HP's iPhone Killer... That Never Was

[@kyeongsushin3145]

LuneOS (an open-source re-write of WebOS) is still alive, too. It is probably closer to what Palm/HP have originally dreamed of (than the LG's WebOS).

[@RexTorres]

The calendar icon is probably a dynamic icon that displays the current date. That's probably why it looks different from all the other (regular) icons. And, for some reason, it probably sometimes fails to get/render the current date and so you end up with that black square.

[@Thiesi]

Or maybe this was filmed on _Black Friday._

[@ryancastley]

Having had both a Pre 1, 2, and TouchPad, I can confirm you are correct, it was a dynamic icon. Even back on webOS 1.4.5, it was. Even today, Synergy and just type can't be matched.😢

[@kissmiasma95]

Scrolled to find this one.

[@Bikeguychicago1]

A thriving webOS Meetup group existed in the Chicago suburbs from 2011 until at least 2013. One of the primary members had connections at HP, so we were fortunate enough to see and try out a number of these unreleased devices. I may have also benefited from a couple of these meetings where we raffled off various webOS-based devices, one of which may resemble one featured in this video.

[@brentgordon3801]

Did you or any of the other members have any blog posts/videos/podcasts etc about these meetings/thoughts about these devices?

[@patrickthebaptist-sharingt428]

You wanna sell it?

[@aymane.bencheikh]

you speak like a politician

[@dashcharger24]

I remember looking at webOS, and thinking wow I want one. I think the CEO (Apotheker) they had back at the time, they were basically throwing everything out of the window, even printers. It shows how a CEO without vision shouldn't earn big money.

[@6581punk]

True. The CEOs you want are the ones who have built up a business from nothing. Instead they hire people with management degrees who have no creativity.

[@Thiesi]

@@dashcharger24 Isn't that _almost exactly_ what Carly did a couple of years later? So he turned out to be quite the visionary after all.

[@JBrandtBuckley]

@@Thiesi You're thinking of Meg Whitman. Carly Fiorina was CEO 1999-2005 (during the Compaq merger).

[@Thiesi]

@@JBrandtBuckley Exactly! She was the one who came from eBay, right?

[@RandonBrown]

Great video, reminds me from those times as being an ex-HP employee. People including myself were so proud when webOS phones came out. Sounded like we were about to beat the smartphone market... and then what - they killed it. Just like that. We already got webOS phones also ourselves, proudly carrying them when meeting clients etc. Phones seem to be pretty ok for business use in those days. Mails, calendars, some quick browsing and so on. Employees were ordering those tablets on their own and some even went to ebay to buy them after the company had formally killed it. So at least where I worked, people believed that we have a pretty competitive product in our hands, but why, why did they let the platform live and develop. Like said it was supposed to be a long lasting development project and could have become a competitor to IOS and Androd if they just would have let it live. After all, LG has been very successful afterwards with webOS in TV's. So the platfrom wasn't that bad.

[@berczigabor]

I actually bought a Veer _after_ HP decided to kill the whole webOS division, because it was just so advanced compared to both Android and Blackberry, the two most successful and advanced systems at that time. (iPhone/iOS was already on the market, but it looked like a toy to anyone who actually used any smartphone before that, because of its limited capabilities and customizability compared to all the other systems.) And I've been a system and applications developer and engineer for decades by that point, so, I also knew what I was in for, in the technological sense. webOS was just so much ahead of the competition in every regard (ease of add development, performance, UX) that it's not even funny. My only objection was with the Java updater, which I didn't make any sense, both because of how cumbersome it was, how much it was losing market share on the desktop, and also how much it didn't fit with the general architecture of webOS. But the actual firmware and OS the device was just unbelievably good and advanced.

[@knightcrusader]

Speaking of Prototypes - I remember when the HP TouchPad firesale happened, a few units running a dev copy of Android ended up being shipped out on accident. So, they were using Android as some kind of prototyping OS at some point for that.

[@BOplaid]

Have you seen MJD's previous video on the TouchPad? It's about exactly that

[@InfernosReaper]

Man, HP was sitting on what could have been what a market force like Android, but screwed up by bringing in a guy who was too concerned with quarterly profits to actually get the return on the investment HP made with that company

[@GAMEandRODO]

As a bilingual Mexican, I always thought that the name "WebOS" was funny, since it almost sounds like the word "Eggs" ("Huevos", used as slang for the male... Uh... Private parts...) in Spanish.

