Internet Explorer 7 RC1 Released

Kawahee writes "Microsoft, in conjunction with the announcement that they have finished Windows Vista RC1 have released Internet Explorer 7 RC1. Further commentary from the IE Blog post: 'The RC1 build includes improvements in performance, stability, security, and application compatibility. You may not notice many visible changes from the Beta 3 release; all we did was listen to your feedback, fix bugs that you reported, and make final adjustments to our CSS support.'"

Comments

Obligatory joke

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but does it run Linux?

Re:Obligatory joke

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but does it run Linux?

Thank God, no!

Re:Obligatory joke

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank God, no!

Why, what OS and web browser combo does he use?

Re:Obligatory joke

[Anonymous Coward]

How the hell is that a troll, it is the truth. The Origional Post was more of a troll than the parent post was.

Re:Obligatory joke

[AlgorithMan]

> Thank God, no!
Why, what OS and web browser combo does he use?

Linux (no distro, self-built from scratch!) with firefox of course...
you see - all MS and Apple products are written because of greed - thats why god wouldn't use them (satan does, though) and why Bill, Steve B. and Steve J. are going to rott in hell...

Re:Obligatory joke

[Jepah]

Great-grandparent was a (lame) joke made in jest. Grandparent was a flame against the post. Hence the troll mod. Heavy handed if you ask me, but he was AC. So who cares?

Re:Obligatory joke

[empaler]

Nonono. God uses NetBSD. God is everywhere, so his OS of choice can be deployed where he is.

Re:Obligatory joke

[Korin43]

Seriously.. I bet it would. Wine is pretty impressive these days..

Re:Obligatory joke

[$calar]

And XHTML for that matter. I heard that IE 7 won't support application/xhtml+xml. This is pathetic.

Re:Obligatory joke

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought satan used bsd... I saw his pic. cute little bugger.

Re:Obligatory joke

[NewsSurfer]

Depends if you use WINE.

Re:Obligatory joke

[Anonymous Coward]

If you're referring to portability, Linux has surpassed NetBSD in the amount of available ports.

CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

does this mean it passes the acid test?

Re:CSS = ACID?

[viniosity]

I'm really curious to see what kind of CSS modifications I'll have to make to support IE7 vs. Firefox. There are a number of well known hacks for IE6 and it'll be interesting to see how people keep those in place without jeopardizing the layouts in IE7.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[kubevubin]

From what I understand, their improvements in CSS rendering are rather limited. I don't think that it even comes close to passing the Acid Test, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[linuxci]

No, they said from the beginning that IE7 would not pass the ACID2 test. Maybe in a later release.

They neglected the browser for years (not the IE devs fault but management decision) so it'll take a long time to get upto speed with the rest.

One thing that we must make sure NEVER happens is that IE gets as dominant as it was pre-Firefox otherwise they'll just stop IE development again. It's happened once, it can just happen again. Fortunately, despite the hard work of the IE team, there's still a lot of benefits to be gained from using Firefox or Opera (or Safari, etc)

Re:CSS = ACID?

[mr_stinky_britches]

Firefox still doesn't pass that test...

Re:CSS = ACID?

[in_repose]

IIRC, Firefox didn't pass the "Acid Test"..

Re:CSS = ACID?

[linuxci]

Firefox 2.0 won't pass the Acid test because the rendering engine in 2.0 is based on the same gecko as 1.5 (1.5 uses Gecko 1.8 and 2.0 uses 1.8.1), however Firefox 3.0 should pass the acid test because a lot of work has been done on the rendering engine (Gecko 1.9).

Basically most of the changes in Firefox 2.0 will be in the frontend, 3.0 will have a lot of improvements to the backend.

However, 2.0's CSS support is vastly superior to that in IE7.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[pe1chl]

It is a step, but it is very questionable if it is a good thing to make a step when they are still so far of the target of rendering common CSS constructs that all other browsers render without problem.
(I do not mean the ACID2 test!)

Now we will have yet another browser to make special exceptions for, different from IE5 and IE6, and we still cannot feed IE7 the same CSS as Firefox, Opera or Konqueror.
That is a step, but is it the right direction? I don't know.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[jZnat]

Since IE7 should be replacing all older installs (or we can assume for the sake of the children here), you can finally drop support for IE6 and below. If a user is using an old version of the browser, they can either update to IE7 or get a real web browser.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[pe1chl]

They cannot install IE7 if they aren't running XP SP2 or 2003 server.
It has always been possible to install another browser, but looking at the number of IE5 and 5.5 visits I still see, I think it will be 5 years before IE6 shows any sign of disappearing.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[icepick72]

One thing that we must make sure NEVER happens is that IE gets as dominant as it was pre-Firefox otherwise they'll just stop IE development again

The popularity of IE7 cannot be stopped because it's bundled with Windows and made available through Windows Update web site which almost every Windows user frequents, knowningly or not. Therefore the browser doesn't have to be popular because it will be widely used regardless.
I've been a Firefox-only Windows user for years however if IE7 supports many of the features I like about Firefox, I will have no qualms using it instead. I want the Web, not a browser. The ACID tests are important for standards, but we know Microsoft usually doesn't adhere fully to standards that aren't their own, so it's no a surprise. With IE7 Microsoft seems to be adhering to the 80/20 rule -- in this case 80% of what the better brwosers have become with 20% of the effort expended. This is smart business practice despite the other aspects.
Microsoft has copied popular features introduced by other browsers (as they have done from each other). I know we're going to see less Firefox on Windows when IE7 is published to Windows update. Most users don't care for the ACID tests (only the developers). It's amazing the dominance the old IE browser still has even though Microsoft hasn't updated it in years. It's inevitable that IE7 will make big wave and grab back a large % of browser share with its copied features.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[icepick72]

Yes, try the acid test here. Indeed my Firefox won't pass. I think it's not fair to hold Microsoft to the ACID test when most of our other browsers won't render it. It doesn't represent a disadvantage of IE over other browsers (except the small group that can support it)

Re:CSS = ACID?

[lukas.mach]

I'm quite sure it won't pass ACID2, but that doesn't matter - CSS support is still pretty good in MSIE 7 RC 1 and that's more that I hoped for. I just had to port quite complex CSS layout for MSIE 7 (used position:fixed hacks in MSIE 6, maxwidth emulation and whatnot) and all it took was to change one conditional comment (to ensure that these many MSIE-6-workarounds won't be applied to MSIE 7). Now I'm using exactly the same stylesheet for Mozilla, Opera and MSIE 7.

Underscore hacks won't do the trick for MSIE 7 (which is probably good thing), pages with xml declaration are rendered in standards mode (which will cause some minor trouble, mainly because of that boxmodel change).

Re:CSS = ACID?

[linuxci]

You can download nightly builds of Firefox from the trunk (branded as Minefield to indicate use at your own risk) so you can see exactly how Firefox 3.0 is progressing. As for IE8 we can't see the current status of that so who knows how much work is left to be done on IE8?

For updates on thr trunk (which will become Fx3.0) see The Burning Edge

Re:CSS = ACID?

[linuxci]

Best thing to do is make sure pages work in IE6 and earlier, but if they don't look as good or are lacking some non essential feature you can put a link to other browsers that do work better. As long as you give the use a choice and don't intentionally cripple them by locking them into one browser.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[insomniac8400]

acid test = retard doesn't know how to code a page correctly so were trying to see if a browser will display code based on the programmers intentions. It's stupid, and any browser that renders it correctly is flawed.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Jekler]

It is absurd that it takes less time and money to design and build an unmanned vehicle to explore mars, launch the vehicle, and complete the mission, than it does to design and build a rendering engine which passes Acid2 (or is otherwise compliant with HTML 4.01, CSS1/2, and DOM Level 1). Nevermind CSS3, SVG, or any newer technology, it is shocking that after 9 years of development on the Gecko Engine, it's not even CSS1 compliant. It seems foolish to bother developing subsequent standards until foundational work is complete.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[daniil]

It is absurd that it takes less time and money to design and build an unmanned vehicle to explore mars, launch the vehicle, and complete the mission, than it does to design and build a rendering engine which passes Acid2

Our experience in building space vehicles: 50 years.
Experience in building HTML rendering engines: ~15 years.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[aymanh]

Web developers can use conditional comments to target a specific version of IE, and here is an article that goes into the details of what hacks are "supported" by IE7.

