After remaining mum for months over the extent to which it plans to support the Cascading Style Sheet (CSS) standard with its forthcoming Internet Explorer (IE) 7.0 browser, Microsoft has gone public with its plans.
Late last week, Internet Explorer lead program manager Chris Wilson posted to his blog a list of fixes, many of them CSS-related, that Microsoft is planning for IE 7.0.
CSS is a style-sheet language that allows developers to attach font, spacing, speech and other information to structured HTML documents and XML applications.
CSS separates the presentation style of documents from document content with the goal of simplifying Web authoring and site maintenance. The most recently approved CSS standard is CSS 2.0.
/zimages/4/28571.gifRead morehereabout IE 7 beta.
Microsofts failure to support completely the Worldwide Web Consortiums CSS standards (beyond version 1.0, with which Microsoft did comply, according to company officials) has been a sticking point for the company.
Because of Microsofts deviance from the standard, developers have been forced to write different versions of Web applications and Web sites.
Until now, developers didnt have high hopes for IE 7.0 on the CSS-standards-compliance front, either. Some Microsoft partners, who requested anonymity, said that Microsoft was wavering on the extent to which it planned to support CSS2 with IE 7.0.
They said Microsoft was leaning toward adding some additional CSS2 support to IE 7.0, but was not planning to embrace the standard in its entirety.
As a result, Microsoft surprised many with Wilsons post and a commitment to comply with CSS2.
“In IE7, we will fix as many of the worst bugs that web developers hit as we can, and we will add the critical most-requested features from the standards as well,” Wilson blogged.
/zimages/4/28571.gifRead the full story on Microsoft Watch:Microsofts CSS Plans for IE 7 Draw Cheers, Jeers