The preview of Microsoft's Internet Explorer 8.0 will beat Mozilla's Firefox 3.0 to the market. But Mozilla more than makes up for this with the advanced development state of the future version of its open source browser. Between April 30 and May 2, 2007 at MIX07, the IE development team will deliver a general preview of Internet Exporter 8.0 through the voice of Internet Explorer Program Manager Chris Wilson, the host of IE7: Past, Present and Future session.

Still, as far as actual development goes, Microsoft is lagging behind Mozilla. While Gran Paradiso alpha 3 has been available for download since the end of March 2007, Microsoft is only dogfooding IE8 alpha. According to the current Firefox 3.0 timetable, the final version of the open source browser will be made available in the third quarter of 2007 and the first beta milestone is scheduled for the end of June.

By comparison, Microsoft will only vaguely discuss the future of Internet Explorer 7 at MIX07. “We will have more information to share about the next release in the future, but MIX07 is too early yet to discuss specifics,” Wilson revealed, speaking about the IE development team MIX07 sessions.

Firefox 3.0 compatibility with Windows Vista, XP, 2000 and Mac OS X 10.3.9+ (Universal Binary) is a top priority for Mozilla, but Linux compatibility is also a given. Firefox 3.0 will also support offline applications and the complete implementation of Cairo vector graphics library designed to develop the rendering process of Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is also a focus of the development.

“Offline application support is an anticipated feature in Firefox 3. Firefox users will be able to access Web-based e-mail, calendars, RSS feeds and old content without being connected to the Internet,” revealed Chris Beard, Mozilla’s vice president of products to APC. “We're also investigating how we can structure bookmarks and navigation history to make these resources easier for users to access and manage. The long term roadmap for Firefox continues to align with our vision of an open, shared, and healthy Web.”