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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.

HP today has officially introduced webOS 2.0, the biggest update to what was formerly Palm's mobile operating system, one of the assets gained by HP back in April when it acquired Palm, Inc for $1.2 billion. Now called HP webOS, the updated operating system will make its debut this Friday on the new Palm Pre 2 smartphone. The phone will be available first in France and then, in later months, in the U.S. and Canada on Verizon's network.

A new survey of Palm Pre and iPhone 3Gs owners found that Pre owners like their phones, though not as much as iPhone owners like theirs. It's no surprise that Apple has its fans, but if you've been thinking about getting a Pre - maybe you should.

The survey was performed last week by RBC Capital and ChangeWave Research and first reported on by Philip Elmer-DeWitt at Fortune. While 99% of iPhone owners surveyed said they were satisfied and 82% said they were "very satisfied" - those numbers were 87% and 45% respectively for the Pre.

Palm's new Pre smartphone is supposed to be remarkably easy for developers to work with but this weekend the company reached out to one such community and demanded they shut down any discussion of one of the most hoped-for software developments - tethering the Pre to laptops for mobile wireless internet access. Apparently, you will pay for multiple internet subscriptions and you will not use cell networks for regular internet access without paying an additional subscription beyond your phone's voice and data fees!

LikeMe, a social recommendation site similar to Yelp.com lets users rate and review local businesses, attractions, restaurants, and clubs. After you join the service, you can upload info about yourself, your favorite places, and your favorite things to do in order to kick start the service's personalized social recommendation engine.

Now the app joins a handful of others (really, just a handful) on the new Palm Pre. But before you go and download this one, there's something you need to consider about LikeMe: their reviews may be compromised.

One of the biggest features of the highly-anticipated Palm Pre is the contact and calendar management system called "Synergy." With this new functionality, your Facebook, Google, AIM, and/or Microsoft Exchange contact data is merged together, de-duped, and made available to you within your phone's contacts.

While it's great to see a mobile device include out-of-box functionality for contact import from webmail and social networking sites, there's still a major problem with this type of syncing: no filters. You see, most people don't want their entire contact list from any online resource dumped into their phone. The reason is simple - we just don't phone all our online friends.

If there was any doubt that the upcoming Palm Pre is being poised as an iPhone competitor, some recently discovered documents about Palm's financial plans can put those thoughts to rest. According to Palm's Subscription Accounting plan for the Palm Pre (PDF link), all revenue and expenses for the device will be distributed across 24 months - the required 2-year contract period for new Pre owners. What this means is that Palm will account for device sales immediately, but plans to use the subscription fees to fund ongoing R&D efforts. For Pre owners, the documents promise "new software features free of charge." Sound familiar? It should - it's the same accounting model used by Apple for their iPhone.