Palm WebOS

A Note from the Author and from O'Reilly Media about what this book does—and doesn't—do:

Palm webOS is a brand new platform and represents a very different type of operating system where the web runtime is used as the basis for the UI and Application model. Palm and O'Reilly felt that it was important to have a book available to help developers get a basic understanding of the new Palm platform at the time that the SDK was released; this timing played a major role in the content and structure of the book.

Ideally this book would have been a complete reference of the new platform but that wasn't possible since the content was written at the same time as the software SDK was being developed by the Palm engineering team. The book does provide a complete overview of Palm webOS, a thorough description of the application model and gives details on many key design concepts. There are descriptions and examples of UI widgets, services, storage, notifications, dashboards and background applications, serving as a great introduction but not as a definitive source.

The book uses a simple News reader application to illustrate the technical descriptions but the examples are not intended to serve as a cookbook tutorial. Experienced developers should be able to use the examples to build up a working application chapter by chapter but others may not find the loose descriptions adequate for recreating the application unaided. Over time, these different needs will be filled by other books, but in the meantime we hope that this book will serve a valuable role introducing developers to webOS and giving them a way of getting started with webOS application development.

A second printing of the book will update any original coverage obsoleted by subsequent Mojo SDK builds. For owners of the original printing of the book, all of these updates are posted on the "View/Submit Errata" link (please see left-hand column of this web page).

Thanks for understanding that book publishing and coverage of rapidly moving technologies can sometimes be an inexact science; we knew there'd be a need for a book such as Palm webOS: The Insider's Guide to Developing Applications in JavaScript using the Palm MojoT Framework, and there's certainly no better person to write that book that Mitch Allen; that said, we understand that because it is such a new operating system and SDK, there would (and will continue to be) changes that at best can't be documented and explored until new printings of the books are released. In the meantime we will be diligent in posting updates to this book's O'Reilly Media catalog page.

Description This is the official guide to building native JavaScript applications for Palm's new mobile operating system, Palm® webOS™. Written by Palm's software chief technology officer along with the Palm webOS development team, Palm webOS provides a complete tutorial on the design principles, architecture, UI, tools, and services necessary to develop webOS applications-including the Mojo JavaScript framework and Palm's SDK.

Palm webOS is designed to support a fast and superb user experience using established web standards, so if you're familiar with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, you're ready to build applications for any webOS-based device, including the Palm Pre. You'll gain expertise, chapter by chapter, as you build a working mobile application through the course of the book. You'll also learn how to extend existing web apps to work with the new generation of mobile phones.

• Get a thorough overview of the webOS platform and architecture
• Understand the critical concepts for application design: what separates webOS from other web and mobile platforms
• Learn the details of Mojo's development tools and SDK for building and testing mobile applications
• Examine best practices, important considerations, and guiding principles for developing with webOS and the Mojo framework