Supporting IE7 will require some extra work by webdevs, but it's doable even if code already contains hacks for previous versions of IE.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[masklinn]

IE7 isn't compatible with Windows 2000, and I'm not even sure you can install it on Windows XP SP1. Remember, IE5.5 still isn't completely dead, and we're nearly 6 years after IE6 was released.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[dvice_null]

> Yes, and Internet Explorer 8 should also pass the test

Really? That is huge news. Do you have ANY proof for that?

About Firefox passing the ACID2 with version 3, here is a screenshot what it looks like in the reflow branch (branch where there is a lot of work done with the CSS support, which will at some point most likely be merged with the Firefox 3 trunk branch). That is why we bulieve that Firefox 3 will pass the ACID2:
http://www.nelchael.net/varia/fireflowfox.png
( For those of you who don't like clicking links or can't see images. There is a screenshot of Firefox browser, ACID2 page open and I see no errors with it. )

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

If Mozilla had $820 million and several hundred rocket scientists working full time and over time on only the Gecko engine for three years, then yeah, I think it might pass Acid2.

I'm not saying it's reasonable that it hasn't, I'm saying it's unreasonable to compare a bunch of cowboys that do stuff for fun with a few paid employees along with them to JPL making robots and sending them to Mars.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget that standards are not in Microsoft business interests -- that's why they went with the Windows' specific developments such as JScript and ActiveX.

It's not so much weak standards and bad design, as it is lack of interest.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Columcille]

One thing that we must make sure NEVER happens is that IE gets as dominant as it was pre-Firefox

Last I checked IE is still pretty dominant. I think we can say/see that Firefox has put some pressure on Microsoft, but MS still has what, 90% of the browser market?

Re:CSS = ACID?

[WhiteWolf666]

The ACID test is not a CSS compliance test. It's more like a CSS torture test.

IIRC, Konqueror and a heavily patched Webkit (they share a similar code base, of course) are the only browsers that pass ACID 2.0 . Oh, and Opera, of course; but that's because Opera tends to be light years ahead in terms of rendering engine design (I do dislike the Opera UI, though). Even Opera on mobile devices passes.

Take a look at the results here. Look at the screenshots. Firefox fails the test, but it's pretty close. IE7 is miles and miles away. But either way, the test is not terribly relevant; ACID is a test of invalid CSS, to see how the browser handles broken code. I think that in terms of standards, a CSS compliance test is more relevant. Not that IE does well there, either.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[larry bagina]

Mozilla foundation/corporation has revenues of > 75 million (from google and affiliate searches) and over 120 full time employees.

hardly "a bunch of cowboys that do stuff for fun with a few paid employees."

Re:CSS = ACID?

[FST777]

I design websites and webapps for a living, and all I ever have to do is design it so that it works in Firefox (ie: stick to the standards mostly) and then make sure it works in IE6 without using browser-detects (ie: use functionality detects). I have yet to come across a situation where the result doesn't work in IE7.

IE7 is an improvement, and I'm glad I have not been stupid enough in the past to use browser-detects. That is the sort of crap that keeps coming back to you with every new major version of any browser.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[kimvette]

Is it truly incompatible, or does the installer merely refuse to run on Win2K? If it is the latter, that is usually fairly easy to resolve with Orca.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about security? IE doesn't exactly have the best track record on that.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[msuarezalvarez]

It's amazing the dominance the old IE browser still has even though Microsoft hasn't updated it in years.

It is not amazing at all: it is simply just another instance of the market deciding...

Re:CSS = ACID?

[jonadab]

> I'm really curious to see what kind of CSS modifications I'll have to make to support IE7 vs. Firefox.
> There are a number of well known hacks for IE6 and it'll be interesting to see how people keep those
> in place without jeopardizing the layouts in IE7.

I haven't tried RC1 yet, but I would characterize the CSS support in Beta 3 as "about the same as IE6". The real improvements in IE7 are in terms of security and (finally!) the PNG alpha channel. I'm sure there *are* some CSS improvements, but they don't seem to correspond with any of the things that were bugging me about the IE6 implementation. Maybe I'm just not using the particular parts of CSS that they improved support for. Perhaps they should publish a list of specific portions of CSS that they have implemented in IE7 that weren't in IE6. Then web developers could find the new features and maybe consider taking advantage of them at some point. (For many sites, the PNG alpha channel by itself will be enough reason, once IE7 is officially released, to tell IE6 users they've got to upgrade. If you're doing that anyway, might as well take advantage of whatever CSS the new version can handle, as well.)

Another annoying thing is that IE7's DOM still doesn't support appendChild and its kin in the same way as every other browser, i.e., you can't take content retrieved via XMLHTTPRequest and insert it into the page without a lot of messing around.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Overly Critical Guy]

IIRC, Konqueror and a heavily patched Webkit (they share a similar code base, of course) are the only browsers that pass ACID 2.0

The ACID patch changes in WebKit have been shipping with Safari for a while now.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[masklinn]

I know that the installer refuses to run it, didn't go any further.

Didn't know about Orca though, is it the Windows Installer table editor bundled in the Software SDK (just find it via googling, so I want to be sure)

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Crayon Kid]

I don't freakin' want MORE work by any means. They'd better make sure IE7 is closer to the standard because otherwise I'm gonna run amok one of these days and kill everybody in sight. I don't want yet "another" browser to hack CSS and JavaScript for.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Pieroxy]

Hmmm, the market doesn't decide anything in this instance. The market is being fed. There is a very important difference. It is basically an abuse by a monopolistic company. Of course, nobody can even sue MS for doing so in that the alternatives are all free (or almost) so there is no monetary damage in their bundling IE with Windows.

Sad, when the monetary damages are the only thing that matters.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[eXonyte]

The reason the code is invalid is because Acid2 tests correct error handling. If you read the CSS specs you'll see that browsers are supposed to handle errors in specific ways. If they handle the errors to spec, more of Acid2 will render properly. If not? You get something like this. Read the Acid2 guide to get an idea of what exactly they're testing.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[empaler]

Thank God I have Opera. =)

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

indeed i do

http://img241.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ie8acidgd 0.jpg

for those of you who cant view this, its IE8 passing Acid test with flying colors.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

no. they don't want ie to pass acid, so it won't.
and situation won't change - they're releasing such shit as before.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Bogtha]

But either way, the test is not terribly relevant; ACID is a test of invalid CSS, to see how the browser handles broken code.

Please do not spread this myth. It is simply not true. If you had actually read the Acid2 technical guide instead of relying on Slashdot hearsay, you would know this. From a previous comment of mine:

Have you actually bothered to read the Acid2 page? Because I hear this repeated all the time, and it's downright misleading.

There is a checklist of about a dozen things the Acid2 page tests. Incorrect code is just one of them. It is necessary to include incorrect code in a test like this. How else are you going to check whether a browser follows the CSS error handling rules?

It's incorrect code, sure, but it's incorrect code that has a defined rendering according to the CSS specifications. It's not something a compliant browser would trip up on. There is a correct way to parse the incorrect code, and the Acid2 page tests to see if a browser parses it correctly - among many other things it tests for.

Where are you guys getting this idea that the Acid2 test is all about error handling? It's a very small part of the test, but plenty of Slashdotters seem convinced that the test revolves around broken code and nothing else. Was there a weekly meeting I missed wher eyou all got this myth drilled into your heads?

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

Which they've had for less than a year, and when you consider how many of those 120 are management, janitorial, financial, HR, administrative or any other kind of non-developers, the circle is even tighter.

Not to mention that those developers aren't likely to have PhDs or the qualifications of JPL scientists. Mozilla doesn't exactly attract the cream of the crop when it comes to computer science. So I hate to break it to you like this, but comparing JPL making freaking robots and hurling them 54 million kilometers and some sandal wearing developers who were primarily comprised of volunteers for a long while doesn't make sense.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[ltbarcly]

I'm not sure about this. There are Safari, IE, Firefox, and Opera, (and Konqueror). I don't know of any other major graphical browsers (I'm sure you aren't counting text based browsers!). Of the 4, 2 (3) pass the test. The two that don't pass are IE and Firefox, the crappiest of the browsers listed. Konqueror is a free browser, and it's engine, khtml, is also the basis for Safari. Opera is free to use but not open source. Opera is available on almost all OS's, Konqueror is available wherever KDE is available, Safari is available on OSX. So no matter what OS you are on you can get a decent browser. If you are on a decent OS (Linux, OSX, BSD) you can get a Good broser (safari or konqueror).

