ie9

The Web is the next vanguard for 3D graphics, but programmers who want to embrace the new dimension next year will have to place a bet on one of two competing technologies: Flash or WebGL.

For years, Adobe Systems' Flash software has been the way to bring graphical games like Crush the Castle, Bloons, Desktop Tower Defense, or Stunt Bike Pro to the Web.

But at the same time, Web standards advocates have toiled to build such technology into the Web itself and not rely on the proprietary and sometimes insecure Flash Player plug-in. That work following in Adobe's … Read more

The latest beta of Microsoft's upcoming Internet Explorer 9 browser has two new fixes out that the company says will improve stability, as well as squash a feedback bug some users had been experiencing.

The stability fix, which rolled out as an automatic update to IE9 beta users mid-day yesterday, should address some of the issues users have had with the browser crashing. Microsoft did not go into detail on if this was tied to any specific usage behavior, or any add-ons, just that it "improves the reliability of Internet Explorer 9 Beta in various scenarios."

The … Read more

Microsoft has released a seventh test version of Internet Explorer 9 the company says is better at "real-world" Web-based JavaScript programs. But with it has come a rival's accusation that Microsoft essentially engaged in the storied computer industry practice of benchmark engineering--designing technology to be fast on an artificial speed test.

The seventh IE9 platform preview comes with new improvements to its Chakra JavaScript engine. And Microsoft asserted Chakra is engineered to do better on actual Web site tasks rather than narrow benchmarks.

"Over the last few weeks, we've been tuning the JavaScript engine for … Read more

The World Wide Web Consortium is griping about this week's premature judgments regarding which browser best complies with the HTML5 standard and is asking for help to improve its tests.

Philippe Le Hegaret, who oversees HTML5 and other standards at the W3C, today chastised those who concluded from tests done so far that Internet Explorer 9 is leading the race to support the new Web page technology. The W3C has added 135 new HTML5 compliance checks in the last month, bringing the total to 232, but that's nowhere near enough, he said.

"It seems that people are … Read more

It began innocently enough--a promotional blog post about Microsoft's newest version of Internet Explorer 9. But in less than a week, it became an illustration of just how rapidly misinformation moves through a hot and increasingly important corner of the software market.

The browser market was already competitive a year ago, but the arrival of IE9, currently in beta testing, has added even more energy to the competition. That's because Microsoft has placed support for a host of modern Web technologies front and center, transforming IE from a drag on the Internet into an ally in developers' efforts … Read more

REDMOND, Wash.--Microsoft kicked off its Professional Developers Conference today, releasing an updated test version of Internet Explorer 9, the company's effort to reassert itself in the Web browser market.

"We've tried to make the Web feel more like native applications," CEO Steve Ballmer said as part of a keynote speech this morning.

The update is a new platform preview that developers can use to test Web sites, but is not an update to the more full-featured beta version that Microsoft released earlier this year. Microsoft had said it would continue to update the platform preview … Read more

Firefox's direct pipeline to Google search results is Mozilla's dominant revenue source, but the next version of the open-source Web browser will also get Microsoft's Bing as an alternative.

Google will remain the default search option in Firefox, and Yahoo will be second, but Bing will become a third for English-language users when Firefox 4 is released, Mozilla announced Wednesday.

"Bing...offers a user experience that we think users will find valuable, and with its significant rise in popularity over the last year, we will also be including Bing as a general search option for English language users," said Jay Sullivan, Mozilla's vice president of products, in a blog post.

Microsoft has had a search engine for years, so why only add it now? "Until Bing launched last year, we didn't have many users asking us to include a Microsoft search engine in the search bar," Sullivan told CNET. "Since then, we've heard a lot of positive feedback about Bing, and based on our own analysis, we thought it offered a valuable user experience."

Those who delve into a dialog box already can add Bing and other search options to Firefox, so it's not as if Bing fans have been shut out. But the new option will build it in, a notable change given the fierce rivalry over the last decade between Microsoft and Mozilla when it comes to browsers.

The browser landscape is changing, though. After years of relatively sluggish change, Microsoft is back in the game with IE9, now in beta testing. The software includes support for many Web standards that Mozilla and others have been trying to establish for months or years, making IE now also something of an ally as well as a competitor. … Read more

Google's Chrome Frame, a project to retrofit older versions of Internet Explorer with modern browser features, has reached "stable" status, which the company believes means it's ready for widespread use. (Chrome Frame is available for download from Google and CNET Download.com.)

"After months of polishing, Google Chrome Frame now starts three times faster on Windows Vista and Windows 7 and the most common conflicts with other plug-ins have been fixed," said programmers Tomas Gunnarsson and Robert Shield in a blog post Wednesday. Chrome Frame emerged publicly one year ago as a developer preview and graduated to beta status in June, and the programmers promised further improvements in the future as Chrome Frame gets on the six-week release cycle of the standalone Chrome browser.

Loathing for IE6 is universal among Web developers who must reckon with its lack of standards support, sluggish JavaScript support, and less secure design; Microsoft is among those who fervently want to see it replaced. Chrome frame is a curious approach to the problem, though: given abundanct free browser alternatives--including two other major IE releases that arrived since IE6's 2001 debut--it's not clear why somebody would choose an IE brain transplant over just installing a new browser. … Read more

The phone wars are dialing up again with Nokia and HTC sending new handsets into the battlefield and Microsoft retreating a bit on its Windows Phone 7 strategy.

Nokia got the ball rolling by introducing three smartphones that use its new Symbian 3 operating system, though none of these new devices will be offered by a U.S. carrier. The company, which was once king of the mobile market, is now battling Apple's and Google's economic might, brand power, and sudden relevance.

To recover its position, Nokia is trying to capitalize on the large number of Nokia phones … Read more