Internet Explorer (March 9, 2006)

Please note: Portions of this chat have been edited for clarity.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):Good morning. This morning's chat topic is Internet Explorer. We have members of the IE team present to answer your questions. We'll try to keep up with them. My name is Dave Massy and I'm a senior Program Manager on the IE team.Let's get started and have the experts introduce themselves.

Introductions:

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Hey there and good morning all, This it Peter Gurevich from the Internet Explorer team. I am the program manager for rendering and display including the ClearType and Page Zoom features. (H)

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Hello, I am Jason Watters, a program manager on the IE team.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Hello all, I'm Max Stevens, a program manager for the user interface on the IE team.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Howdy everyone, I'm Christopher Vaughan, yet another PM on the IE team. Glad you could all make it today.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Hi, my name is Levent, and I'm IE Extensibility Test Lead.

Start of chat:

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When fully exposed, the Links toolbar UI should be like the Classic menu bar and "Bands" toolbar, where folders pull down and up on mouseover instead of double-clicking each folder. Are there plans to add custom line or textual separators in Links folders?
A: There are no plans to add custom line or textual separators in the Links folders right now. Good suggestion though, we'll consider it for a future release.

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will there be more IE7 logos for web developers to put up on their websites?
A: We are still discussing this, thanks.

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will there be any stickers we could get to put on our cars? (for people that want to promote IE7 when driving around town :) )
A: Excellent suggestion, I'll take it to our marketing team.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are there plans for the much-requested "Open in Tabs" option for Links folders?
A: Unfortunately no, you won't be able to open a folder in tabs straight from the links bar. However, the links bar does show up in the favourites centre, and so from there you will be able to click on the folder from within the favourites centre and open it in tabs

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When will Vista be released?
A: Vista is slated to be released in the second half of this year. There more info at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/default.aspx .

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Any estimated release dates for the next release of IE 7?A: We want to release IE7 as soon as possible of course! Fortunately we've gotten great response to our Preview build. Soon we'll get out Beta 2 and after that... RTM.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Have you guys ever made internal IE build where you make everything as W3C compliant as possible? The IE team has said in the past that adding one thing breaks another. How do you you guys find that happy medium between W3C compliance and compatibility?
A: We are constantly working on improving support. We improve support while taking into account compatibility. As you can see in the article at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/IETechCol/cols/dnexpie/ie7_css_compat.asp we use the strict doctype to allow us to move forward without breaking compatibility.

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I saw some cool screenshots from MIX06's version of IE7. Also I made some investigation on sites in the screenshots and saw that most sites were using min/max-height/width. Is it true that we will finally have support for these in IE7 ?
A: Yes, we currently have this in our builds and are working on fit and finish and fixing bugs.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: why doesn't the cleartype option pick up yes/no from the operating system? why would you put the same preference in two different places?
A: For Windows Vista, it will. For IE7 on XP, the default setting from the OS is off. We believe that Cleartype is important and beneficial enough to our customers that it should be turned on by default. We decided that it would be better to provide the users with a work around/option in our app rather that overriding the system setting.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request)When you Select a certain area on a webpage, and then press print preview, it should just preview the selected area. An addition feature would be when the user selects an area on a webpage and then click print; the print dialog box should
A: Actually that's exactly how print preview works in recent builds. If you select a part of the web page and then 'print preview' it will only show what you've selected!

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request) Could IE7 use the spell check that is found in word(if word is installed) on webforms?
A: That’s a good suggestion Joe. We won't be able to do this for IE7, but we'll consider it for future releases, thanks!

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: After browsing the web for a few hours, opening tabs and opening new windows, when I close all of the open IE windows, and I check task manager there are several IE processes still running. Why is this?
A: Which version of IE is this?

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: why the font in IE 7 is not the same as IE 6?
A: The fonts are the same, just they are now rendered using ClearType. It should make the fonts much easier to read.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request) Please add support for "infinite" incremental text resize, instead of just 5 levels (Largest, larger, etc). Also, please add option to toggle Ctrl-scroll between zoom and text size.
A: Great suggestion. This is something that we will definitely consider for our next release. Keep that feedback coming.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q:Are there plans to change the Links toolbar UI to behave like the Classic menu bar and "bands" toolbar?
A:The links toolbar UI is expected to remain largely unchanged at this point Scott.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q:Is there any chance that you guys will be more aggressive with regards to web standards after IE7? (example: make all Microsoft pages "W3C Standard" so you guys can have the button at the bottom of the page)
A:Hey Fiery, nice chatting with you (since I usually only see you in the blog). We are absolutely getting more aggressive about standards. Just look what we're doing in IE7! As for MSFT properties being W3C compliant, we don't own those pages so I can't speak for them, but IMHO the most important thing is for the pages to be legible, useful, and look good. Standards help make that happen but strict W3C compliance isn't always worth the effort (think the 80/20 rule).

