HTML 3.2 Reference Specification
REC-html32
HTML 3.2 Reference Specification
W3C Recommendation
14-Jan-1997
Superseded
15-March-2018
Author:
Dave Raggett
dsr@w3.org
Status of this document
This document has been reviewed by W3C members and other interested
parties and has been endorsed by the Director as a W3C Recommendation.
This specification is a
Superseded Recommendation
. A newer
specification exists that is recommended for new adoption in place of
this specification. New implementations should follow the
latest
version
of the HTML specification.
A list of current W3C Recommendations and other technical documents
can be found at
Abstract
The HyperText Markup Language (HTML) is a simple markup language used
to create hypertext documents that are portable from one platform to
another. HTML documents are SGML documents with generic semantics that
are appropriate for representing information from a wide range of
applications. This specification defines HTML version 3.2. HTML 3.2 aims
to capture recommended practice as of early '96 and as such to be used
as a replacement for HTML 2.0 (
RFC 1866
).
Contents
Introduction to HTML 3.2
HTML as an SGML application
The Structure of HTML documents
The HEAD element and its children
The BODY element and its children
Sample SGML Open Catalog for HTML 3.2
SGML Declaration for HTML 3.2
HTML 3.2 Document Type Definition
Character Entities for ISO Latin-1
Table of printable Latin-1 Character codes
Acknowledgements
Further Reading ...
Introduction to HTML 3.2
HTML 3.2 is W3C's specification for HTML, developed in early `96
together with vendors including IBM, Microsoft, Netscape Communications
Corporation, Novell, SoftQuad, Spyglass, and Sun Microsystems. HTML 3.2
adds widely deployed features such as tables, applets and text flow
around images, while providing full backwards compatibility with the
existing standard HTML 2.0.
W3C is continuing to work with vendors on extensions for
accessibility features, multimedia objects, scripting, style sheets,
layout, forms, math and internationalization. W3C plans on incorporating
this work in further versions of HTML.
HTML as an SGML Application
HTML 3.2 is an SGML application conforming to International Standard
ISO 8879 -- Standard Generalized Markup Language. As an SGML
application, the syntax of conforming HTML 3.2 documents is defined by
the combination of the
SGML declaration
and the
document type definition
(DTD). This specification
defines the intended interpretation of HTML 3.2 elements, and places
further constraints on the permitted syntax which are otherwise
inexpressible in the DTD.
The SGML rules for record boundaries are tricky. In particular, a
record end immediately following a start tag should be discarded. For
example:

Text
is equivalent to:

Text
Similarly, a record end immediately preceding an end tag should be
discarded. For example:
Text

is equivalent to:
Text

Except within literal text (e.g. the
PRE
element), HTML
treats contiguous sequences of white space characters as being
equivalent to a single space character (ASCII decimal 32). These rules
allow authors considerable flexibility when editing the marked-up text
directly. Note that future revisions to HTML may allow for the
interpretation of the horizontal tab character (ASCII decimal 9) with
respect to a tab rule defined by an associated style sheet.
SGML entities in PCDATA content or in CDATA attributes are expanded
by the parser, e.g.
é
is expanded to the ISO
Latin-1 character decimal 233 (a lower case letter e with an acute
accent). This could also have been written as a named character entity,
e.g.
é
. The & character can be included
in its own right using the named character entity
&
HTML allows CDATA attributes to be unquoted provided the attribute
value contains only letters (a to z and A to Z), digits (0 to 9),
hyphens (ASCII
decimal 45) or, periods (ASCII decimal 46). Attribute values can
be quoted using double or single quote marks (ASCII decimal 34 and
39 respectively). Single quote marks can be included within the
attribute value when the value is delimited by double quote marks,
and vice versa.
Note that some user agents require attribute minimisation for the
following attributes:
COMPACT
ISMAP
CHECKED
NOWRAP
NOSHADE
and
NOHREF
. These user agents don't accept syntax such as
COMPACT=COMPACT
or
ISMAP=ISMAP
although this
is legitimate according to the HTML 3.2 DTD.
The SGML declaration and the DTD for use with HTML 3.2 are given in
appendices. Further guidelines for parsing HTML are given in
WD-html-lex
The Structure of HTML documents
HTML 3.2 Documents start with a declaration
followed by an HTML element containing a
HEAD
and then a
BODY
element:

