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As with any struggling company, HP's looking at ways to streamline their business and raise some cash in the process. Late last month HP send a 10-K filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission that the company will "continue to evaluate the potential disposition of assets and businesses that may no longer help us meet our objectives." In plain talk: if you're a part of HP but aren't helping out the bottom line as much as HP would like, you might not be part of HP for much longer. Of course, the ideal method for getting rid of those not-helping-HP units is for HP to sell them. You know, stop losing money by making money. This isn't the first time HP's looked at selling parts of the company. In fact, a lot of HP's problems over the past year can be traced back to efforts to dispense with large parts of the company. It was the plan of then CEO Leo Apotheker and still-Chairman Ray Lane to split HP into two distinctly separate companies, with one focusing on enterprise software and the other built around the declining PC business. That plan kicked off a firestorm in Palo Alto and Wall Street, ending with the ouster of Apotheker. HP also tried and failed to find a buyer for webOS and/or the webOS Global Business Unit at a favorable price, eventually opting instead to commit webOS to open source and spin off the GBU as a standalone company. Or at least, that was the plan months ago. Gram, that standalone company, has yet to launch, and since HP's decision to open source webOS a year ago the mobile landscape has dramatically changed. Could HP be weighing giving a sale of webOS and it's GBU another go? Not likely, considering how much they've invested in spinning off Gram so far, but… crazier things have happened. View the full article

Oh, what a whirlwind year it was for webOS in 2012. From unbelievable highs to unimaginable lows, we've been through it all and we're coming out on the other side looking forward to whatever it is that 2013 has to offer. So let's take a look back at the year that was 2012 and see what all actually happened... read more View the full article

2012 was a weird year for webOS, and we decided it was best if the webOS Nation Best of 2012 Awards reflected that. As did you, with nearly four thousand votes cast, it's time to reveal the winners… read more View the full article

It's the Reasonably Special Edition, need you any more? We've got fifty copies of the colorful and puzzling Giddy 3 primed and ready to give away to you, dear reader, all you have to do is comment for a chance to win one. Across five huge old-school scrolling levels you take on the part of Giddy, the all-round good egg with unfeasibly large hands and fight to save the world from the big bad aliens and their giant robot stompers. Sound exceedingly weird and goofy? Good, because it is, and you should be into that sort of thing. Especially when you get it for free instead of the $0.99 it might normally cost you. Contest: We have 50 copies of Giddy 3 to give away. Just leave a comment on this post to enter. Contest ends next Sunday at midnight US Eastern Time, after which time we will select 50 random entrants to win. Please only leave one comment, multiple entries won’t count. Promo codes are only valid in countries serviced by the App Catalog, and users must be running webOS 2.0 or higher with the latest version of the App Catalog. View the full article

After a roller coaster of a year in 2011 for webOS, the pace of news for 2012 was definitely a lot slower. For the first time since webOS was released in 2009, we did not see any hardware released or software updated for existing devices. Instead, the focus on 2012 was on Open webOS, the open source next generation of the webOS operating system that was officially released this past September. While existing webOS devices will not officially be able to run Open webOS, there are still a lot of users who are proud (or stubborn, depending on your perspective) to keep carrying on with their webOS devices, be it the TouchPad, Pre3 or Pre2, Veer, or even a few brave folks still using a Pixi or Pre+. And there is nothing better at webOS Nation that we like to do more than to make your webOS experience the best it can possibly be. So as long as there are webOS users out there, we will continue to bring you our Tips of the Day, with over 425 and counting for you to view. As we close out 2012, we wanted to look back at some of our favorite and most used tips of the year. read more View the full article

As if the Samsung Galaxy Nexus Open webOS port wasn't enough, WebOS Ports has announced a new porting project: Open webOS on the Google Nexus 7. The seven-inch Android-powered tablet built by Asus was the premiere launch devices for Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, and thanks to the open source and open hardware nature of the device, it is the perfect fit for WebOS Ports's next porting adventure. Seeing how much we loved the small seven-inch TouchPad Go, it's no surprise that the equally small Nexus 7 tablet was on the radar of WebOS Ports. Though larger, the 1280x800 screen on the Nexus 7 is close enough in pixel dimensions to the 1280x720 screen on the Galaxy Nexus, so a lot of the work put into the smartphone project could be easily translated to the Nexus 7. How easy? This work was led by WebOS Ports's Simon "morphis" Busch over the course of about a week while he was on winter break from college. The port was accomplished with the Galaxy Nexus project in conjunction with LibHybris, created by Carsten Munk (an engineer at Jolla, though he also leads Merproject, which grew out of Sailfish ancestors Maemo and Meego), a library that allows for "bionic-based [Android] hardware adaptations in glibc systems", in essence making it easier to translate between the designed-for-Android hardware and Linux-based software like the Open webOS operating system. This means that with LibHybris the WebOS Ports team won't have to write drivers from scratch for different Android-based devices they might wish to attack. In addition to LibHybris, the Nexus 7 leverages the work of those involved in Merproject, FreeSmartphone, and SHR Project. A video of the port in action is after the break, and as an early alpha we're rather impressed. Open webOS on the Nexus 7 runs generally smoothly (there's some intermittent and infrequent lag, which isn't anything too surprising at this stage) and has improved considerably from our last look at Open webOS on the Galaxy Nexus. In addition there's now an Enyo 2-based Settings app that allows you to toy with things like the Wi-Fi and brightness settings and the new OWO Memos app (also Enyo 2 based). The port also supports the classic webOS tablet keyboard, the made-for-the-Galaxy-Nexus virtual gesture area, and forward-swipe-driven screen rotation. Essentially, it's like webOS on the TouchPad Go, except on the slimmer, lighter, faster, newer Nexus 7 and more open source-y. Oh, and did we mention that it runs untethered now? Yeah, it does that. Being able to use Open webOS on the device without being hooked up to your computer is a big deal, and we're really quite psyched to see that happen. You still have to boot from a desktop, but after that you can unplug the cable and get on with the webOSing. The Nexus 7 Open webOS port is still in its early stages, but thanks to the work done on the Galaxy Nexus port it's come a long way in a relatively short time. We're looking forward to what's coming next. read more View the full article

Mobile Nations Podcast Feed Mobile Nations on iTunes Mobile Nations YouTube OUYA ships 1,200 developer consoles, opens dev portal Press: Google Reader done right? Or just different? Multi-window update for AT&T Galaxy Note 2 now live BlackBerry Travel will make its way to BlackBerry 10 New pictures of the BlackBerry 10 N-Series QWERTY device surface BlackBerry Z10 and QWERTY N-Series pose together with a special guest US Department of Justice now investigating HP's Autonomy acquisition WebOS Ports's OWO Memos: an Enyo 2 replacement Messenger Mega Mix mixes in smartphone messaging improvements Facebook Poke vs. Snapchat: What's the best sexting app for iPhone? Apple iWatch rumors surface again, this time with Intel attached 2012 iMore editors choice awards Notifications for Windows Phone 7 hits the Store HDR Photo Camera for Windows Phone 8 updated, adds settings and more Cloud-focused GPS chip by Microsoft Research slashes smartphone battery consumption View the full article

It's been excluisvely up to the webOS homebrew community for over a year to make improvements to the existing crop of webOS devices. Smartphones like the Pre3 aren't going to get a software update from HP, just like the TouchPad isn't going to receive new official software. But that hasn't stopped the homebrew community, from the organized grand project groups like WebOS Internals and WebOS Ports to individual developers, from making improvements on their own. One of the latest improvements comes to use in the form of a combination patch: Messenger Mega Mix. Coded up by webOS Nation Forums member michel_ng and recently added to the Preware and WebOS Quick Install patches feed, the Messenger Mega Mix patch makes a number of improvements to the built-in Messaging app for webOS 2.2.x smartphones, including some very gesture-y enhancements. There are the improvements like adding a character counter (seriously, how did Palm and HP never get around to adding something so simple and yet so imminently useful to an app that deals with a character-limited service?) and putting the date and time of the sent and received messages into the conversation. Messenger Mega Mix also wipes out the on-screen send/attach button, opting to instead have you attach media with a Gesture+P shortcut (or the app menu, which hasn't been changed here) and sending is accomplished with a forward swipe on the gesture area. As in, sending it to your friend with a swipe of the thumb. Magic. We're digging a lot of the changes made by Messenger Mega Mix, though it's worth noting that by adding so much it could conflict with other patches (in particular the Advanced System series) and not install alongside. The patch also isn't Tweaks-enabled, though we'd like to think that's something that could be added in so we can turn on or off the one alteration made by Messenger Mega Mix that might not go over well with everybody: the Enter key switches to adding a new line in the composed message instead of sending said message. Even with those caveats, michel_ng's Messenger Mega Mix is still an interesting patch. The gesture area is one of the most unique aspects of webOS smartphones, and is so beloved by webOS fans that even with it not explicitly needed in the WebOS Ports process of bringing Open webOS to the Samsung Galaxy Nexus they added it anyway. So we're quite pleased to see homebrew developers like michel_ng finding new and different ways to make use of the feature. View the full article