There is only one remaining excuse to run Windows for the apologists. And that excuse is that you are writing windows software. OSX is a good choice if you aren't poor, and Linux is a pretty good choice if you are poor. Of course, if you are stupid or adverse to learning you are probably unable to afford Apple products, and by hypothesis too mentally lazy to learn enough Unix to get around in a BSD/Linux environment. So have fun with your virii and lack of functionality.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[A beautiful mind]

Actually that's not entirely correct.

The ACID test is a test validating behaviour that is supposed to happen when errors occur, according to the standard. In other words, the error handling parts of the CSS standard are validated..

Re:CSS = ACID?

[larry bagina]

Development work has always been done primarily by paid aol/netscape/mozilla employees. That's true of a lot of closed source/commercial projects which are open sourced -- SLASH, Firebird, blender, etc. Certainly, anyone can send in patches, but the amount of work required to understand larger, more complicated source trees prevents sandal-wearing volounteers from participating.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget that standards are not in Microsoft business interests -- that's why they went with the Windows' specific developments such as JScript and ActiveX.

? ActiveX uses the object mark-up that's there in standard HTML. The mechanism allows multiple OS/architecture binaries to be served. There's no reason other browsers can't implement ActiveX support through the same mechanisms.

JScript happened because Sun got pissy over Microsoft's minor extension to Java and they avoided the trademark. Remember the standard is called ECMAScript not JavaScript. Microsoft implements the ECMAScript standard.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[TeknoHog]

It is absurd that it takes less time and money to design and build an unmanned vehicle to explore mars, launch the vehicle, and complete the mission, than it does to design and build a rendering engine which passes Acid2 (or is otherwise compliant with HTML 4.01, CSS1/2, and DOM Level 1).

Mars exploration is a technical problem that can be solved via technical means. Standards compliance, on the other hand, is more like a social one.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Anonymous Coward]

The ACID patch changes in WebKit have been shipping with Safari for a while now.

Let's hope Apple manages to fix the brain dead Document Model in safari too. Although the vast majority of mac users, sick of being treated like second class 'net citizens have moved to firefox....

Re:CSS = ACID?

[OriginalArlen]

Interesting -- I'm running minefield on Linux and enjoying it, eeh! it's like Y2K all over again ;) -- where are the reflow branch builds be available? (I assume they're Talkback enabled?)

Re:CSS = ACID?

[naelurec]

I'll agree.. IF your using XP/Vista and IE7 is default -- there needs to be a compelling reason to install and maintain another browser. With IE6 this was simple as you had many choices: security, interface features, standards compliance, etc.

IE7 *seems* to address many of those issues .. In addition, if your a company that has a Microsoft based network, IE7 fits nicer in the network than Firefox -- Official Active Directory/Group Policy support, updates via a centralized method alongside other Windows updates, etc. I think the lack of official AD/MSI features for Firefox was a HUGE mistake that made many companies stay away from Firefox.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Jesus_666]

Re:CSS = ACID?

[Plutonite]

I'm saying it's unreasonable to compare a bunch of cowboys that do stuff for fun with a few paid employees along with them to JPL making robots and sending them to Mars.

You're a hardware geek aren't you? :)

The boys at NASA send their stuff to Mars, but guys at Mozilla (paid or not) send their stuff to China. Besides, when Mars loses its planet status you will have made a moot point.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[smash]

Actually, given the amount of viruses and spyware floating around, i'd postulate that it's a case of market APATHY.

Re:CSS = ACID?

[kimvette]

Didn't know about Orca though, is it the Windows Installer table editor bundled in the Software SDK

Yes, and it's very useful for overriding "not tested on service pack (n)" warnings and for installing on Win2K Server that you've modified to run as a workstation. :)

FINISHED?!

[Desolator144]

I don't think they should be allowed to call it finished. They'll probably rewrite most of it in patches over the next few years like IE6. At least it has better CSS support. And now it works better with adware applications and maybe they finally added support for the "fixed" div style so we can all get attacked by screen covering super ads that can't be removed.

Re:FINISHED?!

[linuxci]

Apparently they've already written the roadmap for the next two versions of IE (probably called 7.5 and 8.0) so they're probably going to just make security patches for 7.0 and then fix bugs, improve compliance and add features in the future releases.

Not much as been said on these future releases yet except that they're hard at work on them.

Re:FINISHED?!

[Anonymous Coward]

why did I read the headline as "Internet Exploder 7 RC1 Released"... finished or not I am using Firefox, thank you

Re:FINISHED?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Add this to the wishlist: Plugins should respect z-ordering. As it is, even in IE7, Plugins always show on top of everything else. Other browsers do it right, as usual.

Other releases

[Anonymous Coward]

Uhhh, the IE release candidate was out a week ago? Of real interest to slashdotters are:

IronPython 1.0 Release Candidate 2 - out today
Microsoft Robotics Studio (rather incredible...includes simulation environment) - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?fa milyid=66d1363e-36a4-46be-ad36-01bcfbfb4969&displa ylang=en

Can I get these on the front page too?

Thanks,
Microsoft Marketing Department

backwards compatibility

[legoburner]

From people who have been using IE7 betas/RCs, how does it handle backwards compatibility? If someone is detecting IE and then generating different javascript to get around IE6 glitches, will they now need to test for IE6 or below /and/ IE7 or above to handle the old glitches and the non-glitchy IE or do glitch workarounds not affect the output of IE7?

Re:backwards compatibility

[Anonymous Coward]

Really, who cares what people who can't code to standards will have to do? They've made their beds, now they can fucking lay in them.

Re:backwards compatibility

[pe1chl]

The site at work (http://www.uw.nl/) outputs standard html/css to everyone, and uses "IE conditional comments" to feed IE5 and IE6 specialized CSS items to work around their bugs.
A workaround sheet for IE7 has not yet been written, but it is very apparent (at least in beta3) that it is not up to the quality in standard CSS handling that the other browsers (Opera, Firefox, Konqueror) are. There are still positioning and stacking bugs.

I hope they fix them before release, but I'm afraid they won't. So this will introduce yet another class of broken browser workarounds: not as broken as IE6, but still broken.

Re:backwards compatibility

[$RANDOMLUSER]

Really, who cares what people who can't code to standards will have to do? They've made their beds, now they can fucking lay in them.

That's written trollishly, but it's exactly right. The biggest problem with Internet Explorer (aside from security vulns) has been its philosophy of accepting badly written HTML. Throw something with half a dozen missing (or out of order) </TD>s, </TR>s and </TABLE>s at IE, and it will go "sure, sure I know what you meant" and render it SOMEHOW, thus obviating the need for people to actually write correct HTML. Throw the same code at one of the Gecko browsers, and nothing gets rendered, or gets rendered badly. And this is where the author of the code invariably growls "fucking Netscape"; eventually they just stop trying to make their code work on anything but IE. I haven't tried IE7 (and have no intention), but I'd be curious if it still behaves this way.

Re:backwards compatibility

[linuxci]

Yes it still behaves that way, it's basically an improved version of the IE6 engine, better CSS support, but nowhere near the level of their competitors.

I wonder if they will ever reach the level of their competitors without doing a total rewrite of their rendering engine. As we seen from Mozilla rewriting a rendering engine takes time, the gecko engine now used by Firefox debuted in Netscape 6, it took many years to get into shape.

Re:backwards compatibility

[eggoeater]

I do a lot of Visual Studio programming (both desktop/server and Web) and I was concerned that IE-Beta might break some of the integrated debugging features with Studio. So far it hasn't been a problem.

Only once did I have a problem: I ran the debugger and then immediately clicked on an existing IE window. It usually opens a whole new IE window (vs a new tab in an existing IE window), but that one time it didn't do anything. I stopped and restarted the debugger and it worked fine.

