HTML Basics

The Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), developed in the 1990s, is a language for transmitting global hypertext documents. HTML is a "markup language" that defines the structure of a document using information such as tags and text. A web browser reads this information and displays a webpage. In this article, we look at a brief introduction to HTML. Then, we will focus on the structure of an HTML document, mandatory and optional tags, and attributes. As you read these sections, pay attention to the rules for writing HTML. For example, an HTML5 document must contain four basic tags enclosed in open "<" and closed ">" brackets.

HTML

This chapter is designed as a brief overview of HTML. HTML is the language used to markup (or layout) Web pages. It consists of tags that are embedded in strings of text. These tags are instructions in a web page to control things such as formatting. For example, the emphasis (em) tag is used to provide emphasis to a string, and the strong (strong) tag is used to bold text.

The evolution of HTML has caused it to be much more than a program that can format documents. It can be used to include information for other languages. For example, the script tag can be used to include JavaScript source code within the current document, and the style tag can be used to include an external file containing Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). It can be integrated with these other languages to then be used as an infrastructure for writing complex programs, such as form-based systems, mapping systems, and other useful programs that can be run from a browser.

Source: Charles W. Kann III, https://www.oercommons.org/courses/programming-for-the-web-from-soup-to-nuts-implementing-a-complete-gis-web-page-using-html5-css-javascript-node-js-mongodb-and-open-layers/view
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