Ilya Kozhevnikov

Browser Newsletter #14

March 08, 2008

Microsoft Releases Internet Explorer 8 Beta

Microsoft on Wednesday unveiled the beta version of Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) for developers at the annual MIX08 conference in Las Vegas.

The beta version of IE8 includes better predictability when designing sites, full support for cascading style sheet (CSS) 2.1 at release to manufacturing, and integrated developer tools to quickly debug HTML, CSS and scripts in a visual environment, Microsoft said.

“A lot of the end user or consumer features are not featured on this build because it really is targeted at the developers and the designers,” Matthew Lepsen from the Microsoft IE development team, said on a video produced by Microsoft’s Channel 9 site.

Why Isn’t IE8 Passing Acid2?

Although we said that IE8 Beta 1 passes the ACID2 test, some of you may be seeing results like the image above; we thought we should explain what’s going on. IE8 passes the official ACID2 test hosted on http://www.webstandards.org/files/acid2/test.html. (Note, this seems to be a popular destination at the moment. You may have trouble reaching the site.)There are also a number of copies of this test around the net. One popular copy that I’ve seen of late is http://acid2.acidtests.org/

IE8 fails the copies of ACID2 due to the cross domain security checks IE performs for ActiveX controls. Since IE does not natively handle HTML content in the OBJECT tag, but rather uses IE’s rendering engine as an ActiveX to display this HTML content, the same cross domain security checks also apply.

New IE8 beta 1 tantalizes, rough edges and all

To coincide with the first day of MIX08, the first beta of Internet Explorer 8 has been released. The big feature is, of course, better standards compliance, and to this IE8 adds a few small bells and whistles. This release is aimed squarely at developers so that they can get a head start on preparing their pages for the new browser; a later beta will be more suitable for a wide audience.

Microsoft asks Web developers to “bet on us”

Microsoft Corp asked software developers to “bet on us” as it began making test versions available of Internet Explorer 8, an upgraded version of the main software used to browse the Web.

At Microsoft’s MIX08 conference on Wednesday, the company’s chief software architect, Ray Ozzie, said the Web was at the center of everything Microsoft was doing as it seeks to expand beyond the desktop business it dominates.

Opera exec’s take on Internet Explorer 8

One of the most interested observers of Internet Explorer 8 is Opera Software, the Norwegian-based browser maker, which filed an antitrust complaint over the Microsoft browser with the European Commission. Via e-mail today, I asked Hakon Wium Lie, Opera’s chief technology officer, for his take on the preliminary version of the new Microsoft browser.

Steve Jobs pans Flash on the iPhone

Over the last year, many observers have wondered when Apple would deliver Adobe Flash support on the iPhone. At the company’s shareholder meeting on Tuesday, Steve Jobs made comments that indicate that support isn’t coming anytime soon, thanks to architectural limitations in Flash itself. A full explanation of those limitations follow.

JScript in Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for Developers

Making developers more productive through the design, development, and debug phases of web application development is one of the key goals for Internet Explorer 8. I’d like to take this opportunity to walk you through the features that the JScript team contributed to IE8 Beta 1 for Developers.

Hands-on With Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8 Beta

Microsoft released Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 today, available via adownload page.This beta is aimed squarely at Web site developers, but onMicrosoft’s IE8 blog, the company encourages anyone to try it out.

Read more…
© The Washington Post, 05/03/08

Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1, first impressions

The first beta of Internet Explorer 8 was released to the public today, and following Microsoft’s yesterday announcement that Internet Explorer 8 will use its most web standards compatible mode by default, an important milestone in the way to a truly open web, I was eager to see this new version and what’s new, from a Firefox user perspective.

Activities and WebSlices in Internet Explorer 8

With Activities, you can access your services from any webpage. Activities simplify the common task of copying, navigating, and pasting into a single action. Just make a selection and click on the Activity button or context menu to view your services.

An example of a popular Activity is a mapping service. With this Activity, I can highlight an address, select my map service of choice, and see a preview of the location immediately. Clicking on the map opens a new tab to the full mapping website where I can get driving directions, aerial view and more features.