Re:backwards compatibility

[amliebsch]

Make sure you are not running it in quirks mode! You must use an XML doctype declaration to enable proper formatting.

Re:backwards compatibility

[ClosedSource]

The customer for a browser is the web surfer, not a standards commitee. A browser that is able to render badly written HTML is better for the customer than one that barfs on it. It's not the role of the browser to force people to write good HTML.

In Windows Vista Build 5536?

[kubevubin]

If this is the version of IE that's in Build 5536, then I must say that I'm surprised that they haven't made any performance improvements to it. It's still a step up from IE6 in terms of security and whatnot, but it's absolute torture trying to use this browser when you're used to the speed and response time that Opera offers.

Re:In Windows Vista Build 5536?

[linuxci]

This is not the same IE build as in the latest Vista build. This release only works in XP. Actually the versions of IE in XP and Vista are not exactly the same. Some of this they blame on the underlying OS but most likely it's just to make vista more attractive.

IE for Vista was going to be named IE7+ and XP simply IE7, however they scrapped that naming convention.

Also another slight name change, on both platforms it's no longer "Microsoft Internet Explorer" it's now "Windows Internet Explorer".

Re:In Windows Vista Build 5536?

[psycln]

Actually the versions of IE in XP and Vista are not exactly the same.

They are actually using the same "mshtml.dll" (IE7+ build number matches Vista build, apart from that they are identical). The only diff - i think - is in GUI stuff

Re:In Windows Vista Build 5536?

[linuxci]

Not just GUI some of the security related features too, but yes, mshtml (the rendering engine) should be the same on XP and vista

Re:In Windows Vista Build 5536?

[westlake]

The only diff - i think - is in GUI stuff

Protected Mode in Vista IE7, Windows Vista and Parental Controls in IE7, and Vista only network diagnostic tools.

Re:In Windows Vista Build 5536?

[AI0867]

does this mean the useragent string will now include WIE instead of MSIE? might this be an attempt to get around old selective scripts with their slightly-more compatible browser? I can't imagine the amount of IE-only sites this will break though.

Really?

[also-rr]

listen to your feedback

So this version will actually let me punch internet trolls in the face remotley?

I suppose you could say that if they are using Internet Explorer no further punishment is really necessary. Tell you what, I'll meet you half way - if it's detected that Flash is installed the face-punching module can be turned off and replaced with an endless loop of Joanna Smith's Video Blog Installment 19 (My Trip To Blackpool) instead. Do we have a deal?

On a related note in a tainted and statistically useless sample (ie, mostly Slashdot users) even Mac users can be tempted from Safari it seems - so why everyone assumes that on the release of IE 7 Firefox market share is going to die I have no idea.

Re:Really?

[linuxci]

On a related note in a tainted and statistically useless sample (ie, mostly Slashdot users) even Mac users can be tempted from Safari it seems - so why everyone assumes that on the release of IE 7 Firefox market share is going to die I have no idea.

I definitely don't think IE7 will significantly hurt Firefox usage. Look at it this way:

• IE7 is not available for Win2000 or earlier (or and non-Win OS)
• IE7 user interface is totally non-standard on XP
• IE7's installation is more of a hassle than Firefox - it's a larger download, needs rebooting and takes longer

Re:Really?

[rts008]

You left out the part where WGA gets installed automagically during the IE7 install, even if you uncheck the box for "check for updates" at the beginning of the install.

I watched that happen on one of my boxes at home- unplugged the cat5, and the install claimed it couldnt finish without internet connection. And that's after you go through the validation process just so you can download IE7 from MS.

Be warned- if you don't want WGA, be careful trying to install IE7.

Re:Really?

[aymanh]

I agree, IE7 market share will be mainly previous IE6 users, when IE6 was released, its market share climbed up and IE5's dropped down at approximately the same rate. IE7 market share will be mainly previous IE6 users. Firefox users will usually stick to it, even that IE7 features tabs support, Firefox still has a lot to offer, mainly the wide range of extensions available.

Re:Really?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

I definitely think IE7 will significantly hurt Firefox usage. Look at it this way:

• IE7 will come down automatic update. Eventually it'll come shipped with computers.
  
  • IE7 is ripping off several FireFox features (tabs, etc.), thus making FF feel more like a pain in the butt to download for the average user since the differences won't be as large.
    
    • Microsoft actually markets their product.

Re:Really?

[Tumbleweed]

> So this version will actually let me punch internet trolls in the face remotley?

I'm sorry, but that would infringe on my intellectual property - the "Remote Bitch Slap Protocol", or RBSP/IP, which I came up with in 1994.

Re:Really?

[poulbailey]

IE7 user interface is totally non-standard on XP

I'm a happy Firefox user, but have you seen what 2.0 is going to look like? They've updated it for a Vista'ish vibe, but it only manages to look like an absolute mess under XP classic.

I really hope they get it fixed before release.

Re:Really?

[larry bagina]

I think you meant to say "IE7 is ripping off several FireFox features (tabs, etc.) that FireFox ripped off from Opera"

Re:Really?

[truedfx]

Microsoft copying good ideas from competitors is no more a rip-off than their competitors copying good ideas from them.

Re:Really?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"I think you meant to say "IE7 is ripping off several FireFox features (tabs, etc.) that FireFox ripped off from Opera"

*sigh*

Yeah, that's the debate I want people to think of when I describe myself as an Opera fanboy. /sarcasm

Re:Really?

[jez9999]

Depressingly true. I fear the pathetic new 2.0 theme will turn a lot of users off. I don't really know why they released it for beta review; huge numbers of testers are just telling them to revert and they seem determined to sleepwalk into disaster anyway. :-(

Re:Really?

[j79zlr]

And if that ever happens I'll agree with that statement.

Re:Really?

[suv4x4]

So this version will actually let me punch internet trolls in the face remotley?

Trust me, *you* do NOT want this feature enabled.

If this is the only rant a troll can put on IE nowadays, let's call it a win for Microsoft, shall we?

Re:Really?

[truedfx]

Hm. I'm hoping my message was merely misunderstood, so here it is rephrased: copying ideas is not ripping anyone or anything off. People have been doing it forever, in the software world both for closed-source and for open-source, and assuming the ideas are good, that's exactly the way it should be.

Re:Really?

[Ilgaz]

I can guess where that comment comes from as ex Opera win32 user and now Omniweb for OS X user.

Those Opera guys and other commercial (opera free now) developers keeps "inventing" things to keep the sales up and their users can't stand when a free/opensource software copies the idea/invention and months later one of its fanboys say "Why pay for a browser? Are you stupid? Look Firefox has tabs"

I guess you know the deal already ;)

I wonder when will those graphical tabs invented by Omni group http://www.omnigroup.com/images/images-5/gallery.j pg will be "included" in some free/opensource browser or usual suspect Apple Inc. and when will some guy will say I am stupid for buying a browser and "????" has that feature already. :)

As a funny note, that improved printing looks like part of MS IE for Mac (OSX/OS9) which was abandoned by Microsoft.

Legacy OS only?

[Anonymous Coward]

Looks as if it is only available for legacy operating systems. Do they plan to compete with Firefox and offer a version for Linux or OSX?

Re:Legacy OS only?

[Columcille]

Legacy OS? I do not think that means what you think that means - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legacy_code

what

[Bizzeh]

welcome to last weeks news.

Re:what

[Atzanteol]

What?!?! Thank you for the notice! I was enjoying the article until I realized that slashdot is just LIES! How can I ever thank you enough for notifying me of this? Can you perform this function on every article from now on? That would be quite useful.

Re:what

[cecil_turtle]

Chill out. Timely news is important especially on something like this. I believe IE7 is supposed to be released (pushed out as a "high priority" Windows update) in October. RC1 was actually released over a week ago (August 23 or 24) so I would say this news is almost two weeks old. I had to spend some time trying to figure out if this was something actually new or if Slashdot was just slow to the story for some reason; if the parent's comment were closer to the top it would have saved me some time.

IE & CSS

[trezor]

"and make final adjustments to our CSS support"

Does that mean that they make it fundamentally broken and still don't handle the box model correctly?

Re:IE & CSS

[Anonymous Coward]

IE has handled the box model correctly for YEARS, assuming you feed it the right doctype.

