Putting sites at the center of the browsing experience, using the whole PC: IE9 Beta Available for Download
Our approach to building a faster web browsing platform, as seen in the Platform Previews, involves using everything the PC and its hardware have to offer. Before IE9, browsers used perhaps 10% of the PC’s capability. IE9 has shown the clear performance benefits with full hardware-acceleration of webpages.
Our approach in designing a site-centric web browsing experience also involves using everything available around the browser. We see all the pixels and code that people need for a significantly better browsing experience already there on the screen. The beta of Internet Explorer 9, available now at www.BeautyOfTheWeb.com in 33 languages, reflects this unique approach:
Our point of view is that the browser is the stage, or backdrop, for the web, and the sites are the star of the show. Similar to the relationship between Windows 7 and Windows applications, people go to the web for sites, not the browser. We asked, “How can IE make sites shine? How can IE put sites at the center of the experience?” Microsoft has more than a billion Windows customers in the world today, and we want browsing the web – one of the most common things they do on Windows PCs – to be a great experience.
The IE9 experience starts from what people use regularly for launching tasks and managing windows. While consumers have browsed with a home button and bookmarks (or Favorites) for fifteen years, and tabs for closer to five, they use the parts of Windows 7 for launching tasks and managing windows far more. More people launch a pinned application from the Windows 7 taskbar (87%) than use the keyboard shortcut (ctrl+T) for opening a new tab. More people pin at least one non-default application to the Windows 7 taskbar (33%) than add a link to the Favorites bar. While tabs are central to the browsing experience, over 97% of IE sessions have 5 or fewer tabs, and more than 90% of users have never had more than 8 tabs open at once. The set of real-world usage data represents hundreds of millions of sessions and tens of millions of users worldwide, including students, enthusiasts, developers, people at work, and consumers in general. This post from the E7 blog has good background on the use of data to inform product design.
IE9 makes what’s easy and familiar for Windows users available for websites and the people who browse them. Users can pin sites in the taskbar just as they pin applications, and launch web tasks directly, the same way they launch everything else in Windows. Websites can program jump lists for pinned sites, to make common tasks easier for their users as part of the desktop experience. Sites can also program notifications when the user pins them in the task bar. The browser has a clean new design that reinforces the site’s visuals, with a large site icon, and that icon’s colors reflected in the back and forward buttons. IE9 does far more than provide shortcuts to sites on the desktop and reduce the space used in the browser interface. The design of IE9’s frame puts the user’s focus on the site, not the browser, with fewer distractions. IE9 allows sites to shine.
Tabbed browsing is central to the experience of IE9, even when sites are pinned. The metaphor of tabs is the best approach to date for browsing, and we've put a great deal of work into making tabs great. Even for pinned locations which normally reflect one single domain, we heard strong user feedback when we tested early prototypes that tabs were important to users in these pinned scenarios. For example, while immersed in shopping at Amazon or reading a news site, users still wanted the convenience of tabs when following links from these pinned sites, or when comparing information on different pages.
At the same time, we also understand that people consistently value multiple top level windows for browsing, and by integrating across Windows in the taskbar we bring together all the user’s sites: tabs in the context of a pinned site, and the taskbar across all the top level windows.
People often want to see two tabs at once. For example, people want to compare two product pages, or have one page visible for reference while writing a comment or blog post or email. Every day, millions of people use Aero Snap in Windows 7 to put application windows side by side on their screens. About 40% of Windows 7 users have used Aero Snap. (Only 15% of users have control-click’d a link in a page.) IE9 is the first browser to support Aero Snap for tabs:
Aero Snap support offers a good perspective on alternative approaches to building a browser. IE9’s approach involves using what is familiar and available around the browser. Another approach, seen in other browsers, is duplicating within the browser all the functionality that users find around the browser.
Duplication in this context has negative consequences. From an engineering perspective, duplicating code in this way is inefficient. It’s a peculiar decision given the relatively low usage patterns described earlier of in-browser user interface, and the emphasis on removing browser user interface. The better way to duplicate functionality is by sharing the same code across all the running programs. Drivers and video codecs are good examples of shared code on a system. From a consumer perspective, duplicating code can challenge confidence. When users expect things to work the same, but find they don’t, there’s an “Uh-oh, what happened? Why didn’t I get what I got the last time I did that?” moment for consumers that breaks their confidence in the system.
Browser-centric thinking has other negative consequences as well. One is artificially limiting the browser experience to what’s “in” the browser, despite how people actually use their PC. The work that goes into running across several operating systems displaces the work needed to be excellent on any one of them. It also leads to the browser window supporting more and more user interface (or requiring people to learn hidden shortcuts, or other contextual UI) to manage browsing. This growth in browser window user interface is hard to reconcile with the sites the browser needs to support. There's plenty of screen real-estate for improving the browsing experience—it is all around the browser, and not necessarily inside a single browser frame window.
IE9’s browser-specific experiences also focus on sites and users. For example, let's look at the New Tab Page:
We re-designed and re-wrote IE9’s New Tab Page to be fast. The New Tab experience also reflects your usage patterns. It’s an example of building a feature that doesn’t require people to manage anything. In previous versions of IE, after users open a new tab, 47% of the time they just type in the address bar. Just as the address bar remembers where you’ve been and makes it easy to go back, this page adjusts to where you go on the web. This experience is for the vast majority of people who are looking for something that works with their typical usage, and not looking for more information and surface area to organize, manage, and “get right.” Sometimes, and in this case our point of view is, “just works” involves fewer options and staying out of the user’s way.
IE9’s One Box combines the address bar and search box into a single edit control. Our design respects your privacy by default and it does not send your keystrokes to sites unless you tell it to:
With one click, you can get suggestions (typically visual suggestions), and turn the information flow on and off as you see fit. It’s also easy to use many different search providers, as well as add more.
Browsers have an important role in keeping people in control of their web experience and web data. IE9 makes significant progress with safety, reliability, performance and settings protection, and privacy.
Because add-ons are a key source of performance and reliability (and privacy) issues for consumers, IE9 provides information on the ongoing impact of add-ons on site performance and informs the user, so the user can stay in control of performance:
Downloads from the internet are a significant source of malicious software. Is that download really a screensaver, or actually malware? Other browsers leave that decision to the consumer without additional information or context. Just as IE8’s SmartScreen filter protects users from phishing and malware sites, IE9’s download manager offers users an early warning system against malware:
IE9’s site-centric approach uses the entire PC to make sites shine. We made IE9 fast with fully hardware accelerated HTML5 so people who browse the web can enjoy a faster, more immersive site experience using the full power of your Windows PC. Your favorite sites will shine with a clean new UI that integrates web sites into the Windows 7 experience you already know. Because malicious and poorly written sites threaten the reliability, privacy and safety of your online experience, IE9 delivers significant new protections that continue our leadership in developing a trusted browser. And for developers, IE9 delivers excellent support for HTML5 and other modern standards, so the same markup works across more browsers, and the web is more interoperable.
The people who build the web have better ideas for their customers than browsers have been able to deliver to date. With IE9 this situation starts to change. Websites can offer richer experiences because of fully hardware accelerated HTML5. Those richer experiences now blend comfortably and consistently into the consumer’s desktop experiences. The focus should be on the site, not on browsing and browsers.
On behalf of the individuals and companies who have worked with us to deliver this beta, and the many people at Microsoft who have built it, thank you for visiting www.BeautyOfTheWeb.com and trying the IE9 beta.
Dean Hachamovitch
P.S. Folks interested in more information about IE9 ahead of our blog posts might want to look at this feature list, and this "top feature" list, and at this Guide for Developers about the platform.
P.P.S. The beta is available today in 33 languages: 29 fully localized versions, and 4 languages with Language Interface Pack (LIP) localization. The English language version of Internet Explorer 9 Beta will however install on any language edition of Windows Operating system. The localized flavors of Internet Explorer 9 beta will only install on matching language editions of the underlying Windows Operating System.
