Redesigning the Palm OS GUI
January 11, 2006 by Jayvee Fernandez
Filed under PDA, Palm
The past several years has put Palm (well, the company formerly known as pa1mOne, formerly known as Palm) on a comfortable pedestal because they have successfully claimed the rights to the easiest GUI (graphical user interface, or the stuff you see on screen) to figure out.
Palm used to hire a ‘tap guy’ – his job was to make sure that you could access anything within three clicks. Although with the way things get reinvented everyday, sometimes it might take more than hiring a ‘tap guy’ to make sure that things stay simple. Sometimes, it might even be good to start from scratch.
Kent Probbernow had these things to say about the proposed Palm OS GUI:
It’s time to revitalize and reform Palm OS to bring it on par with modern mobile platforms. I won’t waste time or words on the fact that Palm OS development has lagged behind other competing platforms, we all know that Garnet is a relic. But I think PalmSource should take this opportunity to borrow a page from Apple’s playbook by starting over from the beginning. OSX still retains the classic Mac interface while building upon it with modern technologies like Quartz and Aqua. So to, I think, PalmSource should strive to achieve the same goal.
Palm has been sitting on its laurels for too long. The article is a really good read. I learned a thing or two about GUI design and its psychological effects on how people will make use of their gadgets.
Read the source
Yes, the Palm OS is in dire need of an upgrade. It hasn’t changed much since the original Palm “Pilots”. I think the Palm OS has some great things going for it beyond just that it isn’t another Microsoft product.
Yeah, the one thing that has turned me away from palms and towards windows mobile was the gui. The proposed gui in the picture is beautiful.