Microsoft has surprised watchers by saying that it will shortly make a first beta of Internet Explorer 8 generally available, according to a staffer at IT Week who wishes to remain anonymous.
In a mail-out to previous testers, Microsoft said it would make the pre-release code available to the “general public” but pointed out that it is “focused on the developer community”. Microsoft had already stated in the past that the main advances in IE8 will focus on compliance with web standards, security and user interface options, something the web developer community feels that IE7 failed to live up to.
The company has long been the target of criticism for not following standards in its browser but, as numerous critics have noted, any effort to make IE standards compliant runs the risk of breaking existing sites written for earlier versions. Microsoft will attempt to compromise by offering developers the option to stay in or out of the web standards mode.
IE 8 is scheduled to be demonstrated for the first time in public at the MIX '08 conference in Las Vegas that starts on the 5 March.
In a mail-out to previous testers, Microsoft said it would make the pre-release code available to the “general public” but pointed out that it is “focused on the developer community”. Microsoft had already stated in the past that the main advances in IE8 will focus on compliance with web standards, security and user interface options, something the web developer community feels that IE7 failed to live up to.
The company has long been the target of criticism for not following standards in its browser but, as numerous critics have noted, any effort to make IE standards compliant runs the risk of breaking existing sites written for earlier versions. Microsoft will attempt to compromise by offering developers the option to stay in or out of the web standards mode.
IE 8 is scheduled to be demonstrated for the first time in public at the MIX '08 conference in Las Vegas that starts on the 5 March.
Still, I prefer Opera anyway so that's a bit contradicting but whatever :p
Still, I prefer Opera anyway so that's a bit contradicting but whatever :p
The in-line spell checker would be a easy choice as a plug-in/add-on option. But changes to IE's download engine/system are overdue imo. I hate the fact that it first downloads the file as a temp and then moves it over to where I wanted it when it's finished. This totally kills the idea of being able to resume broken downloads from the looks of it.
I'm happy if they don't give us a full blown download "manager" but change the way files are saved so I can at least resume them. That's all I really ask for at this point.
however, i do agree with you that they should have come up with something better instead of this opt-in system
and the majority of the web runs on microsofts non reccomended standard. so you would rather break the majority of the web for regular home users, in order to make a small minority of geeks in their cellars happy ?
logic dictates otherwise. it's just a meta tag telling the browser how the webpage should be rendered and doesn't really break any standards. get off yoru not so high horse.
and the majority of the web runs on microsofts non reccomended standard. so you would rather break the majority of the web for regular home users, in order to make a small minority of geeks in their cellars happy ?
logic dictates otherwise. it's just a meta tag telling the browser how the webpage should be rendered and doesn't really break any standards. get off yoru not so high horse.
Logic dictates to release IE8 as standards compliant only. Tough at first, but easy thereafter.
Apart from the don't-use-a-meta-tag-to-override-rendering-behaviour standard.
Doctype switching has become the standard and it works (for the pages where it doesn't, that is either the fault of the coder or rendering bugs in the browser). A page that states "I'm standards compliant" should render in standards compliant mode (or whatever passes for it depending on browser version / maker) without having extra code to cater for one browser.
"Oh, but it needs to be this way or business webapps will break". Codswallop. They tend to run on archaic versions of IE. Those that have been recoded for IE7 because the business rolled it out will work just as well in IE8. Those businesses that decide to keep using older versions and not recode their apps (for whatever reason, normally cost) don't care about IE8 anyway.
Why should new sites be forced to opt into a mode that all other browsers will use without extra code? Why, if a target audience is not IE8, can't the servers of (possibly deliberately) non-compliant sites add a header to tell IE8, should it be used in the future, to downgrade? As these sites would tend to be internal, it's up to the sysadmins and webteams to sort their crap out, not inflict it on the world.
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I am going to test it as much as I can...
*hides*
It'll most likely just be heavily advertised and listed on Windows Update if you have the show beta option selected.
It's not a bad headline as such, just a little ambiguous until you read the summary.
It'll most likely just be heavily advertised and listed on Windows Update if you have the show beta option selected.
If you have the show beta option selected, what the hell are you using, Windows XP?
This version will at least have enough brains to remember usernames at frequently visited sites!
Always hated that IE7 doesn't do that. I know it does for as long as your computer isn't restarted, but I restart which ever one I happen to get on everyday, and thusly, don't use IE7, although there are some other reasons.
