

IE9 Preview: Large performance improvements and 95/100 on Acid3 - indy
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2010/08/04/html5-modernized-fourth-ie9-platform-preview-available-for-developers.aspx

======
bosch
The part I've been waiting for years to hear was:

"We recommend sending IE9 the same standards-based markup your site sends
other browsers. "

~~~
Setsuna
Does it mean I don't have to use separate code for IE and Standards based
browsers?

~~~
nailer
Yes.

------
kenjackson
The browser wars are back!

MS, please bring the strength of this engine to WP7!

~~~
jf
It is my understanding that IE9 will come to WP7 - just not at launch.

~~~
kenjackson
Thanks. You just made my day!

------
ck2
Fascinating what a multi-billion dollar software company

can finally do when they have some motivation from competition.

Now just allow it to run on the millions of Windows XP installs

who have modern hardware but don't need Vista/W7.

~~~
buro9
No. Don't keep XP alive, it's insecure and dangerous.

~~~
listic
Proof, please.

~~~
nailer
It's pretty well known apps under XP don't need to ask users for permission to
perform privileged actions, unlike Vista, Linux, or OS X.

~~~
Dylan16807
Defaulting to running directly as admin is a settings flaw, not a problem with
the underlying security system.

~~~
nailer
Yes, and poor defaults are a problem with the OS.

------
wmwong
This is great news, except for the fact that there is still a huge percentage
on IE6. Until people migrate off, it'll still be a pain in the ass to develop
sites.

That's one nice thing about the other browsers. Most users are on very similar
versions. IE, on the other hand, have users spread out across many old
versions.

It will be time to celebrate when they can get most of their users on the
newest IE. I can't wait for that day.

~~~
d4rt
The real shame is no IE9 for Windows XP. [1]

Some 60% [2] of the market share is Windows XP. IE 6 - 8 are going to be with
us for some time.

[1]
[http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/info/FrequentlyAskedQuesti...](http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/info/FrequentlyAskedQuestions/Default.html)

[2]
[https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Microsoft_Win...](https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Microsoft_Windows)

~~~
redorb
The best solution I see to the "no IE9 for windows xp" problem if were not
counting on Microsoft to do something is Chrome frame; but I think some big
player (youtube, facebook etc..) would have to almost force it on users for it
to cut down on those big percentages

<http://www.google.com/chromeframe>

------
lini
Too bad that with this platform preview they concentrated on adding new
features and the whole browser is pretty unstable. I keep getting errors with
third party libraries (jQuery 1.4) and controls. Sometimes the errors are
pretty funny, e.g.:

SCRIPT5022: Exception thrown and not caught

Waiting for the beta....

~~~
zemoo
That's probably the issue with the JS standard they discuss here:
[http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2010/07/16/how-
ie9-platfo...](http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ie/archive/2010/07/16/how-ie9-platform-
preview-feedback-changed-the-javascript-standard.aspx)

------
swombat
Until IE9 supports auto-updates down the wire, like Chrome, it is as bad as
IE6. IE6 was a great browser when it came out. It took years to become the
horrible monster we know it to be. If IE9 doesn't auto-update, all it can
achieve is the same success as IE6.

~~~
snprbob86
Not a chance.

Silently rolled out security updates? Maybe. But general purpose auto-updating
behavior? Nope. Predicability is a key motivator for enterprises to use
Microsoft software.

Convincing businesses to standardize on a particular IE version inside their
organizations grants Microsoft a key sales differentiator: "If you use our
competitors' software, you'll need to permanently retain an engineering staff
to deal with an ever changing platform."

If you're an internet startup, Microsoft's position sounds insane, but
consider the stance of tech-ignorant governments and corporations. Yeah,
ideally, they should have engineering teams and utilize them to optimize their
businesses. Realistically, they don't know how.

If you ask me: the standardizations bodies need to step in here. Let <!DOCTYPE
HTML> be the wild west, but declare a deadline for all browsers to work on
their HTML 5 implementations. When that deadline passes, all browsers would
have a small window of time to release a version which handles <!DOCTYPE
HTML5> as a stable, non-changing rendering engine. Then developers could opt
into a stable platform, or the wild west. Enterprises could develop internal
tools with a fixed doctype and browser venders could pledge support for those
rendering engineers. Internet startups could stay on the bleeding edge and
play the upkeep game.

~~~
swombat
I didn't say it was a realistic prospect. What I mean is that this is the
biggest flaw of IE. 98% of IE6's crappiness is directly dependent on the fact
that it doesn't auto-update. IE6 would never have been such a problem if MS
had been able to auto-update it to IE7, 8, 9...

Until that fundamental philosophy flaw is fixed, the rest is just putting
lipstick on a Sarah Palin. I won't get excited about IE9 passing ACID3 tests,
because all it means is that for a while IE will be an ok browser, but within
a year or two it will suck again. I much prefer permanent solutions.

------
thomasfl
Yay, IE9 supports rounded corners and drop shadow in CSS.

Things like that certainly makes it suck a lot less when adjusting css styles
made for webkit to work on IE as well.

------
tomjen3
Unfortunately by the time we can count on this being available on a majority
of client computers, the web will have moved on to newer and better things.

As long as Microsoft insists on allowing users to use anything but the latest
version, we will have to play to the slowest mover - which will make everybody
suffer.

~~~
ugh
Hm, is that actually true? Internet Explorer 7 seems to be fading fast.
Internet Explorer 6 is in my eyes the only really big problem and there is not
much Microsoft can do about it. (They should bring IE9 to XP but I don’t think
that’s going to help all that much.)

Transitions seem to be fast now, Microsoft can push out updates relatively
quickly.

~~~
abstractbill
Some data, from justin.tv:

IE8: 75.57%

IE7: 17.84%

IE6: 6.57%

All other versions of IE: 0.02%

~~~
evo_9
Yeah this is good, but the thing to keep in mind is that an OS release always
drives these numbers way up. IE8 comes with Windows 7. Vista didn't do so well
so the IE7 numbers reflect that.

IE9 Won't benefit from being part of an OS release (unfortunately).

~~~
ghurlman
It's not just that... large corporations that are sticking with XP are finally
getting around to upgrading from IE6 - and skipping directly to IE8.

~~~
invisible
Windows XP Pro price raised (on average) to around $150. Windows 7 Pro is (on
average) $85. I know large corporations get killer deals, but over time the
cost will outweigh the benefits. I think the phase out will be less than 5
years for most businesses.

------
tpinto
after all these years: 95/100. great work huh?

why don't they stop with IE already and start shipping a webkit-based browser?
why would they want to always be a couple years behind everyone else on that
front?

~~~
cracell
While I would be incredibly happy to hear that IE switched to webkit. 95/100
is a great ACID3 score. And they explained why a few of the points weren't
made. ACID3 just tests things that browsers usually get wrong. Not necessarily
things that are in that high demand to be used by Web Developers.

IE9 is an amazing step-up from IE8 so far and I think we should all be patting
them on the back. I'm sure dealing with Microsoft policies and playing catchup
to the other browsers is no easy task. And the team is doing a great job
trying to modernize IE9.

~~~
mishmash
> IE9 is an amazing step-up from IE8 so far and I think we should all be
> patting them on the back.

A boss once told me "you don't get rewarded for doing your job - you get
paid." :)

~~~
ghurlman
Sure, but you don't work for that guy anymore, do you?

~~~
mishmash
Heh, no. And he _was_ a major factor in my resignation. We were all pretty
sure he fit the clinical definition of psychopath.