A study of population dynamics
... other head elements

... document body

In practice, the
HTML
HEAD
and
BODY
start and end tags can be omitted
from the markup as these can be inferred in all cases by parsers conforming
to the
HTML 3.2 DTD
Every conforming HTML 3.2 document
must
start with the

declaration that is needed to distinguish
HTML 3.2 documents from other versions of HTML. The HTML specification
is not concerned with storage entities. As a result, it is not required
that the document type declaration reside in the same storage entity
(i.e. file). A Web site may choose to dynamically prepend HTML files
with the document type declaration if it is known that all such HTML
files conform to the HTML 3.2 specification.
Every HTML 3.2 document must also include the descriptive title
element. A minimal HTML 3.2 document thus looks like:

A study of population dynamics
Note: the word "Final" replaces "Draft" now that the HTML 3.2
specification has been ratified by the W3C member organizations.
The HEAD element
This contains the document head, but you can always omit both
the start and end tags for
HEAD
. The contents of the
document head is an unordered collection of the following elements:
The TITLE element
The STYLE element
The SCRIPT element
The ISINDEX element
The BASE element
The META element
The LINK element

The %head.misc entity is used to allow the associated elements
to occur multiple times at arbitrary positions within the HEAD.
The following elements can be part of the document head:
TITLE
defines the document title,
and is always needed.
ISINDEX
for simple keyword searches,
see
PROMPT
attribute.
BASE
defines base URL for resolving
relative URLs.
SCRIPT
reserved for future use
with scripting languages.
STYLE
reserved for future use
with style sheets.
META
used to supply meta info as
name/value pairs.
LINK
used to define relationships
with other documents.
TITLE
SCRIPT
and
STYLE
are
containers and require both start and end tags. The other elements are
not containers so that end tags are forbidden. Note that conforming
browsers won't render the contents of
SCRIPT
and
STYLE
elements.
TITLE

Every HTML 3.2 document
must
have exactly one
TITLE
element in the document's
HEAD
. It
provides an advisory title which can be displayed in a user agent's
window caption etc. The content model is PCDATA. As a result, character
entities can be used for accented characters and to escape special
characters such as & and <. Markup is not permitted in the
content of a
TITLE
element.
Example TITLE element:
A study of population dynamics
STYLE
and
SCRIPT

These are place holders for the introduction of style sheets and
client-side scripts in future versions of HTML. User agents should hide
the contents of these elements.
These elements are defined with CDATA as the content type. As a
result they may contain only SGML characters. All markup characters or
delimiters are ignored and passed as data to the application, except for
ETAGO ("[a-zA-Z]. This means that the element's end-tag (or that of an element
in which it is nested) is recognized, while an error occurs if the ETAGO
is invalid.
ISINDEX

prompt CDATA #IMPLIED -- prompt message -->
The
ISINDEX
element indicates that the user agent should
provide a single line text input field for entering a query string.
There are no restrictions on the number of characters that can be
entered. The
PROMPT
attribute can be used to specify a
prompt string for the input field, e.g.

The semantics for
ISINDEX
are currently well defined
only when the base URL for the enclosing document is an HTTP URL.
Typically, when the user presses the enter (return) key, the query
string is sent to the server identified by the base URL for this
document. For example, if the query string entered is "ten green apples"
and the base URL is:
then the query generated is:
Note that space characters are mapped to "+" characters and that
normal URL character escaping mechanisms apply. For further details see
the
HTTP
specification.
Note
in practice, the query string is resticted to Latin-1
as there is no current mechanism for the URL to specify a character
set for the query.
BASE

href %URL #REQUIRED
The
BASE
element gives the base URL for dereferencing
relative URLs, using the rules given by the URL specification, e.g.

