Internet Explorer 7 (Beta 3)

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What's New in Internet Explorer 7

• Dynamic Security Protection: Internet Explorer 7 takes security to a new level with new functionality that thwarts malicious software, as well as protect users against data theft from fraudulent Web sites. Additionally, Internet Explorer 7 gives users full control over adding functionality to their browsing experiences, allowing for safe and easy add-on functionality while avoiding inadvertent downloads of unwanted software.
  
• Everyday Tasks Made Easier and Faster: Internet Explorer 7 has enhanced capabilities, making it even more productive for today's savvy Internet users. Internet Explorer 7 focuses on making searching, browsing multiple sites, and printing easier and faster. The toolbar search box contains MSN Search; you can modify the search bar to include AOL search, Ask Jeeves, and Yahoo Search.
  
• Improved Platform for Web Development and Manageability: Enhancements to the Internet Explorer 7 display engine allow Web developers to more easily create attractive and functional Web sites, while maintaining the ability to browse existing Web content. The new Really Simple Syndication (RSS) platform support allows other applications to integrate with the browsing experience. Also, it is now easier for network administrators to centrally deploy and manage Internet Explorer for large numbers of users.

Platform Features

• RSS Feeds—Internet Explorer 7 RSS feeds help you access information quickly and directly on the Web, using automatic discovery of new feeds on Web pages, basic Web feed reading ability, and basic support for saving Web feeds as favorites. Developers and IT administrators can use this API to manipulate the set of feeds to which users are subscribed (Common Feed List). See Windows RSS Platform.
  
• Microsoft Phishing Filter—Internet Explorer 7 includes functionality to protect users against phishing attacks from hostile sites. A complete Phishing Filter, including the ability for system administrators to set group policy for the entire network, is on available on Internet Explorer 7 for all platforms. Developers of well-behaved Web sites benefit greatly from the Phishing Filter because users will come to trust in the added control they have over their environment.
  
• Protected Mode—Microsoft Windows Vista Protected Mode reduces the severity of threats to both Internet Explorer and extensions running in Internet Explorer by eliminating the ability to silently install malicious code through software vulnerabilities. It takes advantage of the Microsoft Windows Vista Integrity mechanism and User Interface Privilege Isolation (UIPI) to block interaction from Internet Explorer with higher integrity applications system resources. Protected Mode also includes compatibility features that allow most extensions to continue running unaffected and provide impacted extensions with feasible implementation options.
  
• Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)—Internet Explorer 7/Transport Layer Security (TLS) makes it easier to see whether Web transactions are secured by SSL or TLS. A security report icon now appears to the right of the address bar when you view a page using a Secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTPS) connection. Clicking this icon displays a report describing the certificate used to encrypt the connection and the certifying authority that issued the certificate. The security report also provides links to more detailed information.
  
• Microsoft ActiveX Opt-In—Internet Explorer 7 disables all ActiveX controls which were not used in Internet Explorer 6. When users encounter an ActiveX control for the first time, they will see a gold bar asking if they want to use the control. Users can then selectively allow or prevent running the control. Note: By default, the ActiveX Opt-in does not apply to Intranet and Trusted Site zones; new controls on those zones, along with a list of preapproved controls, also run without prompting.
  
• Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) Updates—Internet Explorer 7 features improved CSS, Level 2 (CSS2) support for Selectors (first-child, adjacent, attribute and child selectors) and Fixed Positioning. In addition, the :hover pseudo-class now functions on all CSS elements, and background attachment works as well. Internet Explorer 7 also includes fixes for issues of most concern to developers, as gathered from community Web sites and from feedback in the IE blog. For example, the majority of bugs reported on the Position is Everything Web site are fixed. (Follow the link to see specific bug details.)
  
• Portable Network Graphics (PNG)—Internet Explorer 7 adds support for Alpha Channel Transparency to PNG, so that Web designers can implement innovative and complex overlaid graphical designs.
  
• XMLHTTP Native Support—Internet Explorer 7 implements a version of XMLHTTP that is a native scriptable object instead of an object. Users can now have ActiveX controls switched off and still maintain a client-side connection with a server, so that dynamic transactions using Extensible Markup Language (XML) data can continue to run in the background. This allows new dynamically-retrieved data to be inserted into a current, otherwise static, HTML page.
  
• Internationalized Domain Name (IDN)—Internet Explorer 7 includes complete support for RFC-3490 on Internationalizing Domain Names in Applications (IDNA) in all browser functions. This support is implemented in a way that ensures a consistent level of browser security across languages.
  
• Tabbed Browsing—Internet Explorer 7 uses tabs as a way to organize and manage groups of Web pages. Users can set up, open, and preserve a tab, an individual page, or a combination of both. It has also combined your Favorites, History, and Web Feeds into one simple menu; users can dock this menu and use the new open in tabs control to open a folder of Favorites in Tabs.
  
• HTML 4.0.1 Support—Internet Explorer 7 recognizes the ABBR tag from HTML 4.0.1. This tag supports the elements that other tags support and can be styled with CSS. Internet Explorer also supports nested objects. If an OBJECT is nested within another OBJECT, only the outermost OBJECT that can be instantiated is rendered. Note: In Internet Explorer 6 all objects are rendered and the next opening OBJECT is considered a closure for the previous one. For more information, see the HTML 4.01 Specification
  
• Select Element—The Select control is now a windowless control. This change enables z-order and zoom to work correctly. The HTML and Document Object Model (DOM) for Select remain the same, so Web developers and end users interact with Select as before; however, applications that relied on getting an HWND from Select to use with Microsoft Win32 application programming interfaces (APIs) now need to be modified to use the DOM.

Minimum Requirements

• Computer/Processor Computer with a 233MHz processor or higher (Pentium processor recommended)
• Operating System Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2)
• Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
• Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1)
• Memory For Internet Explorer 7 Beta 3:
• Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2),
• Windows XP Professional x64 Edition, and
• Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1):
• 64 MB of RAM minimum
• Full install size: 12 MB
• Drive CD-ROM drive (if installation is done from a CD-ROM)
• Display Super VGA (800 x 600) or higher-resolution monitor with 256 colors
• Peripherals Modem or Internet connection; Microsoft Mouse, Microsoft IntelliMouse, or compatible pointing device

Download Internet Explorer 7 (Beta 3)