Microsoft unveils IE7 at Gnomedex
June 27, 2005
Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 7 browser, scheduled for release this summer, will make it easier for people to be made aware of website updates.
IE7 was revealed at the Gnomedex technology conference in Seattle, US, on Friday. It will feature an orange button, which will light up when it detects a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed on a site.
The RSS alert feature is already available on open-source browser, Mozilla Firefox. It is being introduced by Microsoft as part of a wider strategy to integrate RSS formats throughout its latest version of Windows, Longhorn, which will be released in December 2006. A preview, or beta version, could be released in the summer.
The update will make RSS easier to understand across all kinds of applications, not just web browsing. Users wishing to subscribe to a particular feed will be shown a searchable preview of the page, with no confusing code on display.
Microsoft has also created some new extensions to the RSS format, which will be available for content publishers to use under the Creative Commons licence. The extensions will make feeds more effective at displaying different types of information.
RSS is being increasingly used on the net and users are becoming more aware of the technology. Web users can use aggregators – programmes which collect and organise website feeds, keeping them up to date with site changes automatically.
Dean Hachomovitch, general manager of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer team, said that while the search tool was still important, the ‘subscribe’ approach was becoming increasingly important and would affect web consumption habits.