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IE 8 Passes Acid2 Test
notamicrosoftlover writes to tell us Channel9 is reporting that Internet Explorer 8 has correctly rendered the Acid2 page in "standards mode". "With respect to standards and interoperability, our goal in developing Internet Explorer 8 is to support the right set of standards with excellent implementations and do so without breaking the existing web. This second goal refers to the lessons we learned during IE 7. IE7's CSS improvements made IE more compliant with some standards and less compatible with some sites on the web as they were coded. Many sites and developers have done special work to work well with IE6, mostly as a result of the evolution of the web and standards since 2001 and the level of support in the various versions of IE that pre-date many standards. We have a responsibility to respect the work that sites have already done to work with IE. We must deliver improved standards support and backwards compatibility so that IE8 (1) continues to work with the billions of pages on the web today that already work in IE6 and IE7 and (2) makes the development of the next billion pages, in an interoperable way, much easier. We'll blog more, and learn more, about this during the IE8 beta cycle." There's also a video interview regarding IE8 development on Channel9."
So in other words, it will be standards compliant but at the same time render all the old crap that wasn't even close to standards compliant??? So what's the point?!! If people can still write crap code, they will. You may as well write IE in 1995 Visual Basic if you are going to be that wishy washy.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
Your point about waiting a bit before getting into cheap-shot territory is well taken, but there is nothing about this announcement IMO that's worth getting excited about.
I don't see how anyone could have fixed all that bloated crap code so fast for starters.
At this point, with no real information forthcoming from MS and all the secrecy blinders closed down tight at MSIE headquarters, the safest assumption to make here is that MS is just using web-kit (or their own ripped-off proprietary version of web-kit) as an *alternative* rendering engine and swapping the rendering engines back and forth depending on the doc type in the header.
If it turns out that this is indeed the case, (or something like it), then this is nothing to praise MS for and in essence just another MS kludge as a sop to those who support standards.
I mean, if you have to turn on a switch to make it work properly, on what is a widely known public test suite, makes one wonder if they aren't engaging some very specific tweaks to the render engine to pass the test. I'd like to see the makers of acid2 modify it a bit, shift things around but still be testing all the same elements, and see if ie8 will still pass it. I think I'd also add a small element (like a freckle on the face) to make sure they're not just dishing us up a fixed pre-rendered image.
It would not completely shock me if someone discovered that with that box ticked, it checks the html somewhat tersely to see if it's acid2, and if so, branches to a totally different bit of code.
I'd leave the box checked and see just how trashed it renders some other pages, and then take a look at THEM and see if their code was correct or not. I think I'd prefer a browser that refused to properly render improperly written code rather than one that makes "best effort". Or at least one that has both options. It looks like there's a chance this is exactly what they are trying to do, which is brilliant.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
I don't trust them. They ruined the work life of web designers everywhere. It'll be ten years before we've dug out of the hole created by IE 6 and 7. IE 8 can't solve any of that.
What are they trying to control at this point anyway? Why can't they just pack it in and make IE8 a Gecko based browser? As far as I'm concerned writing another web rendering engine at this point is a colossal waste of time. Wouldn't their customers be happier if they spent their development resources on something else?
Cheers.