Internet Explorer 9 platform preview release is available now for download but its made available only for windows 7 and Vista platform.

Though its Platform preview version, you will not have the extra features which is available in previous version. This is made available for the public only to check the HTML5 and CSS3 Capabilities.

In fact u cant see even the address bar so if you want to open the webpage in IE9 PPR, Select Open from the Page menu or type Ctrl+O, The Open Web Page dialog box will always show the URL of the current page, Enter the Internet address (URL) of the Web page to which you wish to navigate. Alternatively, you may type the path of or browse for a file on your local computer and click OK. You can press F5 to refresh the currently open page if the file or Web page is not found, you’ll see only a blank page.

• Download IE9 PPR

Below is a list of available keyboard shortcuts for use in the Internet Explorer Platform Preview:

Ctrl + O: Open a webpage
F5: Refresh
F10: Home
F12: Developer Toolbar
Alt + 5: Force IE5 rendering mode
Alt + 7: Force IE7 rendering mode
Alt + 8: Force IE8 rendering mode
Alt + 9: Force IE9 rendering mode
Alt + 0: Reset Document Mode to the page default
Ctrl +/-: zoom in and out
Alt + ?: Help
Ctrl + S: Save Webpage As…
Alt + /: About

At the IE9 homepage there are different Graphics , HTML5 and CSS3 demos are available to test on Internet Explorer 9 PPR.

Now a days we feel that for many languages like Hindi, entering text on PC is difficult. And there are many products and tools in market out there today through which we can enter text in hindi by any translation widget. But most products have some barrier – e.g. some require users to know a fixed transliteration scheme; some others allow free form transliteration, but work only on webpages etc.

But Microsoft peoples has made their efforts to create a tool that can bring translations to the desktop such that it can be used to enter text in any application on the PC, and that is a key focus of the Indic Language Input Tool.

Currently it support six languages – Bengali, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil and Telugu.

By using this tool you can enter text in Indic language in any webpages, Take an example below.

You can download this tool in two different versions through Indic Language tool Homepage.

Some FAQ regarding Indic Language tool.

Q1 : How to Install Web version ?

Ans :

1. Select Language.
2. click on Install Web version Button .
3. Follow the instructions according to your browser.

• Internet Explorer.
  • Right-click on the language name above and select Add to Favorites…
  • Click Yes on the security alert dialog.
  • On IE8: Select Favorites Bar from the Create in drop down.
  • On IE7 or IE6: Select Links from the Create in drop down. Make sure the Links
  • toolbar is visible.
  • Click OK.
• Mozilla Firefox
  • Drag the language name above to the Bookmarks toolbar.
• Safari
  • Drag the language name above to the Bookmarks toolbar.
• Google Chrome
  • Make sure the Bookmarks toolbar is visible.
  • Drag the language name above to the Bookmarks toolbar.
• Opera
  • Right-click on the language name above and select Bookmark Link…
    Click OK on the Add Bookmark dialog.

Q2 : How to install Desktop version ?

Ans :

1. Select Language.
2. Click on Install desktop version.
3. Click on Install button and download the Setup.

Q3 : How to use it on desktop application.

Ans :

Do the following to use Microsoft ILIT in any application, such as Microsoft Wordpad or Windows Live messenger.

1. Open the application in which you would like to enter Indic text.
2. Change the language using the language bar, which typically appears in the taskbar as follows.
   

   Language Bar

3. You can now start typing in English and whatever you type automatically gets transliterated after a word-breaking character like a space, comma, etc. is entered.
4. Note that this language setting is per application. You may have to repeat the steps above for each application you want to use Microsoft ILIT in.
   

   Live Messenger Chat Box

Links :

• Microsoft Indic tool Homepage
• MSDN support blog

Take a look to the Microsoft Live labs’ another great experiment “Pivot”. Its nothing but an Internet browser which works on the basis of IE but with the new attractive looks and cool features. Pivot makes it easier to interact with massive amounts of data in ways that are powerful, informative, and fun.