A little over a month ago, HP announced that they were writing down $8.8 billion from "improprieties" in their 2011 acquisition of UK software firm Autonomy, and this week the United States Department of Justice has opened an inquiry into HP's allegations. Those allegations are that Autonomy engaged in accounting fraud that dramatically increased the perceived value of the firm, leading HP to overpay by several billion dollars when they executed their $11 billion purchase. The Autonomy writedown was the third multi-billion paper loss for HP in a year, following up on a $3.3 billion loss on webOS after abruptly canceling hardware development and an $8 billion loss stemming from the 2008 purchase of EDS. Through 2012, shares of HP have declined 45%, despite dumping floudering CEO Leo Apotheker for former eBay chief Meg Whitman. According to a filing by HP with the SEC, the DOJ investigation into the Autonomy acquisition began on November 21, 2012, the day after HP publicly leveled accusations at the former leadership of the software unit (Whitman fired Autonomy CEO Mike Lynch in May of 2012). Unsurprisingly, HP claims to be cooperating with agencies investigating the alleged malfeasance. In addition to the DOJ probe, HP also says they've submitted their evidence to the United Kingdom's Serious Fraud Office and to the US SEC. We have every expectation that this is going to be a long, drawn-out slog for HP, and that they're not likely to get much of their billions of dollars back. A group of disgruntled HP shareholders have filed suit against HP, alleging the company didn't do its due diligence, and Lynch has publicly fought back against HP allegations, demanding they release the evidence HP says they have of the improprieties. It's a cleve strategy that Lynch has employed, as HP's made to look publicly uncooperative when the evidence they've submitted to the authorities cannot be publicly shared while under investigation. And to think, HP cancelled webOS hardware development because they weren't willing to make the multi-billion investments needed for a chance at long-term success View the full article

The WebOS Internals' homebrew app Save/Restore is great to backup your important application data in case you ever need to webOS Doctor you device, swap it out with a new device, or even transfer data between a phone and TouchPad. Typically, Save/Restore will save files that are tied to specific applications, such as progress in your games, specific stock quotes set up in a finance app, or settings/preferences for apps. However, there are a lot of other miscellanous files that you may find throughout webOS that are not tied to specific apps, but you would still like to save. These can include changes that you have made to the lockscreen or boot logos, the background for the phone dialer, or even the database files that contain some system data (e.g. cookies.db, database.db). While you would never want to restore those database files after a device swap or webOS doctor, it would be nice to restore those personalized image files. Since this is not your typical Save/Restore function and does involve some additional homebrew knowedge, it's not automatically added to the list of supported applications within the app. But, there a little easter egg within Save/Restore that will allow you to backup or restore these files as needed. The easiest way to accomplish this is to use Internalz Pro, by Jason Robatille, which is available in both Preware or webOS Quick Install. Open Internalz Pro Navigate to /media/cryptofs/apps/usr/palm/applications/org.webosinternals.saverestore/contrib Tap on the "org.webosinternals.deviceinfo" script and select "Copy". Find "/var/svc/org.webosinternals.saverestore", highlight it and then choose "Select" to copy it. Now, you can open up the Save/Restore app, wait for the data to load and choose "Save Application Data". Scroll down until you find "Misc OS Backup files" and ensure that it is toggled to "ON" Once you run that script, you will have all these files backed up to the USB drive on your webOS device. Be aware that when it comes time to restore these files after a device swap or webOS doctor, you will need to follow the directions above on the new device before you run the restore with Save/Restore in order to add that script to the app on the new device. If you would like to see what files this script backs up (and have some knowledge of how to read save/restore scripts), you can edit the file on your device using Internalz Pro or you can view it on the WebOS Internals git repository. View the full article

Alright folks, it's time to announce the 6 lucky people that will be joining NVIDIA and Mobile Nations at CES 2013! We would like to say a huge THANK YOU to all of the members that submitted an entry. We really appreciate all of the time and effort everyone put in, and the response was quite overwhelming. So, getting down to business... after much debate and discussion, we have selected 6 stand out entries. These folks will join the Mobile Nations and NVIDIA crews in Las Vegas for CES 2013! read more View the full article

From all of us here to all of you out there, we wish you the most splendid of holidays. While you weren't likely to find webOS under the tree today, hope springs eternal for next year. View the full article

