In order to test all of the awesome things they’re doing for compatibility with webOS 2.0 and the new Palm Pre 2, the chaps at WebOS Internals and Jason Robitaille of Canuck Coding were in need of such devices. As open source developers offering the vast majority of their wares at no cost to the public, as you may imagine their coffers aren’t exactly overflowing with funds.

Enter the Palm community, full of awesome members (that’s you, by the way) that organized an internet telethon to get the homebrew all-stars the money they’d need to buy the phones. In less than one month, the community managed to raise $8,732.52, more than enough to buy a developer Pre 2 for Jason and each of WebOS Internals’ fifteen staff members. The excess funds will be used to pay for server costs that result from hosting the popular homebrew tools, and may even be used down the line for buying next generation webOS devices *cough*PalmPad*cough* for testing.

Said Rod Whitby, WebOS Internals Project Lead:

“This community is awesome. ’nuff said.”

We couldn’t agree more. If you missed out on the telethon, it’s not too late to make your own contribution to support WebOS Internals.

As for everybody who contributed, we got the list from cantaffordit (thanks!) and will have a special surprise for you in the forums later today!

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After a short absence from the webOS development world due to studies, Canuck Coding is back in action. Formerly know as Canuck Software, Canuck Coding has now posted details of upcoming changes and a roadmap of things to come.

Among other things, the roadmap details plans for WebOS Quick Install v4.0. This release is planned with the aim to simplify things for users and improve stability, while adding must-desired features like dependency support, and wireless support via SSH.

Another interesting detail was the plan for Internalz. As webOS 2.0 has changed the landscape for developers so must Internalz change. Java is gone, meaning FileMgr needs to be rewritten in C. And more importantly, webOS 2.0 offers the possibility of seeing a more-restrictive App Catalog-compliant release of Internalz, expanding the user base to non-hombrew users too.

Also making news today is the debut of a video tutorial series, Internalz Tipz.  A prequel #0 episode has been released for those unsure how to install Internalz, and the latest episode #1 has been embedded above. Excluding the prequel, there will be a total of 20 episodes, one released every other day. Each will be very short and simplified for new users to understand.

Chances are over the course of the 40 days, you’ll learn a few new things. The goal is that by the 20th episode, the new C-based FileMgr will complete; a countdown of sorts that many will surely appreciate. So take a watch of the debut episode and enjoy. If you have any suggestions or comments, feel free to speak up in the official series thread.

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A little over a month ago, Internalz v1.2 was publicly released, introducing a wealth of new features like master mode, the ipk installer, and the patcher. Today, Internalz is taking another step forward with the release of version 1.3. This time however, the focus isn’t on adding features, but rather refining the usability of existing ones and improving the quality of the user experience.

As the video changelog above shows, the main new feature in v1.3 is the introduction of a dark theme.  Absolutely every aspect of the application is changed. Everything from dimmed icons, dark backgrounds and even dark re-skinned message box pop-ups.

Another big change lies with the text editor, though you wouldn’t expect it, as it looks nearly identical to how it was in v1.2.  However, under the hood, it’s a completely and has been heavily optimized using completely redone coding. This new text editor is far more expansive, and offers many future possibilities. This is evident in v1.3, as changeable font size has been added and text entry on larger files is much more responsive.

That’s not all! A bunch of smaller, yet equally welcomed changes and optimizations have been introduced.  Internalz now registers itself as handler for the view-source:// URI scheme, a first for webOS. And although this isn’t mentioned in the video, Internalz v1.3 has extended it’s international localizations to now cover French, Italian, German, Spanish, Polish, and Simplified Chinese.

If you haven’t yet tried Internalz, or are new to homebrew, now’s the perfect time to try it out. Don’t worry if you feel bogged down trying it for the first time; just try it one step at a time. Coming soon, there will be an Internalz Tipz YouTube video series, showing how to get the most out of Internalz, shown in short informational videos.

Internalz v1.3 is available right now on the PreCentral Homebrew Gallery and on the PreCentral feed.  As the slogan says, "Control your device, don’t let your device control you."

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Developers and users alike have all noticed this “Default Apps” option in the webOS launcher. Right now the only out-of-the-box option users are presented with is a choice of Google Maps or their carrier’s navigation solution (if applicable) for the default mapping software. But below the defaults for web, email, and phone, there’s a long list of file types and the default app used to open them (PDFs opened by PDF View, .WAV opened by Music, and so forth).

