With the goal of ensuring that the webOS platform will continue to evolve in new and creative ways, HP announced today its plan to contribute both webOS and the Enyo application framework to the open source community.
As HP President and CEO Meg Whitman noted, "webOS is the only platform designed from the ground up to be mobile, cloud-connected and scalable. By contributing this innovation, HP unleashes the creativity of the open source community to advance a new generation of applications and devices."
HP will remain an active participant and investor in the project. More details will become available as the project ramps up, but interested developers can start sharing their input immediately at the webOS developer blog.
Jon Zilber
This absolutely amazing! Great news, as long as it truly will result in everything being open-sourced.
Well done, HP, I am very glad to have invested in WebOS. Looking forward to what the future will now bring!
Posted by: Sol | December 09, 2011 at 11:23 AM
Thank you, Meg!
Posted by: Del Prophet | December 09, 2011 at 11:35 AM
Wait.. what does this mean to my original palm pre and touchpad. Who will be incharge of the updates?
Posted by: Carlo | December 09, 2011 at 11:35 AM
This is fabulous! My hats off to you, HP and Meg Whitman!
Posted by: John Destacamento | December 09, 2011 at 11:44 AM
Device updates would still likely come from Palm. Other developers could now use WebOS on their devices much like Android is currently.
Posted by: Dan | December 09, 2011 at 12:01 PM
Awesome News, That will bring webOS back, and will helps to compete with others.
Posted by: mhnassif | December 09, 2011 at 12:01 PM
This is excellent news. I wish to use webOS in good hardware. Hopefully I would be able to do that.
Posted by: aatish | December 09, 2011 at 12:10 PM
I love it. My urge is to contribute to it. It will be better than Android that is not completely open source. Under which licence type it is being released?
Posted by: Shoaib Nawaz | December 09, 2011 at 12:29 PM
Great news! Now if someone would step up and start hearding the cats we will all benefit!
Posted by: Jim from Colorado | December 09, 2011 at 01:02 PM
Nice to see that Enyo will also be made open as well.
Posted by: DJ | December 09, 2011 at 02:24 PM
Tip my hats off to HP and the new boss for doing the right thing and congrates to the Palm staff. You are in the envious/scary position of being a start up. Wish you all the best luck in the future
Posted by: Alpha | December 09, 2011 at 02:46 PM
I like it! Good News. it will be better than Android!
Posted by: Leo | December 09, 2011 at 11:59 PM
Woo hoo! I'm so excited to hear this news. All we need now is new phones and tablets.
Thanks Meg!
Stu :-)
Posted by: Stuart Guthrie | December 10, 2011 at 01:24 AM
Hi, Jon. Can you please shed a bit more light on what happens to the app catalog and who will control the security of it please ? More to the point, purchasing of apps will continue to be secured and control by Hp, correct... not opened sourced ?
Posted by: myDrpC | December 10, 2011 at 09:43 AM
Very Smart Move. Developing yourself would never get Palm as major player. But getting community behind it while HP controls and takes $$ from Market place. Open source creates jobs, jobs make money, money buys products, products get apps, and HP stock goes up. Smart
Posted by: Bill | December 10, 2011 at 10:07 AM
You can find a few more details here: http://h30507.www3.hp.com/t5/Data-Central/webOS-goes-open-source-FAQ-s/ba-p/103841
We'll share additional specifics about operational details as soon as we can, and welcome your feedback and suggestions in your comments here.
Posted by: Jon Z | December 10, 2011 at 10:20 AM
As a huge fan of webOS and a developer that works with Android all of the time because of its opensource nature. I am really excited that HP made the decision to open source webOS. Although I work with Android all day long I don't own a single Android device because webOS is my mobile OS of choice.
I am really excited and hope that webOS starts to be adopted as much as Android has become. I want to got to a cellular store and have the same amazing selection as other OSs have. :) Good Job HP.
Posted by: George | December 10, 2011 at 07:59 PM
Thanks HP,
Meg,
You made the right call. Innovation
will come from this release. HP will move up in the eyes of many, and stock values will climb.
Posted by: Donald | December 13, 2011 at 05:18 AM
This move probably could have saved HP's stock from plummeting and keeping long-time Palm customers from jumping ship. webOS is absolutely fantastic and from what I've read, easily tops the iPhone OS. I especially like multitasking with multiple open cards.
I hope this will bring about a massive increase in webOS apps for the Pre line of smartphones. The app lineup is just too skimpy right now by comparison to iPhone/iPod apps.
Perhaps some app developer will save HP's proverbial skin by developing an affordable, reliable Palm Desktop clone. Btw, PD 6.2 was a move backwards.
One last thing: HP needs to do something about their App Cataglog. Too may of us Pre owners, especially those of us who use them without carrier activation for their wifi ability, are having to rely on the webOS Quick Installer to get our apps.
My hope is that HP will make "Palm" the "900 gorilla in the room" that it once was.
Posted by: Paul | January 02, 2012 at 12:24 PM
How about some support for the many, many pixi plus users out there? I would love to keep using this phone as it does all I need, but an update would be very useful.....
Posted by: JW | January 12, 2012 at 12:03 PM