Comments
Anonymous
January 01, 2003
Even if you had 9 lives, you still couldn't get it right. You should consider going to China and make cheep copies of ..everything. You useless pustules!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Good!!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
In the first screenshot, how did you get the back/forward buttons to be the same color as the website's major color. For example, Amazon website had yellowish orange buttons, CNN website had red buttons. How did you do that? Mine is always blue!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
This is really a very good leap in the right direction as far as a browser is concernedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Well!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Love what you guys have done. A massive step forward for IE and the web! I may even switch back to IE. Who knows. One question: What's with the cut-off back button? It looks out of place. Is it on purpose?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I like the focus on user experience and performance. Those are always good things! Look forward to trying it out on my machine.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The download link on beautyoftheweb.com does not work for IE 8 :X I had to download IE9 Beta with Firefox 4 Beta.. :Anonymous
September 15, 2010
finally! good job!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Found it! I just had to wait till the FAVICO was loaded. When I pinned a website before that, it had the IE icon which was blue! Awesome stuff.. My amazon website IE theme is orange! :)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Impressive! Great job! :)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Will the beta run along side IE8, or should we install it in a VM? Any news on a Application Compatibility VPC Image?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Jumplists for sites is a neat feature. Just added amazon to my taskbar and I have a whole set of amazon-related favorite links there!! This is insanely cool!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Awesome. I know it's a small detail, but...please consider updating the scrolling icon. The current one looks extremely old.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@DaveH: Given it's a beta, a VM seems an appropriate option if you have it.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Can't download. Progress bar gets stuck after a certain point in the "Downloading Internet Explorer 9" dialog. Why has this to be so complex? Why can't you offer a full download link?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Good job guys!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The thing is IE is still playing catchup. Most of the features are copied from Opera and Chrome. IE9 still doesn't have the wow-worthy features that every major release of Opera and Fx seems to include. AeroSnap is nice, but nothing else makes me want to dump my current browser and embrace IE.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The download link on beautyoftheweb.com does not work for IE 8 :X I had to download IE9 Beta with FirefoxAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Here's the log: depositfiles.com/.../ohu0pgy8n. EPIC FAIL. I can't even try IE9 on Windows 7 now.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Sorry, is this really Beta1/Preview5? There are so many regressions and overall it seems the build is from somwehere before Preview 4 was published.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
You guys make it perfect!!! and also thanks for the lots of languages version together.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
awsome!!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@jabcreations: "While tabs are central to the browsing experience, over 97% of IE sessions have 5 or fewer tabs, and more than 90% of users have never had more than 8 tabs open at once. " It's called catering for the majority. @ieteam - nice one, this looks like it's going to be a fantastic release. Oh, and the immediate pop-up telling me AVG's add-in was slowing my browsing down,... A winner! =)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
I don't like the tabs on the left of the address bar... but the global UI is good. Please somebody make an AdBlock that works!!!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Will there be extensions? Themes? Plugins?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Amazing! Great job guys! But please, you have to come up a better way to manage a massive number of open tabs. Right now with 14 tabs open, i can't even see the title of the blog im on right now!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Myth: "IE9 is the first browser to support Aero Snap for tabs" Fact: Chrome has long supported Aero Snap-type functionality on Windows.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
How can I enable the IE8 like formatted XML view in browser? If I open an XML file it will be shown as unformatted texr. The browser looks very clean and it's very fast!!!!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Starting a "Features removed in Internet Explorer 9" article on Wikipedia. Ideally, this article should not exist (there should be no dropped features from IE8. Please don't limit customization which was previously possible and remove features because few people used them or your telemetry said so.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Will it be available for Vista?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Crashes for me win7 32bit :(Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Stephen If you drop the tab and create a new window, you can again grab the tab and put it back into the original window. At least that's what I've been able to do. Grabbing the Window doesn't work like that (and it shouldn't). @IE team Great work on many fronts... but like many, I have some cringes with the GUI (but I'm sure you expected that - you can never please everybody). In particular, even if I unlock the toolbars, I can't move the tabs bar anywhere. It would be nice if you let users move it below the address bar to a dedicated "row", and better yet, it would be able if you could also make it movable to the top too, and end the "should tabs be on top or bottom" debate by letting the user choose, and keep the default in the middle, as is now.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Where is the "Search on this page" function gone to ?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Microsoft: Where is IE9 installed????? I cannot see an icon on the desktop and I see no 'Internet Explorer 9" in the Start Menu?!?! :( :(Anonymous
September 15, 2010
It seems that that annoying bug regarding the zombie iexplore.exe process that remained running for about 30 seconds after closing the browser has finally been fixed! I have been waiting for this at least for a year. Finally, thank you!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Microsoft - When will IE9 Beta be available for Vista?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
A sort of Favorites Bar displayed only in the New Tab page would be nice and useful.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
So, you are bragging about what a resource hog this browser is. Weird thinking. My machine needs the 90% left from browser for other things Iäm doing, now IE9 is requiring 10x more resources and leaves nothing for other programs. Have you ever heard of multitasking? Of course not, you use Windows.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Although new UI looks interesting,it seems it is unusable when one needs more then 10tabs. (Which is modus operandi ofr some of us) Like when I use RSS feeds and open majority of updated ones to separate tabs and then opening new tabs from them with articles of interest. Bets way would to either allow tab-bar on its own row or put there an option "old or new" style. Everybody would be satisfied-Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Frank If you view the video about Aero Snap tabs, we compare Chrome's side-by-side implementation. Chrome's implementation does not integrate with Aero Snap; it works differently.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
What a shame! You should, at least, support the features all other browers already support in the current generation (equivalent to IE8). HTML5/CSS3 support is awful compared to ALL other browsers. Hardware acceleration is good, but it's not everything. Other browsers will just attach these kind of functionality to their already advanced CSS3/HTML5 browsers, and supporting XP. Sorry, but after all these years, this is not even close to what we expect.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
best nice top :DAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Neil: IE9 Beta's ACID3 score is 95. If you're seeing something else, either you've changed settings or you have network troubles. @hAl: Hit CTRL+F to launch the Find on this Page experience, or if you must use the mouse, click the gear icon, choose "File" and choose "Find on this page." @Oguz: There is a known Beta bug where XML is not pretty-printed when loaded from your local computer. Works correctly when loading from a file share or internet site. @Frank: Chrome 6 doesn't currently support Aero snap, so not sure what your "Fact" is.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Can't pin a tab to the taskbar when taskbar is on the LHS of the screen. When I drag the tab, it does not let me move it to the taskbar. Instead, it always opens up a new window, which is not what I want.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@boen_robot I didn't let go of the tab.. try it, grab a tab, drag it to the side, don't let go and now drag that tab back to where you got it, you can't because as soon as you touched the side, the tab you have grabbed magically turned into a window.. thats poor UX.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
nice best very very TOPAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Tabs: wanted to expand thoughts on this. Wouldn't it be cool if, similar to the Microsoft Office 2007 and 2010 Ribbon, if you rest your mouse cursor over a tab and use the scrollwheel it scrolls through your tabs and displays the site live as you do? Could be an easy way to allow a user to preview their open tabs! Alternatively, how about making it so the moment you mouse-over a tab the website appears below but does not become the active tab unless you then click on its tab?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Look, everyone, complaining about the UI... IT'S A BETA, PEOPLE. Give it TIME. Don't act like the UI is set in stone already because it's not.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Looks nice but the being able to move the tabs below the address bar is a must for power users who open more tabs then you seem to think they should. I suspect your low average number of tabs open statistic is mainly due to people who still aren't really aware of the tabs feature, which is a surprisingly large number in my experience. Those people who do make use of tabs in my experience tend to end up with quite a large number open.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
