Web developers dream come true

[ryanhellyer]

Santa has brought every web developers dream to reality this Christmas. Microsoft has finally created a version of Internet Explorer (IE8) which passes the Acid2 test. This is a non-public build which they aren't intending to release, but presumably this is a sign that when it is released, Microsoft will be trailing along behind everyone else and hopefully only be a few years behind the eight ball on browser development. Yay!

http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/200...milestone.aspx


For anyone who doesn't know about the Acid2 test:

Originally Posted by from Wikipedia

Acid2 is a test case designed by the Web Standards Project to identify web page rendering flaws in browsers and authoring tools.

Previous versions of Internet Explorer have failed the Acid2 test miserably have caused numerous problems for many web developers across the world with their shocking standards compliance and shonky rendering of web pages.

[BigAlReturns]

Excellent news, but I think it could be many years before we see the benefits of this - so long in fact that current standards may be meaningless anyway. Only about 40% of IE6 users have upgraded to IE7, so how many are really going to upgrade to IE8?
However, if it is at least standards-compliant, we won't have yet another browser to worry about, as happened with the IE7 release.
So I agree, good news, but it's all a bit too late from Microsoft really!!

[ryanhellyer]

There is bad news on the IE8 standards support front. Apparently IE8 has not passed at all, Microsoft was either lying, hasn't told us the full story or are just a bunch of dim wits.

They do not pass the Acid2 test without relying on an on-page trigger to force the browser to render the page in a so called 'standards mode'. The Acid2 test does not have this on-page trigger, therefore the browser will likely fail.

The only way I can see that this would allow them to claim that they've passed, would be if you force IE8 to render ALL pages in standards mode, but I'm guessing it would then render many non-standard pages incorrectly which isn't acceptable at all.

There's some very detailed information about the test and how various browsers (including the secret IE8 build) are coping with the infamous Acid2 test here ... http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/acid/

[ryanhellyer]

Some YouTube Videos of an interview with IE8 Developers:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=BoSkc6zPtLQ
http://youtube.com/watch?v=HoocGSCZyHM
http://youtube.com/watch?v=IpTzuTIcjIU
http://youtube.com/watch?v=hH1KV8kQ5no

[ryanhellyer]

It seems things have gone from bad to worse. Not only have they lied about the Acid2 test, but they've somehow managed to convince the powers that be that a new Meta tag should be supported for triggering their "standards mode".

There's an article on Alistapart outlining the details ... http://alistapart.com/articles/beyonddoctype
The nuts and bolts of it, is that they're intending to have new trigger modes for each version of IE. So you can design a site for IE8 and not have to worry about it rendering incorrectly in IE9 as if you have the meta tag set for IE8, IE9 will render just like it was IE8 anyway. Technically other browsers could use this technique too, but they are unlikely to require it. Funnily enough, other browsers like Firefox, Safari and Opera actually work correctly without the need for special hacks to make them function. But the IE team are not capable of doing this so they have given up and are using this crude approach to solve their problems.

Here's an example of what the Meta tag would look like if it were targetting IE8 and FF3:
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=8;FF=3;OtherUA=4" />


And yes I am very cynical about this whole concept :P ... just in case you hadn't picked that up already ...

[BigAlReturns]

Hmm I think the meta tag idea is on the whole a good one, as I think it's the only way Microsoft will release a standards compliant browser. If this didn't happen, then they would break so many websites with IE8 that people would start looking for solutions, and start finding firefox! Obviously MS don't want this, so unless they can keep older sites looking ok, I don't think its in their interests to release a compliant browser.
While it's a sorry situation to be in, and obviously I'd like to see more people convert to FF, a standards compliant browser from MS, even if I do have to use a meta tag, is a huge improvement on todays situation!

[ryanhellyer]

This cracked me up and is well worth a visit ... http://www.katemonkey.co.uk/article/...mur-compatible

[ryanhellyer]

Breaking news from IEBlog : Microsoft's Interoperability Principles and IE8

We’ve decided that IE8 will, by default, interpret web content in the most standards compliant way it can. This decision is a change from what we’ve posted previously.

This is a huge boost to the future of the web IMO. Microsofts stance on their proprietary meta tag was a smack in the face of standards supporters and showed their own in adequacies up in a rather serious way - all modern browsers can render pages without having to have a meta tag added to render pages correctly.


Perhaps the following statement is a reference to the recent legal challenge mounted by Opera:

While we do not believe any current legal requirements would dictate which rendering mode a browser must use, this step clearly removes this question as a potential legal and regulatory issue.

[Willemina]

I wonder why they flip flopped on their original idea.

[ryanhellyer]

In a surprise move, Microsoft has released the first beta of IE8!

Internet Explorer 8 Readiness Toolkit


I don't have time to test it right now, but I'll hopefully get a chance later on tonight. Have any of you tried it yet?

Does it pass the Acid2 test?