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Insiders Call HP's WebOS Software Fatally Flawed
Hugh Pickens writes "Some of the people involved in creating WebOS, the HP TouchPad's core software, now say the product never had a fighting chance because it relied on WebKit, an open-source software engine used by browsers to display Web pages, that just didn't have the horsepower to run fast enough to be on par with the iPhone. 'Palm was ahead of its time in trying to build a phone software platform using Web technology, and we just weren't able to execute such an ambitious and breakthrough design,' says Paul Mercer, who oversaw the interface design of WebOS and recruited crucial members of the team. 'Perhaps it never could have been executed because the technology wasn't there yet.' Another problem was the difficulty in finding programmers who had a keen understanding of WebKit as Apple and Google snatched up most of the top talent including Matias Duarte, vice president of human interface and user experience for WebOS, who left for Google a month after HP's acquisition of Palm. 'When he left, the vacuum was just palpable. What you're seeing is frankly a bunch of fourth- and fifth-stringers jumping onto WebOS in the wake of Duarte's leaving.' CEO Meg Whitman has announced that HP will release the WebOS code for anyone to use, similar to Google's open-source strategy with Android, but some say WebKit will still leave WebOS underpowered relative to Apple's software."
How true. I was involved in a project to create a "rich multimedia application" for WebOS back just before they killed it. Some usage of hardware just made the entire thing a nightmare. Built in video playback, for example - Took 2+ seconds to load a short video clip, screen flickered while you did, video playback didn't care about device orientation, and the controls were limited to "play" and "stop" (no pause, no seeking, no looping and so on.. well you COULD loop a clip, if you didn't mind another 2 seconds stall/flicker when the video restarted). Similar issues surfaced on most other hardware interfacing we tried as well. Maybe it could have been fixed in later versions, but overall it just felt terribly unpolished. Good ideas, bad implementation.