Internet Explorer (XP)

What's new in this version:

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. We're not finished ' there's much more to come in Beta 2.

2. We've contributed over 700 test cases to the W3C CSS working group because we think a comprehensive certification test suite for CSS is important for true interoperability and we 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. We'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, we 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. We've delivered better scripting performance because we heard from developers that they needed it given how heavily the latest rich web experiences rely on script.

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

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

6. We'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. We made the OpenService Format specification available under the Microsoft Open Specification Promise and the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike license.

7. We'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. We'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.