WebSlices bring your favorite pieces of the web with you. WebSlices are portions of a webpage that you can subscribe to and view updates directly from the Favorites bar.

WebSlices let you subscribe to a portion of webpage to get updates and view these changes without having to go back to the site. Let’s say that you’re an eBay addict like me, and you’ve got your heart set on a 80’s Swatch watch. With WebSlices, I can subscribe to the auction item and know when there is a price change directly on the browser chrome.

Flock 1.1 is out

Flock 1.1 has been released with a small set of nice and important improvements. Most notable integration with Gmail and Yahoo! Mail that lets you know when you have a new message in either service and send links and handle mailto: requests with the service defined as default or you can keep your current desktop application.

Backbase tests browser JavaScript and Render performance including IE 8

Sjoerd Mulder of Backbase ran a couple of performance tests on a slew of browsers, including IE 8 beta. He tested both the JavaScript performance, and the rendering performance [...]

IE8 and IP Licensing

Some of the first things users may notice in the Beta 1 release of Internet Explorer 8 are new features such as Activities and WebSlice. We recognize that the technology behind Activities and Webslice relies on innovations that have come out of the community, which of course has had a critical role in the development of the Internet. We also appreciate the community’s deep commitment to permissive IP licensing and to ensuring the continued ability to innovate.

So with these new features and other initiatives we’re launching in Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1, we want to highlight the ways in which we’re using new approaches to licensing the various intellectual property components involved. We carefully chose these new licensing models because they are the models, or facilitate the kinds of free and open uses, that the relevant communities have adopted for themselves. While we will still evaluate the most appropriate way to make specifications and test cases available on a case-by-case basis, here we concluded that the Public Domain, Creative Commons and BSD licenses (for copyrights) and the Microsoft Open Specification Promise (for patents) are the best vehicles for making these technologies available.

In this post I’ll briefly describe how these are all being used, and also point you to links where you can find additional information about them.

IE8 and CSS 2.1 Testing

The Internet Explorer team is serious about enabling web developers to be the most effective and efficient as possible. One very important way we can do this is to support and contribute to the web standards. For the Internet Explorer team, we will do this in multiple ways including implementing support for standards and driving to cut the ambiguity in these industry standards’ specifications.

The IE Test Team welcomes your feedback about our CSS 2.1 tests including our interpretation of how they test the CSS 2.1 support in IE8 Beta 1. If you’re interested in commenting on the tests, I encourage you go to join the existing W3C’s 2.1 Test Suite Mailing List discussion on the topic. I truly believe that starting with IE8 Beta 1 we’ve begun a journey toward making it easier for you to build the web in a standards-based, predictable way.

Five things you’ll love (or hate) about IE8

Wondering what you’ll love (or hate) about IE8? I’ve put the beta through its paces, and I’ve got the goods for you. I’ve found some nifty new features, and one that spells annoyance. Read on for details and screenshots.

The Default Layout Mode

During my talk at MIX 08, I covered more background and detail behind the new IE8 layout mode that provides greater standards support, particularly with regards to CSS 2.1, and version targeting. I’d like to follow-up that talk with a brief post on both points for those that were unable to attend in person.

Internet Explorer Application Compatibility VPC Image

VPC Hard Disk Image for testing websites on IE on Windows XP SP2

A VPC hard disk image containing a pre-activated Windows XP SP2 or Windows Vista, and IE6, IE7 or IE8.

This VPC image will expire on July 3, 2008.

IE and WebKit Performance; Is WebKit the Ralph Nader of Browsers?

The WebKit team talked about the Acid 3 test and how they are up to 90/100

The JScript team also blogged about JScript improvements including fixing String concatenation.

The Best Stuff from MIX08

This week was Microsoft’s MIX08 conference in Las Vegas. The event was filled with announcements, demos, and the debuts of new products, like IE8. Some of the news was expected, but there were other things that came as a surprise (like IE8!). If you weren’t able to attend this year’s conference, here’s a guide to everything you missed.

Internet Explorer 8: If you haven’t heard about IE8 yet, then you must have been on a desert island for the past week. Microsoft’s new browser, available now in beta form, offers a lot of new features. (See the complete list here for the items not on this list). Here’s what you need to know about what’s new for IE8 [...]

