TamsPalm – the Palm OS / web OS Blog

O’Reilly has just released the sixth chapter of its WebOS book – this one looks at how to store data locally in a WebOS application:

Here is a key quote:

Palm webOS supports the HTML 5 Database APIs and provides two specific APIs for
simple data creation and access:
x) Depot—a wrapper on the HTML 5 APIs for simple object store and retrieval.
x) Cookie—a simplified interface to browser cookies, a single object store for small
amounts of data.

As usual, further information can be had here:
http://my.safaribooksonline.com/9780596802097?tocview=true

Australians and Canadians just got lucky – a carrier from each of the countries has just stated its interest in all things Pre:

Australia – Telstra
Australia’s Smarthouse reports the following:

…Confirming the release of the new Palm Pre in Australia Palm Country Manager Brett Murray said that their new phone will be released in the second half of 2009 however he would not confirm an exclusive deal with Telstra…

As of now, the carrier has not given further information on the topic.

Canada – Bell
In Canada, the device will be peddled by Bell…who have already put up a web site of their own advertising the device:
http://pre.bell.ca/palm-pre-features

Image: Wikimedia Commons / Kvasir

A blog called “Inside Sprint Now” has started to leak loads and loads of information about the Pre in a very well-planned fashion (could it be a false flag operation from Palm’s?) – here is the latest scoop:

On release dates
He claims that the Boy Genius’s report of a small beta launch is wrong:

…let’s start by saying that any release this big certainly isn’t going to be done with anyone ‘partnered’ in, other than Sprint and Palm. Sprint has thousands of stores across the country that are perfectly capable of launching a device – where we not only can tightly control the inventory pre-launch, but where we can also make money on the accessory sales in-store on launch day. To even think that we would miss out on that opportunity and turn it over to a ‘partner’ is simply crazy. Does this person know how huge accessory sales are for a Sprint retail store?

On pricing
The next scoop is the following image, containing loads of further information on Pre pricing:

Hundreds of pages have been written on the annoying topic of mobile device market shares – and nobody seems to have figured out the one true way to determine market shares as of this writing.

The US-based NPD Group has just released the following figures:

According to The NPD Group, a leader in wireless industry market research, an aggressive “buy-one-get-one” promotion by Verizon Wireless helped RIM’s BlackBerry Curve move past Apple’s iPhone to become the best-selling consumer smartphone in the U.S. in the first quarter (Q1) of 2009. RIM’s consumer smartphone market share increased 15 percent to nearly 50 percent of the smartphone market in Q1 2009 versus the prior quarter, as Apple’s and Palm’s share both declined 10 percent each.

Based on U.S. consumer sales of smartphone handsets in NPD’s “Smartphone Market Update” report, the first-quarter 2009 ranking of the top-five best-selling smartphones is as follows:

1. RIM BlackBerry Curve (all 83XX models)
2. Apple iPhone 3G (all models)
3. RIM BlackBerry Storm
4. RIM BlackBerry Pearl (all models, except flip)
5. T-Mobile G1

“Verizon Wireless’s aggressive marketing of the BlackBerry Storm and its buy-one-get-one BlackBerry promotion to its large customer base contributed to RIM capturing three of the top five positions,” said Ross Rubin, director of industry analysis at The NPD Group. “The more familiar, and less expensive, Curve benefited from these giveaways and was able to leapfrog the iPhone, due to its broader availability on the four major U.S. national carriers.”

Smartphones, which represented just 17 percent of handset sales volume in Q1 2008, now make up 23 percent of sales. “Even in this challenging economy, consumers are migrating toward Web-capable handsets and their supporting data plans to access more information and entertainment on the go.” Rubin said.

These figures obviously are somewhat unfair, as RIM has had its huge launch this quarter (Storm) while the other two mentioned companies are planning to launch their next products in Q2 or Q3.

Nevertheless, interesting data – ideas, anyone?