[@YaSheNePrydumav]

Don't you use cojones as that name?

[@SilentProti]

We use the word "eggs" too - "jajka"

[@otsoscars]

In Finland we say "munat' (eggs) for... the.. you know

[@エミリアン]

FR FR

[@meoutpeace]

we say "bolas", for balls

[@lark9266]

Would've been so cool to see what it'd end up as today. Shame it didn't get to that stage

[@OccyP]

I think the calendar icon showing as a black box is because of missing dates if the calendar is live.

[@AgentTomcat]

This all makes me so nostalgic, happy, and sad at the same time. I read every leak and article I could about this device when it was still a rumor.

[@newrecs4969]

i used a Pre 2, Pre 3 and HP TouchPad back in the day. remember the windsornot and touchpad go prototypes from webos nation as well and still want one years later! there was also a very rare white TouchPad with updated processor, updated Pre Touchstone wireless charger etc still have a new verizon pre 3 in box i’m never using!

[@EZOnTheEyes]

I miss physical keyboards tbh, something so satisfying about them

[@johannesviljoen9656]

removable batteries as a standard, headphone jacks (smaller phones too, but thats probably just me)

[@wipeout97]

I agree, I was much faster on them.

[@googaagoogaa12345678]

So do i. Nowadays, if you are 0.000000000000000001 nano pixel off, you hit the wrong "key." It's at the point where I use my s pen and graffiti like the old days. Yes, I have better results with that than virtual keyboards.

[@hyperturbotechnomike]

Solution: Unihertz Titan

[@cmyk8964]

Unfortunately physical phone keyboards don’t support Dvorak.

[@-kyrieeleison]

Thanks for this. I love seeing webOS stuff. At the time I thought it looked so sleek and way ahead of iPhone OS in terms of usability.

[@kelownatechkid]

This is the best video you've ever done. I am the biggest webos fanboy so it was a delight to see you check these out! The platform was insanely innovative and ahead of its time.

[@World_of_OSes]

No, the Bliss video was the best one he ever made.

[@nubwagon3758]

@@World_of_OSes Lol bruh it's his objective opinion and sharing it w/ the creator. Just like the bliss is objectively yours.

[@TheVoyger1234]

I distinctly remember my uncle (again, same one who used to work at Palm/HP during the time WebOS was a thing) having two of those miniature TouchPad prototypes stored away somewhere. I should ask him about these again when I get the chance (assuming he still has them), I never got to test them out to see if they worked.

[@crazyidiot5309]

Imagine if this was the base OS for Android phones now. Look how old that is and the animations, the smoothness (when it's not doing alpha-software shenanigans), the way the cards interface works. It's a crying damn shame this OS is not still available on a mobile device. Given the same time iOS and Android had, webOS could have been groundbreaking.

[@dashcharger24]

Isn't there a fork of WebOS?

[@DonMr]

LG Smart TVs still use It.

[@dashcharger24]

@@DonMr Isn't it called TizenOS or something nowadays? It's unfortunately not the same I think. They stripped a lot of stuff.

[@crazyidiot5309]

@@DonMr this is known, but it is in no way a resemblance to the software in its original form. webOS was a big boon for LG because of the smart part of the TV was now a fully grown, modern, modular, and ready to go with the right hardware.

[@crazyidiot5309]

@@dashcharger24 Tizen is Samsung.

[@berczigabor]

The calendar icon most likely glitches because, unlike all the other icons, it's not fixed, but rendered on-the-fly or at least periodically re-rendered to reflect the actual day of the month. And it likely tries to do so by taking some kind of default font size (which is then used to render the numbers reflecting the actual day, but also used to determine the icon size), which is different on this prototype device than it was in the original image (probably that of a Veer or whatever) the firmware was built on.

[@kbhasi]

(0:20) I could immediately tell that's a codename from when they hadn't yet settled on the model name. I could tell from the design that HP's project codenamed "WindsorNot" was likely aimed at people who may have been coming over from something like an iPhone 4 or original Galaxy S and may have not been accustomed to using a physical keyboard. As for the calendar icon, I think it's because there was a bug with the live icon that caused it to be rendered incorrectly, but the standard icon was fine.

