Microsoft has made Internet Explorer 8 available to developers at http://www.microsoft.com/ie/ie8.

If you are an IE user, this means an upgrade is on its way.

The new version will have some cool features. One will be the ability to save work being done on a web site down to your personal computer when an Internet connection goes down.

Another lets you highlight a street address on any web page and, with one click,  see a map of that location. You’ll also be able to highlight product names and click to see if they are available for sale on eBay.

Perhaps the most anticipated feature of this new browser is what it doesn’t do: demand an upgrade of web site designs. Unlike IE7, the new release sees the most standards-compliant version by default when loading a site. Web designers everywhere will be happy to learn that they need not redesign all their codes.

It’s not an altruistic move or even one meant to assuage developers. After the IE7 release, European Union nations launched an antitrust investigation into Microsoft and how Microsoft ensures rival Web browsers are not fully compatible with Internet Explorer.

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