Download » Internet Explorer 9 Preview
Windows Internet Explorer Platform Preview
v1.9.7.7.45.6019
The Platform Preview is an early look at the Internet Explorer 9 platform so some features are incomplete, some may change, and some may be added. This document lists features available in the latest Platform Preview and known issues with those features. To view the latest known issues, see our list on Microsoft Connect.
We ask that you refrain from providing feedback on features where noted that they are either partially implemented or not available. We are aware of their condition and will provide updates in future releases. Similarly, for known issues, we are aware of their existence and are actively working on them. Thank you for your interest in the Internet Explorer Platform Preview!
To report issues and provide feedback, please use Microsoft Connect. For general questions or comments, please email iepre@microsoft.com.
Table of Contents
System Requirements
Platform Preview Application (General Notes/Known Issues)
Web Platform (General Notes/Known Issues)
IE9 JavaScript Engine
Developer Tools (General Notes/Known Issues)
System Requirements
Internet Explorer Platform Preview requires Windows 7 (x86 or x64) or Windows Vista SP2 (x86 or x64).
For Vista users, Windows Internet Explorer 8 and DirectX 2D (D2D) must be installed on your system. If you’re not already running Internet Explorer 8, download and install it first. Then install DirectX 2D by installing the Platform Update for Windows Vista, available on Windows Update.
Platform Preview Application
General Notes
There is no Information Bar (aka Gold Bar) in Platform Preview. As a result, downloads initiated by script will not function. Files can be downloaded using the “Save Target As…” in the right-click context menu, by clicking on hyperlinks to files, and by typing a download URL in the Open dialog (Ctrl+O).
Known Issues
Compatibility View List Usage
The Platform Preview Build will use the IE8 Compatibility View Settings including the Compatibility View List. This means that if you’ve chosen to use the Compatibility View List in IE8, some high traffic websites will run in the IE7 Document Mode by default. You can force these websites to render in IE9 Document Mode through the Debug menu option “Force IE9 Standards Mode” or through the Developer Tools’ setting for Document Mode. More information on the Compatibility View List can be found on MSDN here.
Issue 541452: Repairing with the same version of installer corrupts the install
Description: Running the MSI repair functionality on an installed version of the Platform Preview using the same MSI that was used to originally install corrupts the Platform Preview install.
Workaround: If you are experiencing an issue with the Platform Preview, first uninstall the Platform Preview using Programs and Features in the Control Panel. You may then re-install the Platform Preview using the original MSI.
Web Platform
General Notes
To learn more about this preview of the Web Platform, please read the Developer Guide
Features Available
CSS3
Selectors (entire module and ::selection)
Namespaces (all except attribute selectors)
Backgrounds & Borders (border-radius)
Color (rgba(), opacity)
DOM Core Namespaces
DOM Range
DOM L2 Events
Event registration and dispatch APIs (addEventListener, removeEventListener, createEvent, dispatchEvent)
Event capture, bubble and target phases
New event objects (Event, UIEvent, MouseEvent, etc.)
DOM L3 Events
CustomEvent, KeyboardEvent, DragEvent interfaces
HTML5 Selection
XHTML Documents
SVG
The SVG in IE is based upon the SVG 1.1 2nd Edition Full (targeted at desktop browsers)
Most document structure, scripting (eventing) and styling (inline and through CSS) is functional
Many presentation elements and their corresponding attributes and DOM are available including paths, shapes, colors, and transforms
ICC v2 and v3 color profiles are supported on images
Features Partially Implemented
DOM Style
See Known Issue Below
DOM L3 Events
WheelEvent, TextEvent, CompositionEvent, MutationEvent, MutationNameEvent interfaces (and related events) are not currently supported
Features Not Available
HTML5-conformant whitespace handling is not yet implemented
SVG
Gradient, Filters, SVGFonts and SMIL, Linking/Views(ViewBox), Clipping, and Masking are not available
Text is functional but only lifts most of the HTML implementation and does not currently include all SVG functionality (except for a few key areas such as X/Y)
Not all elements of the SVGDOM are available (though most are for the elements implemented, and you can most always fall back on DOM-CORE)
Not all attributes are currently supported
Support for SVG as an image, .svgz, css-image, in <iframe> and <embed> are not currently supported
Usage Notes
DOM L3 Events
FocusEvent.relatedTarget currently returns null in all cases
KeyboardEvent.location not fully supported
KeyboardEvent.key does not currently support the list of key values and the Unicode range as defined by the standard
Events for “dead keys” are not fully supported
SVG
There are several methods by which SVG can be embedded in a Brower, but in the Platform Preview we only support:
The SVG in HTML5 embedding method without using foreign object (i.e. just create an <svg> tag in your HTML file)
SVG as a full document type (with .SVG extension)
SVG in XHTML (similar to that of HTML5, only with XHTML files)
SVG using <object> (note the required type, height, and width attributes)
<object data="rect2.svg" width="100%" height="400px" type="image/svg+xml"></object>
Known Issues
D2D Rendering
In rare circumstances, the IE Platform Preview may render Web page content incorrectly or slowly on some older graphics cards. You may see page content garbled or page scrolling may be slow. Though this issue is known and being fixed, we would still like to hear about your specific issues.
Please use the ‘Report an Issue’ feature in the Platform Preview to bring this issue to our attention. Be sure to include the output file created by running IE Diagnostics in the Platform Preview’s Report Issue menu.