So far so good I am liking this - I would lie the option to put my tabs under the address bar if I prefer. Also "Search on page" is missing and I used that feature a lot. Otherwise very happy :)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
hello i downloaded the beta well I don't like the new back and forward button the back button is Ugly. is there a way i can change it to look like it did in Internet Explorer 8?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Google Chrome internet explorer 9 is going to be faster than google chrome cause google chrome #FAILS big timeAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Stephen - you're right. @Eric - I think it's the acidtests website having issues. Everything else I do is fine and I haven't changed any defaults.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Is that it? There is very little differentiation from FF and Chrome! Why is Microsoft going to come out with something that is innovative. The tab-snapping, history search, etc. is so minor. Is there a benchmark for speed?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Installed IE 9 Beta 1 and after rebooting, if I open IE, it is displaying a "Internet Explorer has stopped working" dialog repeatedly...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Can't say I like the address bar and tabs on the same 'level'. It seems to make both of them second class citizens. With lots of tabs open this will be come unuseable. And the address bar is barely useable. Other than that first impressions are good.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Neil Dunensach : about the UI : even if it's a beta, if nobody tell to Microsoft the new UI is bad, the final will have the same UI. That's why people report it here, because it's really bad and unusable.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Tested with ms crm 4 .. can't save / save and close/ save and new buttons do not work ... I simply can't believe you would release this without testing it with CRM ... Absolutely UnbelievableAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
What about having the option to move the address bar to the top (on the same row of the minimize/maximize/exit buttons)? Or maybe the other way around moving the tab bar to the top.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
An option for a separate tab bar please. I don't like the minimalistic madness for most programs I'm a power user of. Your statistics is probably tiltded because 40% of the users use other browsers and guess what... these are the people that have many tabs open. Other suggestions: Make sure you can bring the status bar back even if it is off by default (I'm not sure if you can do this now). Put back the site title in the title bar of the IE Window. Listen to Ars Technica. These guys know what they are talking about. Otherwise the beta looks cool. Congratulations on reaching this milestone.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Olivier - it's not really bad and unuseable. I don't like the tabs and address bar on the same level, but other than that it's fine. What I'm saying is that the comments on here from some people make it sound like the world is coming to a horrible end instead of being constructive criticism.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@fr: totally agree! I've seen countless users turn-off tabbed browsing and use individual WIE windows because it's "what they're used to". Ironically, the bar for each open WIE window in the Windows taskbar then becomes their tabs! :p Must say the new IE9 tab UI looks very similar to how Limewire's UI went in version 5 onwards (tabs on the right of the main search bar). The open-source alternative, Cabos, however, has it's tabs in a bar on the left which goes down vertically, not across horizontally; on small screen resolutions this is a blessing! Might be an option to consider for future versions of WIE -- a Tab Panel that could be snapped on the left. Would certainly be useful for massive-res widescreen users too I'd imagine: easier to scroll through your sites in a veritcal list than to mouse way over to the right to reach that last tab!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
First of all, congrats, this isa huge improvement on ie8, however, I have one big complaint: WHY ARE THERE NO CLOSE TAB BUTTONS ON NON-ACTIVE TABS??? This is seriously inconvient as it prevents me from opening a new tab (to get to new tab page) and then closing my previous one (which I no longer want). I agree with your other UI descisions though, most of my non technical friends rarely use loads of tabs, and I can still use 10 on my screen using your design. There are other browsers to cater for the needs of power users, and you have addressed the standards and speed issues excellently. Loving the html5/css3 support, cross-browser interperobility and the snappyness of the UI.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@easson: To pin a site to the task bar when your taskbar is in a non-standard location (E.g. top, left, or right) simply drag the FavIcon out of the address bar rather than dragging the tab button itself.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I love the new UI. Having the Address bar and the tab bar in the same row is a brilliant idea. It saves a lot of vertical space. Overall, IE9 beta on Windows 7 is the greatest browser on earth. Thank you.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Outstanding. Spellcheck and "paste and go" like Chrome and this would be perfect.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@EricLaw Please make IE9 save web pages in the background. without blocking all the tabs I remember you saying you would change this, but you haven't kept your promise!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Is there still a way to 'reopen last browsing session'? Thanks.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Congrats for this new version! However, it is not true that "IE9 is the first browser to support Aero Snap for tabs". I use Opera and I have had that for a while in released versions of Opera (i.e. not beta). Yes, one thumbnail per tab open, not only one thumbnail for the whole application (this can furthermore be customised in opera:config#UserPrefs|UseWindows7TaskbarThumbnails ).Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Congrats for this new version! However, it is not true that "IE9 is the first browser to support Aero Snap for tabs". I use Opera and I have had that for a while in released versions of Opera (i.e. not beta). Yes, one thumbnail per tab open, not only one thumbnail for the whole application (this can furthermore be customised in opera:config#UserPrefs|UseWindows7TaskbarThumbnails ).Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Jace: At the bottom left of the new tab page is the "reopen last browsing session." @hdw: I have never, ever, made any such claim in any forum. Please stick to the facts (which are that I simply acknowledged your complaint in a previous blog post). Thanks. @Nico: As in IE8, you can middle-click on an inactive tab to close it. Performance of background-tab closure is even faster in IE9 due to some work that the team did. @Stilgar: Yes, you can re-enable the status bar using the View > Toolbars > Status Bar menu. @All: If you want to make your best case when providing UX feedback (or frankly, anything else), please file a bug on Connect and share that bug number in your posting so that others may vote on it.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I agree, you guys did an awesome job, seriously! Your team has made a complete 180... I can't wait for the final release :)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Loving the download manager - and the pop-up notifications at the bottom of the chrome are a really nice touch.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Computer restart required :(Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Alexandre: I think you might not understand what the Windows 7 Aero Snap feature does. Opera 10.6 doesn't have it. Aero Snap support for tabs means that when you drag a single tab out of the browser window to the edge of your monitor, it becomes a half-monitor window snapped to that side of the monitor. Currently, IE9 is the only major browser with that convenience.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Just out of curiosity, why is the "Always use ClearType for HTML" option disabled by default? May it cause some issues? Do you (the IE Team) recommend leaving it disabled or enabling it? Thanks.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Does it support Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (http://www.w3.org/TR/cors/) in the standard XHR way, or it still uses XDomain object?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Cool, CSS support is now about equal to Firefox 3.0. Way to under-deliver, guys! I guess it's better than IE8, but that isn't saying much.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Drake you can click on the arrow next to save and click on save as to pick where you want the file to be saved. Most of the complains I have seen on here (there are some exceptions and some very good suggestions) are from people that are used to and comfortable with the interface from IE8. As for the "lack" of tabs. If your 10 or so tabs you can see at one time without scrolling is too little for you here is one option. (and I know it doesn't work for everyone but I hope it helps some) Pin your favorites (ie the website you use a lot such as youtube, facebook, ect.) on your task bar and group your tabs accordingly this makes finding things very easy (and why it was designed this way) as for your random sites you can have a windows open for that as well. I know this may change the way you browse but like the new interface for Windows 7 I think once you get used to it you will find it faster and better. Also if you need your (file menu) a simple Alt+t should bring it up temporarilyAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Nico Burns If you have a mouse wheel/button3 you can middle click tabs to close them whether they are active or not.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Alexandre: Aero Snap doesn't have anything to do with the thumbnail preview you get when hovering over the IE icon on the taskbar - that's called Aero Peek, and IE8 had that too. Aero Snap is the part where the window can snap to the sides of the screen, and the new stuff here is that you can snap the individual tabs directly, just like you would a window.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Here's the deal. If you are posting on this blog you are the minority of the minority. The tab space is perfectly fine. If you have more than 10 tabs open you are just a pack rat. And yes, I am a power user. Most of you also browse on a wide screen monitor so there shouldn't be a problem.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Cannot be enable InPrivate Filtering by Default for All Internet Explorer 9 Sessions. InPrivate Filtering is not made effective in default in IE9 though as follows was done in IE8. Enable InPrivate Filtering by default
- Launch Regedit.exe and navigate to: HKEY_CURRENT_USER Software Microsoft Internet Explorer Safety PrivacIE If the above branch or its parent does not exist, you need to create the keys manually.
