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PalmSource Drops Mac Synchronization in Cobalt
Gear_Media writes "Originally posted at PalmInfocenter: 'In a surprise announcement at the developer conference, PalmSource revealed that Palm OS Cobalt will no longer offer synchronization with the Mac. This marks a departure as previous versions of the Palm OS had long shipped with Mac compatible hotsync software.' Smart move? I think not."
I wonder if this stems from any concern at Palm that Apple might come out with an Apple-branded PDA.
On one hand, I think that is unlikely because, unlike the MP3 player, the PDA market is swamped and Apple can't make that much of a splash.
On the other hand, Apple has relentlessly marginalized 3rd-party developers in the past few years. That's not necessarily a bad thing (many of the iApps are great products), but I can see other 3rd-party developers getting scared.
However, all in all, I think Palm is just being stupid.
My Sony Ericsson P900 syncs beautifully...and wirelessly via bluetooth...with my Mac via iSync. Palm is so 90's.
There is no gravity...the earth just sucks.
If nobody writes a free conduit to iSync, then I will. This isn't that big a deal.
..don't panic
You could always help us with pilot-link to get it working properly for these devices. It builds fine, it works with serial devices on OSX, and it supports these newer Palm devices. The only piece missing is the IOKit changes to make it work with the OSX'ish USB device notification.
I see several possibilites here.
Palm might be counting on third-party software to cover their Mac users, or counting on iSync. In this case, they blew it big-time by not making that clear.
Or, Palm could have decided that they just don't need any Mac customers, and didn't give much thought to how their existing Mac customers would feel about it. This would be amazingly stupid.
I don't see any evidence that the second one is true; I'm sure it's the first one. Palm has been pretty good in the past about supporting their Mac customers; why would they suddenly abandon them, just when they are trying to win mindshare for their new Cobalt platform?
Hmmm, I just checked. Missing Sync costs $40. I'm starting to think "amazingly stupid" again.
Thinking about this some more, Apple customers are unlikely to embrace PocketPC. Maybe Palm figures those guys will buy Palm PDAs even if Palm doesn't do anything to support them. That's playing with fire, if true. If you drive customers away, it's hard to get them back.
What Palm ought to do is make sure that Apple has all the data they need to make iSync just work out of the box with all new Palm PDAs. This ought to just mean keeping Apple up to date with some information. Easy, inexpensive. And they ought to brag to all their Mac-using customers that they are doing it!
And if Palm wants to walk away from their Mac desktop application, they should either gift it to Apple, or open-source it, not just throw it in the bin.
steveha
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
I just wrote "beat up martin" into my Graffiti 2 Palm Tungsten T2. What did I get?
"Qpmm."
I'll take "eat up martha" any day of the week, except - of course - that when I write "beat up martin" into my Newton MP 2100 I get "beat up martin"...
That was classic intercourse!
Only problem is that iSync only syncs the calendar and address book entries. I rely on Palm Desktop on my Mac to sync memos, pictures (I have the zire 71 with the crappy digital camera), doodles, etc. Unless Apple plans to provide a full palm desktop replacement, I think Palm's leaving apple users twisting in the wind here.
Head down, go to sleep to the rhythm of the war drums...
Given that their developer tools appear to be migrating away from CodeWarrior and toward Eclipse/gcc/etc. (not Visual Studio), that doesn't seem likely. (Go here and scan down to "PalmSource Offers New Software Development Tools" for more info. They don't yet have it available for download, though, or I would've already snagged it.)
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
You guys are putting way too much thought into this - it just ain't that hard. Palm screwed up. Didn't want to deal with Apple on their terms, and Steve Jobs and Bill Gates decided to hurt Palm, to their mutual best interests.
1. Apple is working on a PDA product of their own based on OSX, Palm got wind of it and decided to jump before they were pushed. Newton II? Odds are against it, but how much more work to add a bigger, 65K color screen to an iPod and brush off Inkwell, which is already in the OSX product? Sync with OSX, sync with Outlook, which explains the lack of an Appleworks 'Office' killer and the integration of Entourage to be used in the Enterprise. Now that Pocket Windows is in cars and smartphones, Gates is willing to cede some marketshare to Apple, whom he thinks he can control better than Palm.
2. The number of takers for Palm's Cobalt is so low that they can't afford the engineers to do the Mac sync. Remember, if you make PDAs like a Clie or other product, you probably purchased a license for Version 5 of Palm OS. If nobody is buying Cobalt (Version 6) you have to make cuts somewhere, and they are making it here. They can easily add it back in if enough Cobalt licensees ask for it.
Now - do a Google check. You will find that none of the usual suspects has agreed to build a new PDA using Cobalt - everything being announced is based on the current Version 5. Palm is in deep doodoo - they haven't sold any Cobalt licenses and have to trim back. Time to sell the Palm stock?