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q:did you guys try to optimize the IE7? the beta2 is horrible, it cause too much memory! And even i cannot visit windows update with IE7 beta2
A:I think you are referring to the Beta 2 Preview build...we haven't released Beta 2 yet. We know we have some work left on perf for the IE7 release, but you should be able to visit/use Windows update with the Beta 2 Preview build. I have had no problems with it on several different machines.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q:Where can I get info on the IE internal architecture, especially about how it manages memory? We are having issue with Office Web Components (OWC) pivot table not getting released properly. The IE stays in memory even when user closes the browser.
A:Hi Abdul we have documentation on IE architecture on MSDN at http://msdn.microsoft.com/workshop/browser/overview/overview.asp?frame=true While this information is still accurate it is also an old article which we are working to update in the future.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q:When I click on a link either from outlook express newsgroup or from an e-mail IE will open (the page appears to keep refreshing) and IE’s process’s CPU usage goes to 100%. I then need to end task “iexplore.exe”. This only happens on 1 of 2 machines with
A:Hi Joe,Which version of IE and which version of Windows is this?

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why are there two rss feeds in ie 7 now (Onfolio and the one that is built in IE7) Onfolio does not use the common feeds liist either. Aso two search bar.
A:Well it was announced that we bought Onfolio, so I would expect that you'll see the separate feed issue disappear at some point :)

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Suggestion) I like Firefox's behaviour where I can middle-click a link my my favourites and have it open in a new tab. Will middle clicking on favourites and quick links open in new tabs for the final release of IE7?
A:You can hold down ctrl while clicking right now to have items open in a new tab. Middle clicking will also open links in new tabs.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q:I am continuing to have problems using Windows Live mail on IE7. Is this a problem with wl mail or IE7?
A:Hi, what specific problems are you seeing live mail?

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):Q:When will beta 2 be released
A:When it's ready of course. We're planning on keeping our B2 release in sync with Vista's

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q:Is Cleartype what is making text more difficult to highlight in IE7, or is it the new Zoom function?
A:You are probably seeing known issues that are caused by zooming. We have be addressing these issues as they come up and will be shipping a much better experience than what you are currently seeing.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q:Will there be an exposed API to clear or release the resources owned by the IE ? Similar to HttpRuntime.UnloadAppDomain?
A:If IE is not releasing resources then please let us know the situation where that happens so we can investigate.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q:"Soon we'll get out Beta 2 and after that... RTM." Will there be no "RC1", "RC2" or the like? Straight from Beta 1 to RTM? :D
A:At the moment, beta 2 is our next planned public release, and we have no planned releases after that before RTM. We may add some, but none are planned at the moment.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q:do you have a list of css properties you support, so we can compare ie6, ie7, and css2.1? this would be extremely useful to developers.
A:Yes. The CSS support is documented on MSDN at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/author/css/reference/css_ref_entry.asp?frame=true

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: i have a problem with signing in to hotmail.com to read my emails in internet explorer, when i try to enter my sign in details (which i know are correct) it just tries to load and then loops back to the sign in page again and again, pls help
A: What version of IE are you using? Does the sign in page have any kind of error on it when it loops back to it?

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: good question, what about favicons?
A: Could you please provide some more context for this question anim? Restate it please.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Does or will IE7 support VML? Any enhancements? What does the future hold with regards to SVG and/or WPF in IE7? Thanks.
A: Yes IE continues to support VML in IE7 see http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/workshop/author/vml/default.asp?frame=true

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Is there going to be another public release of IE7 beta at MIX?
A: There will be layout complete version of IE released to the mix attendees well before it is released to the general public. The important thing about this release is that no further layout changes will be made for IE 7.0.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: IE7 and Favicons - IE7 seems to drop the ico file and then it's there. What gives?
A: We've been working to improve Favico support in IE7. We still have some work to do there though.

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Is there going to be another public release of IE7 beta at MIX?
A: This means that folks can start testing their sites on the MIX release. Sometime after MIX, the build will be made widely available.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: will the new optional update for IE that requires a click to activate objects and such be improved in the future so that a better user experience can be had?
A: We're always looking for and investigating making the user experience as seamless as possible for all of our features, including this.

Alex [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: when i click an email link from internet explorer, it goes straight to outlook express, is there any way to set it so it goes to hotmail or something else?
A: On the Programs tab in Internet Options, there is a drop-down where you can select what you would like to use for e-mail links.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Using IE7, try browsing Flash sites and get "Flash unavailable" type messages. Look at add-ins and Flash 8 is installed. Any fix?
A: Hi, we're not aware of such issues. Can you provide more details on this, such as names of sites etc?

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: hi.. Im having occasional IE6 issues with the browser going into Offline mode. My DSL connection is ok and when I hit Try again, it works fine. This started happening after the last update.
A: We haven't heard of this issue but I will take it to our update folks.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: when i click an email link from internet explorer, it goes straight to outlook express, is there any way to set it so it goes to hotmail or something else?
A: When running on XP, the default mail program can be set in the internet options dialog (tools->options) on the "programs" tab.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: I've noticed that IE7 has made some changes to the http headers that are sent when using a GET request however I can't find any documentation stating what these changes are. Can you tell me what changes were made?
A: Changes to https are outlined at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/IETechCol/cols/dnexpie/ie7_https_imps.asp What changes are you seeing around http?

