Internet Explorer 7 has been announced to beta in the summer, for Windows XP Service Pack 2 only. The feeling is that this is just a marketing exercise to that will roll up the security fixes and attempt to portray IE7 as a secure browser which can compete with Firefox at that level:
Internet Explorer 7.0, designed to add new levels of security to Windows XP SP2 while maintaining the level of extensibility and compatibility that customers have come to expect.
Alas, it seems unlikely there will be any changes to the rendering engine or improved standards support.
Mark wrote:
Really going wild with the post’age now your back online in your dead-time aren’t you? ;)
My guess is IE7 will cause us more problems, and I’m wondering if it will support XAML to give developers a stepping stone for M$ Rich Web Apps between XP/Longhorn.
Personally I want XUL to pick up a bit, I’d love a semantic alternative to XAML – XAML looks like HTML 2.0 in places, taking us right back to the content&style blender we’d almost escaped.
Andrew Hume wrote:
It’s just another example of Microsoft playing games with the market.
They are setting themselves up for a fall by anouncing this as IE 7. Developers are pleading for full CSS 2 and PNG support, and if all they get is a security patch then MS will be in for even more criticism.
However, things will probably be best if there are absolutely no changes to the rendering engine. Better the devil you know I imagine.
CW wrote:
Is it just me or does anybody else remember that IE6 doesn’t even support much of CSS1, let alone 2 or three?
Oh, well. Since my Windows exploration stopped with 2000, the point is moot anyway, I guess.
Alex wrote:
>>>Internet Explorer 7 is coming
No it’s not
http://www.mezzoblue.com/archives/2005/02/15/ie7/index.php
Alistair wrote:
There was some very interesting discussion about IE7 on the Microsoft IE blog site. I feel it is going to be more of a ‘security’ type release as well, however the developers did put a call out not that long ago for features/fixes to the actually internals.
If they don’t actually fix the majority of the problems and get them right, it is only going to cause more problems for developers in my opinion.
Imagine, fixing some things or ‘apparently’ implementing a particular feature, only to do it half arsed. You then might not be able to filter out particular CSS from the browser and it’ll remain broken without us being able to rectify it.
All I know is that, I hope to god that they get it right, only because if what above does happen; we’re going to be forced into browser detection/sniffing again, eck!
Al.
Rich wrote:
Alistair, you might liek a read of Eric Meyer’s thoughts on Unbreaking the Web in which he explains how Microsoft could fix a lot things in their rendering engine without causing the rest of us headaches. Their track record in this department is actually pretty good as backwards compatibility is something that MS seems to spend a lot of time and effort on.
Alistair Lattimore wrote:
The only reason I’m unsure about it, that at some point I’m positive I read that the core IE engine is a real mismatch of code (written in a variety of languages and such). At which point, the person (presume ie developer or something) mentioned that frequently they change one thing, it breaks 5 others (not just related to ‘IE’ but to how windows functions as it uses IE to render within a lot of applications).
I really really hope they get it right. It would honestly be the most wonderful thing to be able to fearlessly write xhtml/css and just know it is going to work in what will be the most up-to-date browser from Microsoft.
Alistair Lattimore wrote:
After reading that article by Eric, you’d have to agree. I think they should implement it and be damned if it breaks things.
I think, inevitably, it will break some stuff. However, the broken pages will be fixed in a short amount of time (and maybe if the author doesn’t specify a doctype, it’ll render in quick mode anyway) – so then only the doctype’d pages will break. At which point, the authors pu the doctype there, they must care about it; so they’ll fix it.
It just frustrates me that the most used browser in the world, by one of the most wealthly companies in the world, is so lacking.
We can only hope for improvements I suppose, but gee wouldn’t compliance done right be a glorious day for web development!
Atlas-Tuesday wrote:
Something with my computers configuration affected the beta version of IE. So now it wont load. Oh well it was beta, right? I went to using System Restore to go back to a working IE 6 configuration, but it broke when I tried to open the application. So now, as if living without IE wasnt bad enough, Outlook 2003, cannot read e-mails either. Its amazing how many applications do not work without Internet Explorer. Even AOL Instant Messenger fails to load. I am very concerned with Windows reliance on a web browser. I discuss this more at my blog:
http://www.atlas-tuesday.com/internet-explorer-7-beta