- Create a new DWORD value named StartMode
- Double-click StartMode and set 1 as its data
- Exit the Registry Editor.
Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Marius: No, IE9's XHR object does not support CORS.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
uh oh... I just noticed I can't print shipping labels from eBay or Pay Pal using IE9 :( Must download ff or chrome because i don't want to go back to ie8Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@IE Team: Please consider adding a way to send feedback directly from the browser. I don't want to have to install some Windows Live stuff to be able to fill in a feedback form.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
IE 9 Rocks. Always been a great fan of Microsoft & its professional approach towards their products. Wish I can get into MS team some day!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Firetech, @David S I know we're a minority. I've been using IE8 since beta and I've been loving it. Should I (and the others like me) switch to another browser just because I can't have more than 10 tabs open or should the IE team add an option to move the tabs to a separate bar? I believe they can add this little option for us. Most of the people here are not questioning the default position but the lack of option to switch to what they are used to.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Where's the VPC? I'm assuming this overwrites IE8, which means I can't install this until it's final.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@EricLaw, Michael Madsen: Thank you for your response; I indeed mixed “Aero Peek” and “Aero Snap” together… I should have listened more carefully to the second video :-P However, this Aero Snap for tabs does not look to work so well when I try from a window that has three or more tabs, because the remaining tabs will be over, and therefore hide, the first tab that was extracted. The demo in the second video starts indeed with a window that has exactly two tabs.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@EricLaw re CORS Thanks Eric. All the other browser support CORS in XHR, which helps a lot on building mashups. Seems like you are trying to get things right with IE9, so why do you use a proprietary way of doing CORS?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Trying to install this in an IE8/Vista SP1 VPC image says "Setup doesn't support the Windows service pack version currently installed on your computer." I want to try this out, but you guys aren't making it easy...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Aethec: We do have a way to send feedback directly from the browser. You can go to Gear icon (on the extreme right) > Send Feedback to let us know what you think. Thanks!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Absolutely terrible work. The text rendered by IE9 is unreadable. It's Migraine inducing. FIX THIS THING so reading doesn't make us all sick.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Possible bug: "Cannot display the webpage" when running a localhost Website from Visual Studio 2010 (Ultimate), i.e. just the normal start button in Visual Studio when developing an ASP.NET Web site. It seems to work when I disable the "SmartScreen filter" apparently.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I agree with rjl_austx. Something is really wrong with the text rendering. It's awful.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Where is CSS3 complete features?! Not working on IE9: www.webdesignerwall.com/.../47-amazing-css3-animation-demos ...and HTML5 Forms... Canvas and GPU speed do not solving the "beautiful web". IE9 run slow on old graphics card.. any option to disable? TksAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
If I go to Gear -> Send Feedback, I'm told I need to install "Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant". If I follow the link to install it, I'm told I already have a more recent version. Help? :(Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Others UI elements (e.g. favorites) need to be more consistente with new look. ...and form elements (old and OS like) don't look good on webpages... its time to make form elements clean and "Web 3.0".Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Still missing Firefox like plugin manager and a better plugin development (e.g. .NET). No HTML5 forms and other features, no CSS3 complete features, no new plugin development, ...something is missing...or we are talking about IE8.1 (not IE9)?! IE9 it's late and still missing features...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@ Xepol - In your multimon scenario, here is an example of what you can do. Say your browser is on your leftmost monitor. Drag tab 1 to the edge of the screen to snap it. Then make tab 2 that you want to snap active, and press Windows Key + Right arrow. Windows Key + arrow direction snaps the active window to the edge of the screen. Hope this helps!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The new IE9 is really great! I like the new minimalistic design and the speed of creating a new tab! But I think the text is blurry compared to IE8.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I like the "lack" of in your face dialog for the mixed content warning... it simply doesn't load the insecure content and prompts you at the bottom. However I like it mostly because the IE8 dialog was a mess and completely unusable! ;-) The messages at the bottom are a bit odd though... at the top where the security bar was before made much more sense. Most users will not spot it, as they will only be focusing on the top 50% of the screen (e.g. when I'm surfing the web... if you asked me to close my eyes and tell you what items were on my start bar... I'd have no idea - I'm not looking there) It was sad to see that the existing IE options dialog was un-touched. It was due for massive improvements but got none. Ditto for prompt, and Print preview/settings. The performance dialog for addons is good unfortunately the issue was in IE8 - it appears that IE9 fixed all the issues with new tab speed! Yahoo! Too bad there are so many bugs in the DOM still and missing HTML5 form features.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I love how fast and uncluttered IE9 is, beautiful! There is one major annoyance though in terms of usability: the fact that the Favorite button and Favorites Center appear at the far right side. Yes, I could use Alt-A instead, but please move them back to the left!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I am very pleased with ie9 and am (for now at least) using it as my main browser instead of Chrome. @ericlaw Chrome has, for a long while now, had a feature when you drag a tab to the edge of the screen it would split the screen half and half between the dragged out tab and the window from which it came. This is functionally the same as the aero snap (although the UI is actually more informative - a little folder appears to let you know what's about to happen.)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Wish list If you want an adblocker go to http://simple-adblock.com/ A browser it not going to provide adblocking as standard functionality.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Providing a working VirtualPC image of Vista + IE9 basically would cost Microsoft almost nothing (a few manhours maybe + some bandwidth costs), but would be really useful for web developers.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Andrzey I'm not able to reproduce the problem you described. While the page is frozen are you able to switch to other tabs or create new tabs?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Ericlaw You say that "To pin a site to the task bar when your taskbar is in a non-standard location (E.g. top, left, or right) simply drag the FavIcon out of the address bar rather than dragging the tab button itself" This violates a basic UI interface principle. The bottom location for the taskbar is not "standard", it is just "common". Windows 7 is supposed to work the same regradless of where the taskbar is placed. Things should work the same regardless of where I choose to have my taskbar located. Please fix for the release.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
esson: What is your bug number on Connect? Some ppl might want to vote on it.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Sunil Joshi, how do you turn on that feature in chrome? doesn't work for me in v6. :-(Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
I really like what I am seeing. Everyone remember this is the first beta of a redesign. So I don't expect everything. Now what I like, FINALLY a download manager. That has been one pet peeve I have had for a long time. I still wish it used BITS instead of just a standard browser download. Loosing connection when traveling and having to start over is not fun. But overall so far experience is good. Facebook is fast, Youtube seems fairly quick. Will give more feedback after testing. But nice overall.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
IE 9 is very nice. But what i don't understand is that are some controls, how scrollbar, are not touchable for fingers? WhyAnonymous
September 15, 2010