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Will IE7 have a download manager with resume & pause functionality?
A: Not for the 7.0 release

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Hi, will there ever be themes available for IE, similar to themes available for Firefox?
A: Ever? That's pretty open ended. But in IE7, we're not planning on supporting full on theming like you may see in other applications. That said, some of the 3rd party apps (like Windows Blinds) should be able to provide themes in some way, and I've seen Vista allow for some small customizations to the color of the window.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Any chance that you guys will throw down the gloves for IE7.5 or IE8 and make the browser you've always dreamed of? A browser that truly pioneers Web 2.0 and newer standards. Web devs do need to be held accountable, push that point and drill it in.
A: For future releases of IE we will continue to innovate and drive to provide the best developer and end user experience in the browser space

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator): Q: [5] "I am using 5296" This usually happens when browsing the web for several hours.
A: 5296 is a preview of beta 2 and known to have issues such as this. We still have work to do before beta 2 and final release.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator): Q: [9] "Running Windows XP SP2(fully updated) and build 5296"
A: Still lots of work to be done on IE7 before final release 5296 is a preview of beta 2.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Hello when web pages are downloaded the graphics are blurry. Can be fixed if I refresh with highest quality picture or page. What is wrong??
A: Hey Alkrussell. I'm not sure what you mean by "refresh with the highest quality picture or page," what exactly are you referring to?

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: How do you intend to improve the use of tabs in IE7? Will it be possible to move them or close them using double/right click? What's next? :)
A: We have many plans for improvements to tabs. You should see a bunch of new functionality in the upcoming beta 2 release. Keep watching our blog to keep up to date on all of the new improvements.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: For higher DPI screen, if DPI is 150 for example, when IE sets UseHR in its register, the font and image become larger (although image is not good). I wonder how to do it in WebBrowser control.
A: If your goal is making the font and image larger, you should hook into the new page zoom feature

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Hello, I just began getting this error when certain pages open. The instruction at "0x5bc8f596" referenced memory at "0xf835b69b" The memory could not be read. Click to terminate the program.
A: Hugo, what browser are you using? IE5? IE 5.5? IE6? IE7? It sounds like you might have a badly-behaved control on your system, if you're using IE6 on XPSP2 or IE7 you should be able to use 'manage add-ons' to disable it

LaurelA [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: will the new optional update for IE that requires a click to activate objects and such be improved in the future so that a better user experience can be had?
A: We don't have any plans to change the user experience at this time.

Alex [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What is the deal with URL showing same starting URL but when moving around clicking links it takes you elsewhere, but URL stays the same?www.jeflin.net
A: The page you link to uses a frame, so the URL in the address bar is the URL of the frame page, not the URL of the page inside the frame.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will IE7 support 256 bit SSL keys? (I asked last chat and I was told there would be a blog entry on this... and there hasn't been unless I'm blind)
A: Last I heard, on Vista, yes. On XPSP2, no. The reason is that we rely on the network stack beneath us for this functionality, and it's only being updated in Vista.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What requirements are imposed on the certificate purchaser for getting such a high assurance certificate? How can one become a CA that is allowed to issue high-assurance certs?
A: The purchaser of hte certificate will have to meet the requirements imposed by the issuer of the certificate. Different issuers will have different requirements. Although not exact, take a look at Verisigns level 3 cert issuance policy - that is a good starting point for what a high assurance cert will involve.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Have you saw quirksmode.org after beta 2 preview was released, particulary this page: http://www.quirksmode.org/bugreports/archives/explorer_7_beta_2/index.html . And will most of the bugs will be fixed until final release?
A: yes we are looking at all the great feedback. We are going to get as many bugs as we can fixed and will concentrate on the most critical ones first. We really appreciate the feedback .

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Please can you clarify the min-height debate? Will it be supported in IE7?
A: As I understand it, IE previously ignored the CSS property min-height. And inaccurately implemented min-width. For the IE 7.0 we have worked with the CSS committee to accurately implement this feature.

Govind [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: One last question, does IE releases on navigation to another url? Can we simulate the same using window.naviage(url) javascript call? Is resources released immediately or are just mark now/release later is used? Thanks once again for great product! :D
A: We release the resources when the new page starts displaying. But some JavaScript objects will be released only if all the references are gone.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will future relases of IE have an integrated antispyware system incorporated? Or at least ad blocking options...
A: No, IE won't bundle with Windows Defender (our anti-spyware solution). However you can download Defender for free today and IE & Defender work well together. As for ad blocking, it's something we're mulling over but it's not natively in IE7. I'm sure there are add-ins you can get for IE that will block ads.

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: no error on the page, i am using internet explorer 6, just keeps looping, i have enabled cookies and also tried deleting existing cookies, with no success
A: Weird. I will see if our compat folks can repro this so we can investigate it.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Is there full support for XHTML 1.1 in IE7? I mean non HTML/TEXT doc types?
A: XHTML strict is not supported in IE7. That is something for a future release. For IE7 we have concentrated on improving CSS for the platform to give developers a robust set of functionality on which to rely.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When will we be able to customize the IE look like in Maxthon or Opera? I mean adding fav. toolbar, move toolbars, remove menus, etc
A: You can customize it now in terms of adding/moving toolbars, removing buttons from our command bar, etc. The level of customizability is not expected to change greatly between beta 2 and when we ship.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I tested some sites on HTTPS. All of them show that certificate is valid, but owner and issuer is not recognized. Is this know issue and will it be fixed in upcoming beta?
A: Vilius, is it possible that the sites you're connecting to are using SSLv2? Because we've disabled that by default in IE7. Otherwise we haven't seen a general problem with SSL sites/certificates. I encourage you to enter a bug on this if it's commonly reproducible.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is there a way for a webmaster to force pages to open in a new tab (as opposed to a new window) when tabbed browsing features are available?
A: Jason: no. Tabs are not part of the OM and so it's strictly up to the user (and the preferences that they've set) to determine if a new window opens in a tab or not.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Where do you manage add-ons?
A: Manage add-ons is available from the Tools menu. It is also available from the internet options dialog, on the bottom of the "programs" tab.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Will the new page zoom also be available for the Web browser control (i.e. send a command to the control specifying the zoom value)?
A: I am not sure I understand your scenario, so I am not sure how to answer your question. If you can send more info and details to IETELL@Microsoft.com, we can look into it further

sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Firefox 2 will have anti-phishing capability using technology that might come from Google. Will IE have any anti-phishing and if so what will it be?
A: yes. IE7 includes a built in anti-phishing filter. check on the blog there are some relevant posts.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: @Dave Massay, re[28]: is this page specific to ie6? ie7? i don't need a repeat of the w3c explanation of properties, i'd like to know ie7's list of supported css is.
A: We are currently working to expand the list on MSDN to include IE7. The documentation is not complete yet but we have blogged about the new support at http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2006/02/02/523679.aspx already.

Alex [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: The page you link to uses a frame, And I'm cool with that, but why does IE do it with MSN/Google?, I will post on your blog a working way to do this
A: I haven't seen that behavior with MSN or Google, so if you could provide an example, that would be helpful.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: are there any plans to make not to show tooltips on alt="" attributes and only show them on alt="" ?
A: Not for IE7. We are aware of the issue though and will look into it for a future release.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request) Double-clicking to pull down folders in the Links toolbar defeats the ease-of-use purpose of having a menu-driven toolbar.
A: Thanks Scott. I'll investigate this one.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why are there so many popups that are generated with internet explorer more than other application software even with the popup blocker function enabled?
A: Afroboi: maybe you've turned your pop-up blocker down to low? You can turn it up to high if you really want to keep the pop-ups at bay.

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Is there going to be public release of IE7 during MIX?
A: The attendees at MIX will receive several items (tools & builds) at the show that will allow them to better test IE compatibility. We will be striving to allow attendees to start testing with the layout complete version of IE7.

LaurelA [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What industry consortiums are in place for defining the standards associated to high assurance (extended validation) certificates? (And how can one get find more information / get involved).
A: We are working with RSA and other Browser manufacturers. For more information on our plans and who is involved I'd check out our blog article - http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2005/11/21/495507.aspx .

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Q: are there any plans on updating the component that ouputs/formats HTML content in forms ("contentEditable" property, for instance), so that it can be outputted as XHTML??
A: We'll be looking at XHTML support in a future release of IE and that will likely include editing for XHTML as well.

sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will there be another refresh of IE7 or will the next build be Beta 2?
A: We are working on the next public release. Can't say exactly when it will be.

LaurelA [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will IE7 have a list of CAs that it considers “acceptable” for issuing high-assurance certificates? If so, how does one get on that list?
A: We will have a list of CAs - please follow up with IETell@microsoft.com - the Program Manager who owns High Assurance SSL isn't on the chat and he would be the best person to follow up with.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Any chance of SVG or Cairo support?
A: Fiery: of course there's a chance! :) In IE6/7 we already support VML. We're aware of both SVG and Cairo and they're both things we're considering for future releases.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Peter,I guess this is related to set logicalXDPI. If IE with UseHR setting, logicalXDPI=96. If UseHR is not set, logicalXDPI=150. The only place to get it is from: IHTMLScreen2, but can not set it.I want the WebBrowser to have the control as IE.
A: Ah, i understand now, but don’t have the information at hand to answer Please sent this request to IETELL@microsoft.com with attention Peter Gurevich so I can look into this further for you.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When I sign in to WLmail using IE7. Mail doesn’t let me read any messages it just sits there not showing me anything. And I have to get into firefox to get access to any mail? Is this a problem with IE7 or WLmail?
A: Once again thanks for your input. I'll take this to our SiteCompat folks to have it investigated further.

CyraR (Expert):
Q: How or will WPF be integrated into IE7?
A: More information about how IE7 and WPF will work together will be available shortly after the MIX conference. There is however a great deal of interest from customers for running WPF applications in frame (within the browser) and outside of the browser.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Zooming on "feed" pages in IE7 causes text to go behind the "table of contents" overlay in the upper-right of the window. Any plans for an option to hide this overlay?
A: We are aware of this issue and are working on a solution. Thanks for the feedback

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: to Q:[61]: I meant will there be a release of IE7 to public that doesnt attend MIX?
A: I'm sorry but we can't commit to that at this point.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request) Double-clicking to pull down folders in the Links toolbar defeats the ease-of-use purpose of having a menu-driven toolbar.
A: Thanks for the suggestions. This is something that we will definitely consider for future versions of IE. Keep the feedback coming. :-)

Govind [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: back to the Q regarding going offline in IE6, what could cause the browser to just go Offline by itself
A: Anytime browser detects a lost network connectivity it goes into offline mode.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Christopher: @Q75: no, they are using SSLv3. Here is some examples https://lt.hanza.net , https://mail.lnk.lt . As I said IE7 shows them as valid, but when you click on Certificate icon near address bar, it shows that Owner and Location is unverified.
A: Vilius, ok I see what you're talking about. Yes the certificates are valid, but they're regular SSL certs. For High Assurance Certs, those two settings will be verified and it will be reflected in our UI. What we're saying with the examples you've provided is, "yes, you're really talking to the site you think you are, but BTW the cert issuer hasn't verified the owner & location of the company. They'll only do that for the High Assurance certificates.

