Author: Derek Kessler

“This is cool, is it new?” No, oh Hannah (Kristin Kreuk), that is not new. It’s the Palm Pre (with some fancy skinning). You call yourself a Nerd Herder? Okay, so maybe this season’s episodes of Chuck were filmed several months ago (they were) when the Pre was still new, but that’s no excuse for a hot little geekette like yourself to not recognize a hot little smartphone like the Pre on sight. Unless you were commenting on the theme job, in which case, yes, that is new. Now put down the cool assassin smartphone and move along. After the break: the fancy pants ‘I’m an assassin’s smartphone’ theme.

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Light days aren’t necessarily bad days for the App Catalog. A few new apps are still new apps, and only because there are a few doesn’t mean any of them are fun or useful. Right?

New apps:

• Blood Pressure Tracker, $3.99, by Vimukti Technologies: Log your blood pressure, pulse rate, and blood sugar levels.
• Cinema Spin, Free, by mathslice: Wheel of Fortune-style movie title word game.
• Daily Light (Love), Free, by TTPSoft: A Bible verse a day.
• Earth Breaker, $1.99, by InfestedRaynor Entertainment: Combine elements in patterns in this puzzle to earn points and clear the board.
• Shaolin Martial Arts and Meditation, $0.99, by ITS: Learn about Kung Fu, Tai Chi, Sanda and much much more.

Updated apps:

• Bull Bingo, $0.99
• Cell Stalker, $3.99
• Clock Sync, Free
• Epocrates, Free
• JogStats Trial, Free
• JogStats, $3.49
• PocketMirror for Microsoft Outlook, Free
• QuickQueue for Netflic, $1.99
• StopWatch Elite, $0.99
• T-Money, $9.99
• Tilt Origami, $1.99

Packed into the deceptively small package of the BlackBerry VM-605 Bluetooth Car Kit you’ll find a host of quality audio equipment and technology that puts this car kit a step ahead of the pack. Now I know you’re asking yourself, “I thought this was a Palm site, not CrackBerry.com.” You’re right, but seeing as the VM-605 is a bluetooth car kit, it should be more or less universal and work with just about any bluetooth-equipped phone. The Pre would be one such phone, and the VM-605 performed admirably when paired.

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We brought February to a close with the much-awaited release of webOS 1.4. For many it seems like a whole new device and the update has breathed new life into the tech media’s hopes for Palm (the traditional uneducated media remains unconvinced). And we had a whole weekend to revel in the chewy newness, only to end it with fresh new webOS apps! That deserves a “huzzah,” wouldn’t you say? Well, if you head on after the break, you can get your cheer on with the traditional listing of apps.

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There is this test call the Acid3 Test, and it is designed to test a web browser’s compliance with web standards, with an emphasis placed on Document Object Model and JavaScript. For an operating system based on web standards, you might think that webOS would have been scoring fairly highly with the test from day one. Not so, it would seem. In the early days of webOS, the browser scored a pitiful 1/100. With the update to webOS 1.3.1, the browser scored a 73/100 – better, but still not great.

Now, with webOS 1.4 out and about, the browser’s standards compliance has taken another step forward, scoring a 92/100. Obviously, that’s a great step forward as far as the browser is concerned, and we have been receiving reports of better performance and rendering on all manner of sites as a result. The score also vaults the webOS browser (seriously, it needs a name) to the upper tier of mobile browser compliance, topped only by Mobile Safari (100/100), Opera Mini (98/100), Firefox on Maemo (94/100), and Android’s browser (93/100). Of note, Safari and Android are both powered by the same WebKit core that hums underneath the webOS browser (and webOS as an OS), so full standards compliance is a possibility. At the very least, the score is worlds better than before and far ahead of Internet Explorer (Mobile: 5/100, Desktop: 32/100). For 99.999999% of users a score of 92/100 is going to be more than good enough for their browsing experience.

jack87 in our forums also notes that several sites (like costco.com) that previously failed out on webOS are now working. How about you, seeing better rendering now that you’re all 1.4’d up?

