Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.5 to Ship at Macworld -- At Macworld Expo this week, Microsoft will release Internet Explorer 4.5 for the Macintosh. Several new features have stood out in our testing of pre-release versions, including AutoFill for automatically filling out basic contact information in Web forms, AutoComplete for completing frequently used text in forms, print preview, and the capability to shrink Web pages to fit when printing (it's ideal for printing directions from a Web mapping service). We also like the drag install and self-repairing application features that Microsoft first introduced with Office 98. A feature that we've found interesting, though less successful, is Internet Explorer's support for Sherlock: you can summarize a page to the clipboard and use Sherlock to find pages similar to the one you're viewing. Other enhancements include a beefed-up Favorites Explorer bar, which now includes channels, a new Page Holder bar that you use to hold another page whose links you can then view in the main window, and a Go button for people who don't realize they can type in the Address field and press Return. Finally, Internet Explorer 4.5 offers better performance, especially when returning to previously visited pages. Stability has been good even with the pre-release versions, so the combination of the new features and better performance should make Internet Explorer 4.5 a worthwhile upgrade. [ACE]

<http://www.microsoft.com/mac/ie/>
<http://www.apple.com/sherlock/>