Developers give Internet Explorer 10 for Windows 7 Preview cold reception

Whoa, and I thought BetaNews commenters were a rowdy lot. Today, Microsoft announced that Internet Explorer 10 would come to Windows 7 next month as a "preview". I would think that would be welcome news, but not to cranky complainers at Microsoft's IE blog.

"We will release a preview of IE10 on Windows 7 in mid-November, with final availability to follow as we collect developer and customer feedback", Rob Mauceri, IE group program manager, posts. "We look forward to getting your feedback on IE10 on Windows 7, and will provide another update when the preview is available".

Among the first comments:

• "Why preview? We want to develop optimized sites now! WTF".
• "Too Little to late, you really drop the ball on the this MS".
• "A preview, really? 100k people and you can't develop anything in time".
• WHAT! i thought IE10 RTM would be out on 26th Oct along with windows 8. Not happy, Microsoft!"
• Wow, just wow! Total Epic Fail! You promised developers a version of IE10 BEFORE Windows 8 went to RTM so that we could provide some feedback to help fix the bugs before you committed to a release!"

By the way, it's unclear from Microsoft's commenting system how many different people these five really represent.

With new Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox versions coming out about every six weeks, Internet Explorer development does lag, by comparison. What? Hasn't it been three years since Microsoft released IE9? Perhaps if rivals didn't rev so fast, Microsoft wouldn't appear to be so slow.

One commenter pleads with Microsoft to do better:

If you could provide more frequent updates on current work being done on IE, and make this blog less of a futile confrontation between Microsoft marketing and angry commenters, and more of a useful, informative and relaxed place, it would be a welcome move. You could start by answering (reasonably civil) comments more often and pressing your management to drop this excessive silence on anything that could cast you in a bad light (slipping schedules, controversial decisions, rival browsers performing better...). Shutting down honest communication in favor of marketing is doing you much more harm than good.

"It's been over a year since the last Preview for Windows 7", writes another commenter. "It's unfathomable that it's taken so long. It's unfortunate there are still hundreds, if not thousands, of pieces of feedback (including legitimate issues) on Connect that haven't even been addressed. It really goes to show how mixed up the IE development team's priorities are if IE10 RTM's GA won't be next week.. or even next month".

Are these people being fair to Microsoft? Being the brunt of negative comments myself, Microsoft gets my sympathy.

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