Just days after webOS 1.1 was tipped to be arriving within a month (and rumored for July 22), Palm let loose their first 'major' update to the webOS platform today, with the 87MB mandatory OTA download bringing some great new features to the Pre. New security features that enterprise users will enjoy are:
- IT initiated Remote wipe
- PIN/password of minimum length w/ complexity (numeric or alphanumeric)
- Device wipe with X number of failed PIN attempts
- Auto-lock after X minutes of activity
- Improved digital certificates
Also included are tweaks to the built-in calendar, camera, clock, contacts, e-mail, and more. The full changelog can be found here.
Football fans will appreciate the new application, Sprint NFL Mobile Live, which allows you to watch or listen to live NFL games on your phone.
And in an bold move, Palm has re-enabled media sync with iTunes 8.2.1., just days after the latest update from Apple broke compatibility with the Pre. But will Apple be quick to shut out the Pre again?
Precentral also is keeping a note of other 'undocumented features' that went under the radar, including:
- Notification sound changed to softer, though richer sound
- Animated drop down and context menus
- Photo app improvements: More distinct bar between photos and albums, preview thumbs also slide in from the right, faster photo rendering
- Memo app now has a menu option to e-mail a memo.
- New font for the Browser (Palm's system font)
- Javascript interpreter performance upgrades - overall performance increases, possibly system-wide
- Better Gmail handling
- New icon for AIM
- More autocomplete / autocorrect entries in the dictionary.
- Center button now turns on the screen with slider open, not just a keyboard key or the power button.
Less welcomed updates include disabling the key combo in the browser to open in a new card, as well as some mixed reports of problems with universal search in Google Maps.
Even with all the new features, we think a couple more apps would have been nice...but those will definitely come in good time, especially with the public Mojo SDK now out. Are there any other useful features that you found, and looking ahead, what would you like to see addressed in the next update?
Friday, 24 July 2009