Microsoft will be completing the finishing touches for Internet Explorer 9 Beta, and plans to make the new version of the browser available in September. The announcement was made by Microsoft COO Kevin Turner during his keynote address at the annual Microsoft Financial Analyst Meeting on July 29th.
Some pre-production builds of IE 9 have been released to the public this year, but until now they have been targeted toward developers. The beta will be the first version aimed toward the public for general use.
Some screenshots of a leaked IE 9 developer build have been leaked by Cnbeta, a Chinese website, earlier this week. The images show a new download manager which is similar to one that Firefox has used for a number of years. Also, a new tab design that shows the user’s “most popular sites” is shown and looks quite similar to Google Chrome.
The validity of the recently released screenshots has been disputed. A user on Neowin.net posted several of the images on June 27th stating that they were almost certainly fake or digitally altered. However, a news article posted at Neowin on July 29th links to several similar images and states that they have verified the authenticity of the screenshots. The images containing the download manager and popular websites features are said to have been part of a recent developer build of IE9 that was distributed to internal and external Microsoft partners.
Recent IE developer builds are also reported to contain a new Microsoft Javascript engine, which goes by the code name “Chakra”, as well as an all new graphics subsystem. Because the builds are intended for development purposes however, they have not contained any built-in security features and do not have a back button.
By the time the IE 9 beta hits in September, it should have all of the consumer-friendly features implemented. There is no word on how long Microsoft plans to keep the browser in beta status, but many are projecting the final build to be released sometime in 2011.
With the popularity of Chrome and Firefox, I wouldn’t be surprised to see more “borrowed” features in the IE 9 beta version. Microsoft is definitely up against some tough competition with their web browser, and needs to make some strides to gain back some of their share of users that have been lost over the past few years.
It would be nice to see Microsoft actually introduce some brand new innovative features with IE 9, rather than just playing catchup to other browsers.
