Announcing Internet Explorer Developer Channel

Just a few weeks ago, we talked about creating a more open dialog between the IE team and the Web development community. Today we’re excited to announce the release of the Internet Explorer Developer Channel, a fully functioning browser designed to give Web developers and early adopters a sneak peek at the Web platform features we’re working on. The Developer Channel is available for download today for both Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 SP1 customers running Internet Explorer 11.

IE Developer Channel can run alongside and independently of IE11, and has all of the browser features that you love in IE11, as well as the latest platform features we’re working on. As you test drive these features, make sure to give us feedback through @IEDevChat or Connect.

More enhancements to the F12 Developer Tools

In April, we described some of the new capabilities of F12 Developer Tools in IE11 with Windows 8.1 Update, and its focus on providing accurate data in the DOM Explorer and actionable data in the memory and performance tools. IE Developer Channel comes with even more improvements to the F12 developer tools, including:

• An enhanced debugging experience with event breakpoints that help you get to your event-driven bugs faster.
• Richer analysis capabilities throughout the Memory and UI Responsiveness profilers, which support further reduction of noise through multi-dimensional timeline filter, while further increasing the semantic value of the data being reported by lighting up performance.measure() based instrumentation and dominator folding.
• An improved navigation experience that provides more keyboard shortcuts (ctrl+[ and ctrl + ]), as well as new header notifications, which allows you to quickly determine whether any of the profiling tools are running or how many errors your page has.

A complete set of enhancements is available on MSDN here.

A look at the new colorization of the DOM in the UI Responsiveness Tool

Automate your tests with WebDriver

IE Developer Channel also comes with support for the emerging WebDriver standard through which Web developers can write tests to automate Web browsers to test their sites. It’s a programmable remote control for developing complex user scenarios and running them in an automated fashion in your Web site and browser. See how you can setup WebDriver in the IE Developer Channel, and try out this sample WebDriver project.

Use your Xbox controller for Web gaming

Ever felt like using your Xbox controller to game in your browser? IE Developer Channel comes with support of the emerging Gamepad API standard that lets you use JavaScript to add gamepad support to your Web apps and games. Try it out by attaching your Xbox 360 controller and helping the world Escape from XP, play your favorite Atari Arcade games, or try Hover.IE!

Use your Xbox controller to Escape from XP

IE Developer Channel also improves WebGL performance and adds support for instancing extension, 16-bit textures, GLSL builtin variables, and triangle fans. This release improves our Khronos WebGL Conformance Test 1.0.2 score from 89% to 94%. For more info about these WebGL APIs, go to MSDN here.

The first of many Developer Channel releases

As we work on new features and standards, we will continue to share early code through the IE Developer Channel. You can always go to the DevChannel.Modern.IE page to learn more about the latest features in the IE Developer Channel. All of the new features supported in IE Developer Channel are also listed on Status.Modern.IE, our new portal to communicate our roadmap for interoperable Web platform features.

This release of the IE Developer Channel uses a combination of code changes and App-V Client to virtualize and run alongside IE11. This virtualization creates a small performance hit, so we don’t recommend you use this version to measure your site’s performance. We also don’t recommend you install this version in your enterprise environment. For more on known issues, see our list of Frequently Asked Questions.

We look forward to hearing your feedback @IEDevChat or via Connect, to help us move the industry forward and continue to enhance the browser. Also, be sure to join us at our next #AskIE session on Thursday, June 19th @ 10AM-12PM PST.

— Jason Weber, Partner Group Program Manager, Internet Explorer