The Sound Of One Palm Clapping

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/0,14179,2913931,00.html">http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/0,14179,2913931,00.html</a><br /><br />The Pocket PC has been, from day one, a PDA that is meant to push technology to its limits and be a device that can win the enterprise market. Palm has taken the opposite approach by keeping the device and operating system relatively simple. Palm Source's Chief Competitive Officer Michael Mace <a href="http://techupdate.zdnet.com/techupdate/stories/main/0,14179,2713343-2,00.html">told columnist David Berlind</a> that "the Pocket PC is too big, too complex, and requires too many pit stops at the recharging station to be appreciated by anybody but the techno-elite who are typically willing to make such sacrifices to own a pocket rocket. "Handheld technology is immune to Moore's Law," he says. "The situation is not about to improve for Pocket PC any time soon."<br /><br />Whoops! :oops: "Two years later, Palm is eating Mace's words as PocketPC-based devices continue to eat away at Palm's share of the handheld OS pie. While handheld technologies were becoming more capable and Microsoft's PocketPC OS in particular took advantage of those capabilities, Palm remained true to its original convictions."<br /><br />Microsoft has also remained true to its original convictions. It has kept the Win32 API. It has emphasized the enterprise. It has designed the .NET concept from the beginning with mobile devices based on Windows CE being an integral part of it. Developing for the Pocket PC (and Smartphone) is a matter of using the exact same Visual Studio.NET platform. The .NET Compact Framework is available for client machines now and will be in the ViewSonic V37's ROM. I am sure other devices will follow suit. Mobile Information Server, once a pet project of the Mobile Device group has been swallowed whole and integrated deep into Exchange 2003.<!><br /><br />Meanwhile, Palm is still facing some OS4 vs OS5 compatibility issues on the developer front, and developing for the PalmOS is unlike anything else, so you have to specifically target the platform, something corporate developers are not likely to do. Developing for Windows and perhaps Java is enough. <a href="http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,3959,1109259,00.asp">Palm abandoned its Tungsten Mobile Information Management Solution</a>, a product that would have competed with Exchange 2003's integrated Mobile Information Server bits.<br /><br />Tying this all back to the Handspring acquisition, where is Palm going? As columnist Berlind points out, what is Palm getting besides distribution, a customer list and the Treo brand? Distribution is only good if you can hang on to marketshare, something Palm hasn't been doing lately and Sony hasn't made matters easier for them. Ditto the customer list. I don't see the Treo giving Palm any inroads to the enterprise either. It certainly hasn't given Handspring any. Do you think PalmSpring matters makes a more formidable opponent than did Palm Solutions and Handspring did separately?

[feo]

Can anybody think of any technology battles that Microsoft may have lost?
There was a pc version GEOS and OS/2 but Windows took over
There was a Wordpefect but MS Word now rules
There was a Lotus but now I can hardly ever see anybody using anything but Excel
Is there still a Netscape? :?
It seems to me like when MS goes to battle, is just a matter of time before they win. The only failed product that comes to mind is Liquid Motion, Flash just kicked its butt.
Can you guys think of other ones? :?:
I wonder if the Palm guys REALLY think they can win. :roll:
I heard once that the best way to predict the future is to look at the past.
I also was told once never to bad mouth MS, it is just a matter before we all work for Bill G. :roll:

[guinness]

The only comment I can make though is that for the most part, the technology used by Palm and Sony has caught up with the Pocket PC, whereas PPC devices have remained relatively constant. Included WiFi and BT is ok, but how about VGA screens or an OS that can support a landscape mode (and a really good version of ActiveSync). You look at as Palm devices becoming more like PPC's, but I see as MS dragging their feet.

[Scott R]

Same old story. Microsoft will dominate because they have more money than everyone else. Have I got it right? If true, it's good news for MS shareholders, but bad news for consumers.

I'm curious about Mace's supposed comments about Moore's law not applying. If he really said it, he was wrong. Big deal. I might care if he put his false opinions into practice, but he didn't. They've applied it themselves with the Tungsten C offering stellar battery life, a 320x320 screen, and Wi-Fi.

I disagree with the author's comment about replaceable batteries being a necessity. They are a necessity only so long as you can't provide acceptable battery life to support the features that your device offers.