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Is overflow:auto supported on thead? So that we can have fixed headers and a scrollable table body?
A: Unfortunately, I do not know the answer to that question right now. I'll have to check the code. However if you email IETell@microsoft.com, I'll double check and try to get back to you

sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When loading a page, IE seems to push itself in front of other programs when the page finnishes loading and IE is minimized or behind other windows. It has happened in IE6 and IE7b2(5296). Is this supposed to happen?
A: Yes, this is a known issue which we are fixing.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: There seems to be some issues with AdSense ads and IE7B2? I assume this is more of a bug, rather than some sinister plot to cut Google out of potential revenues? Any ETA on a fix for this issue?
A: There have been some issues with adsense where the new stricter certificate checking was affecting that. See http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/IETechCol/cols/dnexpie/ie7_https_imps.asp Adsense should work fine in IE7 and we work with partners such as Google to ensure that the final release of the product works fine.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: in IE7, will it support MSN more? or would there be a way to have a built in chat sort of thing?
A: Hi, currently there are no plans for integrated chat in IE7.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Anyone out there successfully browsing flash sites with IE7.0.5296? Add-in installed, but it doesn't seem to be recognised!
A: Hey Steve, yes, I have flash on most of my 5296 machines and it works fine. What are you seeing exactly on pages that are trying to show flash content?

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are you guys aware that most press articles didn't mention the "preview" moniker for the preview and called it just Beta 2. Many people think that the preview IS Beta 2. If you now release the real Beta 2, this may confuse people. Why not call it Beta 3?
A: Yeah we're very familiar with that. We should have just called it our 'preview' and not "Beta 2 Preview." Lesson learned. No plans to change the name of Beta 2 to Beta 3 though :)

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: @Dave Massy, re[64]: yes, i've seen that page, but it's a couple months old. i asked if there would be a list of supported css last ie chat, and was given that the very page you linked to, but it was going to be "updated for ie7". where's ie7 in there?
A: We are continuing to work on updating the documentation. This does not happen overnight:) is there something specific you need to know?

CyraR (Expert):
Q: What happened to "Sparkle"? Will IE7 support this format natively? (if it is even a format)
A: Microsoft Expressions (previously sparkle), will generate WPF applications and content. If the system has WPF installed on the client system, the content will be rendered. More information about the interaction between IE, Expressions and WPF will be made available after MIX.

LaurelA [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: There is alot of errors and bugs in IE7 are you getting round to a solution?
A: Are there specific errors and bugs you're seeing? We'd love to get feedback at IETell@microsoft.com.

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Can anyone answer the min-height question? Will this be supported in IE7, since it is tentatively supported in IE6 (i.e. height acts like min-height). I know height has been fixed in IE7, but will min-height be supported?
A: Min-height will be supported in IE7 - but is not currently supported in current builds

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Chrisropher, did you get my response? alkrussell
A: No I didn't, can you repost it as a Q?

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request) If possible, find a way to keep pages "centered" in the window when zooming.
A: Great feedback. We are investigating this now and looking at the feasability of getting it into IE7.

Jason Watters [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When playing games on zone.msn.com IE processor at 100% until I end the game. Is this a problem with IE, FLASH? 5296
A: Please send this to ietell@microsoft.com and we'll have our perf team investigate. Thanks.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is there a chance for IE7 user to know how much traffic did he borrow from Internet / Intranet / Proxy Cache?
A: Hi Jaja. Unfortunately there are no built-in ways for this in IE, but I'm sure there are some 3rd party programs that might help you out here.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is there going to be a way to make IE7 authenticate at ftp/web servers via the link parameters?
A: Hi Jaja, I assume you're referring to the old "xxxx:yyy@some.com" method. No, there is no plans to bring this back at this point.

Govind [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: In previous versions of IE, a GET request would not send any http headers from the client to the server. If you wanted to use these headers, you would have to use POST. This seems to be different for IE7. Is this true?
A: IE 6 used to send the HTTP headers. However we have made some improvements in this area.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Also regarding RSS updating (in addition to refreshing all feeds): Is there currently a way to schedule more frequent updating? If so, where/how? If not, will you be adding this?
A: I believe you could do this with the beta 2 preview build. Easiest way is to right click a feed, choose properties, and hit "default settings" button to set the default frequency that updates happen on.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: when will the user be able to access the RSS platform
A: The RSS platform is available now in the beta 2 preview build, and will also be available in the upcoming beta 2 release. Check out http://blogs.msdn.com/rssteam for more information.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: does any1 test ie7 on last vista ver.?
A: Of course, we test this all the time.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: @Dave Massy, re[99]: well i didn't think a month was "overnight" for a list of css you think you have. ;) i'm mostly looking for css you think you've got, so i can plan my pages to work in the final version instead of stressing over betas.
A: Hi cj,We have alot of new functionality to document on IE7 the CSS properties are ones we expect to get to very shortly. The current build is a preview of beta 2 that was released to get early feedback. We are working to get all new functionality documented for beta 2 so that you have a chance to understand the impacts before final release. Is there a specific CSS item you are looking for that isn't itemised in the blog post? The blog post is pretty accurate apart from the recent work on min-height and min-width. We are continuing to work on bugs based on the feedback.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What I see on site: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/welsh/squad_selector/default.stm is Flash plug-in required, then I go and download it, and still get the same problem... A little frustrating!
A: Ok this is working for me. I'm not sure why it wouldn't be working. if you want, read our blog comment here: http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2006/02/27/540028.aspx about our app compat toolkit, run the toolkit and see what reason it gives you for not letting the flash control run. if it doesn't give a reason that makes sense to you, file a bug! Thanks!

