Open Source!
Well, you’ve been waiting for the big webOS announcement, and today we’ve made it. This morning, HP announced that webOS will be going open source with the resources of HP behind it. The Developer Relations team is very excited by this announcement and what it means for the future of webOS, and for you, our developer community.
With this announcement, Meg Whitman has reiterated HP’s commitment to webOS as a cloud-connected, scalable platform, while opening up new possibilities for platform expansion and improvement. She has also committed HP to a course of continued improvement to webOS, which means we’re in it for the long haul. Finally, we are committed to good, transparent and inclusive governance to avoid fragmentation of the platform.
Here in Developer Relations, we have the deepest appreciation for you, our developer community. You have helped to bring this announcement about through your passion and commitment, through periods of both promise and uncertainty.
We are committed to you as not only contributors to our app ecosystem, but now to webOS itself. We recognize that there’s a larger open source community of which we will now be a part, and are excited by the future now open to us.
We also know you’ll have a lot of questions, and we don’t have all the answers right now. We will keep you up-to-date on the latest developments, both in the forums and here on the developer blog.
We hope you’ll join us for the next leg of this journey!
Comments (94)
Cool! And hosting the project on Gitorious or GitHub would be even better move.
Great move and as a proud owner of two WebOS devices I’m relived. I think WebOS has a lot of the right concepts in place and now it can blossom.
But I think you should still make more devices, even though other companies also can.
Can only second that: Great step HP! I am looking forward helping bringing webOS further. Mono for webOS sounds interesting but with enyo out there, we got a great framework for application development or did I misunderstand something here? Btw I am new to webOS — registered just because of the good news
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE make it be an open source / free software… or at least make it so that one DOES NOT need to have proprietary tools to compile, use and / or re-distribute ???@!!! see what happens to android if you decide to do so
I think the first step in really securing WebOS is to create enyo / etc. compatibility apps / layers for other devices, including desktops. I think WebOS has a unique architecture and presents the possibility of producing a cross platform app development environment. This ability would draw MANY developers to the WebOS fold in short order.
Here’s to a solid platform and a bright future.
I think its great. However, I have been unable to get a touchpad and find it hard to learn how to program for Web OS without a device. I was planning on buying one at the original price. My HP Touchsmart PC was first but no chance now. Maybe eventually I can get a refurbished one. If there is not going to be devices for this OS it will be harder to get new developers.
Maybe now we can use a modern version of OpenEmbedded?
Far to little far too late imo, HP killed webos with their stupid business decisions and throwing a half backed product out the door and hoping it would compete against apple and Android for a whole seven weeks before pulling the plug.
How short sighted and misguided can one company be ?
A real shame webos could have been so good.
Feels like Adobe and their decision to contribute Adobe Flex to the Apache Software Foundation: If you have technology, and no idea how to monetize on it – but are afraid of killing – you just open source it.
Is this real? (I’m looking for an HP WebOS team member to answer) https://github.com/hpwebos/webos/
Couldn’t disagree more with all the GPL advocates here – this will keep innovation off the platform. It makes much more sense to go with a permissive but GPL compatible license like MIT so that folks who want to develop proprietary solutions with the OS can do that, without preventing the open source community from contributing or innovating on their own.
As an attorney working with open source every day, I can’t begin to tell you how much the GPL retards innovation and gets in the way due to license compatibility problems even with open source projects – do yourselves a favor HP and recognize that strong copyleft has serious downsides.
What license? GPL3?
Since HP invited suggestions and input, read mine at www.linuxbsdos.com/2011/12/09/webos-the-latest-open-source-linux-distribution/
Please, remember BEOS, many years ago palm bought Be and never used, please, open your source too.
@James Gifford: No, that’s not real. The github hpwebos project was simply a joke. Until there’s some real webOS/Enyo code available as OpenSource it might surely take 3-6 months, as some components need to be rewritten which cannot be licensed as OpenSource, all processes, the infrastructure around the project needs to be established etc. That’s nothing like: here’s a dump of the internal developer repositories and tools, now it’s OpenSource.
@webOS Team: Please take a look at Nokia what they did with Qt and their Open Governance: wiki.qt-project.org/Main_Page This might provide some ideas for establishing a community driven webOS project.
Ok, enough with the hype. Where can I find the code?
It’s a great opportunity to continue the system, very good indeed. And what is the license to use?
developer.palm.com/blog/2011/12/open-source/comment-page-2/#comment-11925
> Couldn’t disagree more with all the GPL advocates here
Oh Tor, you *can* disagree more, and you can do it better. Work on your writing style. You keep using that word… dm.spodcast.net/misc/to_tor_esq.html
Then pick a new pseudonym and try again.
Great move guys, but please release your software under the GPLv3 licence. I don’t want webOS to be like Android (2.x is free, 3.x is not free, 4.x is free and 5.x who knows).
Nice move HP =). I declare WebOs back from the dead, I guess a BSD, Apache 2 or a MPL license would be appropriate.
PLEASE include the Classic emulator so that it can be updated to work on WebOS 2.2.x. That was one of the reasons I went with WebOS, only to find it didn’t work on my Pre3.
Please use the GPLv3 with the “any later version” verbiage for WebOS, and make sure there are no proprietary build or flashing tool requirements. Oh, and don’t forget about any WebOS patents — those must be disarmed in order for free software developers to work with you.
Awesome news! Hope webOS will become available soon to both desktops and Android phones and tablets, from low to latest high-end!
Hopeful for webOS! Competition drives innovation!