Fast HTML5 Web applications benefit consumers who browse the Web and developers building innovative new experiences. Measuring performance characteristics of Web applications and writing efficient applications are two important aspects of making Web sites fast. Browser manufacturers can rapidly address developers’ needs through interoperable APIs when collaboratively partnering through the W3C. One year ago today, the W3C announced the formation of a Web Performance Working Group chartered...

The August 2011 Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer is now available via Windows Update . This security update resolves five vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer that were disclosed in coordination with Microsoft and two publicly disclosed vulnerabilities. The most severe vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user visits a malicious, specially crafted Web page using IE. Users who run without administrative rights are more secure in general and should be less impacted...

Drag and drop is a user interaction model that we all use on a day to day basis, probably without giving it much thought. We drag files from one folder to another, text from one area of a document to another, and PowerPoint slides from one place in the presentation to another. HTML5 Drag and Drop , available in IE10 Platform Preview 2, brings this natural, familiar behavior to the Web. Magnetic Poetry on the IE Test Drive site is example of a site that uses HTML5 Drag and Drop to...

The Web is better when developers can build safer experiences in their sites. With each release of Internet Explorer, we’ve led the way with improvements to the browser to help ensure a safe and secure browsing experience. Now IE10 Platform Preview 2 includes full support for HTML5 Sandbox technology that allows developers to further lockdown mash-up content on their sites. HTML5 Sandbox allows developers to further reduce the privileges of portions of their pages. To use it, it’s as simple as adding...

With Web Worker s, Web applications can be more responsive by offloading long-running, complex JavaScript algorithms to run in the background. IE10 includes a complete and predictable debugging experience for JavaScript executing within both the Web page and in Web workers. In IE10, we’ve enhanced the F12 tools to be aware of the new script contexts created for every Web worker. When you start debugging (by clicking the Start debugging button within the F12 tools), you’re attaching to...

Web developers need API’s to efficiently take advantage of modern PC hardware through HTML5, improving the performance of Web applications, the power efficiency of the Web platform, and the resulting customer experience. The second IE10 Platform Preview supports emerging API’s from the W3C Web Performance Working Group which enable developers to make the most of the underlying hardware and use battery power more efficiently. This post details how to use Page Visibility , one of the...

The Web is better when developers can use the same markup and same code across different browsers with the same results. The second platform preview of IE10 makes progress in this area by fully supporting the HTML5 parsing algorithm. This continues work we started in previous releases to improve IE’s HTML parser to make more HTML “just work” in the same way across browsers. Some key examples include supporting SVG-in-HTML, supporting HTML5 semantic elements, preserving the structure of unknown...

Browsers need amazing performance to deliver on the promise of HTML5 applications. Web developers need API’s to efficiently take advantage of modern PC hardware through HTML5 and build high performance Web applications with efficient power use for great, all around customer experiences. The second IE10 Platform Preview supports three emerging API’s from the W3C Web Performance Working Group which enable developers to make the most of the underlying hardware and use battery power more...

Responsive Web pages result in happier consumers. With Web workers, Web applications are more responsive by offloading complex JavaScript algorithms to run in the background. For example, in this test drive ( link ), you can see that offloading the work to calculate movement of water in the fountains via Web workers makes the main page more responsive for consumers: This video shows Web Workers in action in the second IE10 Platform Preview. For a closer look at the code behind this demo, watch...

This is a great week for the Web, in particular JavaScript developers. Standards bodies have ratified the latest version of JavaScript, ECMA-262 edition 5.1 , and have published the test262 test suite for JavaScript. Now, anyone can run the test suite at http://test262.ecmascript.org/ and compare how well different browsers support the standard. The suite already has over 10,000 tests contributed by members of JavaScript technical committee as well as all the JavaScript tests that we have posted...

IE10 Platform Preview 2, the same HTML5 engine seen in the recent public “Windows 8” demos, is now available for download . With this update, IE10 continues to deliver support for site-ready HTML5 technologies as well as improving performance: This video shows some of the HTML5 technologies in the second IE10 Platform Preview in action. With the second Platform Preview, developers can start working with several site-ready HTML5 technologies for building beautiful, interactive Web...

Web technologies across the board can make faster and better progress now that the CSS 2.1 specification is a final, completed standard and published as a Recommendation. First, finishing CSS 2.1 unblocks faster progress moving the Web forward with the rest of CSS and other important technologies in the broader W3C HTML5 family. Even more important, the lessons from CSS 2.1 raise expectations for measuring and improving the actual interoperability of Web standards. Because CSS 2.1 has been “mostly...

The topic of what some customers need from a browser saw a lot of attention in headlines (e.g. Mozilla to enterprise customers: "Drop dead" ) last week. Both Google employees and Mozilla community members alike ( link ) explained that to support consumers, their browsers cannot fulfill the needs of large organizations. At Microsoft, we believe that all Windows customers should have a great browsing experience, whether they stay at home, go to school, or work in a large organization with managed IT...

