Category Archives: webOS

Power scrolling…

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There is some buzz around on Twitter about a new phrase for webOS, called power scrolling.

The interesting thing about this feature is, that it was available from the early days of webOS (don’t know which version, but at least 1.3x) and no developer really used it. Or it was used but not mentioned and nobody knows about that feature in an app. The first mention of this phrase was tweeted from the Carbon for webOS developers:

since we like this new word and also what it is, here is a little blog post.

So, what does Power scroll mean?

It’s a gesture to scroll with two fingers in a list or scrolling region, and if the gesture is used by an app the list will quickly (animated) jump to the beginning, end left or right, depends on the content and the direction you scrolled. Think about the “tap the header” tap to jump quickly to the top of a screen on iOS devices. But this one, once you got it, is pretty intuitive.

We also played a little with this feature in a beta of a new app that is currently not available to the public and plan to implement this feature also in already existing apps, once we find some good physics to balance the scrolling and gesture detecting.

Let’s hope that more new apps and also existing ones make use of this gesture so that users know this a heavily used gesture that’s available on a nearly every webOS app that has long lists or big scrolling regions.

If you’re a developer and want to know how to implement this in your app, @JayCanuck has posted a snippet that is ready to use for webOS.

What do you think about this feature?

App Performance-Tests on a Palm Pre – Believe it!

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We actually did some performance tests for our application Convertor to squeeze the most possible performance out of a Palm Pre for this application.

And we hoped to get some major improvements when we try to JSMin our code, or us Packer (Dean Edwards) to minify the code as much as possible without any issues. Than we compared this results against a “un-minified” version. We where also interested in how much faster runs an app with the vanilla kernel (500MHz) and with the holy Uberkernel, tested with Screenstate 500/800 and also Screenstate 500/1000. These are the options most webOS users will use on a Palm Pre.

We had no Palm Pre Plus available, so all tests were done on a O2 Palm Pre.

Continue reading →

Convertor 1.0.4 available

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We submitted Convertor 1.0.4 to Palm yesterday. Today it is available!Convertor

It is mainly a bugfix release:

  • Turkish Lira was wrong (TRY is the correct sign)
  • British Pound (GBP) is now enabled by default
  • count of enabled items in Categories&Units scene is now updated as it should

So start your upgrade if you haven’t yet or try out the free version Convertor Lite if you’re unsure and get a feeling of why we call Convertor an “Amazing Unit & Currency Convertor”!

Latest reviews for Convertor

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We’re really excited to see some reviews popping up all over the net about Convertor. Our currency and conversion app for webOS. So far we’ve got really positive reviews, that means we’re on the right way and of course we will improve Convertor more and more in the next few months.

First, AboutwebOS reviewed Convertor in September and came to the following conclusion:

If you need a conversion app, then Convertor is a great option at only $1.99. There are free options, but so far I haven’t found one that offers the same level of capabilities. Convertor is easy to use, complete, and has a polish that’s shared by the best webOS apps. The inclusion of local help and currency conversion update function are welcome; the former is something I’d like to see in more apps.

The second review is from MobiObie and the conclusion is:

These things I have mentioned would be great additions for the future, but the fact that they are not here does not take away the fact that this is the best conversion app I have used on any platform, and anyone with a webOS device should consider this an essential purchase.

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Quick Tip Video: Copy to Clipboard in Convertor

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We mentioned this in the help we distribute with Convertor, but since we’re getting some questions about on how to copy converted values to the clipboard, we made a little screen cast (30 seconds) to show you how.

We hope you like it, if we get a positive resonance on this video tutorials, than it could be possible that we provide some more :-)

Watch it here:

Or watch it directly on YouTube

We submitted Convertor Lite 1.0.2 to Palm

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Today we submitted version 1.0.2 of Convertor Lite to Palm for review.Convertor

In this version you don’t need to keep the Currency-Update enabled to use the provided 130 currencies. If one currency update was successful (normally first start) than you can use the currencies.

We added this option to our full version also already earlier, to give travelers the chance to use Convertor in countries without have to pay high roaming costs for data usage each time they need to convert a currency. So it’s now available in both versions.

We hope you enjoy this new version!

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Quick Tip: Access the preferences of an App

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AppMenu open

Since we’re getting 2-3 mails per weeks from users who are using our apps, asking how to change “this” or change “that” in a specific app. we notice that this users are not aware of the preferences in all of our apps and most of all webOS apps.

There is a AppMenu on the upper left when your app is the active card. This Menu is closed and showing the AppName of the active app (e.g. Convertor).
If you tap in this Menu it opens up and displays some more info or options you can access. Mostly all webOS apps hiding the “Preferences”, a “Help” or at least an “About” Page here. Of course there are apps or scenes in apps that don’t have an AppMenu but most will have one.

There is another hint here. If you look at the screenshot, you will see that there is a so-called “gesture” with a letter behind the “Preferences“. You can access such a shortcut if you tap the gesture area of your device and hit the key. In this example the “P“. This will open the preferences directly without tapping the AppMenu and then tapping the preferences line.

Convertor 1.0.3 and Lite approved by Palm

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Thanks to Palm for approving our latest bug fix release of Convertor v1.0.3 so fast!

We submitted it 6 hours before it gets approved! This version has no more known update problems and should run without any issues.

Also we submitted a free version of Convertor called “Convertor Lite” and this one is also approved now.
The difference is, that the full version is fully customizable in categories and units, also the Lite version supports some major categories and units but not the over 400 available in the full version.
There is also no favorite-bar, on this place there is an Ad banner to support our development.

Go check it out! More info available here

Find it in the App Catalog

Convertor Lite

Convertor 1.0.2 about the bug – Don’t update yet!

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We submitted v 1.0.2 yesterday to Palms AppCatalog, but this version seems to have a bug on many devices. We have reproduced this bug already, it is a problem with the internal database.

So any user of Convertor 1.0.0 should stay at this version and DON’T update yet, please wait for version 1.0.3, otherwise it is possible that you can’t use Convertor at the moment.

We submitted v 1.0.3 already this morning to Palm and now hoping for approval before the weekend.

Sorry for this bug to all users! For the future we will triple-check now if there are any things that can happen in an update!

Convertor 1.0 is here!

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ConvertorWe’re very proud to present our new app called Convertor. It’s a unit and currency conversion utility for webOS. We submitted the final version last week to Palm and it should be available now in the official AppCatalog!

After a beta test phase we fixed most of the reported bugs from the initial versions. Thanks to all people who reported some bugs and gave suggestions. Really Thanks!

Convertor supports over 400 units and currencies in 20 different categories. You can easily enabled or disable units you need. On devices with 480 px height (Pre) you have also the option to save up to 5 favorites that you often need for conversion.

Have a look at the page of Convertor for more information.

Find it in the App Catalog