As for the enterprise market that this author (and certain other eye rolling individuals) like to mention, it's a myth. One day? Maybe. But not for the last several years and not for the forseeable future. Handhelds in use at corporations are bought by individuals. They are not deployed en masse (aside from vertical markets). Handheld makers who want to be successful would be wise to aim their feature set at impressing consumers, not IT managers.

Scott

[Wes Salmon]

Same old story. Microsoft will dominate because they have more money than everyone else. Have I got it right? If true, it's good news for MS shareholders, but bad news for consumers.
I think the fact that more people use Tivo, AOL, Playstation 2 and even Apache than Microsoft's competing products proves that money can not buy you a dominating market share.

[Scott R]

I think the fact that more people use Tivo, AOL, Playstation 2 and even Apache than Microsoft's competing products proves that money can not buy you a dominating market share.Well it depends on how good their product is and how much of a financial hit they're willing to take short-term. In the case of the XBox, they're cutting deep into their profits (if you can call losses profits) in order to establish a footing.

In the case of the PPC, they don't make the hardware, and the OS license is one of the cheaper ingredients in what makes a PPC, so aside from possibly offering some major rebates to consumers, it's difficult for them to affect the pricing there.

The MSN vs AOL battle has become largely unimportant as consumers move more and more to high speed offerings. Low-band consumers tend to not want to be bothered with switching from whatever they currently use (which would primarily be AOL).

Scott

[Paul P]

Same old story. Microsoft will dominate because they have more money than everyone else. Have I got it right? If true, it's good news for MS shareholders, but bad news for consumers.

How did Microsoft wind up with all that money in the first place? Providing products and services that people don't need? I don't think so. Microsoft filled a void that Palm and others could not. It's not Microsoft's fault that Palm fell asleep behind the wheel and it took them this long to wake up. There is no question that all that cash is a huge advantage to Microsoft, but it hasn't always been there.

[whydidnt]

I do think Palm lost market share because they rested on their laurels for too long. Yes they have responded hardware wise with the Tungsten Line, but their new OS is basically their old OS with a few minor tweeks. I still can't believe that the have a hard limit on the number of categories allowed or they don't have a true file system. It's Mace's kind of thinking that has really hurt Palm.

However, it would appear that MS is now resting on their laurels, if rumors about PPC2003 come true. I have to agree with earlier comment that both these organizations are chasing a market that isn't there (Enterprise) and losing opportunities on the consumer side of things.

How much do MS' "Pocket PC" hardware requirements restrict hardware manufacturers from innovating? I'm beginning to wonder if that's why we haven't seen integrated keyboards, or higher resolution screens. MS is all about conformity and I bet that applies to PocketPC too. :evil:

[dubStylee]

How did Microsoft wind up with all that money in the first place?

By getting lucky in the DOS/cpm wars, then by using monopoly power to strong arm hardware manufactureres to bundle their OS, then by strong arming netscape out of existence. If you think it was on the excellence of their design, you must have missed DOS and win3.0. I'm not denying they have made some good products, but not enough to explain the extent of their domination of the market.

[whydidnt]

Also, I don't think their is a tangible benefit to Palm in acquiring Handspring. Perhaps Palm thinks a convergence device is going to become a hot product and figured it was easier and quicker to purchase the intellectual property than to develop it themselves.

More likely, they THINK they are getting in-roads into mobile phone vendors. But I suspect those vendors are very fickle and don't care who they are getting their phones from as long as they see a way to make money.

[Ed Hansberry]

Can anybody think of any technology battles that Microsoft may have lost?
Oh yeah. "Tax Saver" was a tax package that lasted all of one year. The .NET Hailstorm initiative died. The cutesy "Microsoft Bob" interface still gets giggles when talked about.

MS is not invunerable by any means

[Paul P]

By getting lucky in the DOS/cpm wars, then by using monopoly power to strong arm hardware manufactureres to bundle their OS, then by strong arming netscape out of existence. If you think it was on the excellence of their design, you must have missed DOS and win3.0. I'm not denying they have made some good products, but not enough to explain the extent of their domination of the market.

