Microsoft on Wednesday unveiled the beta version of Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) for developers at the annual MIX08 conference in Las Vegas.

The beta version of IE8 includes better predictability when designing sites, full support for cascading style sheet (CSS) 2.1 at release to manufacturing, and integrated developer tools to quickly debug HTML, CSS and scripts in a visual environment, Microsoft said.

This specific version is targeted for designers and developers alone as most of the end users requests have not been added. Here is some good news for designers…

The browser will render the Acid2 browser test correctly, and fully supports CSS 2.1, Microsoft said. In addition, it fixes “many cross-browser inconsistencies such as get/set/removeAttribute, default attributes, Attribute object and the < Q > tag.”

The beta will also include two new features, dubbed Activities and WebSlices. In addition to the IE8 beta, Microsoft also unveiled the Silverlight 2 beta, which supports managed code, includes the core of the Common Language Runtime and adds over two dozen user interface controls, Microsoft said.

There is lot more. keep watching this thread and microsoft blogs for more information.