Preview of Internet Explorer 9 Available Today

At the Professional Developers Conference (PDC), Microsoft underscored its continued commitment to HTML5 and showed how developers can fuse the full hardware acceleration and site-centric design in Internet Explorer 9 to tap into the power of PC hardware, transforming their websites to feel more like native Windows applications.

As part of the ongoing commitment to standards and “same mark-up” on Internet Explorer 9. You can download it from Windows Internet Explorer 9 Platform Preview 6.

The team has announced 10 million downloads of IE 9 so far.

Users can pin sites directly to the Windows task bar, and sites can program jump lists and offer notifications just as Windows applications do. The web standard markup (HTML, CSS, and script) in pages runs faster and smoother, taking advantage of modern PC hardware.

In addition to several new test drive samples, you can find more examples from the broader community of what’s possible with a great HTML5 implementation at https://kexparchive.org/ and https://10k.aneventapart.com/. Each of these examples shows how the web becomes richer and more immersive with HTML5, and how tapping the power of the whole PC is increasingly important to deliver the performance consumers expect.

For details on test performance of the browser and about standards compliance, see the IE Team Blog post HTML5, Using the whole PC: Sixth IE9 Platform Preview Available for Developers.

Steps to Get Your Site Ready for IE 9

• Deliver the best performance and best experience possible for visitors with IE9 . We recommend sending IE9 the same standards-based markup your site sends other browsers, and sending it in the default IE9 mode that offers the best performance. Use featuredetection , not browser detection, to handle any cross browser differences in behavior or feature support.  This pattern will keep your site working even as browsers change. If your site relies on legacy IE behavior, place an X-UA-Compatible meta tag or header on your site so IE9 users have a good experience.
• Take advantage of HTML5, CSS3, SVG, Canvas, WOFF, DOM, ES5, navigation timing, the new F12 Developer Tools, and more… described here in the guide for developers.  With IE9, the amazing experiences you write using web standard markup have an advantage, running hardware accelerated and using whole PC.
• Please continue to report issues on Connect if you’re giving IE9 the same code as you’re giving to other modern browsers and your site doesn’t look or work right. With IE9 Platform Preview 6, we’ve fixed over 80 community-reported issues involving common user scenarios, commonly used frameworks, JavaScript, DOM, and aspects of the platform. We’ve also added support for additional standards. We will fix even more between now and the IE9 Release Candidate, and want your feedback.

Bruce D. KyleISV Architect Evangelist | Microsoft Corporation