EverythingPre

PreCentral.net

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Palm responds to iTunes / Pre statement, defiant and unfazed

We're still not 100 percent clear what Apple's next move is, but we do know they're a little more than nonplussed about Pre's ad hoc iTunes syncing methods. Despite Cupertino's update to its support site last night, Palm seems unconcerned, as relayed by a spokesperson to Digital Daily. In a statement, the company said disabling the sync "will be a direct blow to their users who will be deprived of a seamless synchronization experience" and that "there are other third-party applications we could consider." In other word, it'd be Apple's loss. We're not quite sure we agree there, nor would we really think "stay with the iTunes version that works to sync their music on their Pre" method is really the best suggestion, but hey, we're not the multimillion dollar phone manufacturer here. We anxiously await to see if and when this cold war is turned up a few notches.

Pre hackery brings some fancy VNC action

They certainly weren't kidding when people declared the Pre a very hackable OS. Nebula from the #webos-internals IRC channel has done it again. Not too long ago he mad history by porting running a native linux Nintendo emulator on the Pre, full controls and all. Well, he's back and this time he's gotten a native linux VNC application running on the Pre. (That's Virtual Network Computing, if you're unfamiliar, which basically means the Pre is can view and control your desktop.)



This is merely a proof of concept, like running the NES emulator, though this one has much less functionality (due to the lack of a mouse, etc.). Nebula has written up a handy guide if you have a rooted Pre and would like to try it yourself. If you have any questions about setup, feel free to pop on by #webos-internals on freenode IRC. One thing that should also be noted is that the VNC app (like the NES application) is ran from your SSH connection and is not in any form integrated into the WebOS interface, though that could change in the future.

Still, it's a very impressive feat and really helps to show the strength and versatility the WebOS and Pre can come to represent.

From precentral.