To work around the issue while running the Platform Preview, please download and run the "Force D2D Software Mode" registry file and restart the Platform Preview. To switch back to graphics card based rendering again, please download and run the "Force D2D Hardware Mode" registry file and restart the Platform Preview.
getComputedStyle box model properties
getComputedStyle is available in the platform preview builds but does not currently support any box model properties.
addEventListener event registration
Many events corresponding to the existing Event interface are not currently hooked up, including DOMContentLoaded. When an event type registered through addEventListener is not hooked up, a notification will be posted to the Developer Tools Console window indicating that the event is not supported.
SVG Performance
In general, performance with “normal” SVG files is good. However, performance work on large or complex SVG files is not yet complete. You will see this most with CAD- or GIS-generated SVG images.
XML Parsing Errors (affects XHTML and SVG)
No notifications are currently displayed for XML parsing errors encountered while parsing XHTML or SVG. Note that even without notifications, parsing correctly stops and only content occurring before the error is rendered on the page.
Issue 541443: Empty attribute selection change is unversioned.
Description: There was a fix made in IE9 to conform to the CSS3 selectors spec in regards to how to handle empty attribute selectors (http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS2/selector.html#attribute-selectors).
Previously, given the selector [attr], IE would not match the following elements:
<element attr = ''>
<element attr>
Now in IE9 mode these elements will match the selector, however, this fix was not versioned correctly and is currently being applied in IE7 and IE8 modes as well. This means that the behavior with this selector will be different browsing IE8 and IE7 mode pages in IE9 than it would be if you browsed those pages in IE8 or IE7.
Workaround: If you really need this selector not to match your elements in IE7 or IE8 mode you can remove the attribute from the element.
Issue 541445: rgba() bleeds into legacy modes
Description: The new rgba() color notation works in quirks, 7, and 8 document modes. In future versions of IE9, this syntax will only apply in the browser's most standard mode.
Issue 541453: Platform Preview does not list any supported mime-types in the Accept header for outgoing requests
Description: The Windows Internet Explorer Platform Preview does not currently report supported MIME types when requesting resources from a web server. This can impact server-side detection scripts that pivot content based on the presence of specific MIME-types, such as "application/xhtml+xml".
Issue 541446: Floating-point properties won't parse values without a leading zero
Description: CSS floating point values which are less than 1, do not parse correctly if they do not include the leading 0. For example "0.5" will parse correctly but ".5" will not.
Workaround: Include the leading zero for floating point values which are less than 1.
Issue 541450: Properties still using currentStyle behavior for getComputedStyle
Description: There are a few properties where the values returned by getComputedStyle are not yet converted from relative units to absolute units. These properties include:
backgroundPosition (both X and Y)
borderSpacing
fontSize
letterSpacing
lineHeight
textIndent
verticalAlign
wordSpacing
IE9 JavaScript Engine
General Notes
Features Available
Support for core JScript language and library constructs that were supported by IE8, including ES5 features shipped with IE8 (JSON, accessor methods for enabling Document Object Model prototypes)
Feature Partially Implemented
ES5 language and library support beyond what was supported in IE8 (incl. support for defineProperty and getOwnPropertyDescriptor for JScript objects), and versioning of all language and library features across the different IE9 document modes
Support for remote ActiveXObject creation,’::’ construct event binding and GetObject method
Features Not Available
Support for encoded scripts present in JScript.Encode tag (encoded scripts will continue to be functional in IE9 by using the JScript engine shipped with IE8)
Developer Tools
General Notes
Features Available
Network inspection
Improved CSS tracing
Better scalability for debugging large JavaScript files
JScript debugging support in IE9 Developer Tools
SVG Support
Features Partially Implemented
Searching in the Network Capture tool
JScript debugging in non IE9 Developer Tools
Features Not Available
JScript Profiler support in IE9 Developer Tools
Known Issues
Issue 541444: Network inspector is missing compression information
Description: The network inspector is showing the uncompressed size of HTTP request and is not indicating if the requests were compressed (gzip/deflate). All requests seem to be sent uncompressed even though they were sent compressed.
Issue 541449: Browser Mode shows ‘Unknown’ in Developer Tools
Description: When the Platform Preview is opened, a page is loaded, and the Developer Tools are started, the Developer Tools always show 'Unknown' for Browser Mode. You may still change the Browser Mode using the drop down and have the value applied. However, the new Browser Mode value will show in the Developer Tools even when you navigate to a new page that has a different browser mode.
Issue 541447: Re-opening the Developer Tools after closing fails on the first try
Description: If you open and then close the Developer Tools, the next time you try to open the Developer Tools (either through the F12 key or through the Debug menu) the first attempt fails. You must click the menu item or hit the F12 key a second time for the Developer Tools to open.
Issue 541448: Insert Breakpoint is not inserting Breakpoint at desired location
Description: In some cases when adding a breakpoint the breakpoint is inserted at a different statement than the one intended.
Workaround: If the problem persists developers can use the JavaScript reserved word "debugger" in their script to hit a breakpoint, for example:
var foo = 0;
debugger;
var bar = 2 / foo;
Issue 541440: Developer Tools does not list 'border-radius,' 'border-[*]-radius' properties
Description: The Developer Tools Style and Trace Styles panes may show the border-radius property with a value of 0px 0px 0px 0px and a strikethrough even though the property is not applied to this element anywhere in the cascade.
Issue 541791: Initial Web Request is not captured
Description: While captuing network traffic the first request for a page is missing. This only happens when navigation is caused by following hyper links.
Workaround:To capture all traffic you can clear the browser cache and then refresh the page or use address bar at ctrl+0.
