Microsoft preps IE 7 Beta 3 for August

[sarcle]

After years of letting Internet Explorer 6 languish with no new development, prompting criticism from both outside and inside (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060102-5880.html) the company, Microsoft promised that they would shift their priorities and deliver a steady stream of updates to their venerable browser. The company released IE 7 Beta 1 (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060131-6085.html) to the public in January. While some applauded the new features, others were perplexed by the bizarre user interface arrangement—specifically, the menu bar being sandwiched between the address bar and the tab bar. Some felt that the browser was still playing catch-up to competitors such as Firefox.
Beta 2 went public (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060425-6674.html) in April, after Microsoft announced that the layout and rendering engine for IE 7 was "feature complete" and that no new changes, other than bug fixes, would be made outside of the user interface.


Now Microsoft is preparing a third beta, to be released some time in August. The extended beta period seems to have been prompted by compatibility issues that users have found with the first two IE 7 betas. One such issue, described in great detail on Microsoft's IEBlog (http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/default.aspx), involved a problem where the browser would sometimes reload CAPTCHA (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060407-6554.html) images (character recognition tests used to fool spambots) when a network connection was idle: Eric Lawrence of Microsoft stated that "for compatibility reasons, we're going to revert to IE6 behavior for IE7 Beta 3 to prevent this exact issue."
The Beta 3 release is expected to fix problems with some of the new features, such as the integrated RSS reader. Beta 3 will add an ability to control whether or not an article is marked as read. However, don't expect any major interface changes. According to an interview (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/chats/transcripts/06_0511_ez_ie.mspx) with IE 7 developers, there will be no new abilities to customize the interface, for example to put buttons and menus in customizable locations:
"Unfortunately, extensibility in IE7 is not where we want it to be," said Microsoft's Max Stevens, lead program manager in charge of IE 7's user interface. "We don't expect there to be many changes between now and ship, though this is definitely an area we're investigating for our next release."
The final release of IE 7 is expected to be some time this winter, and Microsoft has promised continual updates each year thereafter, starting with IE8, which will contain new networking and rendering features.


http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20060602-6978.html


I've got one thing to say.

You've got to be fucking kidding me!

[alpha]

winter? aka early next year.

[Drewbert]

When something is REALLY broken, it usually means you're better off dismantling it and re-building it from scratch.

Oh, you've done that already and it still doesn't work, huh?

Watching this is like watching an episode of "Build or Bust".

[burnsinternet]

*sigh* I hate to say it, but I actually had faith in those guys. There was no way they would make us sit through Beta 3. No way!

[mulligan]

If it was a small struggling company with a staff of 2, no budget, no electricity, outside toilets, 56K modem, unpaved roads, leaking roof, only one arm per employee with 2 fingers per arm, with one eye to share between them, using an old IBM WITH 8 bytes of memory I could MAYBE understand it.

But they're not.............

[Explorer]

Let's just hope there is no Beta 4.

[burnsinternet]

If it was a small struggling company with a staff of 2, no budget, no electricity, outside toilets, 56K modem, unpaved roads, leaking roof, only one arm per employee with 2 fingers per arm, with one eye to share between them, using an old IBM WITH 8 bytes of memory I could MAYBE understand it.

But they're not.............

Thanks, Mulligan. That actually made me feel better! :p

Let's just hope there is no Beta 4.

My fear is that they will just buy Firefox to save time and $$.

[Drewbert]

Take a look at Microsoft's downloads page - http://g.msn.com/mh_mshp/98765?09769308&http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/search.aspx&&HL=Downloads&CM=Navigation&CE=Resources - heavy "beta" territory.

Take a look at Apple's page - http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/

[gammascalper]

If it was a small struggling company with a staff of 2, no budget, no electricity, outside toilets, 56K modem, unpaved roads, leaking roof, only one arm per employee with 2 fingers per arm, with one eye to share between them, using an old IBM WITH 8 bytes of memory I could MAYBE understand it.


Stop making fun of my operation.

[IDNCowboy]

MS Products have always been 100% betaware :P ::sarcasm::

[burnsinternet]

From: http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2006/04/24/582546.aspx

What’s next? Windows Vista Beta 2, and then Beta 3 of IE7, release candidates, and then a final release before end of year.

[touchring]

Let's just hope there is no Beta 4.


The beta can end once i finish my registrations. :)

[mulligan]

Stop making fun of my operation.

Only difference between you and them is you have more staff...:p

[gammascalper]

Only difference between you and them is you have more staff...:p

hehe -- don't forget I added an extra 16k card to the motherboard. Cost me $500. I skipped the sound card.

[bwhhisc]

hehe -- I skipped the sound card.

No sound! How will you handle the auditon process for your adult video content auditions! Or was that Sarcle? lol

MICROSOFT: You have gone soft! GYST

[sarcle]

No sound! How will you handle the auditon process for your adult video content auditions! Or was that Sarcle? lol

MICROSOFT: You have gone soft! GYST

Lol. Yeah. Microsoft is screwing up my porn business. :)

All I know is those that are still buying tons of names hoping the full IE7 release was in July or August this year better hold some money back and make sure their renewals coming up for this year are paid up through at least the end of January 07.