Silverlight 2: the next version of Silverlight has arrived. Microsoft announced 1.5 million installs of Silverlight per day. Some of the new features include [...]

Improved Productivity Through Internet Explorer 8 Developer Tools

Over the past year, I’ve written about different tools to help web developers become more productive when developing in Internet Explorer. These tools came from partners inside and outside Microsoft. One – the IE Developer Toolbar – came from the IE team in response to your requests for a free, lightweight tool to help debug your site in IE.

The IE8 Developer Tools are the next step in helping make developers more productive in Internet Explorer. In this post I’ll introduce you to what’s available in IE8 Beta 1 and point you to more detailed information about the tools.

Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for Developers – Standards Highlights

Dean mentioned a bunch of things we are doing in Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for Developers. I want to point you to more details specifically about the developer focused changes to CSS, the DOM and the new version targeting.

IE8 improves rendering of content authored to various web standards in standards mode. As we have mentioned before, IE8 Beta 1 for Developers ships with standards mode as its default formatting engine. In order to maintain backwards compatibility, sites can opt-into IE7-like handling of content by inserting a special meta element into the web page, that triggers the “IE7 standards mode”. For more complete details regarding document compatibility, see Defining Document Compatibility.

CSS is not the only place where we tuned IE8, we tweaked the DOM as well. IE8 features an enhanced and standardized DOM that brings it in line with implementations in other browsers. Highlights include changes in the behavior of the getAttribute, setAttribute and removeAttribute modifiers to make IE8 more interoperable with other browsers. Additionally, IE8 has dramatically enhanced AJAX support with features like DOM: Storage, Cross Document Messaging (XDM) and the Selectors APIs. For a more complete list of AJAX and DOM improvements, see What’s New in Internet Explorer 8.

Opera: IE8’s changes don’t let Microsoft off legal hook

Microsoft Corp.’s rivals have applauded some of what they’ve seen in the new Internet Explorer 8 (IE8), but the browser maker that has complained to antitrust regulators in Europe said the changes don’t address all its concerns.

Mozilla stretches Firefox 3.0 development to fifth beta

Mozilla Corp. this week said it would need to issue a fifth beta of Firefox 3.0 because of the number of unfixed bugs remaining in the browser.

The decision was the second time in the past 30 days that Mozilla added an extra build to the beta process of Firefox 3.0. It wasn’t unexpected, however; last week, the head of Mozilla’s development said a fifth beta might be necessary, and that a decision would be made by March 3.

Mozilla VP talks IE 8, Firefox 3

Mozilla Vice President Mike Schroepfer said Microsoft’s decision to support a more standards-compliant mode by default should keep Web developers from having to waste so much time.

With the current set-up, he said that developers have a fairly easy time getting a site that renders properly in Opera, Safari, and Firefox, but often spend a lot of energy trying to get that same site to also render correctly in Internet Explorer.

Browser Newsletter #14

Microsoft Releases Internet Explorer 8 Beta

Why Isn’t IE8 Passing Acid2?

New IE8 beta 1 tantalizes, rough edges and all

Microsoft asks Web developers to “bet on us”

Opera exec’s take on Internet Explorer 8

Steve Jobs pans Flash on the iPhone

JScript in Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for Developers

Hands-on With Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8 Beta

Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1, first impressions

Activities and WebSlices in Internet Explorer 8

Flock 1.1 is out

Backbase tests browser JavaScript and Render performance including IE 8

IE8 and IP Licensing

IE8 and CSS 2.1 Testing

Five things you’ll love (or hate) about IE8

The Default Layout Mode

Internet Explorer Application Compatibility VPC Image

IE and WebKit Performance; Is WebKit the Ralph Nader of Browsers?

The Best Stuff from MIX08

Improved Productivity Through Internet Explorer 8 Developer Tools

Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for Developers – Standards Highlights

Opera: IE8’s changes don’t let Microsoft off legal hook

Mozilla stretches Firefox 3.0 development to fifth beta

Mozilla VP talks IE 8, Firefox 3

Leave a Reply

About Ilya Kozhevnikov

Categories