will you be releasing an IEAK that works with 9 soon?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Where did the small down arrow on the back arrow in IE8 go to? It allows you to jump back directcly to earlier web sites. It is essential because there are some web sites that you get "stuck" on, and can't go back by clicking on the back button. Please fix.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Without wishing to be a bore, revisiting old ground, would MS please, please, please, consider releasing the IE 9 standards based functionality or a sensible subset thereof for Windows XP? The fact is that XP will be around for another 5 years or so in considerable numbers. It would be a shame for the web to be held back by having to support IE8 for that period...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Greg Here are the instructions www.google.com/.../answer.pyAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@EricLaw Some time ago I asked you about the rendering mode of IE 9 WebBrowser control (WebOC) and you mentioned that by default it will continue to be compatible with IE7 (the rendering mode can be changed in registry). Now I have a serious problem with IE 9 WebOC which affects our most important commercial product. We are using the WebBrowser control from .NET to display web pages in Windows Forms and capture a metafile (EMF) screenshot of the web page displayed in browser.Everything was perfect with all the previous versions of IE (up to IE 8). But with IE 9 Beta the captured EMF does not contain any text record even if the test web page contains only text. The generated EMF will contain a raster screenshot image (bitmap) of the web page an no text record. I have the following test project for VS 2010 to reproduce this problem: www.outsidesoftware.com/.../WebBrower_EMF_IE9.zip When this test application starts it will load a simple test page containing only text in the WebBrowser control and then it will capture an EMF screenshot of the web page and it will count the text records in the EMF. With IE 9 Beta, on 32-bit Windows 7, the captured metafile will contain 0 text records. With the previous versions of the browser (IE 8) the EMF will correctly report 12 text records. Is this a known issue? Is it a limitation of the Beta version? Is it something that will be fixed in the final version of IE 9? I see no reason to make any change in the way the web browser writes the content in EMF since the default rendering mode of IE 9 WebOC is IE7. Please try to download and run the test application from the URL I indicated to reproduce the problem and let me know if there is any solution to maintain the backward compatibility with the previous versions of IE. Thank you very much.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@RyanLM Try to disable the "Smart Screen Filter" to get IE9 to find your localhost when running it from Visual Studio. It worked for me. It would be nice to have a proper fix though.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@easson: While the status bar is not visible by default, you can make it visible and get your zoom controls back where you're used to having them - just right-click near the icons in the top right and enable the status bar. You can also control the zoom level using Gear icon > Zoom.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The fonts look horrible. I double checked to make sure cleartype is disabled in html, but it is obviously not. Running Windows 7 with "Smooth edges of screen fonts" disabled in the Advanced system settings performance dialog. I check my default font to make sure its still Times New Roman, and it is.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Firefox 4 explained layout: wiki.mozilla.org/.../Direction_and_FeedbackAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@easson - To access the menu that used to be in the arrow next to the back/forward buttons, you can either right click on the buttons, or press and hold on the buttons for the menu to appear. For the zoom controls, you can click on the Tools button and select your Zoom level from there. If you prefer the Status Bar, press Alt > View > Toolbars > Status Bar. Ctrl + / - as well as Ctrl + Mouse Scrollwheel also change your zoom settings. Hope this helps.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@easson: To adjust Zoom, click the Gear icon and use the Zoom menu. Alternatively, hit CTRL+Plus or CTRL+Minus. While the travel log feature is definitely useful for power users, as you might imagine, few users ever use it. To invoke the travel log function (e.g. what used to be the dropdown next to the back/forward buttons) simply right click (or hold down the left mouse button) over top of the back or forward buttons. @Sunil: Thanks for the clarification. I never noticed that you could drag Chrome's tabs to "magic" spots to get this behavior.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@LouisMa Thanks. Those suggestions work OK. They are, however, a lot less intuitive than in IE8. Any chance of a "power user" mode or somrthing like that, that will make these highly useful operations for power users more obvious in the UI?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@fchivu: Please file a bug on Connect and attach your sample project. That's the best way to ensure that your issue is tracked and gets proper follow-up.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
It would appear the Send Feedback option is not working correctly for me. I have the WLID Assistant installed. However, when clicking the Feedback button, absolutely nothing happens. Am I missing something or is it currently broken?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I'm really glad you fixed that "iexplore.exe still running for 30 seconds after exiting" bug! Thanks!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
"And for developers, IE9 delivers excellent support for HTML5 and other modern standards, so the same markup works across more browsers, and the web is more interoperable." I'd like to believe the web is more interoperable but this very blog doesn't even have its videos available in a WebM version. It just seems.. disingenuous.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Something is wrong on the printing side. To print a webpage that sends 450k from ie8, ie9 beta is sending a 92MB file! Makes printing essentially useless since the printer has to parse so much. What is up with that?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I am also having problems with "Send Feedback". So IE9 told me to get Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant 6.5 (wllogin_64). When I tried installing this, it says "You already have the latest version". Well I guess IE9 team will not receive any feedback at all, what a wasted Beta Release with no feedback from users... I am just hoping Windows Update can fix this soon!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Great job, beauty design, let's see how its got to us!!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Overall I'm very impressed. I have a few suggestions, though:
- Hovering over the location bar should show the entire URL. I instinctively keep doing this and it seems weird that it doesn't work.
- Our internet is a bit slow and I never know whether a site is loading or not. At least keep the tab spinner turning until it's finished so I know something's happening.
- Where's the built- in spellchecking? It's 2010 and all the other browsers have this. This is a MUST-HAVE feature, IMO.
- Hovering over the taskbar previews should change the whole browser window, not just the content area. Currently, I keep thinking: "I didn't know that page had that on it... Oh, wait...". Firefox 4 has a very nice implementation of this.
- I would have used the built-in "Send feedback" option, but it said I needed the Windows Live sign-in assistant, and when I tried to install it, it said I already had a newer version. I think this has something to do with the Windows Live Essentials beta I have installed.
- Lastly, I sure hope someone at Microsoft reads these comments and passes along the feedback... Great job on the speed, standards support, and download manager :-) Hopefully some of my suggestions can make it into the next beta...
Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@TheTechFan: I agree with you, especially on points 1 and 2. It would be nice to have that tooltip that appears in the bottom left corner of the window also when hovering over the address bar.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
More feedback: opening a link in the background (middle click) freezes the current frame (until the new frame has loaded). This makes my browsing experience very frustrating (switching back to chrome for now on the back of this one thing). Please make it kick off the new tab on a background thread rather than freezing any UI to do it.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Possible table layout bug in XHTML (application/html+xml), when omitting tbody. Test case: alexandre.alapetite.fr/.../20100915-XHTML-tbody.htmlAnonymous
September 15, 2010
I can't log in to the Send Feedback tool.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I'm looking forward to IE9 beta but I was told by Darryl Burling (MSNZ) that it upgrades IE8 on Win7 to IE9 beta. During the IE9 Platform Preview, it was able to be installed side-by-side with IE8 without a hitch. Why can't IE9 beta be able to install side-by-side along with IE8 (or IE7 on Vista for that matter even). Firefox 4.0 (all up to beta5) can be installed along side with existing Firefox! I was hoping to give IE9 beta a good test along side with IE8 that I know it isn't buggy. Any thought of making IE9 running sxs with existing IE8/7??Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Miguel: Have you seen the video showing IE9 occupies less space (and more for content) compared with Google Chrome? You should compare them side by side.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I think, that TABS ON TOP are the best choice... WHY?! It makes sense, in real world, to have a software correct UI hierarchy, where the controls are tab specific The things discussed in the following link are there for a reason: wiki.mozilla.org/.../Direction_and_Feedback - Firefox Theme/UI Proposed DirectionAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Since I can't leave feedback, I've noticed on some forums like EVGA's forum (www.evga.com/forums/) in the area where you reply to messages - the toolbar flickers in simple and full mode. It doesn't do this in other browsers like Opera.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
If anyone is getting the crash, restart loop, there is a workaround on the Connect site which turns off hardware rendering: connect.microsoft.com/.../repeatedly-crashing-and-no-images-loadingAnonymous
September 15, 2010
IE9 is great, the gpu acceleration rocks. Love the html5, svg, css 3, canvas, video, js engine, etc. One problem, fonts look terrible on some sites, for instance www.dailyrotation.com (try the site with the different background color options, like blue) and www.techreport.com - this really needs to be fixed, the most important thing about a browser is reading and reading pages in IE9 is quite irritating right now because of ugly/blurry fonts.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@thenonhacker - Maybe you're right, but I think that tabs on rigth are bad for small resolution screens. Because tabs are going to be smaller. I just hope that, not following some good ideias, from Chrome or Opera or even Firefox, won't stop users from upgrading from IE older versions. Because the layout looks cool and beautifull... but I don't know yet about usability. That's really dificult to achive. And I think that Chrome achives both and mantains a UI Hierarquical. And for me It makes sense. Event so ... It's a very cool job from IE team.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@gui is a disaster: TBH, I like the GUI. It's obvious some people can't adjust to change but get used to it. Change is everywhere.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
FEEDBACK: I can't use the feedback tool. FEEDBACK for IE9: If I pin the Favorites Center, it does not appear at the right side (right below the View Favorites Button). The Favorites Center, History, RSS, etc... should be docked at the right side by default. Today, it's weird seeing the dropped-down Favorites Center on right flying to the left when I dock it.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Please implement a meta-tag that allows developers to hide the address bar, navigation buttons and tools buttons on pinned sites. In order to achive a native web app experience the browser should only show the title bar and the content - like Chrome does in Application Mode. It is the only way to give users a feeling of using native apps - otherwise it will remain a browser.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Rob: actually that's a good idea; a tab list dropdown would solve (or at least mitigate) some of the usability issues regarding the tab bar/space being small.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
FEEDBACK: The Tools Menu needs work. You have to see the Firefox 4 Beta Menu, they did a great job. It is inspired by the 2-column Windows Start Menu, and Office 2007. I think you should do the same. SCREENSHOT: www.techreport.com/.../ff4-beta5-il.jpg You got one shot on improving the Tools Menu, now is your chance!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
FEEDBACK: It would be great if you adapt the Zooming Scrollbar in the Microsoft Labs Pivot application. It shouldn't be a problem now that IE9 is GPU-Accelerated. SCREENSHOT: Click the 2nd screenshot in this article: www.mikealt.com/.../going-for-a-scroll-with-micosoft-pivotAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The Opera browser, always was a good example for inovation. For example, I porpose to IE team to try for a weak Opera and then swith to IE9. Then you will see that you miss some features from Opera Browser. Like: * browsing with Opera in slow networks (opera turbo fixes this) * Opening tabs in background * etc ...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
PRO: Almost everything CONTRA: I have also the issue with text rendering, causes migrane and a terrible headache,... had (although I really love IE9) to do a system restore,... still I have a blurred vision. System: W764 Nvidia Graphics,...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Drake - Not sure where you read that it is "integrated with the Downloads folder" but basically it means that the Downloads folder on Windows is the default location for your downloads. You can always pick another location by using the "Save as" option under the "Save" dropdown in the notification bar. In addition, you can customize your default downloads folder by clicking on "Options" in the Download Manager Regarding open with - this option is avalable post download in the download manager for any non executable :) @Drake and RyanLM The speed is in the tooltip as we saw from user studies that people were more focussed on the estimated time remaining. In order to clean up the UI and reduce concepts, we removed it top level UI but still kept it in the tooltip. Moreoever, we optimized for the common case which were quick downloads where the transfer speed is less important. The limitation is that the tooltip is not dynamically updated and that you need to hover away and hover back. @frymaster the notification bar notifies you when the download completes provided this setting is checked in the download manager options - "Notify me when downloads complete" Since we respect your IE8 settings, it is possible that this setting migrated from IE8 where you had it unchecked You can access the download manager from the "tools" option in the command bar and the file menu @Xepol Not sure why you are not seeing the percentage. You should be able to see the percentage and the estimated time remaining. And when we do not know the file size before hand, we do show the amount downloaded. Please point me to the site where you saw this behavior. We took away the progress bar to reduce progress indications overall and keep the users focus on their browsing so that "sites shine". The IE icon on the task bar shows the progress with a green wipe that stretches across it - similar to a progress barAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Congratulations, IE team! I made a Tagxedo -- word cloud with shape -- using this IE9 announcement and the shape of the Internet Explorer logo. Hope you like it! http://i.imgur.com/NhB0P.jpg An interactive version is here: www.tagxedo.com/.../eff28af768cd4f3eAnonymous
September 15, 2010
After testing the beta here's some (more) feedback: SUGGESTIONS: • In the Home Page options change the [Use Current] to a combo-button with "Use Currently Active Tab" and "Use Current Set of Tabs" as options. • Rename "Delete browsing history on exit" to "Delete selected history items when exiting" then rename the [Delete...] button to [Choose History Items...]. Current phrasing makes it sound as though it's just the History list affected by this feature. • I'd like to see "Custom Compatibility View Entries" added to the Delete Browsing History selectable items. I like to keep my history erased for maximum browser performance but this also clears the list of sites manually added to Compatibility View which I want to keep! • "Use most recent order when switching tabs with Ctrl+Tab" still tucked-away on the Advanced tab and not logically in the Tabbed Browsing Settings with all other tab-related options. • "Empty Temporary Internet Files folder when the browser is closed" still exists under the options on the Advanced tab even though this setting is also available in the Delete Browsing History dialog. Isn't it now redundant, doing the same thing? • The Reset Internet Explorer Settings dialog might be good if you could choose manually via checkboxes which elements to reset (e.g. Search Providers list or Accelerators) but then not affect other settings.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Miguel Web Developer IE8 already provides an option to open new tabs in the background ala-Opera. Simply untick "Always switch to new tabs when they are created" then middle-click links on a site until your heart's content. :) @RitikaV [MSFT] That phrasing was on Paul Thurrot's Supersite for Windows review of IE9 Public Beta, but someone has explained the tooltip already, thanks anyway. I'd still prefer an option to add a column with this. And to see amount left to download, not just original total and done so far.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@Srsly?? Of course I use CTRL+F, yes: along with CTRL+E, ALT+D, CTRL+F4 and CTRL+TAB regularly. But there are some users who don't always know these shortcuts exist and so will wonder where to find this feature. To say that any of my feedback is questionable just based on this one point is being quite snide, too. I'm sure many people to this blog will appreciate most of it as being valid -- especially when compared to the other usual "why won't you support XP", "[insert browser here] has been doing this since [insert year here]" and "sorry, have you heard of Linux" comments that add nothing to the discussion.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
<<To access the menu that used to be in the arrow next to the back/forward buttons, you can either right click on the buttons...>> Right-click on a button?! Do the GUI designers know what a button is? A software button is something that looks clickable...and that you click on. This UI is an inflexible mess and still manages to look old. Speaking of old, the UI ignores demographics. While Microsoft UI designers are clearly getting younger, the rest of us are getting older. Poor font treatment and lack of text options for control labels are surprising.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
IE9 seems unable to load an SVG file via the object tag or embed tag anymore. This is a regression from IE9p4Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Bruce: Repro URL please?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@ Brett Merkey Hear hear!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
So that's how you plan to make the last IE6 users to migrate to IE9 by changing the icon's bluish tone back to the 90's blue?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Regarding text rendering in IE9 beta, it uses DirectWrite there, doesn't it? Which reminds me of these two cases: connect.microsoft.com/.../wpf-text-renderer-produces-badly-blurred-text-on-small-font-sizes forums.steampowered.com/.../showthread.phpAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
> Sometimes, and in this case our point of view is, “just works” involves fewer options and staying out of the user’s way. I read this with Steve Jobs' voice.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
OK, I can't seem to get the "Send Feedback" to work... says I don't have Windows Live ID Signin Assistant installed (which I definitely do)... Windows 7 x64, Windows Live Essentials 2011 Beta installed... I hate the back button. I hate the still bird egg blue "menu" for the Favorites/Command bar. I hate the font rendering right now... on smaller text it just looks HORRIBLE! I wish the Add-Ons Manager had the ability to forcefully REMOVE add-ons, not just enable/disable them. I've had quite a few sites that render poorly (Microsoft Technet subscription renewal) or don't render at all (Gateworld.net), but 99% works great. BUT, those handful of negatives aside, the experience overall is quite favorable so far. It's fast... wicked fast! I like the download manager, and the web app concept is awesome! Keep up the great work, you're headed in the right direction! Fast, lightweight, and truly usable! :)Anonymous
September 15, 2010
MSFT, no comment on the text/font rendering? Please look at this: home.comcast.net/.../ie9vschrometext.png <- a picture of chrome v7 and IE9 beta side by side displaying the web page 'www.dailyrotation.com' - IE9's text rendering is totally atrocious. At least tell us if this is a fixable issue or something wrong with my system or what not. System is Core i7 965, gigabyte x58 mobo, 12GBs ram, evga gtx 480, windows 7 x64.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I've been playing around with the developer tools, and am very impressed by the performance. For the first time in a number of years, I can honestly say I am looking forward to developing for IE.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
@GoodThings2Life You can uninstall add-ons through the Add/Remove Programs window. I should also point out that a disabled add-on no longer runs code and will not affect your browser in any way.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I love it, will use it. Well done ! By the way, no support to WEB SQL DATABASE?Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@James Gentile We are looking into the text rendering issues and will address it in a future update. In the mean time, please try the Cleartype text tuner in Windows 7.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@S Kleckner IE9 Beta does sometimes create large spool files - this is a known bug and will be addressed in a future update. Which web site were you printing? Thanks!Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Bruce: ericlaw at microsoft.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Whatever happened to the download progess bar in Downloads windows and Windows 7 taskbar??Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Nice to see that the tabs open a bit faster than in previous versions. Definitely enjoying the speed. Also good to see that the notifications have been fixed. However, it's hardly a step ahead of other browsers. At least progress is being made, I guess. Also, IE9 seems to be having a problem detecting the Arial font - it's using Arial Italic instead. My other browsers aren't doing this, so it's obviously a problem with IE. What's with this? Meh, I'll try restarting my computer after writing this. If that doesn't work, then I guess it hardly matters because I won't be using IE as my browser anyway.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I love the pin to taskbar feature. But when I pin Facebook to the task bar the tasks don't show up as they should, i.e, News, Events, Messages etc. Twitter works fine though.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Definitely good looking but anyway Firefox 4 Pwns... IE is a bit Toooooooo slow...Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The UI approach is bad, the address bar should be contained inside the tab area (like Chrome and Firefox 4 do) and this is why: blog.mozilla.com/.../why-tabs-are-on-top-in-firefox-4Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Apart from what users already said, I was very used to creating .URL files inside folders on my system, by simply drag'n dropping from the address bar's favicon to an open folder in Win Explorer. Now it only saves it as .WEBSITE files, which are not recognized by any other browser. I also dislike the behavior (since IE 8) that every typed site will automatically be recorded to the address bar drop-down list after hitting Enter. In IE 8, while typing the address I could select the last entry ("go to url") and it wouldn't be recorded there. No more possible it seems. Why I don't like this behavior? Because the drop-down list can record a very low number of sites, and if I want to keep a list of frequent sites there, every site added after the limit will remove one site from the list. Also, lots of redraw bugs related to GPU Rendering, especially when changing between tabs. I think it also increases memory usage a lot when opening multimedia-intensive sites or very long pages, in this case, tab crashes also happens. Fonts are also very blurred here. Cleartype is well configured, i.e. no problem with other programs/browsers. (I'm testing in Win Vista). Please polish UI, especially in the matter of integration of additional toolbars (e.g. Command Toolbar), that are very useful to power-users and web-designers. Time to make them Aero-compatible! Or, at least, why not use some theme (e.g. Office/Expression theme) for those interface bars/panels? Search Bar is a good time-saver and Address Bar separated from Tab Bar is way too essential to be missed this way. [My bet: at next Beta Microsoft will say: "We heard you again. We are bringing back Tab Bar isolated from Address Bar"]Anonymous
September 15, 2010
I have always been amazed by Microsoft Technologies. This browser is by far the best with regards to first impression. I have downloaded it only an hour before. But I am sure, it will work well. I find this new browser to be a combination of Chrome in terms of performance and Safari in terms of looks.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Ricardo If you rename any .WEBSITE file to .URL they function again as per a standard link. You will need to rename using the Command Prompt though (or use a patched version of the old File Manager from Windows NT 4.0 SP6) as they are treated in the Windows Shell as special files and so it is not possible to see their extensions in Windows Explorer even if "Hide file extensions for known file types" is turned off.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@Frank Olivier [MSFT] - a page from Amazon.comAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The back and forward button kinda reminds me about Firefox 3.6 :/Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Also, just noticing the status bar isn't as useful as it was before. In IE8, you could enable/disable/change settings on SmartScreen, plus there were about five or six icons that would appear (or not) depending on status. I liked that. Maybe add that back please? Most people won't use the status bar, but for those of us that like it, it should be as useful as IE8 at least.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
Would like to continue testing the beta, however, cannot until fonts are rendered better. Right now text it just way too blurry and disabling hardware rendering, doesn't change this. Gave it a couple of tries, but can only take reading anything in IE9 for a few minutes, had to uninstall and go back to IE8. Hopefully this can be fixed in another beta.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
@MarkM: You can uninstall IE9 and go back to IE8 by using the "View installed updates" link in the Add/Remove Programs applet of the system control panel.Anonymous
September 15, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 15, 2010
Congratulations on the beta release team IE, but when do you plan to support the HTML5 History API? http://html5demos.com/history/Anonymous
September 16, 2010
@S Kleckner: Follow up question to the printer spool size issue. What printer do you have? Make/model. Second, do you have printing of back ground images enabled? (Print->Page Setup and look for the item 'Print background images and colors'. Thanks.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Put back the transfer rate, please! Thanks!Anonymous
September 16, 2010
@EricLaw An SVG file will load via the object or embed tag in IE9 beta. In the preview you could force the IE9 render mode via the toolbar but you can't in IE 9 beta. You must make sure you have the <!DOCTYPE html> tag in the document.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Bruce: The IE9 Beta Developer Tools absolutely should let you force the render mode. If that's not working for you, please file a bug. Of course, you should specify the document type in the page since you don't want users to have to manually change the rendering mode.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Given that web sites now become "apps" in Windows7 it would be nice if Windows Desktop Search could index those apps just as they do regular apps (e.g. email clients). Imagine going to the start menu and searching through the tweets of all the people I follow. THAT would be cool. Just a little idea for you.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
When I go to connect.microsoft.com/.../SearchResults.aspx to see the existing tickets for IE9 (to vote for them), there's nothing. When I go to front page (connect.microsoft.com/.../Feedback), I see the last 10 ones, but these are not the ones I need. In the meantime, can those people who created tickets for 1) separate tab bar, and 2) blurry text, link directly to them in a comment here?Anonymous
September 16, 2010
I just successfully took IE8/Vista SP1 VPC, updated it to Vista SP2, and installed IE9 on it. I will be very sad when this VPC image stops working. Please create an IE9 VPC image, or at least update the IE8/Vista one to SP2!Anonymous
September 16, 2010
There is a nice little music manager called MusicBee that is under active development by it's creator. IE 9 has broken the UI with many graphical glitches. They are only present if IE 9 is installed. Problems include clipping, artifacts, and window selection areas remaining on the screen. Musicbee uses XULRunner for the web browser, so the web browser integration is not a problem. Are there any dlls that have changed that could be the source of the problem. If any dev can take the time to install it (it's free) and poke around, that would be great.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Just a warning in case you rely on Yahoo Messenger--installing IE9 appears to break it. Instant Message appear blank. I'm running 10.0.0.1102 at the moment.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Ryan, it might be the same problem MusicBee is having.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Great... looks nice and i want to try it out, only its not for vista without service packs (which dont want to install at my pc for some reason...)Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Answering my own question... here are the links to Connect tickets for tab bar position, and for blurry text. There is a bunch of different ones for both already, so I've picked those with highest number of upvotes so far. connect.microsoft.com/.../need-tabs-under-the-address-bar connect.microsoft.com/.../font-rendering-is-worse-in-ie9-than-ie8Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Any chance that the beautyoftheweb site will eventually work? There is a link to it on the MS Homepage but it does not work. You guys better get Bill Gates back in and sort the place out.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 16, 2010
When did choice and preferences become a bad thing ? Docking zones and dragable control groups... let the user decide the best layout and arrangment of the controls, and don't hand people such an easy reason to reject the product.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Wow. IE 9 is very good and much faster than its predecessor.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
Please, make installer with everything included when you do RTM. Downloading something when installing is not so good. Other than that I dont like new icon. Looks really bad, too washed.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
ie9 has improved in speed and simplicity, but is far from good enough, here are my wishes
- I wish more bookmarks on a page in tabs groups. I think 36 bookmarks are adequate. ie9 team schould look at then "speed dial "plug in for chrome. here you can costumise bookmarks. It should be the same in ei9
- apple website with quicktime plugin is still slow when loaded why can iu not be faster. It is no microsoft defends itself with it is a 3rd party product. It works faster in all other browsers, chrome, firefox safari etc.
