If you are a developer and tasked with making sure the corporate rollout of Internet Explorer 8 goes without issues, you will find the following links of use.

The main page of interest to you is the IE Developer Centre where you will find all the information and links collected together.

Also:

• Internet Explorer Compatibility (a page with lots of links to useful app compat stuff)
• Internet Explorer 8 Readiness Toolkit
• Microsoft Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.5 (see IEBlog for more information)
• Internet Explorer 8 Compatibility Test Guide
• Differences between IE8 Compatibility View and IE7 (because compatibility view may still not be perfect)
• Introducing Compatibility View (includes details of IE=EmulateIE8 tag for when you have fixed the page)
• asp:menu fix for IE8 problem available (Patch for a rendering issue with asp:menu)
• Report a Webpage Problem Internet Explorer 8 Add-On (for when the problem isn't your web page)
• Internet Explorer 7 'Tips and Tricks' (Lots of useful stuff even for IE8 upgrades)

I ran across an interesting Facebook feature just now. When clicking on a link in one of the group forums I was presented with this:

Nice catch! I suppose they could have just removed the post from the forum though...

You must have seen it by now but in case you haven't Internet Explorer 7  for Windows XP/2003 has been released. You can download it right away or wait for the Windows Update coming soon.

I have a couple of invites available. The first 3 comments to this post with valid e-mail addresses can have them.

...and it looks like this:

There is plenty of drag and drop, right-click menus and background updates. All in all very nice but it'll take a lot to shift Gmail from my daily life...

Now playing: Storm - Time To Burn

I've just logged into Hotmail to pickup my e-mails before closing up shop for the holiday and was greeted by a message asking if I wanted to join the Live Mail beta. Now I can't resist a beta... So I clicked, agreed and was presented with:

 

Service Unavailable

We're sorry, but the Mail Beta is currently unavailable. We apologize for this inconvenience and are working to restore service. Please try to log back in soon.

The Mail Beta Team

... and now I can't pick up my mail and can't go back so I guess their legal disclaimer was warranted.

Now playing: Taiko - Taiko / Echo Drop

Whilst browsing the latest FireFox extensions this morning I found one for http://www.stumbleupon.com/. It adds a button to your toolbar which surfs to a random page on the Internet as recommended by someone else. This is a prefect compliment to Google and I've just spent an hour or so clicking the "Stumble" button.

Along the way I found some pictures that made me laugh out loud which doesn't happen often when I'm alone. I've added them to a gallery too but here they are:

Since installing the blacklist I have had a noticeable drop in referral spam which is good news. The thing that does concern me is false positives. I have had to drop a number of keywords from the list because they are just too common: "hole" appears in "whole" which one search provider uses to tag the query with "wholeinternet"; "golf" was in the list but I since I am buying one there is no reason to block it.

The one keyword I am undecided about is "virgin". There are a high number of spammers still using the keyword but it means that every referral from virgin.net (there is a search engine there too) will get a 404. Koan too has changed her URL; can you guess why yakushitsu.blogspot.com gets blocked?

So, next time you get a 404 response back from a web site then check who referred you in the first place. They maybe stopping you from seeing the page so try pasting the URL into a new browser window. To the users of the virgin.net search engine - I am sorry but you will never see this post.

Ryan blogged about e-mail spam today which reminded me - I got hit this morning on three separate and unrelated addressed within a 10 minute time span. I can’t imagine how many mails they must have sent in that short time to hit all three addresses. The same message got through Google, Yahoo and Outlook spam filters. These spammers need a good long stay in Guantánamo Bay as guests of the US Navy.

So [via www.ryanstevens.co.uk] I suggest the following as a small way of fighting back:

A novel way of making spam less profitable is to help shutdown the scammers who send these mails by driving up they costs. Check out how you can help Artist Against 419

While reading this page you've stolen 41076 bytes already!

 

I see Hotmail has upgraded my account to 250MB… Gee-thanks… But I’m afraid it’s too late, I already use G-mail as my main internet account. Hotmail is now a just a passport sign-in and junk mail repository. For me to switch back, Hotmail will have to become a lot better than G-mail. Here’s some hints:

• Hotmail is too slow
• It’s got too many graphics
• The search sucks
• No POP support
• No permanent tray notification for e-mails (you have to click on the Messenger guy)
• G-mail has auto-complete in the to: cc: lists
• It’s file attachment is faster
• The spell checking is easier to use (although no custom dictionary yet)
• Labels are a more natural and powerful mechanism than Hotmail folders
• G-mail filters are excellent
• I can drive G-mail from the keyboard

Let me know when it’s fixed and I’ll have a look.