@jaledwith: Yes, there are a few. I use an extension called "Tabs Open Relative" that simply opens tabs immediately to the right of whatever tab I have open, but there are others that group them like the Windows Taskbar

thekingofcheap

When do you plan to post about the new features that are unique to IE8
-Accelerators
-Visual Search Suggestions
-Tab Crash Isolation
-Domain Highlighting
-Search Box Synchronization (search from google.com, the search box updates with the keywords filled in)

Your post is written very rudely, why do you insult IE when they are trying to come up?

Tyrax

so, it does load a lot faster than ie7. they also borrowed the bookmarks bar from ff. css support sucks ass still, but they implemented a feature called 'compatibility view' which displays things like ie7. which is odd, maybe they're working on standards support? also, its better find on page. they had it before but now its improved. I'm still sticking with my recently installed ff. the lack of css support really pissed me off recently when making my final web site for a web design class I took.

danger the pirate

@tgrk35:

Standards-wise, It passes Acid2.

So they are making improvements there as well.

(As far as I know, not even Opera passes Acid3 yet)

-Perros-

perros

But can it run Linux?

/ducks behind desk

thekingofcheap

IE is still a pile of shit.

Let's add some more bullshit features that FF has had for YEARS! This will distract them from our poor standards support!

YES. SIGN ME UP.

tgrk35

I have both IE and Firefox. Each has it's own unique things that I like. If only there were a mash-up of these things...

RenRen

i tried it last night, there's nothing there to make me switch from firefox. it's also still one of the ugliest browsers i've seen...

MuglyTheWorm

I really like the tab grouping feature. Is there a Firefox extension that'll do that?

jaledwith

@xaksei: ......standards heh.. I tried it today and it displayed some pages funny still.

Ajh

I think they just copy mozilla's stuff and call it differently... Like microsoft does usually.

NEVERCOOK

My biggest concern about IE8 is how does it conform to CSS standards??

xaksei

I wonder if they added any new standards-compliant features. (i.e. HTML/CSS/JS/SVG...)

It seems they're just trying to bring back users so they don't have to implement the important things.

therethinker

Wow, there are some features there that look great!

Firefox addons, anyone :)

Phoshi

Hi all, great comments, thanks. I updated the post with Tab Crash Isolation, which indeed sounds like a great feature (though one I didn't see in action).

To summarize my review in two sentences: 1. IE8 is playing catchup with Firefox and Opera with several features those browsers already have. 2. I was pleasantly surprised by IE8 (see last graf).

My review was not rude or critical. I AM, however, critical of IE6 and IE7, which are simply crappy browsers in 2008. It's preposterous that mainstream IE users don't have the advanced features that have been in Firefox et al for so long now.

Gina Trapani

@ustice:
"""-Accelerators - FasterFox? Down Them All?"""

Not even close. Take a look at the website. It's a re-brand of "Activities", which serves and entirely different purpose than either of the two things you mentioned.

Kyang

@jaledwith: Tab coloring for Firefox, from Mozilla Labs:

[labs.mozilla.com]

For those bitching about standards, IE 8 uses the standards-compliant renderer by default and only falls back to quirks mode when it fails, just like Firefox:

[arstechnica.com]
[blogs.msdn.com]
[channel9.msdn.com]

wffurr

@.endejas.: She*. Apologies, Gina.

I've been trying out IE8 for a few hours. I'm not sure how I like the way it renders pages. I also hope MS makes InPrivate launch into a new tab, instead of a whole new window.

There's still some pages that get borked, but overall, I'm impressed. Especially since my add-ons and extensions in Firefox are kept to a minimum (Bookmarks Bar, Readitlater, and Adblock).

.endejas.

@Tyrax: He does say he's just going to do the "familiar" features in the header.

And writing something good about IE on the internet is reputation suicide.

.endejas.

