Nov
21
ShopSavvy on Palm Pre and Pixi
More and more of you are buying the Palm Pre (IMHO pretty cool phone) and you want to know if we are going to port ShopSavvy for the Pre and the Pixi. We get the question enough I thought a blog post and FAQ link was called for.
Currently we believe there is no way to access the camera in a way necessary to scan a barcode. If you know of a way we can access it at a frame rate of more than 5 frames per second please comment on this post ASAP.
That being said we assume that Palm will eventually create an API that will allow developers to access the camera allowing for Augmented Reality AND Barcode Scanning. When they do we WILL port ShopSavvy to the platform. Until then we will wait patiently. Again, if you learn of a way we can access the camera please comment.
What happened to the windows mobile shopsavvy??
Comment by James — November 22, 2009 @ 7:56 am
You don’t know how anxious I am to get ShopSavvy on my Pre. The moment it is available, I’ll download and so will all of my friends. The guys over at webos-internals.org may be able to help you with the camera access. They have figured out how to shoot video using the Pre without a proper Palm API. Once your app is ready, you can get it out to the Homebrew Community via PreCentral.net while you await approval into the Palm App Catalog. Its a good way to get user feedback from a smaller user base prior to its release in the App Catalog.
Comment by Kyle — December 5, 2009 @ 1:27 am
There’s more than 1 way to access the camera in webos, but the issue you’re going to have is there’s no physical macro focus in the hardware that would support this.
Also, without using a ‘documented’ api, Palm wouldn’t put it in their app catalog, at least not at the moment.
IF you’re, for some reason, not worried about that (and you have some magical barcode focus technology), email me and we’ll work out the details.
Comment by zsoc — December 5, 2009 @ 9:35 am
@zsoc – we have technology that allows blurry barcodes to be scanned – i.e. no focus necessary. Lets talk.
Comment by amuse — December 5, 2009 @ 4:28 pm
You could release a preliminary app into the App Catalog that allows a user to manually input the barcode numerically until Palm Releases the API then update it down the road. Of course we would still expect a version in Homebrew that utilizes the camera ASAP.
Comment by Kyle — December 5, 2009 @ 9:04 pm
Can someone tell me if this will owrk with the Palm Pro which is a windows based phone. please reply to sdg@prodigy.net. Thanks.
Comment by Steve — December 12, 2009 @ 2:46 pm
The Palm Pre is not a Windows based phone, but we are work out the details of making it work. We will keep you posted.
Comment by amuse — December 12, 2009 @ 5:12 pm
Any word on just manually entering the bar code number? I’d be happy with that for now.
Comment by bdole — December 16, 2009 @ 10:25 am
i would do manual barcode entry on all my shopping if available .
Comment by rprothero — December 17, 2009 @ 6:56 pm
Yeah, definitely need a WebOS version, like this week. I’ll be happy with manual bar code entry for now.
Comment by Katie — December 19, 2009 @ 8:08 pm
I second the idea of manual bar code entry – I would buy this program right away, and wait for an update for automatic scanning.
Comment by Janik — December 29, 2009 @ 11:16 pm
We have a .mobi site coming – should be available in a week or two. Just what you have asked for.
Comment by amuse — December 31, 2009 @ 5:12 pm
Any updates on the .mobi site?
Comment by Kyle — January 13, 2010 @ 11:57 pm
Now that palm has the PDK, will you be able tobrelease your app for WebOs?
Comment by Kyle — January 14, 2010 @ 12:17 am