Microsoft caves: ‘Super-standards’ mode to become IE 8 default

Morshad published 04 Mar 2008, 06:18 in main - 264 views

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After much outcry from developers and users, Microsoft is bowing to pressure and making its new, Acid-2-compliant standards mode the default in Internet Explorer 8.

Microsoft officials are attributing the change in plans to the company wanting to live up to the interoperability pledges that Microsoft made a couple weeks ago. (Come on, guys! There is nothing wrong with saying the real reason you are doing a 180: Two of your core constituencies were really angry.)

In January, Microsoft’s IE team outlined its plans to add a “super-standards” mode to IE 8. That mode was set to be one of three supported in the next version of Microsoft’s browser. (The other two are “quirks” mode, which will be compatible with current IE pages and applications and a “standards” mode, which will be the same as what’s offered by IE 7 and “compatible with current content.”) In super-standards mode, early internal builds of IE 8 passed the Acid2 standards tests, according to Microsoft.

Microsoft originally planned to make the super-standards mode an opt-in choice and the IE 7 “standards” mode the default — claiming that by doing so, Microsoft would ensure better backwards-compatibility with existing Web sites and applications. But that decision angered those who felt Microsoft was shirking its commitment to make IE more standards-compliant.