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Q: ALkrussell, Christopher, if I right clickpicture or page that is an option. But I don't know why it is doing it to begin with. It wasn't a week ago.
A: Ah... it sounds like you have a plugin that's doing that. I don't know what it is because I don't have any option like that in IE. Maybe that plugin is also making the pictures fuzzy?

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Please look at the Firefox Bookmarks toolbar for an example of pulling folders down and up on mouseover. This is the UI experience I'm looking for in IE Links Toolbar.
A: Thanks for the feedback. We will look into this.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Look at my problem above. Everyone is having the problem when your on a website for example it just comes up an error message
A: Jack, it would help if you could be more specific. What's the website that you're on, what are you doing on that website when you see the error, and what exactly is the error message. If it happens 100% of the time, you should send these details to ietell@microsoft.com

CyraR (Expert):
Q: Would it be possible for IE7 to incorporate a user interactive ad blocking feature?
A: IE7 does support pop-up blocking - what do you mean by user interactive ad blocking?

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Flash - just deleted the add-in and re-installed... now works perfectly
A: Yay!

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why isn't IE7 more feature rich, why not put windows live into it native behavior. windows live toolbar is almost there has it.
A: You can always install the live toolbar in order to get direct connection to the live services.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Wil or does, IE7 have any enclosure manager or something to handle enclosures inside RSS feeds. i.e. Podcasts?
A: Yes, IE7's RSS feature supports enclosures for things like podcasts.

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I have a question about cutting and pasting HTML Text. Can IE do verical columns of data in some way similar to how MS Word can select a text box by pressing the ALT Key + holding the Left Mouse button. This allows you to pull columns of numbers i.e.
A: That's a good suggestion, though we don't have this functionality planned for IE7. We will consider this for future releases though, thanks.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Is there a vertical-align CSS for a DIV in IE7? By the way..thanks for his forum.
A: Can you give an example of what you are trying to do?

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Can we use IE7's anti-phishing service in other home grown application?
A: Mike, not yet. We're considering opening it up as a platform API in a future version but for IE7 we just want to get it right. It's definitely something that's on our radar though!

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: (Feature Request) Will there be a way the change the frequency of all the RSS feeds in 1 shot. When you have 10, 20, 100 feeds it takes to long to change all of them. (also when exporting the feeds could you save the frequency)
A: In the beta 2 release, you will be able to click on a feed's properties and from there go in and change the default feed refresh frequency settings

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why would a PC running XP use a lot of bandwidth when no applications are running? I am monitoring traffic on this PC.
A: BavendA: not sure. Some reasons why XP might use traffic: if you're uploading crash reports, if you're streaming data (like videos or music), if you're playing a game, etc. Offhand IE doesn't send anything unless you go to a page that asks you to send something. Without a net sniff it's hard to say. In general XP shouldn't be generating much traffic.

Levent [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why would a PC running XP use a lot of bandwidth when no applications are running? I am monitoring traffic on this PC.
A: This could be due to lots of things. The most common problem is spyware/adware on your machine. I encourage you to download Windows Defender at http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx and have it scan your system.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: How do you guys feel about web devs using Eolas-compatible frankenstein builds running in standalone? We have no other way to test backwards compatibility with IE6.
A: I'm not sure I understand the question Fiery. As we have said many times we do not support side by side installations of IE on the same machine because it is problematic. we have heard the feedback though and will look into this for future releases.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @ Christopher Q:[131]: I would like to see a enclosure aggregator or something to the sort in IE7 is that planned or has it been discussed?
A: Statm1, an aggregator isn't part of our IE7 plans. However that sounds like a great opportunity for someone in the community to provide added value on top of our platform!

Max Stevens [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Do you plan to get the Refresh All RSS Feeds button on there?
A: For beta 2 we have an easy single button way to refresh a single feed. We dont' have a mechanism at the moment of refreshing all RSS feeds. One issue with providing this mechanism is that for a user with multiple feeds, this button could effectively take all of your bandwidth for quite some time.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: "A: IE7 does support pop-up blocking - what do you mean by user interactive ad blocking?" Other browsers have addons that allow you to right click media, such as ads, and prevent it from showing up. Would it be possible to see this in IE7?
A: As with other browsers there are extensions for IE for this functionality. We are working on making it easier for users to discover the many extensions available for IE today.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: There is a problem in IE6 causing me to remove the "reuire all users to authenticate" in my ISA Server 2004 web proxy authentication settings. As I found from the KB articles, there is something wrong in IE auth agains ISA web proxy. Is it corrected in IE?
A: Jaja, I'm not much of an expert on this subject, but I do know that our resident net expert looks closely at all of these issues. Unfortunately it's hard when dealing with a proxy server to tell if it's IE, the networking stack, or the proxy server who might be at fault. However, we are working towards maximum compatibility with all proxy servers so hopefully your problem will be addressed in IE7 - give it a shot with our Preview build. However the fix may require a fix on the Proxy Server side, which of course we have no control over!