Re:IE & CSS

[808140]

I dunno, when I used it last year it still seemed to have the notorious padding bug, and it said it was in standards compliance mode. What doctype should I feed it to fix the padding bug?

CSS Changes for IE7

[aymanh]

I couldn't find links to this page in the summary or IE7 blog entry, so I'm posting it here as I believe many would be interested in it: List of CSS changes in IE7.

It's mostly bug fixes, notable new features are enabling :hover for all elements, implementing position: fixed, PNG transparency support, and min/max width/height.

display: table-cell

[StonedRat]

It still does not support this CSS propery. Which in my opinion would be extreamly useful for designing layouts.

Although it does now allow position: fixed; and to specify, left: 10%; right: 10%; top: 10%; bottom: 10%; to make things centered easily.

Web developers have it backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

The correct way to handle this is to remove the conditionals and let MSIE users harass their vendor about the buggy sub-standard software they supplied. That's how it works for every other piece of software, why should IE be any different?

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[thelost]

because most people use internet explorer and if websites don't work in it it won't me MS they hassle, but the website designers. Designers (I'm one of them) know which side their bread is buttered on, we have to put these hacks in place because at the least clients expect sites we design for them to work in IE. They often might not know that there are different browsers or that websites render differently depending on which browser you view them with.

So in an ideal world, designers would drop tools and say fuck no, i'm not coding another box model hack till MS fix this, however MS are under *no* obligation to make IE work unfortunately. Also, to most peoples standards IE *does* work well enough unfortunately.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[westlake]

The correct way to handle this is to remove the conditionals and let MSIE users harass their vendor about the buggy sub-standard software they supplied. That's how it works for every other piece of software, why should IE be any different?

No one hangs around long enough to give a damn about why your site doesn't render properly.
There is always another just one click way.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[pe1chl]

Because visitors don't know the difference between bugs in the software they use, and problems with the website they visit.
So when they have visited 10 sites that displayed ok, then visit your site and it is a mess, it must be a problem of your site.

Now, this may change with IE7. There will be a lot of sites that people who newly installed IE7 will visit, and will render incorrectly.
That may wake up some people.

It is probably because of this that Microsoft does not allow you to install IE6 and 7 alongside. You would be able to compare. That is unwanted, because it would show up problems that they prefer to deny.
But, you can still install Firefox and Opera and compare with those...

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

MS are under *no* obligation to make IE work unfortunately

Nobody is under any obligation to use IE or make their site work with it.

This site meets WCAG priority 2 and validates as XHTML 1.0 and CSS level 2. If your browser does not render this site properly, please either report the problems directly to the vendor or download an alternative browser.

IE is broken and is not fixed by breaking pages to compensate.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[gregOfTheWeb]

Damn that's the truth. Who cares about standards in the marketplace. satisfy the CUSTOMER! A developer should develop against IE and make it compatible with FF. Why would you possibly do it otherwise with FF having a market share between 10-20% depending on which report you look at.

To do the reverse, develop for FF and make it compatible with IE, is elitist and foolish and wastefull.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[Mike Savior]

because most people use internet explorer and if websites don't work in it it won't me MS they hassle, but the website designers. Designers (I'm one of them) know which side their bread is buttered on, we have to put these hacks in place because at the least clients expect sites we design for them to work in IE. They often might not know that there are different browsers or that websites render differently depending on which browser you view them with.

That may be the case, but wouldn't it make more sense to follow the same direction as a designer, as another company that followed a standard would? For instance, I use a universally standard type of screw, or bolt, that is designed to work in every other wrench or screwdriver that followed the standard, to create a piece of machinery. Would I be to blame when a user contacts me in complaint saying that their faulty screwdriver/wrench that doesn't exactly follow my standard screw, but says it does, produces poor repair results or breakage with my machine? For all intents and purposes I may be required by law to replace said part that broke -due- to the faulty screwdriver, but I am most certainly not to blame for it, as long as I installed it properly, and used the right piece to begin with, and I'd make that clear upon review for the malfunction. Perhaps I'm wrong?

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

Firefox is the better development platform. It supports the webauthor with several diagnostic tools. Its rendering engine is more predictable and powerful than the IE rendering engine. It's closer to the standard, so it's more likely that you end up with a site that needs no extra work to be compatible with Konqueror (Linux) and Safari (Mac). There are scripts which correct many of the problems caused by misfeatures in IE6, so those can be corrected with little extra work (but at the cost of additional bandwidth usage for retarded webbrowsers). The most important reason however is that, in startling contrast to the Microsoft tradition, IE is not a stable platform and never has been. Every single IE version renders core elements of HTML and CSS differently. That would be absolutely acceptable if the differences were the result of correcting the rendering towards the standards, but sadly that isn't the case.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

To do the reverse, develop for FF and make it compatible with IE, is elitist and foolish and wastefull.

Rubbish, a web page should display on any browser and there are many. IE is a complete trainwreck. If Microsoft didn't bundle it, few people would be using it.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[reanjr]

I totally disagree. I design for Opera first, dropping in Dean Edward's IE7 scripts with a single conditional comment (that is standards compliant in every other browser as a comment), and rarely have to make any updates for IE. I usually make a minimal number of adjustments to get things to look right in FF and (depending on the site), Safari. Sometimes I don't have the time to make things look perfect in FF and Safari, but that's not too big a deal. The site still renders in a usable format, it's just the exact vision of what I had in mind.

The only thing I really spend any time on cross-browser support is with the script. I admit, alot of this has to do with the fact that I almost never use ecma/javascript (besides Dean Edward's IE7 scripts), so I am not up to date on the differences. This is the major place I would like to see updates made to IE.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[Anonymous Coward]

It also crashes 3 times a day for no apparent reason. Actually, that's a feature... it's their solution to fixing memory leaks!

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[thelost]

you're dealing in hypotheticals and mixing industries. Web design as an emergent industry is extremely chaotic and sometimes downright stupid. I along with many others am girding my loins in expectation of not just having to write hackes for IE 5 & 6 but now 7 as well. This is my idea of a nightmare. Of course I would like to get on my high horse and ride into town with a big placard saying "WEB DESIGNERS AGAINST NON-STANDARDIZATION UNITE" but unfortunately while I'm doing that I'm not earning.

In the end web design is different from FOSS software, it doesn't have the same strong ideology behind it. It's a job, not a crusade. I'll leave the battles to those who feel stronger, I just want to make money.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[westlake]

There will be a lot of sites that people who newly installed IE7 will visit, and will render incorrectly. That may wake up some people.

I saw some minor glitches in rendering in the public betas. But no show-stoppers so far in RC 1.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[madprof]

Er because MSIE users don't do this! They go "Oh this website doesn't work - they obviously don't care about me" and go elsewhere.

Please show us the statistics to suggest this is not true and I'll gladly stop using conditional comments.

Right now my own relatively small sample of clients suggests that 100% of people want compatibility with IE, even with its quirks.

Re:Web developers have it backwards

[smash]

Well then, do an IE specific version that's plain ASCII text, and code for browsers that support standards.

Web developers expect us to download flash, quicktime and heaps of other crap to work with their websites, firefox (or opera) is smaller than quicktime, last i checked...

Blink Support?

[Quintios]

It still pisses me off that IE doesn't support the BLINK tag. What a bunch of crap, MS. :\

Re:Blink Support?

[aymanh]

Yeah, poor IE users will never be able to see The Page of The Damned in all its glory.

Source

Re:Blink Support?

[larien]

Bizarrely, it's not the worst page I've ever seen on the internet...

Re:Blink Support?

[Anonymous Coward]

On MySpace, that site'd be par for the course.

Still Broken With Exponent CMS

[Anonymous Coward]

Someone tell Microsoft that thousands of us use open source content management systems like Exponent CMS. Using IE 7 is a study in patience, if not masochism. It takes nearly a minute to load ANY page on our site.

This needs to be fixed ASAP.

Re:Still Broken With Exponent CMS

[Columcille]

Assuming the Exponent CMS website is running Exponent CMS, it loads about the same for me in IE 7 RC1 as in Firefox. If you're having a problem perhaps you should ask the Exponent devs to optimize the code a bit more?

