HP has published the code of Enyo, the underlying JavaScript framework of the webOS platform. It is available from a public repository on GitHub and is distributed as open source software under the permissive Apache license. The release of Enyo is the first step in HP's plan to completely open the webOS mobile platform.

The webOS platform is built on top of Linux, but has a proprietary application stack that is made with HTML and JavaScript. HP obtained the platform in its 2010 acquisition of failing device manufacturer Palm. At the time, HP said it intended to ship the webOS software environment on a wide range of products, including tablets, printers, and desktop computers.

That ambitious vision for webOS was discarded when former CEO Leo Apotheker gutted the company's mobile product division as part of a broader change in strategy aimed at getting HP out of the consumer hardware market. Meg Whitman, who replaced Apotheker last year as CEO, reversed his controversial decision to spin off HP's Personal Systems Group. Salvaging webOS proved more difficult, however, after the costly fire sale of webOS product inventory.

Rumors that emerged in October indicated that HP was thinking about shuttering the entire platform and discontinuing development. At the time, we suggested that HP should open source the operating system instead of killing it. In December, HP announced plans to do exactly that: the company decided to open the operating system and continue maintaining it in collaboration with the open source software community.

Releasing a complex proprietary platform as open source requires a certain amount of time and effort. A governance model needs to be established and source code has to be audited in order to ensure that there are no potential licensing conflicts. HP made the excellent decision to start the process by opening Enyo, the JavaScript framework.

As we wrote in October, Enyo has considerable potential value as a stand-alone software project beyond the scope of webOS itself. The availability of the Enyo source code will make it practical for existing webOS developers to take their applications to other environments and make them work on top of other Web runtime environments.

In addition to opening the current stable version of Enyo, HP has also published the source code of the next-generation version of the framework, which is dubbed Enyo 2. The new version, which is still under active development, is being designed for greater portability. That means Enyo 2 will be better-suited for standalone use and adoption on non-mobile form factors.

"This initial open source release includes Enyo 1.0, which allows current developers of Enyo apps for webOS devices to distribute their apps to other platforms. While this release is not intended to be expanded any further, there is considerable utility for our current developer base in releasing it," HP's webOS strategy head Sam Greenblatt said in a statement. "Today's release also includes the core of Enyo 2.0, which will be the foundation for Enyo going forward. It expands Enyo's 'write once, run anywhere' capability to even more platforms, from mobile devices to desktop web browsers."

The Enyo 2 code available today is the frameworks's core, not the widget system and other higher-level components. Greenblatt says that those will be released "in the near future." The code that is available today is published on GitHub and will be maintained there going forward, which means that the community will be able to participate directly in the project.

HP has also launched an Enyo developer website with documentation and other resources. The initial release puts Enyo on a trajectory to compete with existing mobile JavaScript application frameworks like Sencha Touch and jQuery Mobile. As Enyo 2 evolves, the framework will be suitable for use in a more diverse range of environments.