New IE7 Build Available from MIX06!

Today is the first day of the MIX06 conference. Internet Explorer team members are presenting this week on much of the work we've done for IE7. As part of the conference, we're handing out the "Internet Explorer 7 Readiness Toolkit" on CD. This toolkit has a roll up of the IE7 information we've published previously and some new features for those attending MIX06.

One of the other items on the CD is an updated build of IE7 for MIX06. This is build 5335 of IE7. In order to give something to those of you who didn't attend the conference and to address concerns or bugs that have been reported, we've made an updated IE7 build available to the public. This is actually an update from the build we put on the CD for the conference so it is the most up to date build available anywhere. It is build 5335.5 and it is now available for download at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/ie7/. This build is for Windows XP Service Pack 2 and shows the current state of IE7.

Uninstallation

When installing it, you'll want to uninstall your previous IE7 builds. To uninstall an IE7 build:

• Click "Start," and then click "Control Panel."
• Click "Add or Remove Programs."
• Check "Show Updates" at the top of the dialog box.
• Scroll down the list to "Windows XP - Software Updates," select "Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview," and then click "Change/Remove."

If "Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview" does not exist, run %windir%\$NtUninstallie7b2pmx$\spuninst\spuninst.exe (where %windir% is your home Windows directory). You will need to have "view hidden folders" enabled.

In the rare circumstances where you cannot find that directory and IE7 is not listed in the Control Panel, IE7 setup automatically creates a system restore point before making any changes. Use System Restore to restore your computer back to your original install point. This is not 100% effective so please back up important documents prior to using System Restore.

Feedback

As with the Beta 2 Preview, we are very interested in feedback and bug reports for any issues found using it. Please feel free to utilize any of the following feedback mechanism to send us your feedback.

• Beta Client Bug Reporting Tool – You may install the Microsoft Beta Client Tool, which will help you fill out a bug report and include important logs and machine information to help us investigate a problem. This is the preferred way to report any issues that you run into with the new build.
• IE Public Newsgroup – You may post any questions or problems to the microsoft.public.internetexplorer.general newsgroup, either through a newsgroup reader or on the Microsoft Discussion Groups site.
• Email – You may send feedback and bugs to IETell@microsoft.com and it will be given to IE team members to review and act upon.

Other Information Links for IE7

The following three links are good places to go for more information about IE7.

• Information Index for Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview - This document connects you to specific technical articles, overviews, reference material and blog entries that delve into Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 Preview's features and functionality.
• Internet Explorer MSDN Developer Center - This is a collection of articles and information published regularly on IE.
• Internet Explorer 7 Public website - This is the official website for Internet Explorer and IE7. It has the product tour, technology overview, ITPro checklist and more.

Enjoy the new build!

 - Al Billings

Update: Fixed uinstall path directory name...