Palm Pre iTunes Syncing Back With WebOS 1.1 Update 396
suraj.sun points out CNet coverage of Palm's newest OS release, which restores the ability to synch with iTunes that iTunes 8.2.1 had broken. "The news was posted on Palm's blog where it listed the new features and enhancements of the software update and nonchalantly added at the end: 'Oh, and one more thing: Palm WebOS 1.1 re-enables Palm media sync. That's right — you once again can have seamless access to your music, photos and videos from the current version of iTunes (8.2.1).' Bold move, Palm. Bold move. It'll be interesting to see how Apple responds, and do you suppose the use of the phrase 'one more thing,' a phrase that Apple CEO Steve Jobs often uses to introduce a new product at the end of his keynotes, was intentional or am I just reading too much into this?"
More interesting quote from Palm (Score:5, Informative)
well, if anyone RTFA, there's an even more interesting quote from Palm:
Palm believes that openness and interoperability offer better experiences for users by allowing them the freedom to use the content they own without interference across devices and services, so on behalf of consumers, we have notified the USB Implementers Forum of what we believe is improper use of the Vendor ID number by another member.
Looks like Palm really is ready to turn this into a war.
USB Vendor ID (Score:5, Informative)
And because the world doesn't always make sense, Palm filed a complaint with the USB Implementors Forum, stating Apple is abusing the vendor ID (according to http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/20090723/you-can-almost-hear-the-shrieks-of-outrage-in-cupertino-cant-you/ [allthingsd.com] ).
Re:More interesting quote from Palm (Score:4, Informative)
Apple did all the engineering, R&D, and human interface work for iTunes. (Ok, other than what they bought in the beginning). Now Pre is trying to piggy back on this.
Interoperability with competitors' hardware is generally protected, at least in the US. See Coleco and other companies producing Atari 2600-compatible hardware, various companies producing unlicensed software for the NES, Sega Genesis, PS2, etc that had to use similar trickery to what Palm is doing.
Re:Lost battle (Score:4, Informative)
I don't think you understand what it is that Palm is doing here, if they were doing what you described (cracking the security of iTunes) that would be at best questionable, I for one would be completely against that kind of behavior. All that Palm is doing is changing the Vendor ID on their phone to the Vendor ID used by iPods. Basically, iTunes says "Hey, who are you?" and the Pre says "I am definately, definately, an iPod".
Unless Apple adds a new requirement to sync, there's little they can do to detect if the iPod is actually a Pre, and if they add a new requirement they'll be breaking backward compatibility with all the iPods out there that don't have the requirement implemented.
Re:cat and mouse (Score:5, Informative)
My Pre has worked continuously.
I just didn't update to iTunes 8.2.1. And besides, there are other ways to sync the Pre besides iTunes. It syncs the way all other non-Apple phones sync. It just throws in iTunes syncing as an extra bonus, which is nice.
Right idea, wrong mechanism (Score:3, Informative)
Palm could easily inter-operate with iTunes without pretending to be an iPod and abusing Apple's vendor ID. All it has to do is create its own synchronization driver.
"But wait!" the Apple-haters say. "Apple is an evil, anti-competitive wannabe-monopoly! There's no way it would allow such a thing! No way would Apple allow its precious iTunes on other devices! It wants to extend its iTunes dominance to the iPhone by locking out all competitors!"
I give you:
http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/productivity_tools/themissingsyncforpalmpre.html [apple.com]
(Also for BlackBerry. [apple.com])
All Palm has to do is build (or license) its own connector, and Apple would let it be. Maybe it would even promote the software on Apple's own website.
Re:Lost battle (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.precentral.net/how-palm-re-enabled-itunes-sync [precentral.net]
That's a bit shady, and for a group so concerned with open standards like USB, I would imagine more Slashdotters would find that practice questionable.
Re:USB Vendor ID (Score:4, Informative)
First off, I don't like Apple. They sell high-priced fancy style-over-substance gadgets, IMHO. Now that we've got that taken care of...
I didn't see anything on the form stating that you can't use your vendor ID to identify your products, while it did say that using unauthorized vendor IDs is forbidden.
It's perfect! (Score:5, Informative)
"All it has to do is create its own synchronization driver."
Why? All the driver would do is see the Pre and copy the files over.... kinda like it ALREADY DOES! This is because the "sync driver" is already inside the Pre. The Pre reads the iPod music library files directly. Palm already did the "hard work" of reading well documented files. They just chose to do it in a different place than the rest of the market. Why create a totally new way of storing music files, why you can just copy how someone already did it. The only reason the other devices need a driver is because they don't know how to read the library files directly.
