Down Time

Hot on the heels of Microsoft starting to advertise Internet Explorer 9 there is now a leaked video (first picked up by Softpedia) of the browser demoing the user interface and speed. Despite looking like a fake video, We understands the video is of an old, internal build of Internet Explorer 9 which was given to employees to test.

In the video, it can be seen that the user interface bears a resemblance to the leaked image of Internet Explorer 9 from last month but features older icons, gradients and buttons. Neowin has been informed that the leaked image is how Internet Explorer 9 will look when released as a beta next week. Therefore, the video above doesn’t display an accurate image of how Internet Explorer 9 will appear.

The rendering engine used for this build of Internet Explorer 9 appears to be the same as the most recent version of the developer platform preview of Internet Explorer 9. The speed at which the browser loads and functions in the video is expected to be similar to how quick the beta version will be.

Long Zheng has just spotted that Microsoft is already starting to advertise Internet Explorer 9 Beta ahead of its official launch next Wednesday. The banner advert was spotted on TechCrunch and it’s likely to be found on many other sites across the web.

The advert features a few quotes from people and web sites that who played with previous versions of Internet Explorer 9. The advert focuses on how Internet Explorer 9 will allow for a different kind of internet than the one we are used too telling readers to “get ready for a more beautiful web”. This has been the tag line used with Internet Explorer 9 ever since Microsoft announced they would be holding a special event for the launch of the beta.


Microsoft announced back in August that they would be holding an event in San Francisco on September 15th where Internet Explorer 9 Beta would be announced. It is unusual for a company to put so much emphasis on a beta version of a piece of software which suggests either Microsoft have got a lot planned for Internet Explorer 9 or have more to announce than just a browser.

An image leaked in late August that is rumored to be of Internet Explorer 9 but there have been many who have questioned the image’s authenticity.

Microsoft has been providing developer access to the much improved Internet Explorer 9 rendering engine on a regular basis. The company has been stressing that developers shouldn’t have to worry about which browser will be rendering a web page but should be able to just write code for all browsers. To that end Internet Explorer 9 will be far more standards compliant than any other Microsoft browser to date and appears to far faster than any previous versions of the browser, its now almost as fast as Google Chrome and Apple Safari.

Mozilla has released the latest beta for Firefox 4, making this is the 3rd beta in the Firefox 4 development cycle. Beta 3 is available in more than 30 languages, 10 more than the last update. The beta also enables Windows 7 multi-touch support, which allows users the ability to interact with the browser without the need of a mouse. Several JavaScript tweaks have also been implemented to give the user a more streamlined and faster experience.

Beta 3 also changes to the C++ representation of JavaScript, which enables Firefox to execute numeric code more efficiently, allowing for more streamlined graphics in web applications.

As with the past betas, the Mozilla Labs feedback add-on is included, giving a user the chance to submit any bugs or errors they find using Beta 3. Mozilla recommends users keep the feedback add-on enabled, as it gives Mozilla the ability to better track bugs and errors found within the browser. Mozilla states the feedback addition has allowed for more than a half-million testers to submit approximately 3,500 pieces of feedback every day. Additional statistics show that the majority of people using the Firefox 4 Beta are males, who use the web between 2-6 hours every day, and use Firefox for communication and entertainment.

Readers looking for the latest Firefox 4 beta can find it here.

Microsoft revealed this thursday that they are currently readying an Internet Explorer 9 public beta for September. Neowin believes this will be September 2.

Microsoft’s C.O.O. Kevin Turner announced the public beta date at the annual Microsoft Financial Analyst Meeting (FAM) on July 29. Screenshots of an early build of Internet Explorer 9 leaked to the web earlier this week. The screenshots revealed that Microsoft is planning a download manager and add-on manager for Internet Explorer 9.

Microsoft originally unveiled Internet Explorer 9 Photos and concept at PDC 2009. IE 9 will take advantage of the power of the GPU for all page rendering and developers can exploit this using CSS, DHTML andjavascript. A new JS engine (codenamed Chakra) will also be built into Internet Explorer 9 with greater interoperability and standards support all round. Features such as rounded corner CSS support will be built in. In January, we revealed that Microsoft is planning to enhance tabbed browsing in IE9. According to a software patent, the Quick Tabs feature in Internet Explorer is likely to be enhanced with better functionality and greater tab management options.

Microsoft is also planning broader support for HTML5 in Internet Explorer 9 through its new script engine. Microsoft recently performed W3C Web Standards tests on IE9, including HTML5, SVG 1.1 2nd edition, CSS3 media queries, CSS3 borders & backgrounds, CSS3 selectors, DOM level 3 core, DOM level 3 events and DOM level 2 style. Microsoft, with the help of W3C, performed a total of 192 tests on a variety of browsers. Internet Explorer 9 scored 100% in all eight tests, while every other browser, except Firefox in DOM level 2 style tests, didn’t score perfect in any of the test categories.

Microsoft has now started the investigation to find out the caused of Internet Explorer 6, 7 and 8 F1 bug in Windows XP. Microsoft officials are now warning that Internet Explorer could allow remote code execution to the attackers but only in Windows XP. Microsoft officials confirmed the flaw could allow an attacker to host a maliciously crafted web page and run arbitrary code if they could convince a user to visit the web page and if the user presses F1, IE will load an attacker-supplied .HLP file with winhlp32.exe. Which allow attackers to remotely access your data online. So people have to look after these possibility issues in internet explorer to avoid this type of attacks in internet explorer.