Re:Still Broken With Exponent CMS

[Jesus_666]

Internet Explorer 7: Powered by

...buffering...

Real Networks

Re:Still Broken With Exponent CMS

[Anonymous Coward]

Please post or send me the URL where you are seeing this problem and we will investigate ASAP.

Peter Gurevich
PeterG@microsoft.com
Internet Explorer 7 Performance PM

Re:Still Broken With Exponent CMS

[Anonymous Coward]

To the original poster:

Thanks for letting us know about this issue. Unfortunaltly without a specific site or example for us to investigate we are unable to address your concern. I have contacted the developers of Exponent CMS and they have informed me that:

"Exponent itself has some general performance issues, but none that are browser specific and none that should cause such a great deal of noticeable delay regardless."

Please let me know if there is any other way I can help you.

Thanks

Peter Gurevich
PeterG@microsoft.com
Internet Explorer 7 Performance PM

Breaks /. new discussion system

[psycln]

IE7 RC1 makes more than enough white-space in the beta /. discussion system. http://img396.imageshack.us/my.php?image=ndsyn9.jp g my eyes hurt...

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[Anonymous Coward]

That is one fugly, cluttered mess of a UI. What's with the translucent window border,is there any point to that whatsoever?

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[binarybum]

hmm, I believe that's the exclusive "baby-vomit" skin.

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[Anonymous Coward]

The UI for Windows Vista is utterly horrible (I know you can switch it to classic... but classic sucks as well). They added transparency and gradients all over the place just for the sake of having them. After all this time in development the UI still looks terrible and inconsistent...

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[Khuffie]

At least it works? It just craps out in Opera 9, which is unfortunate. I would've thought a site like Slashdot would at least make an effort to support Opera...

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[empaler]

It is there because you obviously need some sort of eyecandy. Doesn't matter that the eyecandy tastes like grabble, as long as it is eyecandy. Sheesh, don't you know anything?

(This post was written from my extra computer with Vista build 5536 - without the goddamned Aero interface)

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[empaler]

Yeah, classic looks worse than ever on Vista. I hope they change that before the final release, as I will sooner or later be forced to use Vista (like I had to use XP).

(This post was written from my extra computer with Vista build 5536 - without the goddamned Aero interface)

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[Anonymous Coward]

Opera 9 renders Slashdot fine for me.

Re:Breaks /. new discussion system

[ZzzzSleep]

Quoth the AC

Opera 9 renders Slashdot fine for me.

But the op was talking about the new discussion system, which is in beta atm. See http://slashdot.org/faq/com-mod.shtml#cm120 for more details.

ZzzzSleep

PNG gamma handling is still wrong

[Glenn R-P]

PNG files with gamma=1/2.2 are still rendered differently from PNG files with the sRGB chunk
and from untagged images. See http://pmt.sf.net/gamma_test where the 1/2.2 patches
should match and the 1/1.96 patches should be lighter (use Firefox or almost any other
browser to see how the page should be rendered).

Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[daniil]

All the reviews I've read have pointed out that IE7's interface is way nicer than that of Firefox -- even in first betas. The default theme that comes with Firefox looks awfully outdated. Now, you may say that it doesn't matter because hey, there's all these themes and extensions you can install, but the truth is, not many people use themes (even the most popular ones only have at most a hundred thousand downloads) it will take an ordinary person only one look at IE7 before they dump Firefox. I'm very sorry to tell you this but all the technical things don't even matter -- what matters is that from what I've heard and read, IE7 is much easier to use than Firefox and it will be the way to go for the majority of Internet users.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[Anonymous Coward]

popular ones only have at most a hundred thousand downloads

FYI: Those are weekly numbers. Total downloads are in the millions. Still a negligible percentage, but not quite as low as you make it look.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[WhiteWolf666]

I actually haven't been reading that at all.

Most of the reviews I've read chide MS for creating an interface that looks far, far different than anything else in the OS.

The average person does NOT like MS's new interface design. For the most part, there is a huge majority of people who run XP in "classic" mode, enjoying all applications in a one-size-fits all, boxy, ugly as sin, tan/grey everything Windows 2000-style interface. In particular, placing tabs above the menu bar seems to incite hatred; people find it confusing.

Joe Blow doesn't like UI changes; even if they could potentially increase efficency. The only people that are really moved by whiz-bang UIs are young gamers and UI engineers.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[amliebsch]

For the most part, there is a huge majority of people who run XP in "classic" mode, enjoying all applications in a one-size-fits all, boxy, ugly as sin, tan/grey everything Windows 2000-style interface.

You are claiming that the "huge majority" of people who use Windows XP run in "classic" mode. What is your source for this?

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[Zerbey]

They do? Where? Most people hate the classic theme in my experience. Maybe most in the IT world, but certainly not consumers.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[kerrle]

Everyone I've seen using IE7 really hated the new layout.

Personally, I think it looks pretty decent in Vista, where the toolbars and window border sorta flow together, but in XP, they should have gone with the classic toolbar layout. It doesn't particularly look good in XP, and it's not what people are going to be expecting.

Also, Microsoft seems obsessed with removing the menubar in all of their latest apps (Office, most Vista components, IE7) , and I really don't think it's a good idea.

Firefox 2 will actually have a new theme as well, though it's more polish to existing stuff, rather than a completely new experience.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[93 Escort Wagon]

"All the reviews I've read have pointed out that IE7's interface is way nicer than that of Firefox -- even in first betas."

I don't know where you're reading these reviews, because I haven't seen any of them. Most all the tech reviews I've read - or, heck, even places like pcworld.com - just point out the places where it's added a feature that Firefox, Safari, and Opera have had for years (e.g. tabbed windows, dedicated search box). When the reviews talk about how IE has differentiated itself, they generally mention the weird design decisions (e.g. referring to the buttons being above the drop-down menus).

From the tone of your post, I suspect you haven't looked at either IE7 or Firefox. I encourage you to take a look and see for yourself.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[cynyr]

I'll agree with the satement that most people dislike UI changes, i've seen it every time Autodesk releases a new version of AutoCAD, even i hate when they do mainly because it makes me slower untill i learn the new layout.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[dave562]

All BS aside, I think you've been toking the Microsoft crack pipe a bit too long. We are all entitled to our personal opinions, but when your broad generalizations are out of wack, I'm going to call you out on them. Specifically...

IE7 is much easier to use than Firefox and it will be the way to go for the majority of Internet users.

I completely disagree. I've been using the Internet since the days of 14.4 SLIP connections and I've gotten used to the "standard" interfaces. IE7 changed the interface up and moved stuff all over the place. I hate it. I have it installed on my PC, but I use Firefox as my default browser. The only time I use IE is when I have to open up OWA sites to check email.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[Anonymous Coward]

The average person does NOT like MS's new interface design. For the most part, there is a huge majority of people who run XP in "classic" mode, enjoying all applications in a one-size-fits all, boxy, ugly as sin, tan/grey everything Windows 2000-style interface. In particular, placing tabs above the menu bar seems to incite hatred; people find it confusing.

You provide no sources, and your claim of placing tabs over the menu bar is incorrect (it was true in older betas, but certainly not RC1). You're likely not familiar with MS's new interface design outside of Slashdot articles.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[westlake]

For the most part, there is a huge majority of people who run XP in "classic" mode,

Classic mode is more or less identified with W2K. But W2K was never mass market.

I'll go out on a limb here and suggest that most users don't know and don't care that there is an alternative to "Luna."

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[stonertom]

They start to like it after you answer "Can you make my computer faster?" with "Ok, turn off all the skins and crap"

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[richardwatson]

I dunno. As a programmer, I didn't feel comfortable with IE7 and if I'm not getting it my grandma is going to have to up her meds to use it. I'm surprised, and maybe I'll figure it out soon, but it took me a lot of work to uninstall and I'm not biting again until I hear some joy from friends.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[Digit Machine]

I don't know about what vista looks like, but I run xp in classic mode. I cannot stand the colorful childlike buttons in the menubar and the menubar is larger in xp theme. I want to be able to see what is in the window, not a big toylike bar across the top of the screen.

Re:Who the fuck cares about CSS?

[amliebsch]

That's a fascinating story, but it does not in any way constitute evidence that the "vast majority" of Windows users share your personal evaluation, which is what I was asking for.