I'd love to see Firefox shine in version 3, as long as the memory hogging is dramatically reduced.
I'd love to see Firefox shine in version 3, as long as the memory hogging is dramatically reduced.
I'm pretty sure IE has about 80% of the market, if not more.
I'd love to see Firefox shine in version 3, as long as the memory hogging is dramatically reduced.
I'm pretty sure IE has about 80% of the market, if not more.
Firefox has 50% of the European market already under its belt which is a good start.
I'd love to see Firefox shine in version 3, as long as the memory hogging is dramatically reduced.
I'm pretty sure IE has about 80% of the market, if not more.
Firefox has 50% of the European market already under its belt which is a good start.
that 50% depends heavily on the source
50% Europeans are buying into the lies from Mozilla Corp.?
No wonder the EU sucks.
I'd love to see Firefox shine in version 3, as long as the memory hogging is dramatically reduced.
I'm pretty sure IE has about 80% of the market, if not more.
Yes, IE is the most used software overall, but Firefox is more used than any other individual browser (http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp)
I'd love to see Firefox shine in version 3, as long as the memory hogging is dramatically reduced.
When will FF support "display:inline-block"? IE7 does.
1. IE8 will be available first as a private beta.
2. IE8 will then (sometime) be available as a public beta.
EARTHSHAKING! You don't get reporting like this every day.
2) it says that IE8 will be available to the general public from the beginning but will be focused on developers
"We are beginning to invite testers into the IE8 TechBeta program [and] we will also be opening IE8 Beta 1 to the public in the future, but have no more information on that at this time," the spokesperson said in a statement e-mailed to InternetNews.com.
I bet that IE8 will feature
just stolen features from firefoxall brand new features newer seen on other browser, the same happened with tab support.;-)
just stolen features from firefoxall brand new features newer seen on other browser, the same happened with tab support.;-)
Oh, like how FF "stole" the tab feature from Opera?
just stolen features from firefoxall brand new features newer seen on other browser, the same happened with tab support.;-)
Oh, like how FF "stole" the tab feature from Opera?
(IE) WRONG, (Firefox ) WRONG, (Opera) WRONG. ALL OF YOU ARE WRONG.
The first tabbed web browser was NETCAPTOR.
I bet that IE8 will feature
just stolen features from firefoxall brand new features newer seen on other browser, the same happened with tab support.;-)
Go back and find the concept image of Firefox 2 where it looks exactly like IE 7. Soo much so that a lot of people said they were obviously stealing IE 7's look and a good chunk of the people that complained were the more hardcore Firefox users. Even they couldn't deny where they got the idea for that concept. Same thing happened when screenshots of OS X Leopard were shown with a transparent menu bar and wallpapers that looked like they came straight out of Vista. A lot of the hardcore Apple fans came out saying all that looked like it was ripped from Vista.
They're going to take ideas from one another and it'll never stop. Almost all software companies do it. Also, don't act as if Firefox created everything like Tabs. Tabs were around long before Firefox was.
What little it's missing I got from simply installing IE7Pro.
The only thing I really want as a end user from IE8 is better file downloading.
Can you remmeber?
Someone?
Can you remmeber?
Someone?
There really hasn't been anything newsworthy about Firefox other than a few critical bugs and they were reported about on the frontpage and that wasn't very long ago. Nothing really interesting is going on with the Firefox 3 Betas except for the new icons that appeared in Beta 3. At least IMO nothing newsworthy has been going on with it.
I'm more interested in IE because Microsoft went soo long without updating it (I'm talking about pre IE 7) and now they're finally getting something done and listening to what people have to say about it.
Can you remmeber?
Someone?
I was saying that because the IE team seems aware of the current browser wars and are fighting hard improving their product. While Mozilla looks like it's satisfied already with what they have accomplished.
On the other side, i hope they incorporate a basic download manager, a useful sidebar and most of all, better performance when creating tabs this is really annoying in IE7 because it takes it a 2-3 second to display the contents of a newly created tab.
having said that, im sticking with FF until i find something more useful in IE to switch.
All standards support is very much welcome though. That means that maybe, just maybe in the next 5 years we webdevelopers can finally say "No, we do not support IE6." Now if they could only come up with an IE6 eradication update...
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