@Tyrax:
-Accelerators - FasterFox? Down Them All?
-Visual Search Suggestions - Sounds a lot like the search box in FF. Not images though.
-Tab Crash Isolation - THIS is good.
-Domain Highlighting - This was in FF3, but was backed out. Not sure why.
-Search Box Synchronization (search from google.com, the search box updates with the keywords filled in) - I hope that you can disable this... interesting, if of minimal use

ustice

I hate when people get criticized just because its from Microsoft.

For instance, IE8 is doing a terrific job in order to compliant standards.

Tab Crash Isolation is a major feature that none of the other browser has but is not being mentioned in the article?

God...

amigokin

@jaledwith: In Firefox, the "ColorfulTabs" extension has a feature that applies the same functionality. Tabs from the same domain can be colored the same, or you can manually set how certain sites are colored. It may take an extra step or 2 to order the tabs the same way, but at least the colors will match.

My guess is that combining ColorfulTabs with TabMixPlus will garner you very, very similar results to IE8's grouped tabs option.

Kyle Wegner

@tgrk35: It is a good step by Microsoft, because even though Firefox users have had these tools at our hands for years via Extensions, the much less tech-savvy "I'll take what comes by default" people do not. By introducing these new features, those people will also be able to use a web-standards compliant browser, with handy few features.

Now if only they can figure out how to natively support extensions, and convince people to update once the final version is released... I can't believe that people are still using IE 5 >.<

srinidhiv123

*yawn* I don't care until:

1. WEB-STANDARDS!!!!
2. Secure

All the features in the world won't matter to me before then.

Oh...good morning everyone! :)

schmelding

IE8's New Features: Does it really matter?

Unless IE8 comes with a month in Hawaii with Keira Knightley I couldn't care less about it's new features.

Ssscorpion

The only thing that makes me happy about the upcoming release of IE8 is that the 25% of surfers who still use IE6 may finally realize it's time to upgrade (either to IE7/8 or Firefox 3). IE6 is such a pain for web designers, whereas IE7 doesn't present any major challenges in strict mode. Maybe Microsoft will finally make it less onerous to upgrade to IE7 once IE8 is final.

zoomZAP

Microsoft should just save the trouble and cost and rebrand Firefox. They are so far behind that it is just embarrassing. They can then take their engineers and have them work with Mozilla... Might as well, since Mozilla is already working to improve IE. :)

Is the next version of the XBox going to just mimic the PS3? What's the next feature? Blue-Ray?

oh... wait... nevermind... ;-)

ustice

I'm not touching IE with a barge pole.

I highly doubt that IE8 will have any standards support.

insomnia_guy

I can honestly say that with what mucking about I have done with Beta 2 so far, that it is a HUGE improvement over Beta 1...

Asian Angel

@Gina Trapani: you should add accelorators to this post, because i feel that they are the big feature for end users in this release. they work a lot like Ubiquity that Mozilla is working on right now, but I think it's a bit easier for users (no typing, just clicking).

i feel this ie update is very promising, and i wish the tech world would stop calling everybody copiers.

natenovs

Woo porn mode!

Wait, porn in IE? Why not just call it virus-gathering-mode?

Phoshi

InPrivate Browsing. You mean "Porn Mode?"

tom2133

I think the question I would have is can you change the config files?? oh, and the all important question of... since IE8 is going to have all of this how bloated will it be? (since M$ likes to stuff their products like a thanksgiving turkey)

cvpunk

@wffurr: Chromatabs doesn't do what IE8's tab grouping does. Chromatabs colors the tab based on the web site. Tab grouping colors tabs based on their referer. (Say, if you open three links from Lifehacker in new tabs, they'd all be green.)

Gina Trapani

Interesting.. Some of the FireFox scripts do work with IE6+ when you use IE7pro. Yes, I know it is not as extensible as FF, but there are some things that are being worked on.

Also, I have looked IEPlus too as they have done similar things to IE7Pro. The Shendoo site is having trouble coming up, you will have to Google IEPlus..

I have been using Firefox and have been pretty impressed with it. Since we have to use sites (i.e. SharePoint) with Activex, I absolutely love IETab for Firefox.

kdyer

@wffurr: (About ChromaTabs) "NOTE: Won't be updated to work on Firefox 3."
And the alternative is "experimental" [addons.mozilla.org]

afolex

@Phoshi:

LOL! Well said!

Ssscorpion

Aww, they're catching up. IE8 really does seem to be making progress, even if FireFox is making more. Its a bit like Windows vs Linux. Each have unique innovations, the supporters of the free version are much more vocal, and both have merits. Frankly, I'm glad there's both FF and IE. The competition between the two forces both to innovate. Without competition, they'd probably just stagnate.

jokermatt999

"Tab Crash Resolution," isn't it just like the "Session Manager" in Firefox? Everytime FF crashes, you open FF again and all your tab will open again.

conannug

I was happy to see the dev tools installed by default. Don't remember if this was so in Beta 1. I used the old dev tools almost daily in doing development and the new version is much improved, more like Firebug, including built-in javascript debugging.

IGotNothin

@thekingofcheap, @Kyle Wegner, @wffurr: Thanks for the suggestions. I'll check out both "Tabs Open Relative" and "ColorfulTabs."

jaledwith

wow... can anyone say Firefox... i guess the biggest compliment is copying.

atomicrabbit

So far, it looks like they are simply porting options from IE7Pro. I've been using IE7Pro for over a year, and I love the ad blocker, mouse gestures, plug-ins, and the find-in-page options!

dtaschler

@conannug: No, tab crash resolution means that when one tab fails, it doesn't bring the whole browser down with it - just that tab. This is something that neither Firefox or Opera currently can do.

tmetzcc325

@xaksei: My thoughts exactly.

paix120

ugh, this sucks. I tried it out for approximately two hours before I uninstalled and went back to IE 7.

Don't waste your time. ffrulz

Cornflakes

I tried it and windows explorer (vista 32 bit) kept restarting. I eventually uninstalled it and things went back to normal.

steelew

Since neither is available as a standalone, can anyone recommend a good solution for running IE 7 and 8 side-by-side on WinXP?

lemontea

Keeping in view the last paragrpah, yayy for you Brother-in-law, Gina! :)
I wonder if he knows about the porn mode

Imran Hussain

People in the comments keep saying this stuff is directly stolen from FX add-ons... I've got news for you, these add-ons also exist for IE7. Incredible how people feel like part of a community just because the product they use is open source (by a for profit organization none the less).

puntai

IE has had find on page forever. It's just a new interface that works more like other browsers' find features do.

bedroll

8 Versions into Internet Explorer and it still cannot beat FireFox. I think Ill just stick with my customized Firefox 3 :)

Oscar Ayala

Revolutionary!

Pensador

Ho Hum. Longtime FF user here (on Ubuntu) and have just rediscovered the beauty of Opera.

gregbzh

@Cornflakes: how so? it is worked flawlessly for me. could you please elaborate on some bugs you've seen, so lh readers can know what to expect.

natenovs

Saft (a paid Safari feature extender) had great crash protection. It didn't isolate the crash, but upon restart, you could tick which tabs you wanted to resume while leaving others unchecked to not load.

Great feature that I hope a FF add-on or update addresses in the future.

robbrechter

At least IE doesn't crash all the time like iTunes...or Firefox. And the whining about standards is dated information, live in the now. Microsoft can get its share of criticism, but let's keep the fake microsoft-hater linux-apple propaganda stuff out of the equation, shall we?

I use FF as my default and it still bombs out everyday on me with just 5 tabs open. And it really has a shitfit over iGoogle. Not sure what happened with v3. Lots of stuff is better but not stability.

I am certainly used to the layout of FF over IE. And I like my Red Cat skin too much.

cliffordthered

umm... anyone know how 2 uninstall ie8. new saying that i need to do so before installation. stupid Microsoft, no unistall app!

techman9

oh and about the tabs, [labs.mozilla.com]

techman9

"sucks a lot less"? It's a good browser. Some of the features (visual search results, tab grouping) are stuff Firefox does not have at all.

burnblue

@Swizzler121: Give Opera a shot. I haven't touched Firefox in months since I made the switch.

You will be impressed.

MrJenkins

IE always had the find on page feature, but it was really crappy, didn't search for it as you typed, and it opened in a separate window. glad to see they're catching up to 3 years ago...

seriously. IE is like the slow fat guy at the end of the race but keeps jogging, you just have to feel bad for him...

Swizzler121

I'll stick with the best: IE6.

tonynyc

@jaledwith:

Group/Sort Tabs extension can do this. I use it with ChromaTabs Plus, perfect combo.

capintro

oh, the ctl pannel, never would have guessed! CCleaners pretty much replaced that. :)

techman9

@techman9: Here you go (link to the article along with the text copied)...this is how I got IE 8 Beta 1 uninstalled on my Vista O.S.

Uninstall IE 8

Do you want to uninstall Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 in windows vista? But are you not finding it in "Programs and Features" of Windows Vista?

Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 can be easily uninstalled in Windows XP using the Add or Remove Programs option.Windows Vista however, does not consider Windows Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 as a "program". Infact Windows Vista categorizes Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 as an "update". Hence, you may not find Windows Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 in "Programs and Features" of Windows Vista.

How to uninstall Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 in windows vista?
To uninstall Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1,

■Go to the control panel,

■Click on Uninstall Programs link or Programs and Features icon,

■Then in the Tasks pane on the left, click on View installed updates link,

■Locate and select Windows Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) beta 1 in the list of installed updates and

■Click on Uninstall button

■Finally click on Yes when asked whether you are sure that you want to uninstall the update.

Asian Angel

but why do they insist on that horrid UI?

glaeven

I commend Microsoft for releasing this so people who use IE will have the same experience we all have enjoyed in FireFox.

I also like the Accelerators.

Also, I too think this post was written poorly. To quote Picaso, good designers copy, great designers steal.

It's great to see the "Awesome-bar" in IE since it is a very productive browsing UI technique.

nyxtom

MS: Please create a simple, basic, standards-compliant browser that I can use to download firefox with.

johnhorneguitar

Also, I'm impressed that they added a Compatability view for IE8. This means that sites designed for IE 5, or older versions where the "standards" were different than today's will still render beautifully.

Many people here have commented on the idea of a standards-compliant browser but fail to realize that standards have been changing over and over since way back when.

Building websites to be standard compliant is dependent upon who and what browsers you're supporting based on the content you have on your website. There are plenty of Firefox hacks that have to be made as there are IE 5+, Opera and Safari hacks. Just because there's a "standard" doesn't mean it will be perfect everywhere its viewed.

nyxtom

First off, let me state for the record, I have always disliked IE and sought out & used other browsers starting out with Netscape then going with Firefox. From this day forward, we'll use the Fx until they turn into IE, but IE beta2 is the first thing in a long, long time that has come from MSN that I could get along if Mozilla up and died...long Live the Fox!!!!
FTW, FREEDOM THRU WISDOM, RIDE FREE RIDE SAFE!

Lil-ndn

Smart Address Bar: Firefox built-in
Tab Grouping: Firefox add-on "Tab-Mix Plus", but it isn't color-coded*
Tab Crash Resolution: Firefox built-in if I'm not mistaken and also part of Tab-Mix Plus add-on
Favorites Bar: Firefox add-on, I'm not sure if this is built-in also
Suggested Sites: I remember seeing an add-on like this in Firefox
Find of Page: Firefox, Safari, and Opera built-in

Most important thing:
%'age of Compliancy to W3C's HTML, XHTML, XML, CSS, etc.: will it ever increase by at least 10% more??

Laibcoms

@Gina Trapani: i think ColorfulTabs does the job....
it can generate colors by URL.
it even has a option called "Enable preset domain colors"

g_e_e_k

@Laibcoms: Firefox DOES NOT have an option to isolate the crashed tab. When a tab crashes, the all firefox.exe crashes.

The new Tab Crash resolution feature lets you to close the crashed tab while the browser .exe is not affected.

amigokin

that Tab Crash feature was the one that made me think "IE8 really has something going on here!"

i'm not a big microsoft fan, but it's been making some great improvements! (office 2007!)

miachenyze

so... the poor mans FF3?

falter

My Take on IE8:
The pros:
+Tab isolation: I've had Fx die quite a few times when a tab crashed, this a brilliant feature.
+Web standards for internet, IE 'standards' for intranet: This is the best answer for making IE8 web standards compliant, without breaking millions of corporate intranet sites that are IE only
+Catching Firefox: Improved tab features, page search, 'awesomebar', and the like. IE, welcome to 2008.

The cons:
-Catching Firefox, but not much more.
-System integration: My biggest gripe is that IE is a windows component and not a standalone app. It's a security risk, it requires rebooting (twice!) to install, and if I update to SP3 now, I could be stuck with it. There's no reason for any of this.
-bug-ugly GUI: There's a lot of wasted space, and what's with not being able to put the Home button on the left like everybody else?
-MS Word is the default HTML editor: I used to do volunteer tech support for Comic Genesis (back when it was Keenspace) and people make pages in Word was one of the biggest issues. MS Word is to HTML what an unsupervised three-year old is to a paint shop.

v.dog

Wow. Firefox, Tab Mix Plus, Colorful Tabs, I love you. iE, it's not you, it's me. Well to be honest it IS you and you just don't get it.

pizzabot

[www.ghacks.net]

tartooob

@perros: Safari 4 passes Acid 3. I imagine it's part of Snow Leopard

fadecomic

Opera's Quick Find features still trumps both the Awesome Bar and IE's new Smart Address Bar.

mickeric

Has anyone seen the tab crash thing actually work? I had one lock up a couple times yesterday and it took down the whole browser.

Also the dev tools I commented on previously work great, but are excruciatingly slow. Overall it feels somewhat better than IE7 but still not ready to be my default browser.

IGotNothin

@jaledwith: Try the extension Tree Style Tabs. It doesn't group them by color, instead it puts a space between them. There is also an option to indent the tabs based referer, so child tabs are a bit lower than the tabs that you opened them from. This allows you to have a tree of tabs instead of just single large groups, hence the name. It also has the ability to collapse groups of tabs (manually or automatically), allowing you to hide groups of tabs. It allows you to drag tabs between different groups, to raise or lower them in the hierarchy, to split them off into their own groups, close the whole group, close only the children, close only the referer, etc. It also allows for a vertical tab bar on the left or right, as well as a bunch of options about how the tree is handled. For instance you can decide whether you want tabs from a new domain to open in their own group or as a child of the referer tab. It is really powerful, and makes it a lot easier to keep track of what you have been doing. It is also compatible with Tab Mix Plus, meaning it respects and cooperates with Tab Mix Plus options. And yes, the trees are restored when you restore a previous session.

TheBlackCat

@IGotNothin:
I have. It's crashed on a few pages and all it does is turn off the tab. even has an option to reload that crashed tab

--

It's odd there's quite a bit this article skipped over.. Like search suggestion in the search bar base don your current provider the cat if you search amazon using their search provider, you get actual pictures of products in the search suggestions

There's not a single mention of accelerators, compatibility mode, or how the address bar is mostly grayed out in order to help you see the top level domain and help spot malicious sites

LordDaMan

I have the beta running, CSS is still wrong. I only loaded it in hopes that building 2 CSS versions for every site would be coming to an end. Way to go M$!

djrogi

@thekingofcheap: LOL

I have dropped IE and never looked back except for IE tab for those few sites that think activeX is all that and a bag of chips....

