I recently went on another rant on the Ubuntu forums, you can read it more in context here, also, it is pertaining to a Lifehacker article which you can find here.
And lets not forget the open nature of the platform to allow apps to be written in HTML, CSS, Javascript, or C/C++ if you want
Um…you can write apps in all of those languages for Android, I don’t see how that makes webOS ‘more’ open than android. (Also, the iPhone let’s you use those languages too, well, I don’t know about HTML and CSS, also, I wouldn’t call them ‘languages’).
Android is open source for its core OS and allows installing apps from outside of the marketplace but so does webOS.
Really? I don’t remember webOS being open source. (Call me pedantic, but that’s a poor choice of words, unless webOS really is open source).
Google also loses by making their “default” apps (Gmail, Maps, etc.) completely closed source and even takes down anyone who tries to share them. Palm on the other hand has written every built in app according to the standards they hold their developers to and made the apps all open source so you could see exactly how they built the app.
Sure, some of the apps are closed, but others are open, such as the web browser, and the home app. Also, Google does make their default apps using the SAME sdk, using the SAME APIs that developers have access to. (Granted, they did make the APIs). So, the only company that you can hold that argument to (out of the three), is Apple, who has their own ‘special’ APIs that only they can use.
Android and webOS are both fairly open, but webOS is more open and is the winner here.
I can’t argue that, as I haven’t actually used webOS (or researched it much), the only reason I could argue the other points is because I’m only pointing inaccuracies they have about android, and taking their comments on webOS at face value.
Okay, I’m done, not going to go onto the other points…if it makes you feel any better, when I read the original article several days ago, I also got to the keyboard section and stopped. It claimed to be a review for ‘power users’, and started complaining about the ‘out-of-the-box’ keyboard. It would be okay if they said it was just a regular review for regular users, or if the keyboard was a bit tricky to install (compiling it from source etc. etc), but as long as the keyboard is only a trip to the market place, and another button click away, you can’t claim to be a review for ‘power users’, and talk about the ‘out-of-the-box’ experience like that (well, you can, but I’ll think it’s dumb ).
I’m not saying Android’s better than webOS, as I said, I haven’t tried webOS, so it might be, but that article wasn’t very good, in my opinion anyway.
