14 DAY TRIAL // With Cascading Style Sheets Level 2 Revision 1 (CSS 2.1) almost finalized, Microsoft revealed that the next major version of Internet Explorer has fully embraced the specification.
Even though Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) hit Beta barely a month ago with the Beauty of the Web event in San Francisco, the development milestone allows developers to take advantage of everything that CSS 2.1 has to offer.
According to Adrian Bateman, Program Manager, IE9 passes approximately 98% of all CSS 2.1 tests, with the Release Candidate (RC) of the CSS 2.1 Test Suite launched on September 17, just days after the Internet Explorer 9 Beta.
“On [October 6th], Microsoft submitted the CSS 2.1 implementation report for IE9 Beta showing that IE9 passes 18960 of the 19403 tests (97.7%),” Bateman explained.
“It’s taken a lot of hard work in partnership with others in the working group and the community to get to this point. Many people in the IE team have been involved in this project and we’re excited to be almost at the end.
“It feels like a long time since we submitted our first batch of CSS 2.1 tests alongside IE8 Beta 1.”
Microsoft and the rest of browser makers have been working to submit their implementation reports in response to the release of the CSS 2.1 Test Suite RC.
The deadline set by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) for browser vendors to respond is October 18th, with the working group’s template since September 17th.
“While we’ll be glad to see CSS 2.1 finished, the real excitement comes from the knowledge that the CSS working group can focus attention solely on the new CSS3 modules that bring richer graphics to the web. Each of these modules has a dependency on finishing CSS 2.1,” Bateman added.
“Look out for the implementation reports coming from other browsers. These reports will be used to move CSS 2.1 to Proposed Recommendation status providing developers with a stable and interoperable CSS platform.”
Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) Build 9.0.7930.16406 is available for download here.