[@crazyidiot5309]

I work with DVT and EVT devices on a pretty constant basis. If I remember correctly, HP codenamed this as it was supposed to be a multi device-wide launch. The OG Windsor is your large large device. WindsorNot was the cinch. They go together. You have the Windsor and the Not. One tablet made for bigger things and the cinch (WindsorNot). It was kind of a double entendre as well.

[@grtitann7425]

HP really dropped the ball on this one. I loved the tablet and WebOS.

[@skipmeister123]

The smaller display apps are because running phone apps on the Touchpad didn't properly scale and reflow the app and they use an older version of the framework/os. This is just a leftover from porting webOS 3 from the Touchpad. It would eventually have been fixed.

[@jamesweimer5478]

There is actually another layer of humor to the name "WindsorNot:" it is a pun on the "Windsor knot," a popular knot used for neckties. 😆

[@TJHorner]

I was desperately searching in the comments to see if someone mentioned this, I was surprised Michael didn’t mention it in the video lol

[@inkco420]

calendar app is probably meant to show actual day on the icon (same as mac os does)- which would make that icon "dynamic", meaning there is some logic that is executed to "create" the icon, and it might lead to improper scaling and black icon.

[@xavmiz3070]

I was in love with my Treo devices. Near perfect form factor for calls, texts, and simple web browsing. Nothing now really hits that spot. There's something to be said for tactile physical buttons and keys.

[@bluephreakr]

See, handset manufacturers of the world?! You **can** create a removable back with Qi charging! Why do y'all gotta make keeping a handset for ten years so damned hard?

[@dogproblems1]

You already know 🤑🤑🤑

[@Juanguar]

Nokia did it as well with the lumia 820 iirc

[@Zoomer.88]

I think qi is not the reason. It's mostly waterproofing. Still, I'd choose a phone with a removable back plane with reasonably low ip rating instead of watertight ip99 phone any day. It's not every day I drop my phone into the toilet, ya know😂

[@NTD59]

@@Zoomer.88 the galaxy s5 has a removable back cover and ip67 rating iirc. Also there's a qi compatible back cover accessory

[@Zoomer.88]

@@NTD59 Well then I don't know! 🤑🤑🤑

[@6581punk]

HP keeps going through CEOs with no ideas or vision. They should promote someone through the ranks who has a clue.

[@arpikatech]

Nice,I love watching MJD!Keep up the good work Michael!

[@moarfizz]

6:00 that is the most genius battery cover I've ever seen

[@eugiblisscast]

I love prototypes of more unusual operating systems!

[@JTManuel]

Not really unusual. If you've used webos back in the day, you'll see that android and iOS cribbed webos to the bone.

[@mikestringfellow7999]

My Palm Pre is still sitting in a drawer somewhere. I switched it on a year or so ago and it still worked! It’s a shame that these devices never saw the light of day: I remember Apotheker not being the most popular chap with the community! WebOS was light-years ahead of both Android and iOS in terms of the user experience, but sadly didn’t get the buy-in it deserved from 3rd party app developers, which is what ultimately killed it

[@hellophilwill]

Windsor knot, maybe, like the tie

[@User-v7e4e]

I LOVE MICHAEL MJD !!!!!!!!

[@Connorplayer123]

Me too

[@pythoneerssADOFAI]

Fr

[@danielsilva0424]

I imagine how the marketing for this smartphone would have been if it gets sold on Mexico.

[@sonicpika4ushka]

Sad that it never saw the light of day

[@catgame515]

Nice

[@pythoneerssADOFAI]

Nice

[@snowy_canada0955]

Nice

[@lesleyhaan116]

Nice

[@rainboweyes18]

Nice

[@gentuxable]

26:24 I wonder if the Wifi model would have had that "M.2 looking" port free so you could've installed an internal SSD into the slot.

[@RDTengineered]

I remember a friend got the original palm pre at ~release and was side loading some Linux apps/tool onto the phone as well as overclocking it right away. I wanted one but it was outside of my budget.

[@YuNherd]

the jankiness of the UI makes me smile... in a positive way

[@Anaerin]

That HP Touchpad Go looks like it has a SATA interface in the back for a SATA notebook hard-drive.