Can't customize the toolbar

[bogie]

I still can't believe MS won't allow you to move some of the features around, notably the home button. It is unbeliveable awkward to go to the top left to go back and forward and then have to move way down and right to get to the home page button. You want to put all of those other little buttons off to the bottom right? Fine. But move the fucking home button back next to the navigation arrows where it is supposed to go. Oh and smart move to hide the file menu and all the other menus. Nobody uses those menus anyway.

Pluses?

Tabbed browing - Welcome to the 90s.
Shrink to fit printing - Gee why would we need that? I like having 15% of every page I print cut off.
RSS Feeds - Does anyone even use this?
Integrated Search - About time.

Overall I think this is the browser that MS should have released 3-4 years ago. It is better than IE 6 in pretty much every way but I don't see Opera or Firefox users coming back anytime soon. I know that MS sees these changes as a big deal but I honestly expected more from a company that spends $1 Billion+ on R&D per year. With all of that money and talent the best they could do is copy features that other browsers have had for years and years? Talk about a total lack of innovation.

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[Chaffar]

I honestly expected more from a company that spends $1 Billion+ on R&D per year. With all of that money and talent the best they could do is copy features that other browsers have had for years and years?

It's Microsoft's tried-and-tested development model... it's worked for them from the mid 80's so why stop now ? :)

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[protohiro1]

Minuses...it thrashes the layout on slashdot. I don't know why, but it does. I guess we are all going to be working on IE7 fixed for the next year...

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[oyenstikker]

"It is better than IE 6 in pretty much every way"

What?! User interface is non-standard and sucks. The CSS support is different but not right, so correct CSS is broken AND IE6 hacked CSS is broken. What way is it better in? Tabs. Thats one way, not pretty much every way.

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[SanityInAnarchy]

My guess, Slashdot autodetects and adjusts itself for the IE6 bug suite, and that this adjustment also occurs for IE7. To make it work on IE7, we'll have to have yet another bug suite.

This is why the Acid2 test exists, folks. We are sick of having to do browser detection, especially for different versions of the same browser.

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[ErikZ]

Maybe your CSS development is a bit more exotic than mine. I've just started working on CSS pages and having to re-work every page I create to look right in IE6 got old real fast. Easily doubled the time it to took make a page. I load the same page in IE7 and it looks fine.

The CSS support may not be "Perfect", but it's close enough to the rest of the browsers on the market for me.

The bad news is that I still have to design with IE6 in mind. It'll be years before it's useage rate is low enough to ignore.

I also hate the UI for IE7. I'm hoping that they locked it down for the Beta, and will unlock the normal release.

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[CaptainDefragged]

Slashdot renders ok on mine ... http://members.optusnet.com.au/~defragged/images/I E7-Vista-Beta2.png [screen shot of this page taken in Vista Beta 2 with IE 7+ ]

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[Julian Morrison]

If I remember, IE is a system DLL or some such, and the "browser" UI is sort of tacked on? That makes me suppose it shouldn't be so hard for someone to write a mash-up which wraps IE7's rendering engine in a more modern front end.

Re:Can't customize the toolbar

[Jfarro]

in re: RSS Feeds - Does anyone even use this?

Yes, we do. Welcome to 2006

I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Anonymous Coward]

Glenn, what would be wrong with having APNG served with an image mime type (temporarily until Microsoft manage to support the format 20 years time)? According to Hixie (and I disagree), mime is dead anyway.

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Glenn R-P]

APNG should be served with a video mime type since it is animation (so should ani-gif but that's
another problem). Better yet there should be an "animation" mime type. Since IE8 or whatever would probably use the PNG renderer for APNG, the gamma would probably still be wrong.

If your suggestion is to use image/png to convey APNGs because IE7-8-9 are only going to see the base PNG and not the animation, then from the IE perspective it is fine but from the perspective of all the browsers that do support APNG it would be incorrect.

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Anonymous Coward]

Since IE8 or whatever would probably use the PNG renderer for APNG, the gamma would probably still be wrong.

Is this Microsofts own image lib?

My question about APNG was if you thought it reasonable to serve as image/png instead of video/x-apng until APNG renderers are widely deployed? I know it became a contentious issue with the bizarre removal of MNG from moz trunk but I want lossless raster animation before SVG or canvas. Is APNG effectively dead now?

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Glenn R-P]

No, I don't think it is at all reasonable to deliver a file with the PNG signature, PNG extension, and image/png MIME type and then gripe because IE8 or IE9 only shows the base PNG and not the animation that is hidden in an aPNG chunk.

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Anonymous Coward]

That wasn't what I was asking, at this stage just having full IE support for the PNG spec would be a worthwhile achievement. I don't think everyone else should be ignoring the demand for lossless animated raster graphics just because IE is trailing a decade behind the curve.

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Glenn R-P]

So long as their nearest competitor, Firefox, is deliberately suppressing lossless animation, IE has no reason to work on it either. The MNG/JNG restoration bug (#18574) for Firefox/Seamonkey currently has 804 votes, and has been the leading voted-for mozilla bug for about 3 years. For a while it looked as though it had a chance to go in Seamonkey, but the same individuals who don't want it in Firefox have prevented it from going in Seamonkey either.

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Kayamon]

They should be able to comply to a standard, certainly, but if the standard is too complex to be able to comply to, I would imagine that says more about the standard than it does their support for it. They shouldn't need to include 3rd party code just to support an image format...

Re:I take it MS do not use libpng?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe they got pissed off at your whiney asses mewling about it nonstop for years and years.

IE7 RC1 has been out for weeks?

[insomniac8400]

Why does this article IE7, when the RC1 version has been out for a while.

Re:Check out Lockheed's wrongdoing

[Anonymous Coward]

What a funny little website. Edited by your local community college volunteers?

Beta is better

[dabbaking]

I think that Microsoft screwed this up. I heard from a bunch of people that RC1 crashes a lot more. Leave it up to ms to make a beta more stable than a rc.

Drop support for IE6? Not so fast...

[Tumbleweed]

You may be able to drop *browser-detection* for IE6, but unless you're using a (correct) DTD, IE7 will still pop into quirks mode, which is supposedly essentially unchanged from IE6, and will thus act 'badly'.

So, all you programmers who write crappy HTML, guess what - you finally have to learn proper HTML! :)

Also note: Users on Win 2000 or below won't be getting IE7. *shrug* Fug 'em, I say. Fug 'em up their stupid...well, you know the quote.

Can a release candidate be released then?

[niceone]

Can a release candidate be released then? I just seems plain wrong to me.

Re:Can a release candidate be released then?

[Shadyman]

What seems most "wrong" here is that Microsoft, of all people, put out a Release Candidate. I thought their methodology was to post real verions and wait for the bug reports?

IE7 is spyware

[eneville]

http://tinyurl.com/ezeey

Re:well

[kimvette]

No; MSIE developers are still dropping acid on a daily basis. No way will they pass a drug test! ;)

Seriously though: no, it will not pass. However, neither will it fail quite as miserably as MSIE 6.0 does.

Re:I have a problem with IE7

[kolme]

Yeah, I really hate tabs too!! It's sweet to have my taskbar crammed, so that finding a window is like where's Waldo.

Oh, and another stupid thing is the 'back' button... I'm the kind of person who never looks back!

One Word...

[xero314]

Union

Re:I have a problem with IE7

[Anonymous Coward]

So... don't use tabs? There's nothing in Firefox that forces you to use them. Nothing.

Sheesh.

Don't rely on your trusty IE hacks anymore!

[Gavin86]

A lot of them have been destroyed.

For further information on CSS compatability, check out the IEBlog entry, "Details on our CSS changes for IE7", as well as the Quirksmode CSS browser compatability page.

No, you're wrong

[r00t]

sRGB does not use a gamma of 1/2.2

sRGB uses a gamma consisting of a linear portion near black and 1/2.4 elsewhere, for a total result that is ALMOST 1/2.2

"almost"

in other words, "different"

Of course, then there is the issue of reality. Gamma is usually wrong. Most anything between 1/2.0 and 1/2.5 is really a crude way to say "like some random monitor I used", which is essentially what sRGB is intended to represent. Probably half the files marked 1/1.0 are really sRGB as well. Other values (... 1/0.9, 1/1.1 ... 1/1.9, 1/2.6 ...) stand a decent chance of being correct. It'd be quite reasonable for a browser to assume that anything in the 1/2.0 ... 1/2.5 range can go direct to screen.

