Microsoft have today announced the availability of Internet Explorer 8 Release Candidate 1, which can be downloaded from the Microsoft website.

Whilst we’re clear Mozilla Firefox supporters here at Pixelapes, not just thanks to its wealth of web development advantages and web standards support, but also in a good tradition of supporting the little guy (especially when the little guy has an all round better product).

Still, that being said, we’re in full support of the upcoming release of IE8 as it is the first IE browser to offer complete support for web standards, or at least the first time it’s going to be passing the old standard of the Acid Test.

In addition, it’s also becoming easier to work out issues in IE, thanks to a web development tool that functions in a similar way to the excellent and indispensable Firebug – a veritable swiss army knife of web design tools for Firefox.

So if you’re still using IE6 – get yourself up to date and experience a faster and more secure internet!