Well I know what I would want to see in the next version of Internet Explorer and I will tell you. The information contained herein does not pertain to the actual development of Internet Explorer 8. But they are features missing from the current release of IE that need to be addressed before IE version Next.

First off, memory usage. Microsoft needs to fix the way Internet explorer 7 handles memory. I have experienced everything from applications lagging on heavy browser usage to aberrant memory management. This is not an aspect to be taken likely. IE7 is a resource hog, at times. This is one of the main reasons that recommended Firefox 2.0 over IE7.

A second area of the IE 8.0 that needs improvement is standards compliance. Microsoft made a few steps in the right direction with IE7, but not enough. CSS support in Internet Explorer still leaves room for improvements. I still come across reports of rendering problems and pages breaking over standards compliance issues.

Another enhancement should come in the area of add-on compatibility. I recently installed a number of browser plug-ins that caused Internet Explorer 7 to crash at an alarming rate. Internet Explorer is still far from the customization options delivered by Mozilla. Microsoft should look to the way Firefox and open source plug-ins integrate and to the personalization options delivered by Firefox and offer an alternative with IE 8.0.

Microsoft also needs to integrate automatic page recovery. Currently, the View History panel does offer access to all the pages opened in the browser along with sorting options but this is not a viable alternative for an automated recovery process. It is not unusual for me to have from 10 tabs upwards opened across a few browser windows. Microsoft did little to the streamline reopening these pages in the eventuality of a browser crash.

There are more aspects to be improved, including draggable IE tabs across different browser windows, the addition of a download manager, the overhauling of the save process involving temporary Internet files etc., but I am going to stop here. I will stop to give you a chance to express your opinion on the matter. What do you think Microsoft should improve/add/remove/resolve with the next release of Internet Explorer?