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Making it easier for Enterprises to stay up-to-date

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As we shared in May, a top priority for Microsoft is helping customers upgrade and stay up to-date with the latest version of Internet Explorer. Today at TechEd Europe, we are making two announcements to help customers upgrade and stay up-to-date:

Starting in November, we are expanding the functionality of the Enterprise Mode Site List for Internet Explorer 11 to include all document modes. We listened to customer feedback, and the list will now give better control over which document mode will be used for remediating Web app compatibility. Customers will be able to force Web apps to render in any document mode—including IE10, IE9, IE8, IE7, and IE5—without changing a single line of code on the Web site; stay tuned for more details in November.

The next major version of our browser will leverage the backward compatibility features from Internet Explorer 11—including Enterprise Mode, Enterprise Site Discovery, and document modes—to ensure good compatibility with existing Web sites.  The work that customers do to upgrade to Internet Explorer 11 today will ease migrations to Windows 10, and help future-proof their browser environments.  We will continue to improve support for modern standards and legacy compatibility, to make it even easier for customers to stay up-to-date with the latest browser.

Recent announcements to help enterprises stay up-to-date

  • Security benefits: In June, we shared the security benefits from upgrading to the latest version of Internet Explorer. Newer versions of IE are faster, more secure, and have better Web standards support than older versions. For Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 users, upgrading to Internet Explorer 11 has significant benefits—and enabling automatic updating ensures that users will always be up-to-date.
  • Support policy changes: In August, we announced that starting January 12, 2016, only the most recent version of Internet Explorer available for a supported operating system will receive technical support and security updates. For example, customers using Internet Explorer 8, Internet Explorer 9, or Internet Explorer 10 on Windows 7 SP1 should migrate to Internet Explorer 11 to continue receiving security updates and technical support.
  • Enterprise Mode for IE11 support through 2020: We shared in August that Enterprise Mode for Internet Explorer 11—with higher-fidelity emulation for older versions of Internet Explorer—will be supported through the duration of the operating system lifecycle. On Windows 7, for example, Enterprise Mode will be supported through January 14, 2020. We will continue to improve Enterprise Mode, to help customers extend existing Web app investments and ease the transition to the latest version of Internet Explorer.
  • Enterprise Site Discovery Toolkit: In October, we announced the Enterprise Site Discovery Toolkit for Internet Explorer 11. This new tool provides a way for IT Pros to better understand how their organization is using Web apps, further aiding in prioritizing testing and remediation efforts. In addition to showing the document modes already being used, Enterprise Site Discovery will also collect the zone, crash counts, and other relevant information.
  • Along with the new Enterprise Mode Site List, which will give better control over how the document modes will be used, the Enterprise Site Discovery Toolkit will help save time and money when testing and remediating Web app compatibility.

What you can do

As always, we suggest that consumers upgrade to the latest version and enable automatic updates for more secure browsing. If you use an older version of Internet Explorer at work, encourage your IT department to learn more about Enterprise Mode and the other new backward-compatible features of Internet Explorer 11. Like many of our other customers, you may find that upgrading to the latest version of Internet Explorer is easier and less costly than previous upgrades.

— Fred Pullen, Senior Product Marketing Manager, Internet Explorer

Comments

  • Anonymous
    October 30, 2014
    The text says " IE10, IE9, IE8, IE7, and IE5" Is IE6 missing?  or is that IE5 supposed to be IE6?

  • Anonymous
    October 30, 2014
    @SJB - Nope, that is probably right. In Internet Explorer 11, the compatibility modes that are available are 10, 9, 8, 7 and 5. No 6.

  • Anonymous
    October 30, 2014
    Hopefully this will bring an end to:"This app only works on IE5 (shudders)/6/7/8/9/10" so we can't be on the latest. Having some of your users asking for the latest and the other half saying stay where we are is frustrating.

  • Anonymous
    October 31, 2014
    Would love to be able to control the state of Compatibility View in EMIE independently from the native IE11. i.e. on for all, or select sites in EMIE, and never on for IE11 itself! :-)

  • Anonymous
    November 03, 2014
    When will the Enterprise Mode Site List Manager get an update to reflect this change?