I didn’t say anything about excellence of design. I am not proficient enough to make that statement. :wink: The issue of monopoly has ran its course. The DOJ case has dragged on for so long that by the end of it most people forgot how it started. I think it’s a matter of market efficiency, with one company delivering and the rest stagnating. If you were a Sun shareholder, would you really be satisfied with management blaming the beaten down stock Microsoft? I wouldn’t be.

[Ed Hansberry]

By getting lucky in the DOS/cpm wars, then by using monopoly power to strong arm hardware manufactureres to bundle their OS, then by strong arming netscape out of existence. If you think it was on the excellence of their design, you must have missed DOS and win3.0. I'm not denying they have made some good products, but not enough to explain the extent of their domination of the market.
That gave MS market dominance to be sure, but their money came from Windows and Office. To give you an example, in June of 1994, they had a mere $4.3 billion in current assets, which for MS is some AR, a tiny bit of inventory and lots of cash. Today, it is closer to $54 billion. By comparison, IBM had $39B in current assets in 1994, Apple also had about $4.3B and Sun had $2.3B in current assets.

10 years later, no one comes close to comparing to the performance of MS. Windows and Office. :D

[mangochutneyman]

I do think Palm lost market share because they rested on their laurels for too long. Yes they have responded hardware wise with the Tungsten Line, but their new OS is basically their old OS with a few minor tweeks. I still can't believe that the have a hard limit on the number of categories allowed or they don't have a true file system. It's Mace's kind of thinking that has really hurt Palm.


To be fair, OS 5.x was not just a "minor tweak" if I may say so. They moved the entire platform to ARM proc which was a very large undertaking. Also PalmOS DOES have a file system if you have a expansion card. Of course everything in ram in root path etc which can be maddening. But VFS is a file system none the less, kinda primitive though but still...

[mangochutneyman]

If there's one thing in that article I agree with it's this:

Why would a developer target anything but a Java or Windows runtime environment? If I'm a corporate developer looking for a platform with industry-wide support from both hardware and software manufacturers, Java and Windows are the hands-down winners. Palm is a bystander.


If PalmSource doesn't include Java support (native/emu) in OS 6, then it will be lights out before long IMO.

[TawnerX]

By getting lucky in the DOS/cpm wars, then by using monopoly power to strong arm hardware manufactureres to bundle their OS, then by strong arming netscape out of existence. If you think it was on the excellence of their design, you must have missed DOS and win3.0. I'm not denying they have made some good products, but not enough to explain the extent of their domination of the market.
That gave MS market dominance to be sure, but their money came from Windows and Office. To give you an example, in June of 1994, they had a mere $4.3 billion in current assets, which for MS is some AR, a tiny bit of inventory and lots of cash. Today, it is closer to $54 billion. By comparison, IBM had $39B in current assets in 1994, Apple also had about $4.3B and Sun had $2.3B in current assets.

10 years later, no one comes close to comparing to the performance of MS. Windows and Office. :D

What exactly those assets means in long term technological trend? Who care about 54B paper money. US steel and Xerox worth more than 54B in adjusted dollar compare to microsoft during their peak, and they didn't last.

Does it have IBM patent portofolio and manufacturing capacity? for eg. IBM lost the PC and survive on big iron technology. And they know the big iron won't last forever so they are moving on to highpower computing like deepblue project etc.

Now what does Microsoft have if Linux take over the planet? (OS+Office apps?) Can they survive on Xbox? is the smartphone flying already? What core know how and patent portofolio do they have?

what happen if some small unknown outfit somewhere in the far corner of the world suddenly make OS worth absolutely nothing? (eg. self generating OS on top of FPGA?) They couldn't even come up with convincing answer against Linux and its scrappy band of hackers.

Beware of a tech company that can only answer tech challange with lawsuit and PR spin instead of never seen before technology. It's the beginning of an end.

If Palm inc. isn't a case study I dont' know what. Isn't their peak value a couple years back worth more than all publishing companies combined or something?

[Unreal32]

Can anybody think of any technology battles that Microsoft may have lost?

If you're talking about failed software efforts, then... Yup. How about "Microsoft Bob"? Anyone remember that? Of course not... because by definition, a losing software product doesn't stay in the collective memory for very long. It may be true that they win by virtue of longevity in the marketplace, deep pockets, persistence, and by purchasing or duplicating the efforts of other companies... but then lots of other companies do the same thing. OK, maybe not on the same grand scale, but still...