EDIT: Anchors (links that lead to a specific point on a page, e.g. comments) work now too! This blogger = happy camper.

Everybody who can get their webOS 1.4.0 jollies on can now also ‘doctor’ their way back to a fresh OS install. Palm has released the webOS 1.4.0 doctors for the Palm Pre and Pixi on Sprint and O2 as well as the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus on Verizon. If you’re not familiar with what the Doctor does, here’s a quick brief: the webOS Doctor is a Java-based computer application (works on PC or Mac) that overwrites corrupted or altered OS files with a fresh install of webOS. The Doctor is essentially the last best hope to restore a bricked phone (because of this, webOS phones are near impossible to brick from a software standpoint). While the webOS Doctor will perform a clean install of the OS, newer versions no longer wipe clean any files you have stored on the Media partition, so no worries about destroying those vacation pictures you forgot to backup.

The following webOS Doctors for 1.4 are available (direct download links):

• O2 Palm Pre
• Sprint Palm Pre
• Sprint Palm Pixi
• Verizon Palm Pre Plus
• Verizon Palm Pixi Plus

And to go along with all this doctoring fun, the folks at WebOS Internals have whipped up new versions of their Meta-Doctor tool for webOS 1.4 on Sprint and Verizon.

Thanks to Shadow 360 for the tip!

Not content to allow Gameloft the run of the PDK category of App Catalog apps, Glu Mobile has kicked things into gear and knocked over a few amplifiers along the way with the release of Guitar Hero 5 for webOS. With 20 songs for you to play along with, you can no get your #1 videogame franchise action going on your Palm Pre and Pre Plus.

Artists featured include David Bowie, Sublime, and Blink 182 (amongst others). So crank up the volume (recommended, if the review comments are anything to go by) and fire up your inner shredder, ‘cause it’s time to rock.

Guitar Hero 5 is available now in the App Catalog for $6.99.

PreCentral forum member zeeebs was reading SF Weekly yesterday and flipping through the pages he spotted an ad for the Palm Pixi. Cool, another Palm ad, you think. But wait, there’s more (isn’t there always?). This ad showed off the webOS Facebook app, but it’s not like any Facebook app we’ve used on these phones.

If you squint real hard you can see what’s going on. The background of the app features the same News Feed stylings that we’re used to, but the top bar now includes a drop-down button that lets you choose between your News Feed, viewing Photos, a plain-old Search, your Inbox, checking your own Profile, and viewing Events. Those options are not options that we have right now in the Palm Facebook app, which as Dieter has described, is more like Twitter than Facebook. Whether you like that or not is another question entirely, but this ad at least shows the possibilities.

The question we have to ask is: will this be an update we’ll see any time soon? Or is this just the art department gone wild? So far we haven’t seen Palm’s ad gurus screw up with the new ad campaign, so we’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and hope that an update to the Facebook app is on its way.

I know what you’re all thinking: OMG 1.4! Either that’s elation over the fact that you’re on Sprint, O2, or Movistar and have webOS 1.4 up and running on your device right now; or it’s frustration that you’re not and don’t. Rest assured, 1.4 will be coming to everybody soon enough – we don’t know what they hold-up is for folks on Bell, Telcel, or Verizon, but we have no reason to believe you’re going to be waiting weeks on end. While you’re waiting, we do have new apps to check out, and none of this needs 1.4 for you to get your jollies on. Especially Guitar Hero 5. Check it all out after yonder break.

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Spanish Pre users needn’t worry about when they’re going to get 3D gaming, as Electronic Arts has come to the rescue. Available now in the App Catalog on Movistar in Spain is a new app: Need For Speed Undercover (GRATIS), for the price of gratis. Gratis being free. And as best as we can tell, it’s the full version that will run you $9.99 in the States.

Yep, that’s right, NFSU is available to Spanish Pre owners for zero dollars down and zero dollars a month. The in-game content has even been translated into Spanish. Amusingly, due to the size of the game, the App Catalog description carries a request to download it over Wi-Fi instead of the HSDPA network.

