Windows Internet Explorer 8 Expert Zone Chat (April 17, 2008)

Chat Topic: Windows Internet Explorer 8 Expert Zone Chat
Date: Thursday, April 17, 2008

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

Introductions:

Katheryn (Moderator):
The talented experts will now introduce themselves!

Allison [MSFT] (Expert):
Hey everyone, I'm Allison and I am a PM on the IETeam in charge of the IE8 Technical Beta Program.

Deepak Jain [MSFT] (Expert):
Hi, my name is Deepak. I'm the program manager for the JScript debugger.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Hello, my name is Eric Lawrence; I'm the Security PM for IE.

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Hi Everyone! I'm Helen and I'm a PM on the User Experience team - working with tabs, the favorites bar and the favorites center.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Hi. My name is Jane Maliouta, and I am the program manager for IE deployment.

Jefferson [MSFT] (Expert):
I'm Jefferson from IE Product Management. Thanks for joining us today!

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Hi, my name is John Hrvatin. I'm the program manager for developer tools, jscript engine integration, and HTML editing support. Thanks for joining us today!

Kristen [MSFT] (Expert):
Hi! My name is Kristen and I work on the Customer Feedback Team and IE Blog

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Hi all, I'm lead PM for user experience.

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Hey All - I'm Sharon. I work on search and on part of the first the first run experience. I worked on ActiveX Opt-in in IE7.

Start of chat:

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What's the current target for l IE 8.0 general availability?
A: Sorry, we haven't announced a release date thus far. We're all working hard and very eager to ship a great browser as soon as we can.

Katheryn (Moderator):All the guests in the chat, please be sure to check "Ask the Experts" in order to get your question into the queue

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: If an <object> element references content on another domain and thus fails the cross-site security check, could you please change IE8 to display the object's fallback content? Adding the object's fallback content is much more useful to the end user.
A: Thanks for the suggestion, this is good feedback.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What about Beta 2? (obligatory question)
A: Beta-2 will be available later this year. Sorry, I don't have a precise date available.

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Is Harel Williams not with us today?
A: Harel isn't with us this morning. I'll let him know you were looking for him!

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: The most voted for features is Opacity, but yet you closed it saying that you are not planning until a future version. Are you re-considering this, and what are your current thoughts on how to implement opacity? (filter or CSS3.0)
A: Thanks for the feedback. Unfortunately, resolutions can be a bit misleading, you shouldn't take them as a sign of our future plans. We don't have anything to announce at this time, but stay tuned.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: For IE8, will binary behaviors still be subject to the same lower security defaults than ActiveX controls?
A: Which "lower security defaults" are you referring to?

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Could you move the "Home" and "Stop" buttons back to next to the "Back" and "Forward" buttons, like people are accustomed to? IE7's terrible UI was a big reason why many did not move to IE7 the last time around.
A: This is great feedback and definitely a request we've received before :)! I will pass this request on to the appropriate PM. Thanks!

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Will the toolbar icons be customizable in IE8? - I Absolutely hate the reload button position, I want it on the left of the URL. If I write an extension, can I modify this?

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will IE8, like IE7, display an EV certificate on a web page that includes non-EV content? See http://my.opera.com/yngve/blog/2007/06/19/it-aint-ev-til-its-ev-all-ev
A: We currently have no plans to change this behavior. Ultimately, only the top level certificate is displayed to the user in any meaningful way, so ultimately it's the top-level page that ends up being the relevent security principal.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is it possible to estimate general availability by quarter. Will it be 4Q08?
A: We don't have any estimates at this time. Please stay tuned and we will announce our plans on the IEBlog when ready. Thanks.

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Hi, do you plan to implement a Find-As-You-Type search facility like Firefox has? Given Vista's emphasis on search (and find as you type search like in the start menu and outlook) I really want this functionality in IE as well, and I didn't see it in beta1
A: Thanks for the suggestion. We'll take it into consideration.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I just reformated my harddrive and mow I can't play movies on my computer. I have windows media player 10.
A: Sorry, you'll have to ask questions like this in a Windows Media Player forum. We're all IE folks here.

