Microsoft has been receiving a heap of criticism lately for their Internet Explorer web browser, and the Opera antitrust suit just added more fuel to the flames. People want to see Internet Explorer follow the standards that other web browsers have already complied with, and that will hopefully increase the number of sites that are compatible outside of the IE realm.
Despite being overly “hush hush” about the next version of Internet Explorer, the development team has decided to help put our weary hearts at ease by telling us that the current internal version of Internet Explorer 8 already passes the Acid 2 test. There are not many *released* browsers out there that can boast such an accomplishment: Safari, Konqueror, and Opera. Firefox 3, which is expected for release in the first half of 2008, also passes the test.
If you’re thinking that Microsoft did this purely because of the pressure put on by Opera I think you’re wrong. It would have been pretty difficult for them to slap together Acid 2 compliance in such a short period of time, and I would therefore have to believe they’ve been working on it for awhile. Although I do have a strong inkling that they only posted this information because of the antitrust suit.
Now the only problem is browser adoption. Even though Internet Explorer 8 is going to be mounds better when it comes to standards, it won’t mean a thing if users don’t download it. I’ve been rather disappointed at the rate at which IE 7’s market share is increasing, and it looks as though many users are content with IE 6. Hopefully we’ll see more people adopting the standards compliant browsers in the future.
Internet Explorer 8 is not expected to be shipped until 2009, but Microsoft has said that the first Beta should be rolling out in the first half of 2008. If you’re anxious to give the new browser a whirl keep an eye out because an early look could be just a few months away.
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Tags: Pre-Release, Software, Beta, Internet Explorer
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Internet Explorer 8 beta would be out in 2008. wonder whether it would be for Windows Vista only. Just like they dumped windows 2000 for IE 7.
In any case doesnt make a difference to me. A proud Ubuntu User
I doubt it will be for Vista only. Doing so would shun too many XP users that are content without upgrading, and they would therefore lose out on a huge market share opportunity for IE 8.
I don’t think that we’ll see any more of an increase in market share with IE8 than with IE7. I’d be willing to lay bets that the majority of market share for IE7 has come from people buying computers with Vista pre-installed, only because Vista comes with IE7. Most people using XP are probably still on IE6 because they don’t know any better. The only other two groups of people I see updating to IE7/IE8 are (1) those of us who like to be on the bleeding edge and (2) the incredibly paranoid, and they’ll probably wait for the first service pack to be released before doing so.8O
While Microsoft has done a great job in getting computers into the majority of households, they have also done a great job in making computers usable by people who probably shouldn’t. I know a lot of people out in cyberspace who don’t even know that other web browsers exist, let alone that there are different versions of IE. The only way I see IE7/8 making significant gains is if Microsoft makes them into critical / mandatory updates through Windows Update.
Kudos to M$ for finally making their browser compliant. Now we just need to see if they are going to make their Sharepoint Authoring Tools compliant as well…
The Acid 2 test is bullcrap, IMO.
Firefox 2 fails miserably. Opera fails, not as miserably as Fx, but it still fails.
So really, at that point, who really cares if IE8 passes a test that popular browsers (at least in the geek community) can’t even pass?
And if you don’t believe me about Opera failing, here’s a screenshot I took.
http://img405.imageshack.us/im.....cidep6.png
Currently I’m using Opera 9.25, pretty sure it’s the most up to date stable build as of right now.
The reason no one is downloading IE7 is because they have heard from their friends what a bad idea it is. It’s sort of like Russian Roulette. For some people, it works great. For others, it breaks half the applications on their computer.
I know. I work in a computer shop, and have fixed MANY computers by reversing a recent upgrade to IE7.
Also, why would IE8 work for XP when IE7 doesn’t?
I am happy 8 will support the standards, though. I’m tired of coming up with a nice layout for stuff on my site in Firefox, only to find that IE isn’t implementing half of the CSS properly.
Nice, sounds like MS is finally getting serious in the browser realm. A beta in 2008 sounds great, hopefully it doesn’t get too delayed. To be honest, currently the Mac default browser (Safari) beats that of the PC (IE7). What IE8 really needs is the basics IE7 is missing. A download manager w/ resumable downloads after restarting browser, find as type, bookmarks=manager/better add favorite form/comments field/search, undo close tab, probably more I can’t think of right now. IE7Pro’s latest beta fixes several of these, but they are basic essentials that should be built right in.
What M$ need to do is force the IE7 upgrade with the Windows Update, if not that then definitely with the next service pack. There’s utterly no reason to stay on IE6. I reckon people would pull their finger out if pages just stopped working for them. Already if you use Gmail you won’t get the new version on IE6 - I myself no longer test my sites in IE6, I just have the PHP put in a link to Firefox if they’re using IE6 or earlier.
Incidentally the Acid test is valid, and quite a lot of browsers pass it - Safari which is the default on all Macs and the iPhone, Konqueror which is the main KDE Linux browser, Opera (no idea why yours didn’t pass, mine does) and Firefox 3 (which currently has a perfectly stable Beta out).
At school I sometimes use IE5 (on Win2000). If I tried to update, deepfreeze would just drag it back down. The browser actually works fine on most sites. There’s really no disadvantages of IE7, compared to past IEs, though. It even keeps the menubar available.
IE7 does actually work on XP.
Unfortunately that is the truth. I’m surprised that some people are able to figure out how to turn on their computers, and trying to upgrade their browser is not exactly something they would comprehend.
I definitely agree with that, but as long as they do let people roll back to the old version if they really want to. Unfortunately Microsoft has already said that XP SP3 will not upgrade Internet Explorer, but I think that it really should.
IE7Pro is an amazing add-on, and I would really like to see Microsoft take some ideas from it. Things like built-in scripting capabilities (like Greasemonkey) would be awesome.
Oh, and the Acid 2 test is currently broken right now as someone reported over in our forum. Firefox 3 nightlies show the same result. Here’s a copy that still works: http://www.hixie.ch/tests/evil/acid/002/#top
Well, that explains it.
Also, regarding IE6….I like it better than IE7. IE7 to me is more or less a bloated POS that takes like 2-3 seconds just to open a tab.
I have a computer literate friend who uses IE6 because:
1. he hates tabs (he says the ADD that comes with tabs is frightening to him)
2. he thinks IE7 is a bloated POS, etc, etc.
so no, the remaining IE6 users aren’t a bunch of idiots who don’t know how to turn on a computer…