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Is IE7 going to support SMIL 2.0 as it is declared or there is still the HTML+TIME 2.0? May be both?
A:IE7 will support this at the same level as IE6 which included the HTML module for SMIL 2.0

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why can not open this chat room in WebBrowser hosted application? When sign in,the middle is blank. OS:XP SP2, IE7 Betat2. Dell Inspiron 8500 DPI 1500. But IE is fine.
A:Mike, you should be able to - there is no specific thing preventing it from happening. Of course without looking at your web application I couldn't tell you why it's not working. That said, it's possible!

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Do you plan to add a "Refresh All Feeds" button before the final release?
A:This is something we're investigating but I don't have a hard answer for you right now

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: There is a problem with ClearTyped text over a field filled with gradient filter. For example, if you try to fade it in, it's cleartype borders look bad. Is it going to be fixed in IE7?
A:We are looking at any and all cleartype issue. Please send the repro and details of your issue to IETELL@microsoft.com and we will investigate

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: As a system administrator and a programmer, will I be able to know which ways did the browser use to get the page to the screen? I mean if it used proxy or bypassed proxy, if the page was taken from the local cache?
A:Jaja, if you own the proxy then you can sniff the traffic and tell if the content went through it, but that said the browser still might use some cached content. There's really no easy way to get to what you're looking for right now that I know of.

Govind [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: For trusted sites, can we remove the toolbar, menubar, statusbar, etc. when using showmodaldialog?
A:Toolbar menu bar and status bar on a showmodaldialog is not zone specific. So there is not way to currently remove it.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @ Christopher Q[144]: There are already aggregators for enclosures. Just not built into a browser.
A:Well with our RSS platform part of IE, it means that people who right those aggregators will be able to play nicely with our feed store. It shouldn't take much more to make an add-in to expose that functionality in the browser somehow, if they choose to do so.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Will IE7 support the CSS properties display: table; display table-row; display: table-cell; etc...? (please :D)
A:The table functionality of CSS is something for a future release of IE. For IE7 we concentrated on fixing the most critical consistency issues and adding support for selectors and fixed positioning which was the most requested functionality. We know we have more work to do here though and the team is thinking about the next release.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: When I use Content-Disposition http header directly from server side language (e.g. PHP) and the web page is on HTTPS connection, I get Information Bar and a warning that this page uses non HTTPS content in HTTPS page. How to avoid this? (it was ok in IE6)
A:Vilius - not sure, I'm checking right now. If I can't get an answer during the chat session I'll see about getting it appended to the chat transcript that's eventually posted

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: What is the best way for a EA customer to get a needed feature added to IE or to have a plug-in created for a specific need? Ben Carr from Watkins Motor Lines, INC. Lakeland, FL
A:Email the IETell@microsoft.com alias with any feedback and feature requests. To create extensions see the documentation on MSDN. http://msdn.microsoft.com/ie

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Q: 128 haven't added anything lately. did download free adware software, could that be it?? also once picture clears up that option is gone. :S
A:Yeah that's really strange behavior - nothing I've seen before. It's possible that the adware is doing something there. I don't think it's functionality built into IE though :(

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: In the meantime, have you implemented an additional way to access feed properties other than using the shortcut menu? This is critical, because shortcut menus are a feature that is discoverable only for experienced users.
A:Dave, I'll have to ask (our resident RSS expert just had to run). I hear you, the functionality needs to be discoverable. That's good feedback.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: What is this "Next Release" that you guys keep mentioning? ;) Will there be an IE7.1, IE7.5 or jump right to IE8? :-0
A:we don't use specific version names at the moment but are starting planning for the "next version" We definitely plan to return to regular and frequent releases of IE moving forward.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Will you include a short tutorial in IE named "How to safely browse the Web", which could also show users how they can utilize the new security features of IE7.?
A:That's a great suggestion that I'll pass on to that part of the team.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: How many ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLDOM") can be used in one web page? And How many load() method can be call at the same time? As somewhere mentioned XP SP2 only can have 10 concurrent TCP/IP connections.
A:I don't believe there are any changes to the connections in IE7.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: what is the topic?
A:the topic of the chat today is Internet Explorer. We have 10 minutes left for the chat so keep your questions coming.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will there be any way to notify the user that their feeds have been updated (besides going into the favories center)?
A:In IE? Probably not. However there are other parts of Windows that will expose this, like the RSS sidebar toy in Vista. Also apps like Office may expose this in some way too.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: What will be the release cycle from 7.0 forward? Are there plans for a less than annual release of IE?
A:We are looking at regular and frequent releases of IE and continue to build a great team to deliver future versions of IE. Until we are through planning it is difficult to say exactly how frequent but it will certainly not be anywhere near the gap between IE6 and IE7 :)

