XHTML, HTML, Designers

XHTML is improved HTML, because the tags don't have mistakes in them.

a

tag, which is for anchors, which are the links, like this: Yahoo

abbr

which is for abbreviations, but a rather stupid thing, like WWW--because you can already see it's an abbreviation, it is stupid, kind of like saying, "Yes, I like the--this is an abbreviation--HTTP/1.1 specification."

acronym

which is for acronyms, like radar, and it is almost as silly.

address

is used for information on the author,

This is written by Joseph K. Myers

, not just an address. It is a way of finding this information, which could be marked with id="address" except that people would be more likely to use the tag itself instead of an id, since ids are supposed to be arbitrary. (I could have said id, indicated with the var tag.) I believe you can have as many addresses as you like, but they should be associated with "a major part of a document," such as a form, or simply the entire document, and often they are placed at the beginning or end--but that is not important. It is not a tag used for formatting or creating a paragraph, but often it is displayed in italic.

area

is for a client-side image map area--an embedded image or object with "hot" links in certain regions.

big

specifies a larger text style than surrounding text

blockquote

is to contain an extended quotation, such as an excerpt from other material. This does not need to be long, but it may contain multiple paragraphs. Usually it results in intended text, like this:

They went in single file, running like hounds on a strong scent, and an eager light was in their eyes. Nearly due west the broad swath of the marching Orcs tramped its ugly slot; the sweet grass of Rohan had been bruised and blackened as they passed. (The Two Towers).

body

Everything displayed in the document is considered to be in the body.

button

is specific to forms, and used to draw a push-button. This is only useful for scripted web pages--for anything besides looks--since by itself it does nothing. Oops, sorry, that was my opinion. It can actually function as a submit or reset button as well.

caption

is specific to tables, and comes immediately after the table tag, to contain a table caption. It usually is confusing, unless a table occurs all alone. This is something seemingly ignored, that the table is often discussed outside the table, and for a table to occur without being described first--outside of the table, of course--is more confusing than omitting a table description. It seems like a description inside of a table itself, and a caption inside of a table itself, only have reasons when you contemplate a table without thinking of any of the other tags which would have been used to describe and title the information in a table.

cite

is only to indicate who said something, or where it came from, such as The Most Important People Who Say Things Never Are Recognized.

code

is an indication of computer code occurring, usually to preformat the code: ls -l is my girlfriend (would I have said just my friend, would you not have heard the end).

dd

stands for a definition description. Each of these elements is defined inside of dd, following the dt definition term.

dfn

is an especially ridiculous tag, because it is supposed to isolate the "defining definition" or "instance definition" (because they knew the idea was stupid) of a word; it is ridiculous because there is no formatting clue that something like, "Paul was an apostle," is the definition and not anything else like em for emphasis. (Really, it is useful for people who are reading the HTML--they know what you mean--but that isn't the normal ability of web users.)

div

is a generic container, and often does nothing except create a section of the document--which then may be beautified with stylesheets/CSS. By itself, it does nothing except break off its contents from previous or following lines, a clue to its literal meaning as a "division."

dl

creates a definition list (with nothing in it by itself) for the tags dt and dd, which are usually shown as a nice list of terms and definitions, just as this list you are reading right now.

dt

is for the "definition term," or simply a term, that comes in a dl definition list of terms and definitions.

em

is for emphasis to words, and is usually shown in italic. Many other formatting types are indistinguishable, and so they are useless as far as documents are concerned.

fieldset

is similar to a list of terms and definitions, but used for forms. The classic mistake is made, that it is perfectly clear when reading the HTML code--except that most people don't get around to doing that, and that most browsers make a puddle of the beautifully organized form. The supposed excuse for this is that everyone was supposed to have "styled" their own forms with CSS, a nice try, but false, since there really isn't any meaning in the HTML if the very excuse that HTML won't work is to say to use CSS. Excuses aren't reasons. It works with the legend tag to identify form fields directly.

form

is used to create an interactive form, with nothing in it by itself. The interaction itself is for the user to put data into the form. Things are put into it by input, button, select, and textarea elements.

h1

this is a heading, the first size. Headings really help explain things.

h2

the second size of the same thing.

h3

the third size

h4

the fourth size

h5

the fifth size

h6

the sixth size

head

is used for the information like the title and the stylesheet of a page. The head isn't shown in the page, except for things which don't belong there, but you shouldn't put them there.

hr

makes a separation mark across the page.

img

embeds an image--the most popular tag in the world.

input

for a form. There are several kinds: text, password, checkbox, radio, submit, reset, file, hidden, image, button.

kbd

shows text to be entered by the user, just like saying "type this."

label

shows the kind of thing to put into an input field in a form, like "First Name" for the "fname" field.

li

for a "list item," a part of either an ordered list, ol, or an unordered list, ul.

link

is a very important tag, for including stylesheets, especially.

