HTML Introduction
What is HTML?
HTML, or HyperText Markup Language, is the standard markup language used to create web pages. It provides the structure and content of a webpage by using a system of tags and attributes to define elements and their properties. HTML documents are interpreted by web browsers to display text, images, multimedia, and interactive elements on the internet.
HTML has some basic structure that are following:
- Structure
- Tags
- Attributes
- Document Structure
- Basic Elements
Structure of HTML
An HTML document is composed of elements structured in a hierarchical manner. Each element is enclosed in opening and closing tags, and they can contain text, other elements, or both.
HTML Tags
ags are the building blocks of HTML. They are enclosed in angle brackets < >. Tags usually come in pairs – an opening tag and a closing tag, with the content nested between them. For example, <p> is an opening tag for a paragraph, and </p> is the closing tag.
HTML Attributes
HTML tags can have attributes, which provide additional information about the element. Attributes are placed within the opening tag and are written as name-value pairs. For instance, the <img> tag might have an src attribute to specify the image file’s location.
Document Structure
Every HTML document begins with a <!DOCTYPE html> declaration, which specifies the version of HTML being used. This is followed by the <html> element, which contains two main sections: the <head> and the <body>. The <head> section typically includes metadata, such as the page title and links to external resources like stylesheets or scripts, while the <body> section contains the visible content of the page.
Basic Elements
HTML provides a variety of elements for structuring content, including headings (<h1> to <h6>), paragraphs (<p>), lists (<ul>, <ol>, <li>), links (<a>), images (<img>), and more.
Example
See the Pen
My first webpage by Meena Subash (@Meena-Subash)
on CodePen.
In this example,
<!DOCTYPE html>declares the document type.<html>encloses the entire HTML document.<head>contains meta-information about the document.<body>contains the visible content.<title>sets the title of the webpage displayed in the browser’s title bar.<h1>,<p>and are elements for headings, paragraphs, respectively.
History of HTML
HTML, or Hypertext Markup Language, has a rich history that dates back to the late 1980s. Here’s a brief overview of its evolution:
Initial Development
HTML’s origins can be traced back to the work of Sir Tim Berners-Lee, a British computer scientist, who developed the concept of the World Wide Web in the late 1980s while working at CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) in Switzerland. HTML was developed as a markup language to create documents that could be viewed in a web browser.
HTML 1.0
The first official specification for HTML, known as HTML 1.0, was published in 1991. It provided basic elements for structuring a document, such as headings, paragraphs, links, and lists.
HTML 2.0
HTML 2.0 was released as an Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) RFC in 1995, further refining the language and introducing features like tables and forms.
HTML 3.2
This version introduced significant improvements and became widely adopted. It included support for features like tables, applets, text flow around images, and more. It was published in 1997.
HTML 4.01
HTML 4.01 was the last version of HTML before the major overhaul that came with HTML5. It introduced better support for scripting languages like JavaScript and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), as well as more semantic elements. It was published in 1999.
XHTML
XHTML (Extensible Hypertext Markup Language) was introduced as a reformulation of HTML 4.01 using XML syntax. XHTML aimed to bring HTML closer to XML’s syntax rules, which made it easier for developers to write consistent and well-formed code. It was published in 2000.
HTML 5
HTML5 is the latest major revision of the HTML standard. It introduced numerous new features and APIs, including support for multimedia elements like <audio> and <video>, new semantic elements like <header>, <footer>, <nav>, and <article>, as well as improvements in forms and accessibility. It was published in 2014.
HTML Living Standard
Instead of releasing new versions, HTML is now maintained as a “living standard” by the WHATWG (Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group). This means that it is continually updated and improved, with new features being added as needed.
Throughout its history, HTML has evolved to meet the changing needs of the web, from simple static documents to dynamic, interactive web applications. It remains a fundamental technology for building and presenting content on the World Wide Web.
This is the HTML introduction and basics. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask me. Happy Learning…