Velocity 2011: The Performance Impact of Modernizing Internet Explorer Browsers need amazing performance to deliver on the promise of HTML5 applications. Modernizing Internet Explorer 9 has changed what’s possible with Web sites, and dramatically improved the performance of the HTML4 sites consumers use today. To demonstrate the real world performance gains in IE9 at the recent Velocity 2011 conference, we presented our talk on Modernizing Internet Explorer as an interactive HTML4 Web application...

Mixed content on a Web page puts consumers at risk of man-in-the-middle attacks, especially as consumers spend more time browsing from untrusted public networks (like free WiFi in coffee shops and airports). An attacker can view page content that a consumer expected to be delivered securely, and even modify the contents of the page without the consumer knowing it. This happens when Web sites void the security promise of HTTPS by including content delivered by HTTP into their otherwise secure HTTPS...

Adobe Flash Player 10.3 delivers super-fast graphics by plugging into the Internet Explorer 9 hardware-accelerated rendering pipeline using IE9’s ISurfacePresenter interface. Recently, some of you may have seen this rendering issue with Flash content on some pages: Screen shots of a Web page with Flash content displayed incorrectly in its upper left corner (left) and correctly (right) Adobe addressed the problem illustrated above (Flash content displaying in the upper...

The June 2011 Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer is now available via Windows Update . This security update resolves seven vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer that were disclosed in coordination with Microsoft. The vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user visits a malicious, specially crafted Web page using IE. Users who run without administrative rights are more secure in general and should be less impacted than other users; you can read more about this security...

Internet Explorer now gives you more control over the data that Web sites store on your computer. This includes Flash Player’s Local Shared Objects (LSOs). We’ve worked closely with Adobe to integrate Flash LSO deletion directly into Internet Explorer, making it easier for you to manage your online privacy with the latest version of Adobe Flash and IE9 (as well as IE8): IE will delete your Flash Cookies as well as your Web cookies If you want to try this out, please visit our Test...

Any site can offer Tracking Protection Lists ( TPLs ) to help consumers protect their privacy. This post shows you how to make a TPL available from your site. For example, clicking here in IE9 will add the list from the EasyPrivacy . A word about Tracking Protection Lists Tracking Protection Lists are similar in concept to the lists behind the AdBlockPlus add-in for Firefox. The main differences are that TPLs are built in to IE, the W3C is working through the standardization process of their format...

Join us this September 13-16 in Anaheim, California for Microsoft’s first BUILD conference . What’s special about BUILD? It will be the first broad hands-on unveiling of the next version of Windows and its new app model featuring HTML5 and JavaScript. In short, building Web-connected apps for the next Windows is as easy as building for the modern Web. You will also learn how to work with the all-new touch-centric user experience to create fast, fluid, and dynamic applications that leverage...

Internet Explorer 9 is now available in more local languages than any other browser on Windows. Today, we released support for IE9 in 53 additional languages, making IE9 available in a total of 93 languages: Please visit the Worldwide downloads page to download IE9 in a language of your choice. Here’s the complete list of languages Internet Explorer 9 is available in, starting with the originally released 40 and followed by the 53 new languages in blue: Arabic Lithuanian Bengali (India) Malayalam...

Social-engineering attacks, like tricking a user into running a malicious program, are far more common than attacks on security vulnerabilities. Application Reputation in IE9 helps protect users from these socially engineered malware attacks. This post offers details about real-world attacks and how these protections work. For context, recent studies (like this one ) show that despite the headlines that exploits of software vulnerabilities get, people browsing the Web are more likely...

Sounds form the background of our life. Today the HTML5 <audio> element enables Web developers to embed sounds in their applications. The flexibility of the control coupled with the integration with the rest of the platform allows several scenarios, from simple sound effects to background audio to gaming experiences to more sophisticated audio engines. This blog post walks through some of the best practices for using the <audio> tag in your Web applications, and includes useful tips from...

One of our guiding principles in Internet Explorer is to keep users in control of their browser. This applies to settings like the home page , enabled add-ons , and the default search provider. Sometimes, 3rd party software changes the consumer’s default search provider without their consent . Consumers may be surprised to see search results from an unfamiliar Web site and may not know how to change back to their previous default search provider. As we work with developers to ensure that they use...

Last November, we released the Galactic test drive alongside IE9 Platform Preview 7. This test drive is a 3D simulation of our solar system and depicts planets orbiting around the sun. You can press the “V” key to toggle between a close up view centered on the sun and a zoomed out view showing more of the entire scene. When I set out to build Galactic, I knew that I wanted to use HTML5 Canvas to render my scene in 3D, but I wasn’t quite sure how to go about it. After skimming a handful of 3D math...