{"slug": "palmos", "name": "PalmOS", "category": "os", "category_name": "Operating systems and desktop", "description": "", "recommenders": 3, "commenters": 4, "warners": 0, "score": 3.11, "rising": 1.67, "first": "2026-02-26", "latest": "2026-10-18", "why": "PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 1, "compare": 0, "warn": 0}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["PalmOS", "Palm OS"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 802326144, "item_id": 50145384, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50145384", "by": "user3939382", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love and miss PalmOS.", "excerpt": "This is awesome, I wish I had it for my Treo. I love and miss PalmOS. My current iPhone I can\u2019t wait to get rid of it. It\u2019s half owned by other companies, phoning home in the background all the time, addictive. My Palm devices really felt like mine.", "context": "", "use_case": "mobile OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "PalmOS Lemmings"}, {"id": 797287424, "item_id": 49830464, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49830464", "by": "holowoodman", "date": "2026-09-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "every application could contain links to every other application's content", "excerpt": "Imho the fundamental problem is not a problem of the \"Desktop\" but of the whole application ecosystem. I want to get some work done: Just as an example, this work consists of reading some email like \"pls review this document, and create a presentation in response\". I'll follow up the email with an answer and some clarifying questions. Then I'll read the document, making some notes. I'll read some additional documents", "context": "", "use_case": "cross-app linking", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ideas on modernizing the open-source desktop"}, {"id": 754795920, "item_id": 47174745, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47174745", "by": "felixding", "date": "2026-02-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft", "excerpt": "I can\u2019t recommend another excellent free ebook by Zen of Palm enough. It accurately describes the key differences between designing for desktop and mobile, which explains why PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft at the time. I even wrote a whole blog series about this book two decades ago (https://dingyu.me/blog/zen-of-palm-1). I switched from a Dell Pocket PC ", "context": "", "use_case": "mobile OS", "switched_from": "Windows Mobile", "story": "Palm OS User Interface Guidelines [pdf]"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [{"by": "NikolaNovak", "context": "used several Palm Treo generations", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49344315", "date": "2026-08-18"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["mobile os", "cross-app linking", "handheld os"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50143536", "title": "PalmOS Lemmings", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49825642", "title": "Ideas on modernizing the open-source desktop", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49313360", "title": "IBM Simon (1994): the original smartphone, explained in its own ad [video]", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47168726", "title": "Palm OS User Interface Guidelines [pdf]", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-10": {"recommend": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 802326144, "item_id": 50145384, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50145384", "by": "user3939382", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love and miss PalmOS.", "excerpt": "This is awesome, I wish I had it for my Treo. I love and miss PalmOS. My current iPhone I can\u2019t wait to get rid of it. It\u2019s half owned by other companies, phoning home in the background all the time, addictive. My Palm devices really felt like mine.", "context": "", "use_case": "mobile OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "PalmOS Lemmings"}, {"id": 797287424, "item_id": 49830464, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49830464", "by": "holowoodman", "date": "2026-09-24", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "every application could contain links to every other application's content", "excerpt": "Imho the fundamental problem is not a problem of the \"Desktop\" but of the whole application ecosystem. I want to get some work done: Just as an example, this work consists of reading some email like \"pls review this document, and create a presentation in response\". I'll follow up the email with an answer and some clarifying questions. Then I'll read the document, making some notes. I'll read some additional documents", "context": "", "use_case": "cross-app linking", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ideas on modernizing the open-source desktop"}, {"id": 789509040, "item_id": 49344315, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49344315", "by": "NikolaNovak", "date": "2026-08-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "The basics of PalmOS were fairly touch oriented but resistive rather than capacitive", "excerpt": "The basics of PalmOS were fairly touch oriented but resistive rather than capacitive, which made a difference usability wise. Menus though could get desktop-y. I think the big diff was assumption of handwriting as the UI. Latter palm treo had a keyboard like blackberry, I used several generations of those before trying the HTC g1 :).", "context": "used several Palm Treo generations", "use_case": "handheld OS", "switched_from": "", "story": "IBM Simon (1994): the original smartphone, explained in its own ad [video]"}, {"id": 754795920, "item_id": 47174745, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47174745", "by": "felixding", "date": "2026-02-26", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft", "excerpt": "I can\u2019t recommend another excellent free ebook by Zen of Palm enough. It accurately describes the key differences between designing for desktop and mobile, which explains why PalmOS was so much easier to use than the various Windows-based mobile formats from Microsoft at the time. I even wrote a whole blog series about this book two decades ago (https://dingyu.me/blog/zen-of-palm-1). I switched from a Dell Pocket PC ", "context": "", "use_case": "mobile OS", "switched_from": "Windows Mobile", "story": "Palm OS User Interface Guidelines [pdf]"}]}