Oh, and Spanish Pre owners aren’t the only ones that can get in on the hot PDK action in Europe. Those in merry old England (as well as the rest of the United Kingdom and our friends in Ireland) can download the English-language version of Need For Speed Undercover (FREE) for, well, free.

We wouldn’t be surprised to see more PDK demo apps like Need For Speed coming to the European App Catalog in the near future. With paid apps due to launch across the pond next month, developers will want to get a taste of their apps in the mouths of webOS users starving for more application action.

Thanks to pitsop for the tip!

Thanks to the early seepage of webOS 1.4.0 to some GSM Pre owners we can show you what some of the improved aspects of the update look like. A lot of the changes are under the hood, but Shadow-360 of the UK has posted in our forums several screenshots of the newer and recording-er Video app, as well as new options in the reset screen and a much-improved call log that gives you more options and info on your missed calls and sorts calls by caller. Additionally, Media Sync has disappeared from the plugged-into-USB options (no surprise, and no loss since iTunes sync hasn’t worked for months anyway) has been turned off by default, but can be turned on in Settings. As we already heard, Blink Notifications come enabled out of the virtual box this time. Check out some more screenshots after the break!

Update: Also after a break, a video recorded on the original 1.4 Pre in Vietnam by Tomi666. Check out how well it renders the splash. Shadow-360 is also continuing to post more screenshots in this thread.

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I know, you all want webOS 1.4, and you want it now. I can’t give it to you (but if I could, rest assured I would). But what I can give you are new apps. Yeah, that’s almost as good as video recording, flash support, and everything else rolled into 1.4, right? How dare you doubt me. Apps are good! I wouldn’t do this every day if I thought otherwise. And to prove it, I’m going to point you after the break where you can see for yourself what’s new in the land of webOS apps.

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In a posting on Sprint’s support discussion boards a Sprint Admin has stated in a rather official tone that webOS 1.4 will be sent out to Sprint Palm Pre and Pixi owners on Friday evening, not today as had been rumored/suspected. Who exactly has their information wrong is unclear, though you know we’re pulling for today and not tomorrow (though in the grand scheme of things it makes little difference). Additionally, there’s a new changelog, which is more or less the same as the one we posted earlier today, with a few small differences. We can also confirm that the 1.4 changelog for Verizon will be the same (with the exception of Sprint-specific updates and fixes). Oh, and those Email and notification enhancements? You’ll soon be able to set your own tones for emails as well as calendar alerts.

Check out the Sprint-posted changelog after the break.

UPDATE: And just like that, the post is gone, removed from the ether that is the intertube. Regardless, we’ve got it all after the break.

UPDATE 2: We’ve received an image from another Sprint source, which is now above. It presents yet another changelog – although the list here pretty much confirms the list below. It also confirms Sprint’s target date for webOS 1.4 on the Pre is tomorrow, February 26th. The screenshot (which is is cropped) also says that the Sprint Palm Pixi will receive its 1.4 update on 2/29/10 – aka a day that doesn’t exist because 2010 isn’t a leap year. As if there weren’t enough twists in this webOS 1.4 release date drama already.  Thanks Anonymous!

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If there’s a lesson to be learned here, it’s don’t mess with the investors. They are sharks, and if they smell blood in the water, look out. Today that’s a lesson Palm learned, revising down their previously upbeat forecasts for the current quarter. The move, along with ongoing worries about Palm’s performance in the marketplace, sent Palm’s shares nose-diving through the floor of the NASDAQ exchange, to the tune of a 19.28% loss, closing the day at $6.53 a share.

That loss was the biggest one-day percentage loss since October 2006 when the investment by Elevation Partners resulted in an $8 dividend for stockowners. Today’s loss also sent Palm stock to a point not seen since January of last year, just before the Pre was announced at CES 2009. From a peak of $18.09 in October, Palm stock has lost nearly two-thirds of its value, wiping out $2.9 billion of shareholder value. As of today’s closing, the total outstanding Palm stock plus Elevation Partner’s 1/3 stake (purchase price, ~$7/share) comes to just $1.6 billion. In the past week alone, Palm stock has declined more than 30%.