[@izchann]

Palm OS, was so ahead of its time, that even now with modern tech and UI. Still they are the inspiration of the major companies like Apple, Samsung, Google and etc.

[@sprungles]

You were saying how you think that the AT&T software was likely a restore. I actually think the verizon version was being ported from the AT&T version. I think you are on a development build.

[@PixPMusic]

...is that a laptop SATA connector inside the Touchpad Go???

[@TweeterMan287]

WebOS prototypes... thank you

[@xeroniris]

I miss webOS so much. I had a Pre 3 as a daily driver until around 2017 or so.

[@Bonzibud69]

What do you have now?

[@xeroniris]

@Brushedmetal69 z fold 4

[@Bonzibud69]

@xeroniris Nice, I thought you were a normie and were going to say iPhone lol.

[@frankiemouse992]

26:00 Is that an msata port on a tablet?

[@diablorojo3887]

i have the same question, problably is the LTE wwan, what is uncommon on a non-notebook, and open a platora of questions

[@Sb129]

I remember hearing about this, really cool to see it up close in a video. Yeah what happened in 2011 is why I say WebOS was killed, it didn't die, it was killed. I had a Pixi Plus at the time to so I was totally on board. It was so unceremonious too. Interesting to see what they were cooking up. That TouchPad Go looks pretty nice. Oh what could have been, WebOS was so ahead of it's time. After what HP did to Palm it made me data horde palm software, Lul.

[@Shimkusnik]

Such an awesome video!

[@MicrosoftXbox360-zg7tb]

Where can I gat a WindsorNot and Touchpad mini?

[@beez1717]

It frustrates me that HP killed WebOS before it gained any traction, which everyone expected would happen, and Microsoft failed to get developers to put their software on Windows Mobile 10. It feels like they both gave up too early. Microsoft should have paid developers to put their apps on Windows Phones so there was a good app ecosystem and HP shouldn't have given up so easily. Too bad the days where a 3rd mobile OS has a chance is essentially over. Maybe Microsoft should try again.

[@Kwpolska]

The calendar icon is probably glitchy, because it tries to render the current date on the icon.

[@tonicipriani]

Palm was way too ahead of its time. Touchstone basically was the precursor to Apple Magsafe, it was the first to use magnets to align the wireless charging. Many bits of webOS still live on today in Android, as the original designer, Matias Duarte, went on to work for Google. The card app switcher came straight from webOS, except it lacked the ability to stack cards.

[@RexTorres]

It's so sad that WebOS was scrapped for mobile devices. WebOS had such potential.

[@sniklaceladelyk]

Was the name of the developer Gabe by chance? I know it's a random question but my Uncle worked on the software and I was just curious.

[@manosheal8336]

Can you please make a video on Ubuntu Touch?

[@HowlAtTheMoon481]

My first smartphone was a Palm Pre Plus on Verizon, and despite all it’s flaws (and there were many), webOS is probably still my favorite mobile OS even all these years later and I’m sad that Palm couldn’t make it work

[@renakunisaki]

Not deleting the keyboard was a good call. This is an early prototype; it might not have sanity checks to prevent silly things like that.

[@Zoomer.88]

The HP webOS story is such a depressing one. Such a potential and such a proper time for all of that - and it's all flopped due to mostly bad management.

[@ReaIYoBlue]

How is the KZbin change "change thumbnail" feature going?

[@Aceplaying27]

The calendar icon has gone rogue

[@renargues]

OH MY GOD IT SEES THE LIGHT OF DAY

[@skysuperblock2204]

2 hours old video LETS GO!! IM NOT LATE!

[@fatihkan2601]

how did softwares end up to boring fancy interfaces from this? Looks completely productivity oriented. It doesn't look nothing like a consumer product. Nothing to distract your attention. That's what I feel about devices like that.

[@RandomTechWZ]

I had the Palm Pre back in the day and it was a good phone, especially when you overclocked it.

[@poeticsilence047]

This is why I liked BB10 on the Blackberry's phone. It was so smooth.

[@leylandlynxvlog]

This was fascinating, but I wish you would have been allowed to do some browsing and emailing on them.

