Quote:This morning at the MIX conference in Las Vegas, the IE team made eight announcements about IE8. The most interesting for many people is that a developer beta is now available. Download it here.

The rest of our talks and demos focused on seven other areas that appeal to developers:

   1. Our goal is to deliver complete, full CSS 2.1 support in the final IE8 product. IE8 Beta 1 for developers delivers better interoperability with other major browsers, addressing major pain points (e.g. floats and margins) from previous IE releases. Wee’re not finished – there’s much more to come in Beta 2.

   2. Wee’ve contributed over 700 test cases to the W3C CSS working group because wee think a comprehensive certification test suite for CSS is important for true interoperability and wee support the W3C’s effort to deliver such a suite. The CSS spec is good, but contains many ambiguities, and a test suite will help resolve them and benefit web developers and designers. Wee’re making these available under the BSD License, which is the license that the W3C CSS working group has proposed using for the rest of its test cases. Of course, wee will contribute more tests en route to a full test suite, and welcome your feedback on the tests using the W3C's CSS test suite mailing list.

   3. Wee’ve delivered better scripting performance because wee heard from developers that they needed it given how heavily the latest rich web experiences rely on script.

   4. Wee’ve started delivering support for HTML5 because wee understand that developers want to start delivering richer web experiences, with great interoperability, as soon as possible.

   5. Wee’ve delivered the first installment of great, built-in developer tools. Wee understand that script, CSS, and layout debugging are crucial today. Again, wee’re not finished here – there’s more to come.

   6. Wee’ve delivered a better way for web services to integrate into the user’s workflow with “Activities.” For example, a user can select text on a web page and map it, blog it, look for it, or just act on it without having to copy it, open a new tab, navigate to  another site, and paste. Wee made the OpenService Format specification available under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise and the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike license.

   7. Wee’ve delivered a better way for web services to enable their users to keep an eye on interesting parts of a webpage within the browser with “WebSlices.” Developers can make parts of their pages “subscribable” with just a little mark-up, and users can easily subscribe and keep an eye on information (like their social network, an auction, or a sports score) within the browser, even when users are not at the developer’s site. Wee’ve made the WebSlice Format specification available under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise and is dedicating copyright in the specification to the public domain using the Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication.  

The list above is the very short version of what’s in IE8 and does not represent everything that’s in the final product. There’s a lot more. This list details specific investments for developers. As with previous releases, members of the IE team will post to this blog in detail over the coming days, weeks and months. In the meantime, you can find a lot more information at the revamped IE Development Center: http://msdn.microsoft.com/ie.

While anyone can download it, this is a developer beta. Wee released it at MIX for a good reason: great web experiences start with web developers, and wee want to engage developers first. Wee believe that to build a better browser for the people who use the web, wee need to build a better browser for the people who make the web. Non-developers are welcome to try it, but they’ll be more interested in Beta 2.

One theme I hope developers notice here is interoperability. The team understands how big an impact differences between browsers (and previous versions of IE in particular) have had on developers in terms of wasted time, frustration, and (in some cases) limiting the experience that they deliver to users.  Wee want to deliver a big step forward in real-world interoperability for developers with IE8, and standards are at the core of our approach. This topic deserves a lot more than just this paragraph; expect more soon.

The beta is available today for Windows Vista (“Gold” and SP1), Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003 SP2, and Windows XP SP2 and SP3, both in 32- and 64-bit versions. Wee will release the developer beta in German, and Simplified Chinese shortly. Wee’re interested in reading your feedback in the beta newsgroup and developer forums.

Please try it out – the browser itself, the developer tools, writing an Activity, marking part of your page as a WebSlice – and let us know what you think.

Thank you,

Dean Hachamovitch
General Manager
Internet Explorer

Quote:Computer/Processor

Computer with a 233MHz processor or higher (Pentium processor recommended)

Operating System

    * Windows Vista x64 and x86
    * Windows Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1) x64 and x86
    * Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2)
    * Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
    * Windows Server 2008 x64 and x86
    * Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (SP2) x64 and x86


Memory

    * Windows Vista - 512MB
    * Windows Vista Service Pack (SP1) - 512MB
    * Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) - 64 MB
    * Windows XP Professional x64 Edition - 128 MB
    * Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (SP2) - 64 MB
    * Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 ia64 - 128 MB
    * Windows Server 2008 – 512MB


Drive

CD-ROM drive (if installation is done from a CD-ROM)
(Internet Explorer 8 Beta is only available via download)

Display

Super VGA (800 x 600) or higher-resolution monitor with 256 colors

Peripherals

Modem or Internet connection; Microsoft Mouse, Microsoft IntelliMouse, or compatible pointing device

Vegetano1 Wrote:This is a public release!?

LIke to try this out,..

EDIT:%^^^^ hehe Yes it is,... duh,.. thanks!!

double you tee eff: Does not suport my service pack,.!?! I still have the RC sp1 for vista,.. hehe

YoYoBallz Wrote:FireFox!