A release candidate for Microsoft's browser is due in early 2009, which suggests that Windows 7 could also hit the decks by the end of the year.
The development wheels at Microsoft might grind slowly, but Redmond is obviously feeling the pressure from rivals such as Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome to get updates out the door more quickly.
Microsoft confirmed today in a post on its official IE7 blog that the release candidate for Internet Explorer 8 will be out in early 2009. The first public beta appeared in March and version 2 followed in August A 12-month cycle for a major new release is a speedier path than usual for Microsoft, suggesting that it's aware of the competitive pressures in the current browser market.
"We will release one more public update of IE8 in the first quarter of 2009, and then follow that up with the final release," IE general manager Dean Hachamovitch wrote. "Our next public release of IE (typically called a 'release candidate') indicates the end of the beta period. We want the technical community of people and organizations interested in web browsers to take this update as a strong signal that IE8 is effectively complete and done." More than 20 million IE8 sessions have been tracked so far, Hachamovitch wrote.
A mid-June release for IE8 would tie in nicely with Microsoft's plans to get Windows 7 out the door sometime in 2009. Distribution via Windows remains one of the most effective ways for the company to get consumer users to upgrade, although the heavy push for standards compliance in IE8 ironically might make some enterprise buyers less receptive.
IE8 ditches most of the MS-specific tweaks made in earlier versions of the browser in favour of Acid2 compliance, but many of those "design features" have been incorporated into sites and applications built for use on enterprise portals and web-based applications. If those sites aren't redeveloped rapidly, companies installing Windows 7 might choose to downgrade the browser rather than flood their support desks with calls. For Microsoft, even that would be preferable to companies switching to Firefox or Chrome.
Source : http://apcmag.com/
