The bloggers over at PreCentral have gotten their hands on the new, unreleased version of HP's webOS, the mobile operating system HP acquired through its purchase of Palm last year. The updated software, webOS 3.0, will soon power new HP Pre smartphones and a tablet computer called the TouchPad. The webOS SDK (software development kit) was released a few weeks ago to developers, allowing them to have an early hands-on with the software in order to begin building mobile apps. Although prohibited, an unknown developer has leaked the SDK to the media.
In a comprehensive review, PreCentral has examined every aspect of the new software, noting updates to core apps like the Web browser, email client, maps and others. Most notably, HP has ditched Google Maps in this version, and is now using Microsoft's Bing Maps instead.
According to the site, the following features and/or applications are new: