IE 5 preview coming soon
Microsoft will deliver a "developer preview" release of its forthcoming Internet Explorer 5.0 browser later this month.
The enhancements to the development options within Internet Explorer 5.0 will allow users to create a variety of new options for Web page functionality.
Discussion of the next release of IE here at the company's TechEd developer conference represents one of the first public showings of the forthcoming browser technology. Executives from the software giant said the initial release of the software is primarily targeted at developers who want to start adding functions that the new client browsing software will support to their Web sites or Web-based applications.
Users of the developer release will see an interface not unlike that of the current IE 4.0 version. "It won't seem like much of a step at all," said Craig Beilinson, an IE product manager.
New features of IE 5.0 include the following:
The company is putting a heavy emphasis on Dynamic HTML as a programming tool, hoping to cut down the time that Web-based programmers spend coding.
Executives also pledged that IE 5.0 will offer increased stability and performance. Initial versions of IE 4.0 were known to sometimes crash a PC, prompting a swift round of patches from Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Washington.
Integration between IE and Microsoft's client operating systems has come under intense scrutiny from federal regulators, resulting in a lawsuit filed by the government and 20 states. The browser's integration with the forthcoming Windows 98 release, however, was not broached during the presentation.
A beta release of IE 5.0 will follow soon after the developer preview. "It should be a relatively similar beta cycle to what you've seen from us in the past," Beilinson said.
Netscape Communications reacted to the news of an IE 5 preview with nonchalance.
"Microsoft releasing IE 5 to developers is a nonevent for us," said Eric Byunn, Netscape's group product manager for Communicator. "We are proceeding on our development path and our communication with developers according to the plan we laid out in the beginning of the year: releasing our source code, working with the development community all along, and moving a product into beta later this year."
Netscape retains a larger share of the browser market with its Navigator software, according to most surveys, but has felt significant pressure from the Microsoft juggernaut.
To spur its own developers on, Netscape has chosen to offer its source code for free, hoping to gain an advantage via the creation of a developer network based on third-party input.
Net reporter Paul Festa contributed to this report.