- Firefox Panorama, has anything microsoft also must implement in ie9. It is a completely gineal things that are so useful. It must be such that when closed ie9 remembers which organized groups of tabs you have chosen regards Kim H, denmark
Anonymous
September 16, 2010
I like the simplicity, IE9 is a very fun browser to use over all. A couple of things I would add: Per site Scripting like Per Site Active-X Allow IE9 x64 to be the default, and allow IE9 x64 to open pinned sites. Fix the font rendering on some sites (as I already noted.) Other than that, it's really a great product, thanks for the hard work.Anonymous
September 16, 2010
I think is perfectAnonymous
September 16, 2010
IE9 Beta is increasing my laptops' startup and shutdown time significantly. if i uninstall it, things are back to normal. Re-install, lots of waiting. Anyone else see this behaviour?Anonymous
September 17, 2010
@Dan Plaster: HP Laserjet 4200 PS Print Background Colors and Images is NOT checked.Anonymous
September 17, 2010
Another 2 cents. Make it possible to remove "compatibility view" button. Make inprivate filtering usefull without registry tweaking - make it remember last setting. If I turned this on I want it to stay on unless I turn it off, not until I close browser.Anonymous
September 17, 2010
I just tried IE 9.. don't like it. It scores 96 points out of 300 on HTML 5 test - http://www.html5test.com/ I wouldn't release such a product, it would downgrade company's reputation.Anonymous
September 17, 2010
The so-called HTML5 test is garbage. It uses user-agent sniffing and tests a bunch of things that are not really html5. IE9 smokes other browsers on real-world stuff.Anonymous
September 17, 2010
Congrats -- looking forward to the competition this spurs, and to what's in IE9.5 or 10. :)Anonymous
September 17, 2010
@S Kleckner: Thanks for that information. We have reproduced the large spool size issue with your specific printer and confirmed it is the known issue we thought it was (that is good) and that Frank Oliver mentioned (above) that will be addressed in a future update. Thanks for the cooperation tracing this issue down.Anonymous
September 17, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 17, 2010
@Steven Fuqua, @thenonhacker, @TheTechFan, @Sebastian, @rbridgeman, @GoodThings2Life, @Markus Thank you for installing the IE9 Beta and helping us to make it better through your feedback! We have identified an issue with the Send Feedback tool for users of the IE9 Beta on 64-bit versions of Windows 7, Vista, and Server 2008 who have also installed the Windows Live Essentials Beta. Enhancements made to the Windows Live Essential Beta prevent the Feedback tool from running – you will receive a message entitled “Please install the Windows Live ID Sign-in Assistant” with a link to ”Get the Windows Live ID Sign-In Assistant”. When you try to download and install from the link, it will say you already have a more recent version installed. This issue has been reported by users in Connect, and we will update those bugs as we investigate the issue. To provide the IE team with your feedback, go directly to the IE Feedback Program (connect.microsoft.com/ie) on Microsoft Connect. This is the same location where all entries from the Feedback Tool are logged. You can use it to view, edit, and comment on bugs, and to see the results of our investigation. You need to register on Connect to use the Send Feedback tool and the IE Feedback Program. Registering is a quick and easy process described here: connect.microsoft.com/.../content.aspx. Once registered, you can go directly to the Feedback page (connect.microsoft.com/.../feedback), search for your issue, and submit new feedback if it is not found. The Feedback page has additional information on the process. Your feedback is very important to us and much appreciated. Thank you for taking the time to let us know about your experiences with the IE9 Beta. Justin Saint Clair Program Manager, Internet Explorer @All (@Authec, @AdamR, etc) For those of you for whom the feedback tool simply isn't running, you should similarly go to connect.microsoft.com/ie. In addition to logging your original feedback, we'd like more information on your experience with the Send Feedback tool so that we can troubleshoot those issues.Anonymous
September 18, 2010
"While tabs are central to the browsing experience, over 97% of IE sessions have 5 or fewer tabs, and more than 90% of users have never had more than 8 tabs open at once." At the time i was reading it on my iTouch's RSS reader. i didn't look closely at the screenshots, so i didn't see the address bar/tab position changes. When i first read this i thought to myself, "Okay, as long as you don't remove the space available for tabs. Just cause the majority of users don't have more than 8 tabs open - doesn't mean that i don't. Just don't change the UI based on that assumption." Now that i've seen the IE9 beta, and the cramming of the address bar and tabs into one row... ...i'll just let the rest of the world's mad out-cry speak for me. But i thought it was ironic that i predicted the very UI change that i didn't want; based simply on the very mention of an interesting piece of telemetry.Anonymous
September 18, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 18, 2010
is it going to support 2d transform, text shadow, multicolumn layout and any other css3 features?Anonymous
September 18, 2010
In ie9 beta, proxy settings failure, Winodws 2008+IE9 Beta,and in ie8 normal. Internet options > connection > LAN Settings > Proxy Server > Advanced ... > sockets:127.0.0.1:7070Anonymous
September 19, 2010
@Shane: I'm not sure what you're asking. If you don't know why your proxy settings are set that way, you should switch them back to "No proxy" and scan your computer for malware. Other than web debugging software and perhaps old "web accelerator" software, the most common reason that a proxy setting is set to 127.0.0.1 (your own computer) is because malware is installed on your computer. @cartman: IE9 Beta many CSS3 features, which you can read about here: msdn.microsoft.com/.../ff468705.aspxAnonymous
September 19, 2010
hey thanks eric. yes i saw that link before. my question is IE9 final going to incorporate 2d transform, text shadow, multicolumn support since Firefox and Chrome already have it. i know IE9 is still in beta so I'm hoping you guys would add those css3 features in the final version plus other ones which arent available in the beta.Anonymous
September 19, 2010
Hi, i have 2 pc's with win7, i instaled ie9 on both, but Aero Snap Tabs only works in one, i already uninstaled and installed again but it just wont work, any ideas what can it be?Anonymous
September 19, 2010
The translucent bar where the tabs are displayed makes it very difficult to see the inactive tabs when the desktop is a dark color (mine is black). I often have a dozen tabs open. I prefer the look of IE9 on my netbook which doesn't have Aero. All the tabs are easily visitlble.Anonymous
September 20, 2010
this is, well i have to say, a chrome OEMAnonymous
September 23, 2010
I have set Google as primary search provider. Some of my searches takes me directly to a website instead of showing the search result in Google. How do I turn this off?? For example searching for "internet explorer" takes me directly to www.microsoft.com/.../default.aspx (I live in Denmark).Anonymous
September 24, 2010
The comment has been removedAnonymous
September 25, 2010
I usually have I have 5 or 6 tabs opened... And in my view, there is a lot of blank space up the tabs doing nothing. something it's optimized yet! Should tabs go that space left?