14 DAY TRIAL // The highly-expected Palm Pre is reported to come with a couple of more capabilities than we have initially expected. According to the latest news on the Web, the device would be able to allow for the porting of Google's Android platform on it, due to some features its processor includes. If the Android port is completed, the smartphone could become a dual-booting webOS/Android handset.
The porting of Google's platform on the Pre would be facilitated by the fact that Texas Instruments, the manufacturer of the device's OMAP3 processor, has released a development device called “Zoom OMAP34x Mobile Development Kit,” which is meant to help developers write software for their new CPU lineup.
At the same time, the OmapZoom project, formed shortly after the release of the Zoom MDK device, is aiming at porting open-source operating systems to devices that run on the OMAP3 processor. And since one project is targeted at bringing the Google-made Android mobile OS to the OMAP3 processor, the result would be that we might soon see an Android-powered Palm Pre.
Although it sounds rather simple in theory, there is still a lot of hard work to be done. One of the problems encountered would be the fact that developers need a serial connection to the device so that the initial boot sector could be accessed. By default, the handset would search for that sector on the NAND at the beginning and, since its OS is placed there, it would stop looking elsewhere after that.
The OmapZoom team is confident that they will find a solution to access Palm Pre’s bootloader and thus allow for different platforms like Android or OpenMoko to be installed on the device. According to them, this would also allow for native applications for the smartphone to be developed. Provided that they succeed in their attempt, we might see a Pre with dual-boot capabilities shortly after its launch. More details on the project can be found here.