Introduction to HTML5

What is HTML5?
HTML5 is being developed as the next major revision of HTML (HyperText Markup Language), the core markup language of the World Wide Web. HTML5 is the proposed next standard for HTML 4.01, XHTML 1.0 and DOM Level 2 HTML. It aims to reduce the need for proprietary plug-in-based rich internet application (RIA) technologies such as Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight. 

Its development is still under process. The difference between HTML5 and its immediate predecessors HTML4.01 and XHTML1.1 is that HTML5 has features like video playback and drag-and-drop which were missing in the earlier versions.

The origin of the specification dates back to June 2004 by the (WHATWG) Web Hypertext Application Technology Working Group under the name Web Applications1.0.In March 2010 WHATWG was ready with the draft standard state of the specification. The editor of HTML5 is Ian Hickson of Google,Inc.Also at this point of time the specification was ready in working draft state at World Wide Web Consortium.

 

HTML5 was the starting point of the group working upon the new HTML at W3C in 2007.On 22nd January 2008 this working group published the First Public Working Draft of HTML5. The specification is still under development and will remain to be so for years to come although some parts of it will be ready to be implemented in the browsers soon. It is being estimated that HTML5 will reach the final recommendation stage in late 2010.It will be recommended by W3C.  Ian Hickson is expecting HTML5 to reach the Candidate Recommendation stage in 2012.The specification will be recommended by W3C only if it has "100% complete and fully interoperable implementations".
HTML5 will also help in building new features.

One feature that the Gmail design team is now working on is the ability to drag files from the desktop into the browser.This feature will be important in that it will bring Web applications even closer in feature functionality to desktop applications, de Boor said.

Gmail will also make use of HTML5's database standards. Now, the e-mail service uses Google Gears to store mail for offline reading, but over time that will migrate to the HTML5 standards.
De Boor also talked about adding new features that couldn't be rendered using HTML5.

One will be the ability to drag files from the browser window onto the desktop. To do this, his team is working on a new data transfer protocol, called "downloadurl."

 

"We tried to get this in HTML5," but were unable to do so. He jokingly said that Google will have to lobby to have some of the functionality needed to make that happen added into HTML6, which, as of today, does not exist in any form.
Instead of rendering it into a standard, the web design company will "encourage other browsers to use it," he said.

He noted that the web design company doesn't wasn't to revisit the "browser wars" of the last decade. "We tried to learn from history and be much more cooperative to the other browser makers," he said.

Another new feature he talked about was something called "Magic iFrame," which would allow a user to take part of a Web page, rendered in a frame, and pull it out and make it its own full Web page in a new browser window.

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HTML5 employs inputs which ensure full exhaustion on the modern websites. Some of the inputs are semantic replacements of general functions of generic block () and the inline () elements. Some of elements from HTML4.01 have been deleted and some new ones have been added to HTML5 to make it more efficient. The syntax of HTML5 is not based on SGML although their markup is same. Along with markup specification. Scripting application programming interfaces (APIs) is also specified by HTML5.

The new APIs specified are:
The canvas element for immediate mode 2Ddrawing.
Offline web applications.
Timed media playback.
Document editing.
Drag and drop.
Cross document messaging.
Browser history management.

Must visit site: 'HTML5 Showcase' - A gallery of the best html5 sites in the world.