Re:No, you're wrong

[Glenn R-P]

1/2.2 is the closest fit of sRGB to a pure gamma curve and is not visibly different. The 1/1.96 that IE7 uses is visibly different. Different enough that it screws up any attempt to match a PNG with a background color. The best workaround that I know (other than requiring your visitors to use Firefox) is to remove the gAMA chunk from the PNG and only store the sRGB chunk. IE will ignore the sRGB chunk but that's OK; the colors will match the rest of the page properly. Other browsers will recognize the sRGB chunk and handle it properly. The recommendation in the PNG spec to supply both gAMA and sRGB chunks can be safely ignored.

The issue of whether gamma is accurate or not is beside the point. The problem is that a PNG with gamma=1/2.2 is displayed differently by IE7 than a PNG without a gamma chunk or a GIF or JPEG or the HTML background, when the target is a PC monitor (whatever the actual gamma of the monitor).

IE hacks with conditional comments

[Chris Daniel]

... it'll be interesting to see how people keep those in place without jeopardizing the layouts in IE7.

I recently started tweaking my layouts for IE using conditional comments. There is an informative article on the IE Blog regarding CSS hacks and conditional comments. Using these, one can include a stylesheet that is targeted for IE versions greater than or equal to 5, for all those hacks, while other browsers only see comments in your markup.

meh

[ElephanTS]

Oooh, oooh, tabbed browsing. Can't wait to get my hands on that little feature. Sounds really useful.

not a joke

[twitter]

It might just run linux. If not I'm sure Firefox or a good live CD can fix things for you.

For every joke there's some nut to make it happen.

Re:not a joke

[iced_773]

Firefox or a good live CD can fix things for you.

Waitaminute...who said there was a problem?

Re:not a joke

[Anonymous Coward]

twitter, please read this carefully. Following this advice will make Slashdot a better place for everyone, including yourself.

• As a representative of the Linux community, participate in mailing list and newsgroup discussions in a professional manner. Refrain from name-calling and use of vulgar language. Consider yourself a member of a virtual corporation with Mr. Torvalds as your Chief Executive Officer. Your words will either enhance or degrade the image the reader has of the Linux community.
• Avoid hyperbole and unsubstantiated claims at all costs. It's unprofessional and will result in unproductive discussions.
• A thoughtful, well-reasoned response to a posting will not only provide insight for your readers, but will also increase their respect for your knowledge and abilities.
• Don't bite if offered flame-bait. Too many threads degenerate into a "My O/S is better than your O/S" argument. Let's accurately describe the capabilities of Linux and leave it at that.
• Always remember that if you insult or are disrespectful to someone, their negative experience may be shared with many others. If you do offend someone, please try to make amends.
• Focus on what Linux has to offer. There is no need to bash the competition. Linux is a good, solid product that stands on its own.
• Respect the use of other operating systems. While Linux is a wonderful platform, it does not meet everyone's needs.
• Refer to another product by its proper name. There's nothing to be gained by attempting to ridicule a company or its products by using "creative spelling". If we expect respect for Linux, we must respect other products.
• Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project , MIT, Berkeley and others too numerous to mention, the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.
• Don't insist that Linux is the only answer for a particular application. Just as the Linux community cherishes the freedom that Linux provides them, Linux only solutions would deprive others of their freedom.
• There will be cases where Linux is not the answer. Be the first to recognize this and offer another solution.

From http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/linux/docs/HOWTO/Advoca cy

Re:not a joke

[iced_773]

And YOU should post that when it's relevant. In this thread, twitter has (although surprisingly) avoided tangents bashing "M$ Windoze", "(P)urge", and "WiMP". If he had gone on such a rant, I would have posted my modified version of your guidelines rather than simply calling out an idea fragment.

Re:not a joke

[Achromatic1978]

Actually, not true. If you look above, you'll see lays blames personality conflicts on open source mailing lists squarely at the foot of Microsoft. Talk about a persecution complex.

Re:I have a problem with IE7

[compro01]

you could just hit "open in new window" rather than "open in new tab" and set it (the option is right in the "tabs" section of the options) to open links from other application in a new window rather than a new tab. also you can have it hide the tab bar (though i think it is hidden by default).

though i personanlly like tabs, as i multitask a lot, and even with a 3x size taskbar, the icons start to get really small and lack useful titles, so without tabs, all i see if a bunch of firefox logos and no way to tell which is the one i want at the moment.

Re:I have a problem with IE7

[Anonymous Coward]

Hrm, how about going to settings and clearing the checkbox for "Enable tabbed browsing"

Wow, that was tough.

firefox power

[Anonymous Coward]

crossplatform + foss plugins(mouse gestures,no-js,customize-gg)

installing ie7 rc1 breakes ...

[Anonymous Coward]

system restore on windows XP pro.
not sure it's because i installed ie7 rc1, but i can't seem
to make any system restores anymore ... bug?

CSS "adjustments"

[mojinoman]

and make final adjustments to our CSS support

Translation: "and make sure our CSS implementation is totally incompatible with any standard one, so we are going to fill Internet with crappy-IE-only designs again".

the acid2 isn't exactly perfect in its logic

[Eric Coleman]

The ACID2 test assumes that the correct interpretation of the following rule is that the background should be yellow.
.parser { error: \}; background: yellow }
According to w3.org's grammer page, http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/grammar.html, the only valid use of the backslash character is if it is followed by up to six numbers in base hex. Also on the page http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/syndata.html#parsing-er rors it says that you must match paris of (), [], {}, "", and '' when handling errors.

Given those rules, the logic, as I see it would the following interpretation and if any of this is wrong then it is due to my lack of groking the regular expressions in the grammar doc.

• .parser is a class name and this is valid
• { begins the style declaration body
• error: is an invalid token so it must be ingored.
• \ is not escaping a valid hex notation number, and it should be ignored.
• } closes the declaration
• background: yellow } is invalid because it is outside the body of this style declaration

The end result is the style should NOT be yellow, contrary to what the ACID2 test states.

The w3 spec says that matching pairs of (), [], {}, "", and '' should be respected, but it doesn't say how to match cases where you have a differing number of opening and closing tokens. There are basically two options when tokening such a heirarchial data stream, and that is outer to inner parsing and the oposite direction inner to outer. The w3 spec doesn't say which order of tokenizing it prefers.

I should also point out that the w3 site has only one other use for the backslash escape, and that is to escape certain characters in an unquoted URI. Specificially the characters are parentheses, commas, whitespace characters, single quotes (') and double quotes ("). The { } are not specified and this ACID2 css rule does not use an unquoted URI, so this escaping does not apply.

IE 7R1

[Oshkoshjohn]

I d/l'd and installed IE 7R1 on top of IE 7B3, and there were no problems. I did a restore point just to be safe, but nothing bad happened. I still use Firefox first, but some Web sites load better in IE. What're ya gonna do?

buggy

[MassiveForces]

I may submit a suggestion to Microsoft they check their code again in light of minor incidents I've been having with the product. For instance, after a failed beta install which crashed explorer (shell) on boot up, RC1 caused a BSOD at boot up, even preventing safemode from working after overloading the page file (+2GB) and causing a page fault in a non paged area solved only by a reformat. However, I remain only mildly homocidal.

Re:I have a problem with IE7

[Anonymous Coward]

But they are so convenient and easy to use! If I have access to them, I'll use them! I don't want that! I f*cking hate tabs!

get ready for a christmas release?

[Anonymous Coward]

With the coming release on auto-update for most IE users, I'm guessing they will release this just before christmas so their partners, who receive the release before anyone else, will have updated their sites so they display properly. Us developers need christmas money so this will be great.

IF YOU ARE AN E-COMMERCE COMPANY DOWNLOAD THIS AND GET YOUR SITE TO WORK IN IE 7 NOW!! Before its too late (and I need a new computer thanks microsoft)...

looks very good indeed

[SebNukem]

ie7.com