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HP Releases Open webOS 1.0
An anonymous reader writes "Hewlett-Packard has announced the release Open webOS version 1.0: 'We now have an OpenEmbedded build that allows a full webOS experience running inside an OE emulator. We have added core applications — email & browser — while continuing to support the desktop build environment. The 1.0 release also brings support for Enyo2. You can now take apps built on one of the best cross-platform JavaScript frameworks and easily run these same apps on Open webOS or other platforms. In the past 9 months, we have delivered over 75 Open webOS components. This totals over 450,000 lines of code. ... The source code for Open webOS can be found in Open webOS repositories on GitHub. Combining today's components with those from the previous releases, Open webOS can now be ported to new devices.' HP also reaffirmed plans to continue work on Open webOS, and to bring support for Qt5, WebKit2, open source media components, and more."
Here's to hoping the kinks get worked out for some bugfixes to my TouchPad tablet.
Before you list WebOS as "too little, too late", remember that the same can be said about FirefoxOS. Both are pointless in a sea of iOS and Android devices.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sy_MWog3ltw
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Time to get WebOS running, ten minutes
Time to get OpenEmbedded build working, ten weeks
amount of time taken asking questions: 0 seconds. ability read and follow instructions: 0%. ability to complain: 100%. ability to file bugreport or contact forum or mailing lists requesting detailed instructions: 0%.
_come_ on, dude, you know the drill. if you can't get something working, *ask the developers*. give them detailed reports, help them diagnose the problem with the build instructions, so that they can be improved. over time, things get fixed, yeah?
what would you have the developers do, huh? if you understand what openembedded's "bitbake" command is really about, and understand how powerful it is, you wouldn't be complaining, you'd be somewhere in awe or possibly shock. openembedded has a bang-per-buck ratio that's wayyy above anything else available from the free software community. gentoo's portage, buildroot, debian's build system - they're all child's toys by comparison.
tell me if you know of any other cross-build system that, in order to correctly configure a package and cross-compile it, fires up a *native* gcc compiler and runs the autoconf configure script in a qemu command-line virtual environment. now that's just so fucking smart - it solves *all* the problems that all the other "autoconf cache" broken workarounds just can't get right.
the people who came up with openembedded are just... unbelievably smart people. they know that they don't have a lot of resources, so they come up with solutions that make up for it, and do the work in an automated fashion. they've been at this for over 10 years, so cut them some slack, ok?
WebOS is like SCO. Whenever you think it has died it pops up in the news again.
Really?
Drop the meta-webos directory, in toto, into the OE-Core or Yocto main directory, source oe-init-build-env in the main directory, add the meta-webos directory to your config/layers.conf file in build (which you'll be moved to when you source oe-init-build-env...) and then type "bitbake webos-image".
If you're green, a quick trip over to the Yocto project over at the Linux Foundation would be suggested and it doesn't take 10 weeks as implied. It might take a couple of hours if you need to refer to the quickstart over there at the Yocto project- but it should take minutes if you've got the required skillsets to be actually DOING this sort of thing.
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If an emulated webOS phone rings in a crowd full of Android devices, does it make a sound?
Maybe it's on vibrate.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
Having never actually used a Windows phone, I have to ask, is it that bad? Or is it just that everyone hates it simple because it's from Microsoft, or possibly because Windows Mobile 6 was so bad that people think the new Windows phone couldn't possibly be any good. I mean, on phones the interface itself doesn't matter that much since it's mostly about the apps. Once you launch the app it takes over, so it doesn't really matter what the main interface is like too much.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
WebOS - great OS, lousy apps. I picked up one (actually two) of the Touchpads at the fire sale. Here are my observations of it:
- The OS is beautifully designed. Logical and fluid and reasonably quick
- It seems that about half the apps I tried were warmed over Palm Pre apps that were scaled up to fit the Touchpad screen. They looked absolutely horrible. The core apps (email, etc.) seemed fine though.
- The volume doesn't seem to go very loud. When I try to watch a movie on a plane it's not loud enough. If I reboot it into ICS (which I installed shortly after buying it) the volume is plenty loud.
- Nice screen. Not retina quality but pretty good.
My advice to anyone that has a Touchpad would be to install ICS on it. WebOS just doesn't have a lot of good apps. Nice OS but the overall experience is just putting lipstick on a pig.