Palm has released version 1.2 of webOS, adding new enterprise-friendly features to its Pre smartphone but effectively ending its one-up battle with Apple by not restoring the device's access to iTunes digital media storefront.

The calendar feature has been improved to make scheduling easier. For instance, if a calendar note has a phone number or address embedded in it, users can tap it to dial or receive directions using Google Maps. The email application now always enforces security policies when attempting to access Microsoft Exchange accounts, while the update gives IT departments an easier time allowing webOS devices to receive corporate email. Also, users can now cut and paste webpage and email content, download files in the browser, filter emails via search and download content from the Amazon MP3 store from either Wi-Fi or wireless area networks (WANs).

New billing features now enable the addition of premium applications to the Palm App Catalog storefront. Users can store their credit card information and store it with their Palm profile, which doesn't sit on the phone itself. A new Share button enables users to send a link to an app page in an email or text message.

Absent from the Pre's Palm Support webpage is any mention of webOS 1.2 restoring the Pre's connection to the App Store. That might be because the USB Implementers Forum sided with Apple in Palm's charge that Apple was restraining trade by blocking the Pre's access to the iTunes digital media storefront. Palm said it believed Apple is enabling just its own devices to connect directly to the iTunes software and thus is abusing the standards created to facilitate interoperability between computers and devices that use a USB connection.

The USB-IF disagreed. In a letter sent to both firms, it also warns that if future Pre software updates include Apple's vendor code (a move Palm indicated it would make, as stated in it's complaint, to restore iTunes access) it would violate the forum's rules.

The skirmish began in May when Palm confirmed that the Pre would enable users to synchronize with iTunes. By July, Apple released a new update that "disables devices falsely pretending to be iPods, including the Palm Pre," an Apple spokesperson had told BusinessWeek. A week later, Palm released a webOS 1.1 update that re-established media sync. But Apple's recent release of iTunes 9.0 once again quashed the capability.

For more:
- read this Official Palm blog post
- see this InformationWeek article

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