Pivot is currently available by invitation only to a small technical audience to help us explore future scenarios. To learn more about Pivot and our vision for this project, check out this video, share it, embed it, and blog/tweet/post your thoughts about it.

Invite codes for Microsoft Pivot :

• 53BA F928 4F13 67C0
• 10C3 8B53 7123 74C6
• 9BB9 870B A97F 2832
• 36C0 B281 6D74 45C7
• CD83 B193 D775 6087
• FE95 9A79 C189 8D98
• 5E0A 5E6A 82BB 9869

visit @Liveside for updated codes. (Thanks to Ankur Mittal)

Homepage : Microsoft Pivot

Internet Explorer 8 released with lots of new exciting features like Web Slices, InPrivate Borwsing, Smart Screen Filter and many more. But i am totally impressed with one of its new feature called Accelerators.

The new Accelerators in Internet Explorer 8 help you quickly perform your everyday browsing tasks without navigating to other websites to get things done. Simply highlight text from any webpage, and then click on the blue Accelerator icon that appears above your selection to obtain driving directions, translate and define words, email content to others, search with ease, and more. For example, with the “Map with Live Maps” Accelerator in Internet Explorer 8, you can get an in-place view of a map displayed directly on the page.

Have a look at the sidebar for WinSpark.net Accelerator. (All non PC who has never faced to IE8 – this Accelerator works only in Internet Explorer 8.)

You can also create your own Accelerator for your Blog/Website. Its very simple. follow these  two simple steps.

• Create your own Accelerator XML definition file exactly like the given image and replace with your own data like HomePageURL, Display name Icon and description etc.

The XML file just created is called the service description file and it contains specific description about the service provider and type of service it provides. Upload this XML file to your blog and paste the URL of the XML file in the space of Addservice() method parameter. (described in step 2).

The first 2 lines define the OpenServiceFormat using the xml file version and the namespace. The namespace merely defines all elements in this specification. These lines must be in there.

<homepageUrl> : Defines the home page of the service provider.If you want to create Accelerator for www.Example.com, this link must come in homepageUrl attribute.This domain name value must match the other URLs defined in this XML file, or you will get an error when Internet Explorer 8 attempts to install the accelerator.

<display>: Defines the text that is presented to the user when they attempt to install the accelerator. And it will also appear when user will use the accelerator (see the screenshot given below). A popup window appears on the browser that shows information about the type of Accelerator.

<name>: The child of display element & contains the name of the Accelerator.

<activity>: Describes the activities of this accelerator. The category attribute defines what the category of the accelerator such as Search, Map, Define. You can define your own category but there must be only one instance of this element.

<activityAction>: This section defines information that is specific to a context of the activity using a context attribute. The context attribute indicates on what the accelerator should act upon. It can be one of the following values:

• Selection (default) – The text selected by the user.
• Document – The entire document.
• Link – The URL, if selected by the user.

<preview>:You can preview the information without opening the site. Internet Explorer 8 will open a box where you can preview the information without actually opening the web page. The preview element defines the action for preview.

<parameter>: The <parameter> element defines the name and values you want to pass to the URL when executing a preview or execute. The {selection} is like a variable. It will be replaced by the user selected value when invoking the web service. The Type defines the parameter data type.

<execute>: This element defines the action to take upon executing the accelerator. Typically this opens a new instance of the browser and displays the results using the posted data.

Your first step is over, Now its time to step ahead.

• Host the Accelerator XML file though an install button, Add the following code to your Homepage. (you can add this code as a widget).

The window.external.AddService() is one of the new extensibility API in IE 8. Get more info about this method here. Replace the method URL to your XML file url.

Over. Its simple and quite interesting. Hope you will have fun creating your own accelerators and improve your browsing experience. Add WinSpark.net Accelerator to your IE8.

Add WinSpark.net Accelerator

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