What is HTML?
HTML is a markup language for describing web documents (web pages).
- HTML stands for Hyper Text Markup Language
- A markup language is a set of markup tags
- HTML documents are described by HTML tags
- Each HTML tag describes different document content
HTML Example
A small HTML document:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Page Title</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
<html>
<head>
<title>Page Title</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
This is Code Result:
My First Heading
My first paragraph.
Example Explained
- The DOCTYPE declaration defines the document type to be HTML
- The text between <html> and </html> describes an HTML document
- The text between <head> and </head> provides information about the document
- The text between <title> and </title> provides a title for the document
- The text between <body> and </body> describes the visible page content
- The text between <h1> and </h1> describes a heading
- The text between <p> and </p> describes a paragraph
Using this description, a web browser can display a document with a heading and a paragraph.
HTML Tags
HTML tags are keywords (tag names) surrounded by angle brackets:
<tagname>content</tagname>
- HTML tags normally come in pairs like <p> and </p>
- The first tag in a pair is the start tag, the second tag is the end tag
- The end tag is written like the start tag, but with a slash before the tag name
Web Browsers
The purpose of a web browser (Chrome, IE, Firefox, Safari) is to read HTML documents and display them.
The browser does not display the HTML tags, but uses them to determine how to display the document:
HTML Page Structure
Below is a visualization of an HTML page structure:
The <!DOCTYPE> Declaration
The <!DOCTYPE> declaration helps the browser to display a web page correctly.
There are different document types on the web.
To display a document correctly, the browser must know both type and version.
The doctype declaration is not case sensitive. All cases are acceptable:
<!DOCTYPE html>
<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<!doctype html>
<!Doctype Html>
<!DOCTYPE HTML>
<!doctype html>
<!Doctype Html>
Html Editors:
Write HTML Using Notepad or TextEdit
HTML can be edited by using professional HTML editors like:
- Microsoft WebMatrix
- Sublime Text
However, for learning HTML we recommend a text editor like Notepad (PC) or TextEdit (Mac).
We believe using a simple text editor is a good way to learn HTML.
Follow the 4 steps below to create your first web page with Notepad.
Step 1: Open Notepad (PC)
Open Notepad in Windows 8 or later:
Open the Start Screen (the window symbol at the bottom left on your screen). Type Notepad.
Open Notepad in Windows 7 or earlier:
Click Start (bottom left on your screen). Click All Programs. Click Accessories. Click Notepad.
Step 1: Open TextEdit (Mac)
Open TextEdit.
Please be sure that the text editor is set to plain text. Go to: Preferences > New Document > select plain text.
Also make sure both "Display html file as html code" and "Display RTF file as RTF code" options are checked under "Open and Save".
Then open a new document to place the code.
Step 2: Write Some HTML
Write or copy some HTML into Notepad.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
<html>
<body>
<h1>My First Heading</h1>
<p>My first paragraph.</p>
</body>
</html>
Step 3: Save the HTML Page
Save the file on your computer.
Select File > Save as in the Notepad menu.
Name the file "index.html" or any other name ending with html or htm.
UTF-8 is the preferred encoding for HTML files.
ANSI encoding covers US and Western European characters only.
Step 4: View HTML Page in Your Browser
Open the saved HTML file in your favorite browser. The result will look much like this:
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