All of this tells us one thing: Palm’s in trouble. They had enough trouble gaining the faith of customers and a handful of stock analysts, and while webOS 1.4 will make plenty of current users happy, we don’t think it’s going to do much to assuage shareholders, analysts, or potential new customers. Sorry for all the doom and gloom lately folks – sometimes that’s just the news.

While it’s an issue for a few CDMA Pre owners, the problem is a major complaint for GSM webOS users: network time sync just doesn’t work the way it should. In the US most Pre and Pixi owners can roam across the country and their phone will pick up and sync the time with local cell towers – useful for when crossing into different time zones. What’s not so awesome is how this sometimes just doesn’t work in Europe, but as always we can count on an enterprising developer to come up with a solution.

To the rescue here is content754 and the new Clock Sync app. This app is a simple utility that instead of trying to sync the phone’s internal clock with the network time connects to online time servers and gets an accurate read on the current hour. It can even run in the background and sync your time every few hours to prevent temporal shift. Judging by the near unanimous 50+ five-star reviews (many in languages this blogger can’t read), it’s a godsend for those with this problem.

Clock Sync is available now in the App Catalog for the low low price of absolutely free. Depending on when webOS 1.4 (which should fix the issue) arrives for GSM Pre users, it could be a godsend.

That’s not to say that the Android Market isn’t growing quickly. It is. As our friends at Android Central pointed out (noting an insightful application store study done by Distimo), the Android Market is growing by more than 3000 apps a month, which equates to 15% of the total available apps. That’s cool, but we feel the need to clear our throats and say “Wait a minute…”

Here’s the deal: Palm’s webOS App Catalog hit 1000 apps on January 1, 2010. Since then 561 new apps have joined the catalog, a pace of 10.2 new apps per day. Or 310 new apps a month. Or 20% growth per month. Or more than 15%. If you’ll pardon the indulgence, “Ha ha.”

More analysis after the break!

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We still can’t say for certain that webOS 1.4 will land today (but that is the rumor). What we can say for certain is that an anonymous source has sent us what looks like the changelog for webOS 1.4!

Read on for the details on video recording, fixed bugs, alert lights, improved universal search, and more! Which is your favorite?

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No day is complete without new apps, and yesterday was well on its way to being a complete day. If that makes no sense (I tend to ramble, you should know that by now), then know this: there are new apps in the App Catalog. From lyrics searches to 3D Deer Hunter to apps for developers, yesterday’s app drop ran the gamut of application types. And, of course, there were several buckets full of updates to apps that we hold near and dear to our hearts. Interested? Don’t lie, you know you are. The lists is waiting for you, patiently, after the break.

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While there are all sorts of streaming music apps available for the Palm Pre (Pandora and Slacker, to name two), there’s one more service has made its presence known on webOS: Grooveshark. Their app, as demoed above, leverages Grooveshark’s popular and powerful recommendation engine to find other music you might like. Like Pandora you can rate a song up or down (smile or frown, in Grooveshark lingo), but you can also save playlists and songs for later repeat listening and sharing with other users.

What makes Grooveshark truly unique, however, is that users can upload their own content to the service. Like YouTube, you can upload whatever music or other audio you want (from your desktop, of course – that’d be too much for webOS) to Grooveshark. What makes this cool is that you can upload your own music collection to Grooveshark and listen to it from wherever you have an internet connection, be it on a friend’s computer or on your webOS phone using the Grooveshark app. Cool, eh?

Grooveshark is available now, for free, in the App Catalog.

[via: MobileCrunch]

Thanks to everybody that sent this in!

Yesterday brought some beefy new apps to the App Catalog. While we got the standard smattering of updates and cruft apps, there are some gems in there that I feel obligated to point out. First there’s the popular Gameloft game Real Soccer 2010, and a 3D fantasy adventure in Castle of Magic, also from Gameloft. But the real heavyweights here are Grooveshark and Epocrates. You all know Epocrates as the gold standard of medical reference apps, and Grooveshark is a sweet service that lets you upload your music to the cloud and listen to your entire library from anywhere you have an internet connection. Of course, there’s plenty more, and it’s all after the break.

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