webOS Woes: Worst mobile browser ever?

Dear HP,

Now that you’ve dropped some serious coin on Palm, start making some changes to what could be a pretty useful OS.

For this installment, let’s talk web browser. Years ago we were lucky to even have internet on our phones and serving up plain text websites was acceptable, but we expect just a bit more out of our smart phones these days. So please step up your game.

Here’s an example of the quality browsing experience I’ve been dealing with lately.

Digg
How I am supposed to get my peer approved nerd news spoon fed to me when Digg looks like this?

webOS_browser_fail_1.png

Yeah, that’s a good looking webpage.

General things that could use improving.

  • Currently there seems to be a weird grey box at the end of every webpage, for no apparent reason.
  • Along those same lines, the last paragraph or two gets cut off completely on some sites.
  • JavaScript support is nothing short of terrible.
  • Can I please have a pop up when I click and hold a link? With the options to copy the link, copy the text, or email the link to someone. Pretty please.
  • I could just be missing the proper shortcut for this, but why is there no way to jump back to the top of screen aside from painfully scrolling for hours on end?
  • If I have my Pre in landscape orientation why can’t I access the address bar? Sure, the keyboard is sideways at that point, but did it ever occur to the developers that I might just want to access my bookmarks?

In Palm/HPs defense, Blackberry still holds the award for worst mobile browser ever. And I don’t see that changing anytime soon, that doesn’t mean HP should slack off though.

Comments

2 responses to “webOS Woes: Worst mobile browser ever?”

  1. jonshipman Avatar
    jonshipman

    The grey box is there for the buttons so they don’t cover up anything.
    To do a ” right-click ” just hold down the function key and tap.

    I really hate how digg renders – and since they changed the api none of the old apps work. Hopefully when webos 2.0 gets here Digg will load properly

    1. Aaron Nelsen Avatar

      Thanks Jon, good to know.

      I’ll try Digg out on webOS 2.0 when I get back to my office, but the browser in 2.0 actually scores lower in the Acid3 test than the current one. So don’t hold your breath.

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