When the Default Apps scene appeared back in November with webOS 1.3.1, and was enabled with 1.3.5 a month later, we were all aflutter as to what that could mean for webOS. Pick your own third party dialer app (Google Voice), web browser, and more? That’d be grand. Sadly, Palm has yet to release an API for developers to set their app as an option for default apps, but that hasn’t stopped Jason Robitaille and Rod Whitby from hacking their way onto the Default Apps screen.

The addition of service calls registers an app with the Default Apps service, selecting the app as the default when no other apps present open that file type, and setting it as an option when there are already apps that open said file. For example, Robitaille’s Internalz app is registered as the default app for more than twenty different file types, and appears as an option for .TXT, with Doc View as the other and default choice. Tap on the file type, select the new apps, back swipe, and you’re good to go.

Jason does note that it’s not entirely stable (thus Palm not publishing the API), and that some not-all-that clean "mimetype" registering to get Internalz to be an option for file types already defaulted by another app (e.g. a PDF viewer app would have to masquerade as PDF View to trick Default Apps into giving it the option).

Of course, it’s worth noting that because Palm has not released the APIs to performing these service calls, any app submitted (be it to the App Catalog, beta, or web distribution feeds) will be automatically and summarily rejected. But that’s not to stop developers from wishing, hoping, dreaming, and preparing. And releasing via homebrew… nudge nudge, wink wink.

Source: MetaViewSoft

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After months of private on-the-side development, Internalz, the first and only file manager for the webOS, has been released with 1.0 status. Along with it, the custom service powering Internalz, FileMgr service, has also been release at version 1.0.

Internalz made its first public appearance way back on August 18th. Back then, it was essentially a proof-of-concept application, with that early FileMgr being my first attempt at custom webOS service. And after a few minor revisions, I decided to switch to private development and testing. This is the result.

The above video show much of the central features: full device browsing, file/directory moving and copying, easy deletions with optional swipe-to-delete feature, simple renaming, built-in image viewer, built-in text editor and more.

However, there were a few features I forgot to mention in the above video. First off, Internalz supports many international languages. It fully supports English, French, Italian, German, and Spanish. As well, tapping on the "Name" header toggles sorting by name, and tapping on "Size" toggles that respective sorting. In addition, tapping and holding on the "Size" label will toggle it to a label for filetype.

FileMgr, the custom service that powers Internalz, is also hitting version 1.0. As a result, I’ve released a public API specsheet for developers to freely use. Among other things, this allows developers to write data to files locally on the device. Such a feature is already employed in at least one app, MapTool, by Metaview.

Internalz 1.0 is now available here and FileMgr service is available here. Both are also on the PreCentral feed for OTA installation. Huzzah for homebrew!

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WebOS Repair Utility hit the big version 2.0.  After several months since v1.9, this update will come as a welcomed release for many, especially as v1.9 only supported webOS 1.3.5.1 Sprint/Bell devices and webOS 1.3.1 European devices.

Here’s the full change log from the WebOS Repair Utility forums thread:

v2.0 – March 15, 2010
- No longer version/carrier restricted
- Grabs stock md5sum list from selected webOSDoctor
- Fixed diff generation
- Added safeguards to prevent/deal with connection errors
- Improved scanning efficiency
- New md5sum reader class
- Dynamic webOSDoctor downloader (like in WebOS Quick Install)

Obviously the biggest improvement, by far, is that it’s no longer carrier/version dependent.  Previously, users would have to wait for  WebOS Repair Utility to be updated for every new device and new webOS OTA update. This was both annoying for users and annoying for the developer, me. With v2.0, this restriction is gone and WebOS Repair Utility will now work with any carrier/version, as long as the webOSDoctor matches that carrier/version.

Better yet, now that md5sums are grabbed from the selected webOSDoctor, if you used MetaDoctor to create a custom webOSDoctor, you can repair your custom webOS build with that same webOSDoctor.

Lastly, the third biggest change was the improved connection handling. Previously, there was the dreaded "Error 5". In short, WebOS Repair Utility will reconnect when such a disconnect is detected. An update long-anticipated, for those who previously experienced this error.

The end result of v2.0 is a much stabler scan, that only took about 10 minutes on my device. WebOS Repair Utility is now available in its PreCentral forums thread, and as always, is free.

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