Darkmatter91

IE8 is starting as slow (20-30 seconds) as IE7 did for me. Is anyone else having this problem? I am a Firefox user, but I would like to use IE quickly when needed. IE pages load faster in IETab.

Babelfish

IE8 is starting as slow (20-30 seconds) as IEI didn't for me. Is anyone else having this problem? I am a Firefox user, but I would like to use IE quickly when needed. IE pages load faster in IETab.

Babelfish

How quickly we forget how many computers FF3 crashed. There were nothing but complaints all over the place. I could not wait to get FF3 off all my computers. MS could cure cancer and people would find a problem with it. It's the flavor of the day.

tcatnat

Can any of the brilliant LHers here possibly help me?

I had IE Beta 1 installed until tonight. Then I downloaded and tried to install IE 8 Beta 2. It said it was removing Beta 1, then restarted my computer and said it was installing Beta 2. My computer restarted again, and when I clicked the Quick Launch for "Launch Internet Explorer Browser" the monitor flashed for half a second but nothing else happened. I re-launched it several times with the same result, then I checked Task Manager to see if IE was running at all - but it wasn't.

So I tried to remove Beta 2. When the computer restarted the Desktop Info program on my Desktop still said that I had IE 8 Beta 2 installed. So I checked Add/Remove Programs but Beta 2 was no longer listed there. So I ran jv16 PowerTools to remove the installer that still showed up for Beta 2 when it scanned and to remove Beta 2's reg entries, then I checked to see if IE 8's uninstaller had "rolled back" to IE 7 - but it hadn't. IE 7 no longer seems to be on my computer at all, IE 8 doesn't work and can't be removed, and now I'm stuck without a modern version of IE to test my websites against. What do I do now? Is there an answer to this?

In the meantime I use the Multiple IE program to access IE versions 4,5, and 6, and that still works, but I want at least version 7 on here. If anyone can help me figure out what to do I'll be very grateful.

emnem

@ ustice: well said in your 1st comment. indeed, Firefox is improving IE, by making M$ catch-up with FF. The one who leads is the winner; not the one who copies / follows.

Rangzy

@emnem:

I hate asking for help, and waiting to get an answer is even more nerve-wracking, so I went and found it myself.

I am the worst-case-scenario: I had Service Pack 3 installed, I had Beta 1 installed, and I had System Restore turned OFF. I am deeply, deeply screwed from every angle, since MS hardwires IE 8 into SP3 somehow (what they call "seamlessly integrating it").

Now I can't use any version of IE above 6 unless I use the Recovery Console to remove SP3. That will be tomorrow's project, I suppose.

Belated warning to others with SP3: Uninstall Beta 1 manually (through the Add/Remove Programs applet) before you install Beta 2, or you are never going to be able to use any version of IE above 6 again - unless you first take the steps on this page - or reinstall Windows.

What a nightmare this has turned into.

emnem

@emnem: I have SP3 installed, upgraded to Beta 2 from Beta 1 without uninstalling manually first, and it all went well. No problems at all.

Even if I were somehow rendered incapable of using "any version of IE above 6", I wouldn't consider that much of a tragedy. After IE6 I pretty much never actually used IE. I still keep upgrading it just to see if they've actually fixed any of its actual problems, its ugly and terrible interface, and its incredible lack of intuitiveness and customizability.

Its really laughable. There's actually a toggle option specifically for which side of the address bar the reload and stop buttons should go on. Thanks, but are these the only buttons you've designated that people would ever like to be able to move, and are those the only two places you've decided they will ever want to move them? Get that from some focus group, did ya?

Might be nice if Microsoft stopped trying to predict how people will be using their software and just start making it so that we can use it the way we like to, how ever that may be. Just being able to move the address bar would be the biggest upgrade I can imagine for IE. I'm waiting for that feature in Beta 3. Fingers crossed.

IE is the browser people use only when they don't know any better. So sad.

equazcion

Privacy? On my microsoft app?

This is a sick, sick joke ... But still very funny.

TheLouis