The paint's still drying on the final coat of IE9, but Microsoft has this week signaled its intent to contest the browser wars of tomorrow by launching a preview build of Internet Explorer 10.
Continuing a tradition initiated this time last year, the new version of Microsoft's web browser was unveiled at the MIX developer conference in Las Vegas, where IE corporate vice president Dean Hachamovitch stressed the company's commitment to HTML5 and hardware acceleration.
The first platform preview of IE10, available to download from ie.microsoft.com/testdrive, is intended to give software developers an early glimpse at some of the latest standards adopted by the upcoming browser - including CSS3 Gradients on background images and CSS3 Flexible Box Layout.
Microsoft hasn't yet issued a final release date for its next major browser revision, but the company has stated that new builds will be made available every 12 weeks and is widely expected to ship Internet Explorer 10 alongside Windows 8 in 2012.
As with the first platform preview of IE9, the current release of IE10 is notably rough around the edges. With the intention of providing developers a hands-on experience of the rendering engine, the IE10 preview features a minimal user interface and is intended to run alongside existing versions of the IE browser.
The Internet Explorer Test Drive website has a handful of demos designed to showcase the added capabilities of the IE10 engine, but if you prefer to see the upgrades in action without installing pre-beta software, check out the Microsoft-provided clip below.