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will the toolbar icons be customizable in IE8? - I Absolutely hate the reload button position, I want it on the left of the URL. If I write an extension, can I modify this?
A: We've definitely received requests for this customization! I'll let the PM who works in this area know of your additional request :) Thanks for the feedback!

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Regarding Opacity as mentioned by others... if the CSS3 Opacity property is not going to be added, thats fine, but why did the filter:alpha() stuff get removed if the CSS3 opacity is not supported yet?
A: Steve, I think the issue here is the exact syntax used to trigger the opacity filter being in conflict with CSS standards, but I must confess I'm not an expert in this space. This is a topic we'll certainly discuss more in the future.

Allison [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: How can feature requests vs bugs be searched for in Connect? I would like to watch the progress on many suggestions I have voted on and find out when and if they will be implemented in which beta stage.
A: For IE8 we are focussing our search on IE8 beta 1 bugs, but some suggestions have been filed through connect by placing "Suggestion" or "Sugg" in the title.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Could you add automatic spell checking to IE8?
A: We're not ready to talk about features in upcoming releases of IE8 but we appreciate the feedback. You may also want to check out a couple good plugins available to add spellchecking - IESpell and IE7Pro.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Whats with the Domain Highlighting feature? I understand that is for security measures, but as a IE user with poor vision :( is there gonna be a way to turn this off in lata betas, as i found it hard to see the domain greyed out.
A: The domain is the part that's rendered in black. If you hover over the address bar, the non-security components of the URL (e.g. path, etc) are rendered in black.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are you changing how RTL layout behaves in IE8 ? Earlier IE browsers ignores style.left and suddenly wants you to use style.right, which is different from how all other browsers behave and makes the developer experience horrible.
A: I'm not sure about the exact behavior you describe, but IE8 Beta-1 standards mode has very limited RTL support.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What are IE8's dependancies on scripting engines? MS08-022 indicated that 5.7 was shipped with IE7, and I wonder if there are any vulns in newer scripting components of the IE8 beta.
A: IE8 will use the latest version of each scripting engine.

Kristen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What are the plans for a PERMANENT public bug tracking system? - This is a serious issue.
A: Hi Steve! Good to have you in the chat. We've definitely heard the message from the public, requesting a public bug tracking database. We are investigating options for this type of public feedback channel.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are you going to implement addEventListener in IE8? it is really needed
A: At the moment, we're not ready to talk about features in upcoming releases, but we appreciate the input.

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: In the Beta1 of IE8, I note that the option to reopen all tabs on next startup has disappeared. Is this by design or just a glitch in the Beta1 release?
A: We are aware of this functionality and have had many people request this feature. I will pass this info on to the appropriate PM. Thanks for the feedback :)

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will Silverlight come bundled with IE8 final?
A: We didn't ship it with beta 1. Microsoft is promoting silverlight with various media partners such as NBCs coverage of the Olympics. Do you think it should be shipped with IE?

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What are the plans to include dev-addons with IE8 (eg: FireBug for FF)
A: IE8 Beta 1 includes built-in developer tools. within IE8, press SHIFT+F12 to open the tools. you can find more info in my blog post: http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2008/03/07/improved-productivity-through-internet-explorer-8-developer-tools.aspx. it also has links to other documentation.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: If you had problems with the proposed standards for things like cross-site requests and DOM storage as produced by the W3C, why didn't you raise these within the appropriate working groups instead of developing non-standard alternatives for the IE8 beta?
A: Jon, we have had many conversations with the working groups on the concerns we have with their proposals. Our differences on DOM Storage are very minor, and we expect to work them out with the group. Cross-site spec remains under heavy edit; the Firefox team pulled support for the feature in their latest beta for that reason. We have offered up our XDomainRequest draft for standardization because we believe that it represents the proper balance of security and power.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will you support installing IE6 and IE8 side by side? This is a major headache for developers, especially those without the capability to run virtual machines.
A: We have considered this feature for IE8, but unfortunately it's extremely difficult to implement side by side support as IE6, IE7 and IE8 all share the same registy location for their settings. Plus IE has Windows platform components, for example wininet. Having two different versions of those components on the system will impact other Windows applications.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @EricLaw: IE makes it very clear to the end user if a regular encrypted page contains unencrypted content. But if IE sees an EV page with potentially malicious non-EV-encrypted content, it doesn't even tweak the EV notice. Isn't this a security issue?
A: Please re-read Yngve's post. IE does not show an EV page as EV when there's non-SSL content on the page; we block such content behind the mixed content dialog as we've always done. Yngve's complaint is that IE permits non-EV HTTPS content to be mixed into an EV HTTPS page. We believe that this is a safe behavior, and have had extensive discussions with the CAB Forum and Opera on this topic.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Could you please promote good web practices by having the developer toolbar use lowercase names for elements (for example, "body" instead of "BODY")?
A: this is good feedback and we definitely want to promote good development practices. our focus, though, has been on modifying the data we get from IE as little as possible to provide transparency into the platform. however, this is an area where modifying the data may only have a positive effect and it's something we're considering.