map

create a client-side image map with nothing in it, to be used to put area tags in.

meta

is a tag for your own convenience, and traditionally applied for specifying descriptions--but again, if your page does not describe itself, what are you going to do? Write a meaningless page with a good description? Of course, there are other uses for it, often for a certain site--don't look at someone's special uses and think they actually are something to copy for your own site. One time I actually did that, and it reminds me of trying to copy the HTML for a "Top" link, when I hadn't put an anchor at the top that was named top--don't worry, you can learn by experience. :-) This tag is used by certain voluntary rating systems, and surprisingly, is accurate once in a blue moon, probably because inappropriate websites are encouraged to mark themselves as "adult" because most people in the world are actually looking for that. As usual, any attempt to deal with those problems by ranking or rating or filtering results in supporting, even financing, the problem.

object

embeds an object, such as an application or an applet into the HTML. For particular programs, necessary arguments can be supplied with the param element for objects.

ol

creates ordered lists, such as steps listed in order, with nothing them. The li list item tag indicates each part of the list.

optgroup

creates a group of options in a selectable form element, with nothing in it. The option is used to present selectable sub-choices.

option

writes a visible option in a selectable form element, with an associated data value.

p

formats a paragraph. This is extremely useful, as all paragraphs in HTML are not formatted unless they are written inside of this tag. The main benefit of HTML is obvious: text written any way becomes formatted and organized from merely this tag.

param

supplies named property values / parameters / arguments to a program embedded in the object tag.

pre

specifies preformatted text. This also is extremely useful, allowing you to format the borders and other elements of poetry, for example, while keeping the placement of text.

q

puts quote marks around a quote, as well as specifying a quote is present. I heartily disrecommend this element, as it requires the asinine elimination of quote marks from quotes, really doing nothing but rendering quotes out of context with everything except for the quibbly preferences of temporary web browsers.

samp

gives a sample of output, from a program, script, etc. This tag is interesting because it creates an easy-to-apply category for styling if you like to, but on its own it is an ambiguously differentiated text formatter.

script

embeds a script, usually JavaScript into the HTML. I advise that you please yourself to separate the script itself from your HTML by saying <script type="text/javascript" src="scriptcode.js"></script>, for example. Scripts are not HTML, and there is no reason for them to be conform to HTML, and they will have to if they are embedded directly into the HTML. It also organizes your pages better, and does not deny access to the script code, a plus for open source--like HTML--and a minus for people who strangely don't wish anyone to see their legs, and so they wear a long coat--and then don't wish anyone to see their coat.

select

creates a selectable form element, with no selections in it. The available selections are written with option and groupable with optgroup.

small

specifies a smaller text style than surrounding text.

span

does absolutely nothing, except specify a portion of HTML to be controlled with CSS.

strong

is to strongly emphasize words. Text is usually changed to bold.

style

is used to create a stylesheet, with nothing in it. Generally this is bad, and stylesheets should be organized with the link element, e.g., <link rel="stylesheet" href="stylesheet.css" />.

sub

changes the text to be subscript. This is used for writing expressions like K_C. Note that it usually increases the height of a line, sometimes leaving undesirable margins. This tag is a good example of a tag which is useful, but is wrong if used in the wrong way. Don't use subscript just to make a section of text look smaller, or something like that--it is a side effect--unless you want to be ridiculous. To change the size easily you may use small or big.

sup

changes the text to be superscript. This is like x², but generally it is better not to do that, since text often needs to be copied from HTML and sent; in such text, you should say x^2.

table

creates an HTML table, with nothing inside. The table is a tremendous way for organizing data, but not for trying to mimic layouts. For that, use images or some CSS. Theoretically, and with a lot of trouble, you could make anything with a table, even with no text inside, simply by changing the color and size of each cell. The general meaning of a table is simply a structure of rows and columns, where each column lines up in each row, and if you draw borders along each "cell"--which you can--they would all line up. What you should generally do is to specify the meaning of each column, or row, with the th table header tag intended for this purpose, and list out the values continued in each row with the td table data tag.

td

positions a cell of "table data."

textarea

creates a writable area of a form, with a default value of whatever you choose to write inside, starting with nothing. The textarea allows multi-line input.

th

positions a table header cell.

title

shall contain the title of the HTML document. The title belongs in the head.

tr

creates a table row, with nothing in it. The first table row may contain the series of th headings for each column. The following table rows may each begin with one th heading cell also, if desired. The table rows should all contain the same total number of cells in order for the table to be aligned. A single cell may be left blank, or cover more than one row (rowspan) or more than one column (colspan).

tt

formats text in teletype/monospace style.

ul

creates a very nice nestable, bulleted list of items

var

shows an instance of a variable or program argument. I would say that it formats it, except that it is indistinguishable from many other duplicate formatting. The usefulness is for particular authors, who may easily conform it to their needs for clarity.