This gives the best experience to the user. No additional software to install.
Re:cat and mouse (Score:3, Informative)
You don't have to clone iTunes. You just need an XML parser and file transfer tool. Let the user use iTunes to enjoy their music on their PC, and let the Palm software sync the library.
Re:cat and mouse (Score:3, Informative)
Some apps are more useful than others (The web browser and YouTube applications are not very useful without some form of Internet connection because they don't cache anything) but apps like Calendar, Tasks, Memos, Photos, Music, SplashID, and Classic work just fine.
Even the email app will function without a network connection (you can't send or receive new messages but you can read messages that have already been downloaded.)
Re:cat and mouse (Score:5, Informative)
You don't have to clone iTunes. You just need an XML parser and file transfer tool. Let the user use iTunes to enjoy their music on their PC, and let the Palm software sync the library.
Using Cocoa:
NSDictionary* theLibrary = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithContentsOfFile: [@"~/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music Library.xml" stringByExpandingTildeInPath]];
NSArray* thePlayLists = [theLibrary objectForKey: @"Playlists"];
NSDictionary* theTracks = [theLibrary objectForKey: @"Tracks"];
and you can go from there. To check the exact file structure, run "Property List Editor" and have a look at the contents of the file.
Re:USB Vendor ID (Score:4, Informative)
It's a strange thing to attribute such an intention on the USB vendor ID, I wonder if there's any documentation of that...
I own an x-keys [piengineering.com]. Now, when I plug in the X-Keys, my Mac is completely unable to make any use of it, because it doesn't map the keystrokes of the xkeys to any actions. The OS is absolutely receiving the key events through the HID driver, I've seen them in the IO explorer. Is Apple intentionally crippling my x-keys, or rather putting Pi Engineering at a competitive disadvantage because they don't provide software to map the HID events from my X-Keys to software events, while at the same time they DO provide software that allows people to map events from Apple's own gear, like the Mighty Mouse? Is Pi Engineering being "locked-out" of the Mac keyboard market because they have to ship a helper application along with their key arrays?
On the other end of things, it's not so much the interoperability as much as it is the branding involved. When you plug a Pre into iTunes with this voodoo working, it looks like an iPod, and iTunes says "iPod" when it's talking about the Pre. That's a trademark, and it implies (wrongly) that Apple created or sanctioned the functioning of the Pre, when in fact it makes iTunes do a bunch of weird things -- like make two iPod tabs appear in the preferences window, and other oddities. iTunes isn't really built to talk to a Pre this way, and Apple isn't really under any obligation to make it work this way. They've gone and made the library data readable through XML, so vendors can read the library wtihout nettling with iTunes's execution state.
All I can say is, if I wrote a program that wrote data to an open file format, and someone insisted on writing a special bit of code that patched my program and made it do stuff I didn't write it to do, and I was the one who started getting the support calls about it, I'd be sorta pissed.
Re:Trivial? (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, Palm could conceivably read the full iTunes XML, allow the user to create playlists, and sync from there, but that would involve more work for the user, instead of allowing them to easily sync already created playlists.
Playlists are included in the iTunes XML file.
Re:cat and mouse (Score:3, Informative)
I'm actually surprised (for better or worse) that Apple hasn't invoked the DCMA.
The DMCA has an explicit exception for "interoperability". Check it out under paragraph (f), Reverse Engineering.
http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/openlaw/dvd/1201.html [harvard.edu]
Re:cat and mouse (Score:4, Informative)
Re:cat and mouse (Score:3, Informative)
It is also important to note that when Apple sued MS, Xerox sued Apple. Xerox's suit was thrown out because they waited too long. However, the idea originated with Xerox, not with the Apple Macintosh. So the implication that MS stole the idea from Apple is false. MS got the idea for the GUI from the same place that Apple did--Xerox PARC.
Re:Seems Palm is coming thru with the Pre (Score:3, Informative)
As held in every case about this issue, copyright and trademark law are not violated when using a competitors name for the purposes of interoperability.
Re:cat and mouse (Score:3, Informative)
I've used MediaMonkey under Vista to transfer music to my iPod Touch (though I haven't tried with the newest firmware).
It's still somewhat in the realm of "ugly hack," though: MediaMonkey uses parts of iTunes (which must also be installed) in order to accomplish this, but it worked fine in the boneheaded, practical sense of things in that it was transparent, easy, and I didn't have to suffer with seeing iTunes.