Mobile Nations Podcast Feed Mobile Nations on iTunes Mobile Nations YouTube The checkered, slow history of stories about Android updates 5 Android apps to help with last-minute holiday shopping Motorola said to be working on the 'X Phone' to bring the ultimate Android eXperience BlackBerry L-Series to be named the BlackBerry Z10 at launch? RIM CEO: 'We are very very confident in BlackBerry 10' Research In Motion Q3 Analysis and the BlackBerry Roller Coaster webOS Synergy Google sync safe from Google's ActiveSync shut down webOS Ports hackathon on Wednesday to update Internals apps to Enyo 2 Nexus 7 dual-Touchstone charging mod Instagram realizes it needs to start making money, decides to do it with your photos and identity Apple releases iOS 6.0.2 software update, bug fixes and iOS 6.1 beta 4 now available to developers 2012 iPhone and iPad gift guides Nokia begins Windows Phone 8 OS update for AT&T and Rogers Nokia improves Lumia 920 camera. We do a before and after comparison Samsung ATIV S unboxing and hands-on View the full article

The Memos app built into webOS has never been much better than 'just okay'. Both the TouchPad and webOS smartphones adhere to a sticky note user interface convention that makes for fun eye candy - "look, push pins!" - but does nothing to enhance the user experience. In fact, you could argue, quite easily, that the grid layout for the notes with a small preview of the contents is detrimental to use. So when WebOS Ports's Josh Palmer (or shiftyaxel, if you prefer) told us that he was working on a replacement app for Memos built off of Enyo 2, we were understandably excited. I wrote our review of the TouchPad using the Memos app and it was a nightmare (though the app's responsiveness and stability has improved since then with OS updates, but nothing on the user interface front), so anything would be better. The app, available to TouchPad owners in the WOCE beta feed in Preware (beta feed instructions here), is called OWO Memos, and while it's a work-in-progress, we're still liking what we're seeing. The app retains the basic features of the basic Memos app - individual notes with user-selectable colors, but does away with the needless user interface chrome for something more authentically Enyo and simply easier to use. And titles! Oh how we've wanted Memo titles for so long... read more View the full article

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Xecutah is a great homebrew app by WebOS Internals (available in Preware or webOS Quick Install) that allows you to access the command line interface on your webOS device. However, there are times that you launch it on the TouchPad and the device's virtual keyboard does not automatically appear. Tapping on the screen doesn't help, so it seems as if the app is totally useless without any way to interact with it. Luckily, there is a very simple way to toggle the virtual keyboard by perform a three-figured tap on the screen. As soon as you tap the screen with three figures, the keyboard will appear. To dismiss the keyboard, you can do another three-figured tap on the screen or just press the dismiss key on the bottom-right of the keyboard. View the full article

Have you submitted your entry to The Mobile Nations 2013 CES Experience yet?! If not, you better hurry, because the entry deadline is tomorrow at 11:59 PM EST. Remember, if you're one of the lucky selections, you'll get to join NVIDIA and Mobile Nations crew at CES 2013 in Las Vegas. Your airfare, hotel and CES pass will all be taken care of. Woohoo! What are you waiting for!? Full details here > View the full article

Over the years we've witnessed dear friend and webOS hacking guru Rod Whitby of WebOS Internals fame perform all types of webOS hackery. From the infamous Frankenpre surgery to bricking the tiny Veer while trying to find out what makes Touch to Share tick, Whitby has had his hand in projects most of us would never dare to go. One of his most recent passions has been to perform Touchstone mods on all manner of devices, but this time he has definitely topped even the coolest of Touchstone mods with his absurd Nexus 7 project. Using two Touchstone charging coils and two Touchstone dock pucks - two - Whitby has successfully completed a project that will have you charging your Nexus 7 with the ease of wireless charging. Charging can be done via one or two Touchstone chargers but only using one will result in a slow trickle charge that would be fine for charging over night but not for much else. If you want a good normal charge you will need two phone Touchstone chargers working in tandem to get the job done. Granted this isn't the most ideal manner of wireless charging, but it's a start (and a damn cool one if we say so ourselves). In the future, Whitny plans on attempting a follow-up surgery making use of the larger and more powerful (not to mention tablet-intended) TouchPad Touchstone dock. Is this something we would perform? Probably not. Whitby's put together some impressive documentation to guide any brace souls through the process, but it's a bit too intense for us (and likely all but the most daring hardware hackers). In the meantime, a round of applause to Mr. Rod Whitby for an impressive job well done and for keeping those of us that have been following this project's progress thoroughly entertained over the past few week. View the full article