[whydidnt]

To be fair, OS 5.x was not just a "minor tweak" if I may say so. They moved the entire platform to ARM proc which was a very large undertaking.

I have to disagree with this. Just because it runs on a different processor doesn't mean that there are end user improvements to the OS. It still looks, acts and works the same as before. One could say that the ARM processor is overkill for what the system does, especially when you consider Palm's awful support for multimedia applications. Again I think this relates to Palm's management and their inability to grasp what many if not most Consumer's want out of a handheld. They delivered the hardware because the had to in order to compete with PPC hardware Specs, but really did little with the software to improve the user experience.

Whydidnt

[Howard2k]

Microsoft's Lan Manager had the snot kicked out of it by OS/2 and Netware..

Windows NT 3.1 was hardly a raging success.

Windows286. You could argue that this was a battle won by Apple. (Till Win 3.0/3.1 came along)

I believe MS SQL server still doesn't scale as well as the big boy's databases. (I could be wrong.. Been a while).

[mangochutneyman]

To be fair, OS 5.x was not just a "minor tweak" if I may say so. They moved the entire platform to ARM proc which was a very large undertaking.

I have to disagree with this. Just because it runs on a different processor doesn't mean that there are end user improvements to the OS. It still looks, acts and works the same as before. One could say that the ARM processor is overkill for what the system does, especially when you consider Palm's awful support for multimedia applications. Again I think this relates to Palm's management and their inability to grasp what many if not most Consumer's want out of a handheld. They delivered the hardware because the had to in order to compete with PPC hardware Specs, but really did little with the software to improve the user experience.

Whydidnt

I agree there hasn't been much of an improvement in the PalmOS interface. But you weren't talking about "end user improvements", you said "their new OS is basically their old OS with a few minor tweeks" which obviously wrong.

Anyway, this whole microsoft vs. Palm debate is old news. The real competition is not Palm but linux and Symbian to be honest, Palm is irrelevant and dying (unless a major change occurs). It will be interesting to see how this whole SCO controversy settles down...[/i]

[Scott R]

Can anybody think of any technology battles that Microsoft may have lost?The cutesy "Microsoft Bob" interface still gets giggles when talked about.

MS is not invunerable by any meansWhat a silly example. Who was the competitor of MS Bob? Was this a market where someone else was making good money?

Of course MS has tried out several technologies which didn't work out and left without sticking to it. But what about the markets where they felt real money was to be made, where there was already another company making good money in that market? When did they give it the college try, do miserably, and leave those? Those would be far better examples, IMO.

Scott

[felixdd]

While handheld technologies were becoming more capable and Microsoft's PocketPC OS in particular took advantage of those capabilities, Palm remained true to its original convictions."


I don't think so. I think Palm ate more of their own words by saying that people don't need multimedia abilities in their PDA...then look at their new line of palms now.

[hollis_f]

Can anybody think of any technology battles that Microsoft may have lost?Does anybody still use FrontPage? MS Publisher? MS Paint?

Even if there are some users I would say that MS are nowhere near leaders in Web authoring, DTP and graphics packages.

[marlof]

Can anybody think of any technology battles that Microsoft may have lost?Does anybody still use FrontPage? MS Publisher? MS Paint?

Even if there are some users I would say that MS are nowhere near leaders in Web authoring, DTP and graphics packages.

MS never battled for DTP and Graphics reign supreme with Publisher and Paint. They just wanted to give their customers a program they can use. And yes, I know many people who use both programs. Not too many people need, or can afford, full blown packages like InDesign, Quark Xpress, Photoshop or even CorelDRAW.

I think MS would like Frontpage to become more of a standard, and so far, I'm happy enough it isn't that standard. But still, I know many people that use it. Why? Because they get it with their other MS products, and they don't want to spend money on a second package. Which of course is a known MS placement strategy. :)

[iznogud]

I don't know if anybody notice it, but latest ROM update for Axim (A03) contains .NET Compact Framework

[Ed Hansberry]

The cutesy "Microsoft Bob" interface still gets giggles when talked about.