And by all means, not that it will do any good. Write some emails demanding the full release of IE7 sooner to Microsoft. Write them everyday if you can.

And for the final thought of today.

Bill is a Bitch.

Here is a little present for him

[/URL]http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/5043/tampons1fs.jpg[URL="http://images.google.com/images?q=tbn:SScYOhdxxtuDtM:news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/635000/images/_636547_tampax300.jpg"] (http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/635000/images/_636547_tampax300.jpg&imgrefurl=http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/health/newsid_636000/636547.stm&h=180&w=300&sz=15&tbnid=SScYOhdxxtuDtM:&tbnh=66&tbnw=111&hl=en&start=5&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtampons%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DN)

[touchring]

Lol. Yeah. Microsoft is screwing up my porn business. :)

All I know is those that are still buying tons of names hoping the full IE7 release was in July or August this year better hold some money back and make sure their renewals coming up for this year are paid up through at least the end of January 07.

And by all means, not that it will do any good. Write some emails demanding the full release of IE7 sooner to Microsoft. Write them everyday if you can.

And for the final thought of today.

Bill is a Bitch.

Here is a little present for him

[/URL]http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/5043/tampons1fs.jpg[URL="http://images.google.com/images?q=tbn:SScYOhdxxtuDtM:news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/635000/images/_636547_tampax300.jpg"] (http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/635000/images/_636547_tampax300.jpg&imgrefurl=http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/health/newsid_636000/636547.stm&h=180&w=300&sz=15&tbnid=SScYOhdxxtuDtM:&tbnh=66&tbnw=111&hl=en&start=5&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtampons%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26sa%3DN)


Unless the upgrade is automatically downloaded, it will take at least 2 years before large scale adoption of the new browser happens.

[IDNCowboy]

Unless the upgrade is automatically downloaded, it will take at least 2 years before large scale adoption of the new browser happens.
I'm surprised that MS hardly ever totes IDN features in IE 7 :(

They mention it once or twice in the blog but most of the updates are on other stuff.

darn

[idn1234]

Hey guys, this is disturbing news to be sure,
and in times of uncertainty like this I always
like to consult my Crystal Ball...

It told me that:

a) Beta 12 can be expected sometime in the
'second half' of 2008.

b) Bill Gates will be assassinated in downtown
Seattle at some point in the 'first half' of 2008
(it will later be discovered that the assassin is
a disgruntled IDN'er, who couldn't keep up with
reg. fees).

c) The Chinese Govt. couldn't wait any longer
for idn, so employed a group of unemployed
school-leavers and massage parlour attendants
to make a competing browser (apparently, it
works just fine; and it even manages not to
write over Google search!).

:-)

[bwhhisc]

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/default.mspx

And the latest info on VISTA is early winter release. Look under "Features" on above site and it mentions "enhancing" the IE7 experience but nothing more.

[IDNCowboy]

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/default.mspx

And the latest info on VISTA is early winter release. Look under "Features" on above site and it mentions "enhancing" the IE7 experience but nothing more.
yea its been stated that vista may be released with IE7+ (the + version with a few more features)

[bwhhisc]

yea its been stated that vista may be released with IE7+ (the + version with a few more features)

It seems they would want to have IE7 in place with all the new computers that come up with VISTA op system. As Christmas is peak computer sales, "you would think" that would be their target to support the computer manufacturers with some new "features and benefits" to support thier sales of products.

[sarcle]

Unless the upgrade is automatically downloaded, it will take at least 2 years before large scale adoption of the new browser happens.

I seriously doubt that. IE6 is so racked with security flaws Microsoft will be pushing hard for everyone to download IE7 once it becomes available. It's such a horrible outdated browser that I really see them having no choice but an automatic update for the browser anyways. Not to mention all the "Vista-Ready" computers this Christmas are bound to have the IE7+ version preinstalled also.

Technology doesn't take that long to assimilate nowadays. The real killer is we really won't have a clear idea until this Christmas it seems now. If there was anytime for google to build a browser now would be it.

My question is why aren't the media and security experts roasting Microsoft on their inability to deliver fucking software? INCOMPETENT BASTARDS

[Rubber Duck]

My prediction it that Vista will never happen. Microsoft will go bust first.

They will rush out IE 7.0 as a last smoke screen to try to stop the vultures from hovvering , but it will be a futile effort to stop the obsolete IBM compatibles from being thrown into skips all around the globe.

The dawn of the Mac Era is upon us!

[touchring]

My prediction it that Vista will never happen. Microsoft will go bust first.

They will rush out IE 7.0 as a last smoke screen to try to stop the vultures from hovvering , but it will be a futile effort to stop the obsolete IBM compatibles from being thrown into skips all around the globe.

The dawn of the Mac Era is upon us!


Microsoft is not near going bust, they are earning more and more money playing on our expectations with delays and etc.

[Rubber Duck]

Microsoft is not near going bust, they are earning more and more money playing on our expectations with delays and etc.

Well there share price trade at about 60 to 70 times earnings, and from what I have seen a price of 2 or 3 times earnings would be much more appropriate. They are heading for a really bumpy ride on Wall Street.

[Drewbert]

The entire US financial system is due for a MAJOR correction.