WebOS 1.1 Emerges!

A quick post to comment on my early impression of WebOS 1.1.

First of all, thanks to Palm for updating WebOS so often and so quickly. The rate and pace instills a great deal of user confidence in the future of the Pre and in your dedication to making it a phone users stay excited about. Thanks!

What's New?

The Palm official list can be found here. The compiled list of the "tons of undocumented features" can be found over at my home away from home, Pre Central.

From the looks of it, there are lots of little fixes (for example, you can view items in 'sent mail' for gmail and yahoo separately now), improvements (photo app, sound for notifications, animated drop down menus, and Javascript interpreter performance upgrades), and added features (emailing memos and a bunch of EAS-related stuff).

Highlights So Far?

I haven't had long to play around, but so far, here are a few things that excite me:

1. Links on the web browser select easier and faster.
2. The UI seems snappier in general (likely due to the JS performance upgrades).
3. Okay, shallow, I know, but I love the emoticons in text messages. It's a fun detail.
4. iTunes sync is back! This doesn't greatly affect me, but it's kind of fun in a "Ooo, no you didn't" kind of way.

What's Not New?

It appears as though there are no big new improvements for the average, non-corporate user--improvements that many were hoping for. Namely, there is no video recording, no improved calendar functions (like, being able to add contacts to events), no message forwarding, and no improved cut/paste functionality.