I recently gave the new beta of IE 9 a try and was actually impressed with modern standards support. All the popular new HTML 5 elements are present, accounted for, and performing as well as Chrome (at least that’s on my casual observance; actual number-crunching may vary). Web design gets a little easier with some support for CSS3; though the support is not fully baked yet. If you visit We Are Change Branson’s website (one I designed) with Chrome or Firefox and Internet Explorer 9, you will notice the gradient in the background is way different. This is because the beta does not include support for standards-compliant gradients yet. Though in CSS3, it’s hard to be standards compliant when each “engine” has it’s own markup. Notice the -moz-border-radius and the -webkit-border-radius in that link? The moz-border-radius tells Mozilla Firefox how long the radius of rounded corners are. The -webkit-border-radius tells Webkit browsers (Chrome and Safari mainly) how long the radius of rounded corners are. Does that sound stupid? Yes. Does there need to be a standard? Yes. Fortunately, IE 9 follows the border-radius standard markup, and that’s how it should be for all browsers. Hopefully that happens soon so we can reduce the amount of coding. As for security holes, I’m sure there are plenty. Maybe.
Microsoft’s product line-up is looking better by the day. The new Xbox is a good-looking machine, Windows Phone 7 looks to be a promising mobile OS for those who don’t want Android (for some weird reason) or the overly-simple iOS. Windows 7 is still being good to a lot more people than Vista was good to, and IE 9 is also catching up to other browsers.
Brandon Backlin