[@TheRathead80]

I managed to pick up a web os tablet a few weeks ago for 3$ in the box at a garage sale. Bummed that it doesn't work but is the weirdest coaster I now own

[@systemchris]

I had one of these. Amazing little devices

[@OfficialMeccaXP]

thanks david, and thanks michael

[@ofres5651]

possible video idea installing different operation systems on a prototype phone

[@namhyeongkim_cos]

We Indonesians called it as "unbranded smartphone", since the device type and the manufacturer shares the same abbreviation

[@joeomalley1969]

Rear Cameras are useful for uploading pics if you're selling stuff online as using the interface is always easier on a tablet and having the camera right there makes it painless

[@cannagame3933]

Michael, by chance would you be willing to find a HTC ChaCha? It has the Facebook button and I remember back then it was such a convenient and insane feature back then lmao

[@charlesdorval394]

That poor calendar icon getting no love at all hehehe

[@megamanfan3]

The case design on that WindsorNot reminds me of one of those Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich smartphones.

[@SuikaIbuki]

I just happened to watch this video on my LG tv😂

[@natanteam]

Does this WebOS have something to do with LG’s?

[@RemyJustice97]

The "WindsorNot" is hysterical

[@brycephil4668]

4:35 it's probably a reference to Logic Gates (AND, OR, and NOT gates, etc) so if they continued they most likely would have had the WindsorAND

[@That.One_Luke]

It would be nice if community took this dead project back to life and make it usable again

[@misterJBD]

If HP teamed up with Windows that would've been killer, HP hardware and Windows Phone together.

[@tergish1]

I miss palm. I had a treo 650 in high school and then I got a treo 800w, I always wanted the palm centro and palm pre, but then they killed palm os and web os. Rip

[@pizzadoge2958]

The calendar icon is probably dynamic and changes based on date.

[@sillymatthewosu]

🅱

[@dodgerson2752]

In Germany at the biggest Store we have „Tried“ to sell the HPWepOS-Tablets, but its was like „A Sitting Duck“ in my Stocks. We have it sold for 29€ only for getting it out of my Shop. It was a horrible time long ago. Ps.:Sorry for my bad English 😂

[@brontiago]

I remember a classmate of mine in middle school had the first palm pre phone. I thought it was the coolest thing ever.

[@RRAIDRR]

Dang that EVT1 battery for the winsornot has the same production date as my birth 😭

[@nebuthejackal]

Was that an NVME slot on the touchpad prototype?

[@sebastianx708pl]

could be mSATA or other thing like wifi card

[@BaroqueSphinx]

I did not know that hp had phones back in the day. I also didn't know that webOS was used on phones, i thought webOS was used on LG tvs only.

[@dashcharger24]

They took over its development.

[@JoeyMarziano]

I had a palm pixi for a bit and I remember it fondly. Very sad that hp didn’t give palm more time.

[@TUYonYouTube]

I wonder why its named after a necktie technique

[@rahithahsan188]

By the way, Windsor s a city in Ontario, Canada.

[@AvegIslam-q2s]

The prototypes are legend! But nice video i always like ur video

[@edgemaster240]

I miss WebOS, damn HP for killing it off.

[@snorlatopus]

26:13 is it mSATA on a tablet?????

[@ryanzmuda3167]

Can you install android or Linux on it.

[@2kool4programmingschool]

i love the konami code reference in the search bar "upupdowndownleftr"-cuts off

[@oliverstemp9132]

It’s weird the touchpad go was so different from the regular one.

[@ManfredRoslinger]

6:56 German word: "Vorsich" spelt wrong should be Vorsicht! Vorsicht = Attention!

[@ax14pz107]

I really hate how everyone has settled on the worst date formats. Month day year is terrible and day month year is just as terrible. Year month date just makes the most sense in all scenarios where you'd be using all three dates.

[@Bonzibud69]

Month year day or day year month is the best in my opinion...

[@ax14pz107]

@Brushedmetal69 both ways sort terribly.

[@0xbenedikt]

@@Bonzibud69 Month year day is the worst of them all

[@randomgreekhuman]

webOS is pretty cool imo

[@solsburian]

HP messed up big time with the webOS products IMHO. Back then WebOS was a well developed and relatively mature product for mobile devices and Android at the time was still not quite there yet in terms of market dominance (and user experience - and perhaps still so). Blackberry 10 was in a similar situation to HP WebOS IMHO.

[@World_of_OSes]

6:50 - that is actually the normal way to write dates in other countries, it's just America that uses month-day-year.