first keyboard idea which has impressed me.

Future devices using this technology could allow customers to dynamically adapt the keyboard layout of their devices, for example by replacing unpopular special characters with others he needs more often (I’d love to ditch some weird chars on my XPERIA’s keyboard for < and >, for example).

What do you think?

Tamoggemon has always had a very special relationship with TealPoint group…which is why we are very proud to present you the first official statement from the CEO of TealPoint Group on the upcoming demise of TealOS:

Hi Tam,

Just wanted to let you know that at Palm’s request, we will be no longer be selling or distributing TealOS after this upcoming Monday. We’ve posted a message on our TealTalk forum with the details.

Best regards,

–v

As of now, no further details on the transactions involved are available: while I personally assume that Palm has provided TealPoint with some kind of incentive to stop selling the product (read: cash or early access to WebOS SDK), none of this has been confirmed officially and thus is to be considered my personal speculation as of this writing.

In case anyone of you wants to get his hands onto TealOS ASAP, do so at Teal’s web site…

P.S. I just stumbled across this passage in the TealPoint forums. Make of it what you wish to…

Sorry. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be beneficial for us to do anything to
encourage unofficial distribution of the TealOS either.

Even though Krusell does not have the strong online presence of other case manufacturers, they can easily be considered one of the largest case makers currently on the market.

As their products are mainly sold in brick-and-mortar stores, I am a fan of their monthly sales stats as they provide an insight into what “normal customers” (aka folks who don’t read pages such as this one ) buy.

Enjoy:

• 1. (1) Samsung SGH-i900/i910 Omnia
• 2. (7) Nokia 3109
• 3. (3) Nokia 6300
• 4. (2) HTC Touch HD
• 5. (8) Nokia E71
• 6. (4) Nokia E51
• 7. (10) Nokia 3120
• 8. (8) Nokia 5800
• 9. (5) Blackberry Storm
• 10. (-) Samsung M8800
   () = Last month’s position.

The top selling list for March reflects the growing trend where we see an increased demand for a well designed protection for smart phones, says Ulf Sandberg CEO at Krusell. The Omnia as well as Touch HD and the E-series from Nokia are good examples of precious devices that the user is anxious to protect, and to do it with style. The consumers are becoming more demanding and they don’t except solutions that doesn’t combine protection, user-friendliness and good design.
 
The Swedish manufacturer of carrying cases for portable electronics, Krusell, releases its “Top 10″-list for March 2009. The list is based on number of pieces of model specific mobile and smart phone cases ordered from Krusell during March 2009. Krusell’s list is unique due to the fact that it reflects the sales of phones on six continents and in more than 50 countries around the globe.

The BBC reports that the rumored plans for a next mandatory price cut will be decided upon in a full session of the EU Parliament April 24th the latest. Should the legislation pass, roaming mobile phone users can look forward to the following benefits:

by July 2009
Roaming costs, outgoing call: 43 cents/minute
Data: 1Euro/MB

by July 2010
Roaming costs, outgoing call: 39 cents/minute
Data: 0.80 Euro/MB

by July 2011
Roaming costs, outgoing call: 35 cents/minute
Data: 0.50 Euro/MB

Furthermore, SMS costs will be capped at just 11 cents for a single SMS transmitted all over Europe. Call billing will be per second, with an initial 30sec charge permitted.

Image: Wikimedia Commons / Lars Aronsson

I have had my fair share of eekers with shipment companies in the last years: some were stupid, some uncooperative and some just slow. However, the folks at GLS Germany’s have business practices which I consider nothing short of legalized extortion. But let’s start at the beginning.

Yours truly ordered a parcel from the German notebooks-billiger-Shop, which was to be delivered to his new office in Linz. The parcel went out on the 23rd, and arrived in Linz on the 26th according to GLS’s web site:

However, nobody arrived. Both I and my wife were at home at the time, and never heard even the slightest beep of our doorbell. The web site furthermore stated that a card was affixed to the door, which was nowhere to be seen either. As for the call: nothing here, either.

At first glance, I thought that I would just need to give em a call and get the stuff tomorrow…until I found out that the phone number costs a whooping 95 cents a minute! Of course, no fax number was given…and emailing was not possible either (web form only, which is not legally binding).

After asking some friends who had similar experiences, I personally feel that GLS Germany is performing a particularly nasty form of racketeering scam. They don’t ship your parcel, and when you call to ask them about the whereabouts, they earn about 50 cents a minute.

Folks: whatever you do, beware of GLS and use DHL instead. Their staff is always friendly and calling them is free. Your customers will definitely appreciate your move…

P.S. I have sent an email to GLS press heads asking for a statement, and will update this post as soon as I hear from them. If this post doesn’t get updated, they didn’t react…which essentially validates this post and my suspicions further…

BusinessWeek’s recent editorial titled Palm’s secret Weapon for the Pre caused bad vibrations all over a non-public Palm OS developer mailing list. The most interesting quotes are below (anonymized):

I, too, felt it would have been nice if Palm had extended an olive branch to
a few of us “old time” developers. During or at various times over 12 years,
I supported their devices, helped them forge into new markets, gave them
free software to bundle on their devices. A thanks, at least, would have
been nice.

Given that, I’m not surprised. After all it is big players that they need to
show they are viable. Little EekerSqueak softcorp isn’t very exciting to the
press, after all. But Facebook’s every move sure is.

Anyone willing to show their hand if they were at that meeting in
November? I’m a bit miffed that we didn’t get the tap. Ironically,at
that time, we just finished up a year in our new building only ten
blocks from Palm’s HQ in Sunnyvale. Makes me question going into this
further.

I personally feel that Palm does not care too much about its existing developers. If they would have cared, the following two things would have taken place:

SDK pre-releases
Even though I fully understand that Palm can not give out a preliminary SDK to everybody, I nevertheless wonder why companies which have been approached ro participate in device beta tests in the past were not given a pop before release.

Some sort of compatibility or similarity
I was one of the few who looked at the SDK for the ill-fated Foleo in the short time span between it being uploaded and it disappearing forever. What I saw was surprising: even though all API calls were different, the event filter mantra found on the Palm OS was still around.

From what I have seen so far, developing a program for the Pre follows a completely different mantra. Binary compatibility could likely have been accomplished, too (see PalmRevolt or SkinUI)…but was not absolutely necessary.

As neither of the two happened, I feel that Palm wants to grow a new group of developers. The Pre and traditional handhelds are based on different mantras, which demand different development philosophies (e.g. counting taps vs looking good).

What do you think?

The folks at AdMob’s have just released this month’s Mobile Metrics report, which can be downloaded here(PDF file). Palm’s market share has taken a heavy beating, the Palm OS is now the fourth platform in the USA:

On a world-wide scale, the Centro is now the 19th-most-used handset:

In the USA, it has fallen to #12:

When looking only at smartphones, the Centro fares better – it is #4 smartphone in the USA:

World-wide, it manages a respectable #9: