As expected, Apple yesterday unveiled the capabilities of the iPhone 3.0 version of its mobile operating system. Such a move is no doubt a pre-emptive strike against the increasingly difficult mobile landscape, and designed to take some of the wind out of the Palm Pre's sails. Palm has earlier indicated that the Pre will be in retail by the first half of this year.

eWeek poured through the specifications and managed to dig out some improvements that enterprise users will appreciate. On this front, Apple has added VPN on demand, certificate revocation and LDAP, with the new operating system being able to do some media scrubbing in order to eliminate sensitive data. It can now also synchronize "Notes," though the presence of iTunes on the client desktop will be required.

While not yet confirmed, Apple has hinted that it has successfully addressed the need for over-the-air updates of security profiles, a common complaint in previous versions of the iPhone. And of course, consumers and enterprise users alike will certainly look forward to the inclusion--finally--of the ability to do copy and paste.

So what is my take on this? The iPhone still has a lot of ground to cover in order to be truly enterprise-friendly. However, it does appear to be making moves in that direction.

To read more:
- check out this article from eWeek

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