MS is not invunerable by any meansWhat a silly example. Who was the competitor of MS Bob? Was this a market where someone else was making good money?
Nice bit of selective quoting Scott. :roll: Miss the Tax Saver reference? As for Bob, ever used AOL? I just loaded AOL8 on a friends PC. If that isn't cutesy, I don't know what is.
Of course MS has tried out several technologies which didn't work out and left without sticking to it. But what about the markets where they felt real money was to be made, where there was already another company making good money in that market? When did they give it the college try, do miserably, and leave those? Those would be far better examples, IMO.
Do you have a definition of the time length necessary for one to try something and then give up and it can be called "the college try?"

[scottmag]

What exactly those assets means in long term technological trend? Who care about 54B paper money. US steel and Xerox worth more than 54B in adjusted dollar compare to microsoft during their peak, and they didn't last.

Not even close to the same thing. What Microsoft has is cold hard cash. Over $50 Billion in liquid assets that they can spend. This is not "paper money" or stock value that could vanish.

Scott

[JonnoB]

Intuit regularly beat Microsoft Money with Quicken. Microsoft has tried hard to compete - even giving Intuit $100m USD in a settlement over a failed takeover a few years ago. Better product can win.

[mmace]

"Handheld technology is immune to Moore's Law," he says.

This isn't the right forum to respond to all of the issues I have with David's article, but I do want to touch on the Moore's Law thing.

David's quote of me ("handheld technology is immune to Moore's Law") was probably accurate, but definitely incomplete.

Moore's Law basically predicts the "doubling of transistors [in chips] every couple of years," as Intel puts it. http://www.intel.com/research/silicon/mooreslaw.htm If you look at it in that narrow sense, Moore's Law definitely applies to handhelds. But that's not what I was discussing.

Some folks in the industry have tried to generalize Moore's Law to all handheld technology. If a handheld is too heavy or uses too much power they say it's okay because over time Moore's Law will fix the problem. Sometimes it does, but often it doesn't, because Moore's Law doesn't work for all areas of handheld technology.

Battery capacity is the most notorious example. Battery capacity per unit of weight improves by about 10% per year. As we add wireless to handhelds, we're often decreasing the total battery life of the devices. The situation's getting worse, not better.

Screen resolution is another example. Anyone here think it doubled on handhelds in the last two years? (Well, actually on Palm OS it did, but this is a PPC forum. :wink:) The more important point is that in terms of raw pixels available in the marketplace, screens are not doubling every two years.

Maybe some day fuel cells and e-ink technology will help us out in both areas, but they are still a long way off, unfortunately.

The point I was making to David is that when designing a handheld you have to make tradeoffs around features -- you can't just throw all possible features into a single box and expect that everyone will buy it.

When Palm was one unified company, it focused on designing systems that would be popular with the average customer (which tends to alienate most of the more sophisticated online enthusiast community). Since we split into two companies, the Palm hardware folks have continued to focus mostly on large mainstream markets, while PalmSource has tried to get a lot more flexible -- allowing different licensees to focus on different types of customers. I think that's the right way to go for a mobile information platform. Unfortunately, David's article kind of muddled the two companies, attributing Palm hardware actions to PalmSource and vice-versa. That's a communication problem we need to fix.

Anyway, I stand by what I said two years ago.

I know most of the folks on this forum are not Palm OS fans, but I hope you'll allow that we're executing pretty well on encouraging diversity on the Palm OS platform. And there's a lot more to come.

Mike
CCO, PalmSource

[Janak Parekh]

I know most of the folks on this forum are not Palm OS fans, but I hope you'll allow that we're executing pretty well on encouraging diversity on the Palm OS platform. And there's a lot more to come.
Thanks much for the comments, Mike. My one concern about the new approach PalmSource has been taking towards more diversity is the possible fragmentation of POS APIs. In particular, the sound API -- the Sony NX/NZ units don't use the standard Palm OS ones, so you can't use third-party MP3/Ogg players. Are you guys trying to improve interoperability on that front? The Pocket PC has always had a consistent sound API across all licensees...

thanks,

--janak

[mmace]

My one concern about the new approach PalmSource has been taking towards more diversity is the possible fragmentation of POS APIs

You nailed that one, Janak. In my opinion it's the #1 task in managing diversity. I think we're getting better at it, but we still have work to do.

It's probably good to have different philosophies operating in the marketplace. On the PPC side you get consistency across licensees, but perhaps slower innovation. On the Palm OS side, perhaps faster innovation but a strong need to manage fragmentation.