Allison [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are suggestions made here in the chat added to the Connect site for users like me who don't have official bug reporting abilities?
A: If you wish to join the technical beta program where you can file bugs in Connect, please send us an email at ieso@microsoft.com with the Subject "Apply for IE Tech Beta".

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: to EricLaw: Do you plan to resolve the issue in IE7 for IE8 where phish pages have the big warning displayed OnLoad and are therefore vulnerable to a redirect so that the warning only appears momentarily and the user goes to another site not blacklisted?
A: Such claims are inaccurate. Once the blocking page is shown, the entire scripting context is torn down; there's no possibility of being redirected away from the blocking page.

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: ...has any serious thought gone into fixing this to render everything "un-grayed out", and bold or italicize the key true domain?
A: We are taking all the beta feedback into consideration.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: What is the status of VML support (or SVG for that matter)
A: VML should behaves the same as in IE7. if you have a particular test case that exhibits a problem, please let us know about it by filing a bug in the connect site.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: As soon as you know which route you are going with Opacity, could you please blog about it. We would like to put that support in our API, but if you are moving from filters to CSS3 opacity, we would like to accomodate for it in the API as soon as possible.
A: We'll definitely let you know.

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Sharon: if Microsoft is to get a significant market share with Silverlight, then IE8 final should should have it bundled.
A: ok. thanks for the feedback.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will IE8 have support for 4-button mouses?
A: What sort of support would you expect? Mouse mouse software (e.g. Intellipoint) offers support. Many mice use the 4th button as "back."

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Please consider turning on the Menu bar by default in IE8, like the IE7 re-release. I also suggest that the menu be turned on in future Vista service packs for a consistant user experience cross OS's.
A: If you have the menu bar on, it'll be on when you upgrade to IE8 too. We respect your configuration.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Suggestion: Please add the "you have caps lock enabled" popup feature to the password textboxes, like Windows has at the login screen.
A: This is a great suggestion. We'll consider it for a future release. Thanks.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: As an EXPERT user, I have no interest in EVER seeing the very insulting "You've opened a new Tab page" (I've used tabs for 5 years now)... will there be a way to turn off this message?
A: Sorry if you find the page insulting. You can simply configure IE to open your homepage as a new tab page, our you can edit the registry so that the about:tabs entry points to any page you'd like.

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will IE8 have expanded support for Vista "touch" features?
A: Are there specific features you are looking for?

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: There are many remaining Element.setAttribute() bugs in IE8Beta1 Will these be fixed (in Beta 2 or IE8RTM)?
A: beta 1 isn't the final beta so we're continuing to improve quality. for specific issues, we'd appreciate it if you filed bugs on those (if you haven't already) so we can be sure to understand the specifics.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Perhpas SilverLight could be bundled with an option in the FirstRun of hte application? e.g. a pre-checked check box about "enhance the web with ..."?
A: The Silverlight team is working with major content providers to offer lots of great content in Silverlight, and you may have seen more and more sites enhanced by Silverlight. I expect this trend will continue.

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Can the Refresh button and Stop button be one button do you think? Their functionalities are mutually exclusive, and you did this on <2003 versions of Windows Mobile
A: In the browser, stop is useful because you can stop animations and sounds on a page. At the same time, you may also want to refresh the page.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will I be able to upgrade directly from IE 6 to IE 8?
A: Yes. You already can upgrade from IE6 to IE8 Beta1. :) Are you running IE6? Have you considered upgrading to IE7?