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will you consider save page as feature not to change page source code? I mean when I save a page I get different HTML than original?
A:Vilius, I don't think we're investing a ton of effort into the save page feature in IE7. I don't know if anyone's looked at what IE does to a page when it saves it recently (hopefully the page is still valid, if slightly different). I'll put it on our list of things to think about for the future.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Currently IE7 5296 is using 233 MB of VM, and 110MB RAM, is this from debug code or a memory issue with IE7?
A:Mostly likely a bit of both. we are continuing to performance tune IE7 to minimize the memory and CPU usage.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is there a plan to in some way aggregate RSS search results into a single feed, like Safari does?
A:Scott, not that I heard of. Really in IE7 we wanted to provide the fundamental RSS building blocks: discovery mechanisms and a common store that any Windows app can use. While it's something we might consider doing in the future, I'd hope that instead some clever 3rd party would provide a plug-in or app to do what you're talking about.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: At internet coffee,many people leave their username, and passwords can be tracked usindg keyloggers or saving passwords and using autocomplete
A:In IE7 we have introduced the clear my tracks feature to help in this scenario. See http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2006/01/12/512232.aspx

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I ask again. Can anyoine tell me how to fix IE7 not being able to paste ?
A:Poopysyd, what specifically are you talking about? I didn't see your question before.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Q:142 feedback: so is it in the plans to have a button to refresh all feeds in the final version? The bandwidth does not seem to be the biggest issue out there especially if you get them to refresh consecutively (not all at once).
A:Tacoma, right now it's not in our plans, but we're not done taking feedback on IE7 yet so it's possible that this could change

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: With more and more code being pushed to the client, is there any new methods in IE7 to protect code other than putting copyright info in the source?
A:We already support in IE obfuscation of script for this. I believe it may be broken in teh recent preview of beta 2 but will work in final release.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: i am using ie 6 my home page is set sn.com which comes default in windows i cant change it everytimer i change it it goes back to weindows default
A:Sachin - sounds like you've been hijacked. I'd recommend installing an anti-spyware app (like Windows Defender, which you can download for free from Microsoft.com).

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Do you like pie?
A:Yes, I love pie. Especially chocolate cream

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Re:Q [160]. Does that mean we can only have max 10 XMLDOM.load call at the same time?
A:I'll have to check on the exact limitations but there should be no change here from IE6

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Users should get notified if feeds were updated with new content. How about changing the color or icon of the Favorites Center button if that's the case? Users would then see that they can now open the Favorites Center to see the updated feeds.
A: DaveCutlerFan - yes we'll have some simple UI to show that an RSS feed is updated - it might sparkle or glow or something. Not sure what the exact plan is but we definitely will give the user some feedback that a feed has been updated

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Christopher: Q149: it is not slightly different, it is A LOT different. For example if I save XHTML page I get a lot of HTML only stuff with uppercase tags, etc. Never had a chance to check if it's valid though.
A:We'll take a look and see what we're doing here. Again I doubt it will change/improve for IE7 though. :(

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: Will the MIX build made available for MSDN subscribers? This would be very helpful.
A:We are looking into making more previews available but have nothing to announce today.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: will there be a special program for ISVs around patch releases? We'd like to get the patches for IE before the monthly patch release, so we can plan accordingly... ;)
A:JVast: you should talk to your MSFT TAM (technical account manager) to see if that's something you could be involved in. I don't think it's common to do so but you never know!

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: I have had a copy-paste issue with the pages at tacomacc.edu for quite sometime. This ussue is only in Internet Explorer both 6.0 and 7.0. Do you have any idea why this might be?
A:Off the top of my head, no, but if you send the details to IETELL@Microsoft.com, we can look into it further.

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: If you try to edit from outlook and then paste the web address to the address bar in IE7, it fails to work.
A:In IE7 you should see a prompt to allow the user to paste into IE. This is a change for security to prevent pasting of content from script on the web page without the user's permission.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is there an IE 7 Beta 2 Build 5299
A:Aussie, yes, it was a leaked build, but 5296 is better because we forked that code and drove the quality up. 5299, being leaked, might also have been infected with spyware etc since you cannot download it from official Microsoft servers.

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Q: Do you guys have kitchen in HQ? Or are you made to go out and buy lunch?
A:: We have many cafeterias in and around our buildings

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Why does IE7 make a sound when you type something in the built-in search box and hit the Enter key, but not when you just click the search button with the mouse?
A:Hey Pat - I have no idea. I hadn't noticed. I'll ask!

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Q: what version of ie is windows vista going to have? i would like to make the migration in to vistal.
A:Windows Vista will include IE7 and also have additional support for parental controls and Protected mode where it can take advantage of the advanced security of the operating system.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Thanks for the answers Christother and other. It was great pleasure!
A:Sure, thank you Vilius for the good questions!

Peter Gurevich [MS] (Expert):
Bye All, this was fun. See you next time. :-)

Dave Massy [MSFT] (Moderator):
Hi Everyone. We are at the end of our hour today. Thanks for a great chat but the team has to go back to work now.

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: can someone help me get my speakers to work?
A: Are they plugged in? :)

Christopher [MSFT] (Expert):

Hey thanks all. This hour went quickly. I found it useful, I hope you did too. See you all next month, and on the blog!

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