[ArchonAdvisors]

I agree with auTONYmous, what killed webOS is the ability to hack it to death. Carriers don't want to allow users to bypass their money grabs such as tethering.

What about android then? Plenty easy to hack...even go as far as a full custom rom replacement like CM7 and many others.

[callmechewy]

What about android then? Plenty easy to hack...even go as far as a full custom rom replacement like CM7 and many others.

Android is not "plenty easy to hack" by any standard normal people use. It requires the downloading of a lot of different items, placing said items onto an SD card, using terminal, rooting, and then actually choosing a ROM to use.

With webOS, all you had to do was download Preware and start installing the goodies.

[dajedikidd]

Excuse my lack of understanding in these issues, but does this mean no more official WebOS updates from HP? Will we be forced to choose between ROM A or ROM B for new features and bug fixes? Or is it even too early to know the answer to those questions?

[Suntan]

and they are paying to install Android on every phone.

Would you honestly expect to see a $300 (or even $200) pricetag on an HTC phone running webOS? I don't think a carrier would try to ask that much for an OS that doesn't have a complete ecosystem of content offerings. I don't think the carrier is going to pay the OEM as much for a $150 to $100 handset (that quickly plummets to $50 or lower if previous webOS handset sales are any indication) as they do for the $200 to $300 handsets. Thus the $8 in cost savings would be more than offset negatively by the substantially lower sales price they would receive from the carriers.

-Suntan

[Suntan]

Android is not "plenty easy to hack" by any standard normal people use. It requires the downloading of a lot of different items, placing said items onto an SD card, using terminal, rooting, and then actually choosing a ROM to use.

With webOS, all you had to do was download Preware and start installing the goodies.

As I've said elsewhere, rooting my android phone was easier to do than installing preware. But both of them were prettysimple to do by anyone that can properly run a web browser and read English.

Ease of hacking was not the downfall of webOS.

-Suntan

[auTONYmous]

Wait, didn't you just say almost the opposite right here?:

http://forums.precentral.net/webos-o...ml#post3260936

Yep, then I kept talking and kept reading more into it, and my position has changed slightly.

Not the exact opposite. Just not quite so sure I see HTC picking it up (but that would be awesome, right?)

[gargoylejps]

A lot of the speculation does depend on the structure HP decides to install on the open source project. I suspect, as with most projects, there will be an organization and a way to limit fragmentation.

I suspect HP's plans include using webOS as a platform to push services. Some may well follow the basic free/premium paid model (see Evernote and Dropbox). They've got plenty of properties they could do this with and can sell a good number of new tablets without having to bear the full cost of supporting the OS.

Gargoyle

[smooth3006]

the xda devs will be hard at work soon, bank on that. and with the help of rod & webos internals i see great things coming here. can you imagine running webos on a evo4g or the galaxy nexus?

[jpash549]

In hindsight the most graceful way of exit allowing reduction of money outlay while still keeping a finger in for use in printers and other devices such as consumer tablets, laptops,desktops and printers which are consumer and business devices. Slate 2 is a business tablet with windows 7 but same size as Touchpad. If someone else reinvents webOS in the phone market this may give HP a good position in the family of devices. At least the decision pleased some customers and probably didn't irritate those not of the Android ilk. What about the Linux marketers?

[chalx]

Hope community will manage to optimize webOS in some significant extent because webOS in it's current state is pretty resource hungry. I can't see some unknown Asian manufacturer risking with webOS even if it's free.

[k4ever]

don't see any manufacturer spending time or money making hardware for a os with no apps.

I'm torn on your statement. On the one hand I reluctantly agree with you. On the other hand I look at Android's success. The open source community loves Android and has contributed a lot to the platform to include apps. I believe that now webOS will get the same type of support. However, it is going to take a while before anyone ports it to new hardware. I just hope HP is very responsive with reaching out to hardware makers for driver support.

[cgk]

I'm torn on your statement. On the one hand I reluctantly agree with you. On the other hand I look at Android's success. The open source community loves Android and has contributed a lot to the platform to include apps. I believe that now webOS will get the same type of support. However, it is going to take a while before anyone ports it to new hardware. I just hope HP is very responsive with reaching out to hardware makers for driver support.

Yes but even that 'open source' success has involved Google sinking billions into activities to support it's adoption.

[omahawildcat]

the xda devs will be hard at work soon, bank on that. and with the help of rod & webos internals i see great things coming here. can you imagine running webos on a evo4g or the galaxy nexus?

Why would anyone other than tech nerds want this? WebOS is essentially dead to the consumer market.

[k4ever]

Doesn't the problem arise of formerly-Android phones not having the proper drivers to operate under weBOS? I know the CM team managed to port Android over, but they didn't have to deal with 3G or GPS radios.

I just brought this up in the answer to another post. HP needs to stay on top of driver development. However, both Android and webOS use Linux as the underlying operating system. Linux handles all the low level driver stuff for both. So if the device already runs Android and their are drivers available, then in theory those drivers should work under webOS. Unless, of course, they are proprietary.

[ArchonAdvisors]

Yep, then I kept talking and kept reading more into it, and my position has changed slightly.

Not the exact opposite. Just not quite so sure I see HTC picking it up (but that would be awesome, right?)

Gotcha, that explains it. Understandable that news and opinions are in rapid flux today.

I think we'd all love to see HTC throw its hat in the ring!

[k4ever]

No idea, I'm sure someone will try - the bigger question for me is that HP *say* they will avoid fragmentation but with an open source project, I'm not really sure how they do that?

Yeah, Google can't even get a handle on the fragmentation of their open source OS. I think that HP can leverage the patents in this regard. Set a rule that if a hardware maker strays from the official webOS project, then they lose the legal cover that HP could provide with the patents. So if HTC produces a webOS fork for its hardware, they are at the mercy of Microsoft.

[k4ever]

Why would anyone other than tech nerds want this? WebOS is essentially dead to the consumer market.

I totally don't agree. We will probably see a lot more people running webOS. The problem is that it won't be easy to track it's use.

[k4ever]

This model should work for the consumer about as well as a Hackintosh does - making Mac OS X run on a PC designed for Windows. It's been around for a long time but most of us would never recommend it to the average computer user because of all of the complexity and potential glitches.

Hackintosh does not have the support of Apple, so it is a totally different animal. This is the equivalent of Android.

[Suntan]

Hackintosh does not have the support of Apple, so it is a totally different animal. This is the equivalent of Android.

A little premature to make a claim like that.

HP didn't put the support into webOS that google puts into android when they owned it outright. What makes a person think they will start doing that now that they have given it away to everyone?

Sorry, but in the months that webOS has been stagnated, the requirements for a complete system have gone up significantly. At first all you needed was decent hardware and a nice OS. Then you needed decent hardware, a nice OS and good app support. Now you need excellent hardware, the OS, apps, movies and music. HP didn’t commit to those when it was full in, why would they commit to them now?

-Suntan

[jrstinkfish]

and they are paying to install Android on every phone.

And they sell MILLIONS of them BECAUSE of Android, but they won't sell millions of webOS phones. If they drop Android, their profits will decrease.

So again, if you're expecting any of the big Android manufacturers to drop Android to place all their eggs in the webOS basket, when that OS has never grabbed more than 2% of the market, then you're in for a big disappointment.

If you're expecting a ZTE webOS phone, now we're talking. If you're looking for devs to put it on existing Android phones, then you are in for a treat. If you think it will suddenly make up more than 2% of the market, you're dreaming.

The good news is that it's not dead, so be happy for that and stop overreaching