Allison [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I find entering bugs in Connect to be a little un-enchanting when there is no status option for FIXED. Are the bugs entered in Connect being reviewed, or is it just a place for developers to vent frustrations?
A: You won’t see the status of your bugs as fixed until it is in a publically available build. And yes the bugs are been reviewed by the IE Team.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Yes I am also of the opinion that Silverlight should be provided with IE8, but there are many who will oppose it.Earlier I had suggested it and it was opposed.
A: Thanks for the note.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: JohnHrv: Re VML. I did put in a bug and it's been verified by several people. There is no VML support what-so-ever. I'd be interested in a sample that proves me wrong though.
A: i know VML doesn't work in strict (standards) mode pages without using an inline-block display, but that's the same as IE7. there could very well be other issues so i'll look for the bug.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: By default, binary behaviors are allowed even when ActiveX controls are disabled for some situations where higher security settings are applied. This is why CardSpace is implemented as binary behavior as well as control.
A: We have not made any changes here. Note that the security implications of ActiveX and Binary Behaviors are somewhat different in that the implementation and installation models are different.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Is it possible to dynamically create new elements (like what Firebug can do) using the IE developer toolbar? I was quite puzzled when I looked but could not find any way to do this.
A: i'm not sure i understand...are you referring to creating elements or running any javascript through Firebug's console?

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Not being able to Prototype on the Element class (or the HTMLElement class) makes designing advanced sites difficult, and makes fixing IE bugs darn near impossible. Will IE8 support Prototyping when it is released?
A: Thanks for the suggestion.

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Could there be a feature that, as you type URLs into the address bar, as a second order precedence from your history, it recommends site domains that match what you've typed so far in reverse order of top web sites (getting the data from e.g. live)?
A: Thanks for the suggestion. We certainly want to make sure that it's as easy and fast as possible to get to the sites you want to.

Allison [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are you already aware that list-style-image doesn't work in IE8 beta 1?
A: Thank you for your feedback, we are going to follow-up with this issue in house.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: For what reason was Inline AutoComplete dropped in IE8? - was there a security bug? Users of web based applications expect this behavior and removing it will cause significant headaches if we as developers need to re-implement this
A: I'm not sure I understand your question? The inline autocomplete change only affects the Internet Explorer address bar, and not anything in the page.

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: In IE8, to get an activity on one word only, I have to select the word and then right click. If I just right click on a word I get activities for the whole page. I see the dilemma, but it would be much nicer if I didn't have to select the word first.
A: Let me make sure that I understand the problem. It sounds like you want to use an activity without having to select text on the page. Are you looking to use the activity on against the entire page?

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: The ability to drag and drop hyperlinks in IE7 was significantly reduced from IE6. Will IE8 be fixing these issues so that links can be dragged into text boxes, "NEW" tabs, etc.?
A: That does sound useful! Great feedback - Thanks!

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @JohnHrv Q[56] - is similar to my previous Q. Where in FireBug we can make changes & view the realtime affects. Will IE8 have something like this included in the DevBar or as an allowed AddOn?
A: the ie8 developer tools let you edit HTML attributes and values live. simply click on them in the DOM tree and an edit box appears. when you press ENTER, the change will take affect. you can also enable and disable styles from the 'styles' and 'trace styles' panes using the checkboxes (note: beta 1 has a bug so only leaf-node checkboxes work). and when in a breakpoint in the jscript debugger, you can execute any javascript from within the immediate window.

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Would it be possible to have the option of NOT including local resources in the history of the address bar? In IE7, my address bar gets swamped with local resources and servers instead of actual websites.
A: We'll take that feedback into consideration.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Like Senff, I have had problems with valid XHTML Stict code which has been verified & checked.. not working in IE8. What are the plans to fix this?
A: Internet Explorer does not support XHTML, so you will likely find some cases where XHTML syntax does not behave as you would hope.

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @JohnHrv: The problem I ran into was actually that there does not seem to be a "New attribute..." option like Firebug has to add attributes (say, "title" or "style") to an existing element. There also does not appear to be a way to add new CSS style rules.
A: correct, those are not available in beta 1 but we're looking at them for upcoming releases.

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: it is possible that HTML5 support will be added to IE in the future?
A: The HTML 5 specification is still under development. As developers identify the importance of new technologies we will absolutely consider them

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Not strictly IE8 but I would like to comment on the behaviour in IE7 where, when a scripted prompt() appears, IE displays an information bar by default in the Internet zone. I'm not convinced there's a security risk here and doing this breaks past scripts.
A: We know that there is a spoofing risk here, and we've seen proof-of-concept exploits here. Obviously, ShowModalDialog (which shows an address bar) is a reasonable alternative.

Kristen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are there plans to require IE8 support when shipped to SP3 on XP, or will XP SP2 also be supported?
A: At this time, we have not yet publicly announced a final list of supported platforms for IE8.

Jefferson [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: IE8b1 has major problems handling the more complex aspects of CSS2.1 such as z-index and overflow. Is CSS support going to be frozen at beta 2, or will it keep being improved until the release version?
A: Beta 1 addresses some CSS pain points, but this preview release was just our first step. Our goal is to deliver full CSS 2.1 support in the final release of IE8.

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @Cyrar: Say a page contains "This is an apple". I want to right click apple and use the Search activity. But to do that I have to select the word "apple", and then right click. I'd like to just right click on apple and use that instead of page activities.
A: That's great feedback. We'll discuss the feasibility. If you double click in the middle of the word, IE will select the contiguous characters.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: For IE8, will using the OBJECT/codebase tag to install an .EXE respect the UAC manifest tags such as running asInvoker?
A: Thanks for the question; I'll have to talk to our extensibility PM about this question. Stay tuned for the IE Blog for an upcoming post on IE8 ActiveX changes.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Navigating sites with iframes in IE is notoriously difficult. Will there be a context menu (right click) section where we can open an iframe in a new window or tab?
A: Good suggestion, Steve. It's very very easy to build an extension that does this (2 lines of Javascript) but I understand your request for native support.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I am currently developing a site that is 100% valid XHTML STRICT (I checked and validated). If IE8 Beta can't display that site correctly (some DIV's have incorrect heights at random), what's the point of releasing a beta for developers?
A: It would be great to see your repro, but as noted previously, IE does not fully support the XHTML standards.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Jane: Windows XP installs IE6 by default, so why not skip directly to IE8 ? Besides us developers need IE6 for testing, and you haven't made it easy on us...
A: You can go to IE8 from IE6 directly. However, there are many benefits upgrading to IE7 instead of staying on IE6 (tab support is one of my favorite features for example.). I understand your need as a web developer to test your applications on all version of IE. We do have VPC images available that make it a bit easier. Check out this link: <http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/ie/default.aspx>

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will the developer tools also allow you to live edit the CSS style rules ala Firebug?
A: we're not ready to discuss features for upcoming releases of IE8, but this is something we're looking at.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: The window.prompt() dialog is by far the worst dialog in the history of IE, yet it still looks horrible, and fails to display any meaningful amount of info. Will this be fixed in IE8?
A: :-) I would say that there are worse dialogs, but no, we haven't made any investments here to date.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: http://webbugtrack.blogspot.com/2007/10/bug-109-javascript-prompt-in-ie-how-did.html
A: This link doesn't work for me, but I assume it's just a followup from your previous remark?

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Re Q[75]: Would the solution not be to simply display the originating domain in the javascript prompt dialog? - Like firefox does ("The page at [domain] says")
A: Thanks for the suggestion.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Any possibility for a micro-browser for Windows Server 2008 Core? I need to browse some HTML documentation for server specs, install readme's etc.
A: I'm not an expert on Server Core, but I can say that the browser stack involves a great many components, some of which I suspect are not compatible with the design philosophy of Server Core. I don't think Core is really intended for full use by interactive users.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I haven't seen a written answer for this yet, but can we presume that swtiching between IE8 and IE7Mode in the final version of IE8 will be possible on-the-fly without restarting? (if not, I would consider this a very major usability issue)
A: I believe this question was asked a few minutes ago. Certainly, our hope is that as CSS support improves in IE8, and as sites are updated to be standards compliant, the need for IE7Mode will decline.

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: CSS hacks such as *:first-child+html and *+html that target IE7 still target IE 8 beta 1. Will this be fixed? A lot of sites are going to break otherwise
A: Hey AntonP. In the IE8 Beta1 we have a set of ways for developers and end users to choose which rendering mode they want. By default, IE8 sends a User Agent String to the server saying that it is IE8. The server can choose to send down a Strict Mode HTML file (signified by the strict mode doc type). The server can send down a quirks mode HTML file (no doctype or meta tag). In the quirks mode page, the CSS hacks will still work. For a more detailed description of how IE8 supports standards while maintaining compatibility see the IE blog post http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2008/03/03/microsoft-s-interoperability-principles-and-ie8.aspx

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: With [Q30] i meant i cannot see the URL easily if its greyed out. How is IE 8 going to support users with poor vision?
A: Windows offers many options for users with limited vision, and IE participates in those features. For users with otherwise normal vision, as noted, as soon as you interact with the address bar (hover, focus, etc) it returns to black on white display.

Helen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I work in an environment that uses multiple montiors. The ability to tear off a tab and make it into a seperate window would be outstanding when you need to view two pages at the same time.
A: Agreed. I have definitely received this feature request before. Thanks for the great suggestion :)

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Paul Cutsinger, my point with [Q37] is the menu bar on BY DEFAULT on all versions of IE, make it up to the users to disable it.
A: First we respect user customization. So, if you turned it off in a previous version, we leave it off when you upgrade. Second, people are effective at using commands. XP and Vista have different usage patterns. In XP, the menus are on everywhere so they're expected when in IE. In Vista, the menus are not on everywhere and it's not shocking to the user to see a command bar like in the file explorer or photo gallery. We've studied people's usage of commands in Vista with and without the menu bar on and, there we see that they're effective at using the command bar. Finally, given the low need, we don't want to take a row of space from the web page.

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I'm serious. In strict mode (with valid DOCTYPE) :first-letter and :first-line are not parsed.
A: Ok. Thanks for the feedback. We still have some improvements that we are making in the parser and rendering engine. We'll pass this on to those developer

JohnHrv [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will the onchange event for radio/checkboxes be fixed in IE8? (current bug is that the event only fires when the element is blurred)
A: we're not ready to talk about features for upcoming releases, but the best thing to do for now is to make sure it's logged on the conenct site and vote on it.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: The Fieldset bug in IE8B1 is also very frustrating, I would like to see this fixed in Beta 2. https://connect.microsoft.com/IE/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=336258
A: Thanks for filing the bug, Steve.

Deepak Jain [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: you can log messages to a console both Firefox with Firebug and Safari with console.log(), I know it's hardly a standard, but is it possible that IE will implement it to make cross-browser development easier?
A: That is a great idea and we will look into this. Thanks for your suggestion.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @EricLaw: Cheers, im still using IE 7 so i havent seen the feature in action myself. I have only seen the pictures in the blog posts
A: Thanks.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are there any plans to make browser settings (favourites, passwords, history etc) properly syncable across different machines - perhaps cetralising the data as part of a Windows Live service?
A: There are some browser extensions available today that enable this type of functionality (e.g. Windows Live Toolbar) but it's an interesting suggestion. thanks!

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @EricLaw: Q: [90], you dont really confirm if this change will happen 'on the fly' or if the entire browser will need to be restarted to get the IE7Mode rendering
A: That's true. Note, however, that an "on-the-fly" restart could result in all sorts of interesting bugs, particularly when IE7 Mode pages and IE8 Mode pages attempt to interact.

Kristen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: As a note, I would really like it if you bundled IE7 with XP SP3 because it would give us web developers a stronger IE7 base to work from and decrease our need to code around IE6.
A: The version of IE that initially ships with the OS, is considered the default version of IE for that OS. IE6 is the default browser that ships with Windows XP. Though IE7 is supported on Windows XP, it will not be considered the default browser for XPSP3. For more information on the IE lifecycle, please see here: http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifeselectintmsn

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: With all the changes to IE8 etc, will HTAs (Hypertext Applications) continue to be supported and with their current level of privilege? I rely on these regularly and it would be nice to be reassured that they are still supported.:-)
A: I'm not aware of any plans to make changes in HTA support at this time.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: @EricLaw: Q: [100] - Thanks, could some sort of option be included in the Dev tools then for IE8? So that regular users would not have this problem of switching & where us as Devs can view our changes & switch through modes with more ease?
A: The developer toolbar offers a "Switch Rendering Mode" option that takes effect immediately, without a restart.

Kristen [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: I would REALLY prefer that you are a little more open about what you plan to do about bugs/missing features on Connect, so we have something to go on and can prepare for.
A: We are resolving bugs as "By Design" or "Won't Fix" as appropriate. As we answered in another question in this chat, if you are specifically looking for "fixed" resolution, you will not see that until the reported issue, if fixed, is available in an IE8 build available to the public. Please keep in mind that "won't fix" can indicate that we might intend to address this issue in an alternate way.

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Are there any upcoming improvements to make IE8 more accessible to users who can't or don't want to use the mouse? I know I can hold down tab to go through links but I was hoping for something a bit more user friendly (like Fx does integrating with FAYT).
A: We are considering adding accessibility features in IE8. I will pass your feedback to the team working in this area. Thanks :)

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: will the Mozilla team get another cake this year (FF3.0)? Did they return the cake you gave them?
A: I believe they ate the cake, with photos on their site. As for any future cake plans, I'm afraid we consider all bakery related strategies highly confidential. :-)

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Q: Any chance the Options Dialog in IE could be enhanced to be stretchable? Picking some of the advanced tab options is very tricky when you can't see enough of the list.
A: Thanks for the suggestion. On one hand this is the kind of refinement that we'd love to get in. On the other, we need to focus and make sure that our key scenarios are highly polished. This is the kind of thing that might get in but not at the cost of a more mainstream scenario.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Re Windows 2000: I know the security features are hard to port back and so on but is there any chance the standards support and layout engine could be given the persistent prevalance of this OS in corporate environments, as in IE 6.5?
A: Unfortunately, the product lifecycle for Windows 2000 pretty much makes this impossible.

Kristen [MSFT] (Expert):
Thank you! See you at the next chat!

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Do the desktop and mobile versions of IE share the same code base?
A: We work with the IE Mobile team, but I'm afraid I cannot comment about the internal details of their implementation.

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: how do i turn off the content advisor in ie6 if i don't the password
A: http://support.microsoft.com has a KB article on this topic.

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Stop saying "we're not ready to talk about features for upcoming releases" all the time and be more open about what you are considering to do.
A: Hey Opaque, sorry for the frustration. We generally have a policy about commenting on features that are not built, tested and ready for release. Suppose that we did comment on a feature that was important to you, but then had to cut it because quality or some other blocking factor. If you had made business plans around that feature - I imagine that you would be pretty frustrated. Our policy gives our customers more predictability in their planning

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Based on support for official Windows versions, when do you currently project full support for IE6 to stop?
A: IE6 shipped with XP and WS2003, so it'll be supported for the life of those operating systems.

Katheryn (Moderator):
Thank you so much for joining the chat on IE8 today

EricLaw [MSFT] (Expert):
Sorry everyone-- Gotta run. See you next time!

Cyrar [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Will anything be done about the "glitchiness" of the Page Zoom feature, where objects start overlapping and not behaving as intended by the designer? Admittedly Firefox3beta4 does this no better but that's no reason ;)
A: There's a post on the IE blog about the fixes we have made for this feature

Katheryn (Moderator):
We will be wrapping up for now

Katheryn (Moderator):
See you next chat

Paul Cutsinger (Expert):
Bye!

Allison [MSFT] (Expert):
Thanks for the questions! Bye!

Jane [MSFT] (Expert):
Bye. This was fun. See ya next time.

Sharon [MSFT] (Expert):
thanks for the questions. see you next time.

Deepak Jain [MSFT] (Expert):
Q: Based on support for official Windows versions, when do you currently project full support for IE6 to stop?
A: bye!

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