Then there's Symbian, where the platform vendor encourages fragmentation of APIs and user interface but in some ways discourages hardware diversity (won't license things other than smart phones).

It'll be interesting to see how those three philosophies play out in the marketplace in the next few years.

Mike
CCO, PalmSource

[Scott R]

You nailed that one, Janak. In my opinion it's the #1 task in managing diversity. I think we're getting better at it, but we still have work to do.I raised this issue a while back on PDABuzz (of which Mr. Mace was a part of that discussion thread). It's pretty much a free-for-all in the Palm OS world. Several different resolutions, several different processors (not just talking about ARM vs Dragonball, the Palm TT's ARM had a built-in DSP, though I'm not sure if any developer made use of it).

The problem is that it creates difficulties for the average consumer. They can't just download an app (or have it beamed from a kiosk - what happened to those?) and assume it will work on their Palm OS device. It's not a big deal for experienced users, but for the non-geek community (which is a large part), it will be confusing and problematic.

I definitely prefer the free-for-all approach, since whatever "standard" anyone picked, no matter how great, would end up disappointed many. What's surprising is that Palm is the one employing it while MS locks everyone down. This is made more annoying given the fact that the CE core of the PPC OS is already flexible enough to easily allow for varying screen resolutions (the biggest complaint among geeks).

Scott

[Janak Parekh]

I definitely prefer the free-for-all approach, since whatever "standard" anyone picked, no matter how great, would end up disappointed many.
Of course, I disagree. ;) Your kiosk example is perfect -- developers are forced to either develop many versions of their app or to program for the least common denominator, which means a 160x160 greyscale PalmOS device. By locking it down, as MS has with Pocket PC, I can download a Pocket PC 2002 app and be quite certain it'll work with minimal issues. Except for...

This is made more annoying given the fact that the CE core of the PPC OS is already flexible enough to easily allow for varying screen resolutions (the biggest complaint among geeks).
This is the one thing I'll concede a point to you on. I want 640x480. If they can set up a pixel-doubling mode, and eventually transition to that resolution full-time, I'll be very happy. Maybe MS should lock the resolution down for future Pocket PC OSes... I don't like the PalmOS approach of having 160x160, 240x320 (OK, HandEra's gone, so that doesn't count), 320x320, and 320x480.

--janak

[Jonathon Watkins]

How much do MS' "Pocket PC" hardware requirements restrict hardware manufacturers from innovating? I'm beginning to wonder if that's why we haven't seen integrated keyboards, or higher resolution screens. MS is all about conformity and I bet that applies to PocketPC too. :evil:

Same here - the two items I am Really Waiting for on PPC. :?

When can we have a 640x480 VGA screen and keybaord? The Linux crowd have one already. Surely it's our turn, before Palm or Sony gets there first. :roll:

[Scott R]

Of course, I disagree. ;) Your kiosk example is perfect -- developers are forced to either develop many versions of their app or to program for the least common denominator, which means a 160x160 greyscale PalmOS device. By locking it down, as MS has with Pocket PC, I can download a Pocket PC 2002 app and be quite certain it'll work with minimal issues.Yes, but you essentially made my point in the second part of your comments. Microsoft's 240x320 resolution is essentially a "lowest common denominator" resolution, it's just that it happens to be higher than Palm's lowest common resolution of 160x160, so it doesn't sound so bad. I agree that it could probably be good for Palm to have some "standard" resolutions (2 or 3), but even as it is now, the market will dictate things. There's enough of a market for Sony's 320x480 resolution that several apps support it (with more added each day). Sure, you'll never have all of the 10,000 plus (or whatever it is) apps support it, but big deal. Even if they just had one other officially supported resolution, not all apps would be rewritten to support that, either.

Yes, it seems like a burden for each developer to have to support all these different things, but what usually happens (especially for the small developers) is that they come out with an app that supports some subset (or goes the lowest common denominator route). Then when enough users email the developer that they'd like such-and-such support for their particular device (could be higher res, could be jog-dial support, whatever), the developer will do the work and add it.

But, since we're on a PPC board, I won't belabor this other than to add to the chorus requesting that MS add (at the very least) 480x640 support in a manner similar to Palm's pixel-doubling.

Scott