IE 4.0 - UNAUTHORIZED

First Contact - Alpha 1, August, 1996 (4-6mb)

Alpha is the first physical contact that most of the world got with regards to Internet Explorer v4.0. This release was extremely unstable, but that should go without saying, we are talking about Alpha software here. This sneak peak proved to be quite exciting, and really set the stage for all of the net hype regarding the March PPR release of MSIE.

Working Features:

HTML View/Web View - About the only thing that was working in this release was the beginning of the integration of the operating system and the web browser. Although the interface was extremely rough, it completely demonstrated the Microsoft vision regarding desktop/internet integration. Notice in the screenshot to the right that the WebView was still using the old IE 2.0 style navigation buttons. This was before IE 3.0 got it's UI overhaul, in fact this was even before IE 3.0 was in wide release.
%:\windows\web Folder - While this might not seem to be a big thing, the \windows\web folder layed the ground work for the ActiveTheme. Alpha 1 was emminently more workable from an HTML standpoint, in fact it allowed for complete manual manipulation of most of the visual aspects of the interface.

A Great Start

Alpha 1 was an incredible move forward for IE, and I surmise that it was around this time that MS decided to integrate a number of planned features from IE 5.0, hence Alpha 2. It is also interesting to note the simultaneous service pack releases for Win95 as each new major IE build surfaced. It appears that Alpha 1, 2 and OSR1/2 are nothing more than overtures towards the final Memphis/IE4.0 release later this year.

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