Palm OS as a Precursor to iOS

I was a big a fan of Palm OS back in the day (I carried a Handspring Visor for a year or two), so I certainly didn’t mean to imply here that the iPhone was the first device to use a home screen that was just a grid of app icons. (Palm wasn’t first, either.) I’d still argue that the iOS “system” interface is simpler — fewer hardware buttons, for example — but the fact that Palm had something so brilliantly simple so long ago shows just how badly they bungled their evolution.

★ Friday, 22 February 2013