This tip is only for devices running webOS 3.0 or higher While the stock music player for webOS phones or the TouchPad has never been as fully featured as third-party alternatives, such as Music Player (Remix), the Enyo-coded stock Music Player update on the TouchPad did provide some nice upgrades as compared to the previous phone version. One of those features was the ability to create a music playlist right on the fly directly on the TouchPad. Unfortunately, due to a limitation in Enyo that did not allow you to press-and-hold on a list item to rearrange, you are not able to easily rearrange your playlist once it was created, but you do have the ability to edit some features of that playlist To edit the playlist Open up the Music Player app on your TouchPad Tap on the playlist name on the left side of the screen you want to edit You should see a icon on the top-right of the screen. Tap it. You can then perform of the the following three actions: Delete songs: Tap on the "X" icons on the right on the screen for all songs you want to delete. Then tap on the "Done" button and confirm the deletions in the pop-up menu that follows. Rename Playlist: Tap on the playlist name on the top of the screen (in the blue area) and then type in your new name. Tap "Done". You will actually get the same "Delete the selected songs?" prompt as above, even if you didn't choose to delete any songs. You have to select "Delete" to confirm the rename, again even if you didn't delete any songs Delete Playlist: Tap the "Delete Playlist" button on the bottom-right of the screen and then confirm the deletion in the pop-up that follows. View the full article

While we still have a strong webOS community, many webOS users have moved on to other platforms and no longer use their webOS phones as their daily driver. But, many of those are still keeping their foot in the webOS-door by using their old phones on Wi-Fi only* or maybe even SIM swapping when they miss the joys of webOS. Or, you may just have multiple webOS phones around and like to use some as a media player for music or podcasts or have given your phones to others in the family to use. If this is the case, one of the things that you should do when using a phone without a cellular connection is to disable those cellular radios. We have gone over how to disable just the data portion of your signal in the past, but you can also turn off the entire radio to save additional battery life. There are a few ways to disable your phone's cellular radio: Turn on airplane mode to disable all radios, and then turn on Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or GPS as needed. Install a patch to customize your Device Connections menu when you swipe-down from the top-right of the screen to add a Phone usage toggle. One example would be the "Device Menu Megamix" patches from Jason Robitaille that adds a "Phone" section where you can disable the entire "Phone Radio" (see screenshot) Unfortunately, the second solution above will be undone whenever you reboot your device. If you want a more permanent solution, check out another of Jason's patches in Preware called "Radio always off". This will force the device to always disable to phone radio whenever you reboot your device. If you have a need to turn them back on, you can use the toggle in the Device Menu that you added in the step above! * Note that if you need to activate your webOS phone without a cellular network connection, you may need to bypass that phone's activation. These steps differ, depending on the webOS version you are using. You can refer to our tips for webOS 1.x phones and webOS 2.x phones for more information. View the full article

This Mobile Nations Survey comes to you via our accessories team. We're always putting new smartphone accessories to the test, and are often getting into debates over which are the best. One topic where the team is 100% in agreement though is car mount docks. We think that car mounts are the absolute best way to take your smartphone with you on the road. We're curious to know if you agree, if you own a car mount or not, if you like them or not and why. Thanks for sharing! Take the Survey View the full article

The beginning of a new month brings us yet another rack of updates coming down the pipe for the Open webOS project. This particular month has some very important and extremely technical work being accomplished within Open webOS. Some of this is rather of the heads of the layman (like us, we'll admit it) and some sounds very promising even to the not so tech savvy. First up is something kind of big and has us all rather excited here at webOS Nation: the Pluggable Keyboard Project. Any webOS fan knows that official virtual keyboards (with the exception of the TouchPad) in our world have been quite elusive over the years. There have been everything from homebrew solutions to apps in the catalog to try and quench the thirst for a virtual keyboard. Despite the herculean efforts, none of the solutions brought forth have really operated like a good solid virtual keyboard should. Thankfully, all the guys and gals working on Open webOS plan to bring those days to an end very soon. Using the existing virtual keyboard logic out of luna-sysmgr (the 'system manager' for webOS) the new keyboard will be both tablet- and phone-friendly. Since it will be based on the much loved TouchPad virtual keyboard we are excited, as the keyboard on the TouchPad is one of the best virtual keyboards around. Next up, Open webOS will be in the process of updating to Qt 4.8.3. If you remember way back in July the Open webOS System Manager was opened up to active development. This major upgrade incorporated what was then the latest QtWebKit and Qt technologies in an improved architecture, and the update to Qt 4.8.3 update furthers the cause. Since Qt now underlies all applications, providing state-of-the-art support for HTML rendering and I/O and is integrated across the system it allows the Open webOS team to continue to clean out old code and in turn continue to enhance the performance of Open webOS. The Open webOS Project Blog gets way more detailed as to what exactly is going on, but we'll be damned if we understand what they're talking about. If you would like to read an in-depth explanation of what's going down, hit up the source link below. View the full article