...

The image is deferenced to
In the absence of a
BASE
element the document URL should
be used. Note that this is not necessarily the same as the URL used to
request the document, as the base URL may be overridden by an HTTP
header accompanying the document.
META

http-equiv NAME #IMPLIED -- HTTP response header name --
name NAME #IMPLIED -- metainformation name --
content CDATA #REQUIRED -- associated information --
The
META
element can be used to include name/value pairs
describing properties of the document, such as author, expiry date,
a list of key words etc. The
NAME
attribute specifies the
property name while the
CONTENT
attribute specifies the
property value, e.g.

The
HTTP-EQUIV
attribute can be used in place of the
NAME
attribute and has a special significance when
documents are retrieved via the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP). HTTP
servers may use the property name specified by the HTTP-EQUIV attribute
to create an RFC 822 style header in the HTTP response. This can't be
used to set certain HTTP headers though, see the HTTP specification for
details.

will result in the HTTP header:
Expires: Tue, 20 Aug 1996 14:25:27 GMT
This can be used by caches to determine when to fetch a fresh copy
of the associated document.
LINK
LINK
provides a media independent method for defining
relationships with other documents and resources.
LINK
has
been part of HTML since the very early days, although few browsers as
yet take advantage of it (most still ignore
LINK
elements).
LINK elements can be used
in principle
for document specific navigation toolbars or menus
to control how collections of
HTML files are rendered into printed documents
for linking associated resources such as
style sheets and scripts
to provide alternative forms of the current document

href %URL #IMPLIED -- URL for linked resource --
rel CDATA #IMPLIED -- forward link types --
rev CDATA #IMPLIED -- reverse link types --
title CDATA #IMPLIED -- advisory title string --
href
Specifies a URL designating the linked resource.
rel
The forward relationship also known as the "link type". It specifies
a named relationship from the enclosing document to the resource
specified by the
HREF
attribute. HTML link relationships
are as yet unstandardized, although some conventions have been
established.
rev
This defines a reverse relationship. A link from document A to
document B with
REV=
relation
expresses the same
relationship as a link from B to A with
REL=
relation
REV=made
is sometimes used to identify the document author,
either the author's email address with a mailto URL, or a link to the
author's home page.
title
An advisory title for the linked resource.
Here are some proposed relationship values:
rel=top
The link references the top of a hierarchy, e.g.
the first or cover page in a collection.
rel=contents
The link references a document serving as a table of contents.
rel=index
The link references a document providing an index
for the current document.
rel=glossary
The link references a document providing a glossary
of terms that are relevant to the current document.
rel=copyright
The link references a copyright statement for
the current document.
rel=next
The link references the next document to visit in a guided tour.
It can be used, for example, to preload the next page.
rel=previous
The link references the previous document in a guided tour.
rel=help
The link references a document offering help, e.g. describing
the wider context and offering further links to relevant documents.
This is aimed at reorienting users who have lost their way.
rel=search
The link references a page for searching material related
to a collection of pages
Example
LINK
elements:

The BODY element
This contains the document body. Both start and end tags for
BODY
may be omitted. The body can contain a wide range
of elements:
Headings (H1 - H6)
The ADDRESS element
Block level Elements
Text level elements
The key attributes are:
BACKGROUND
BGCOLOR
TEXT
LINK
VLINK
and
ALINK
. These can be used to set a
repeating background image, plus background and foreground colors for
normal text and hypertext links.

bgcolor %color #IMPLIED
text %color #IMPLIED
link %color #IMPLIED
vlink %color #IMPLIED
alink %color #IMPLIED
">

background %URL #IMPLIED -- texture tile for document background --
%body-color-attrs; -- bgcolor, text, link, vlink, alink --
Example:

bgcolor
Specifies the background color for the document body.
See below for the syntax of color values.
text
Specifies the color used to stroke the document's text.
This is generally used when you have changed the background
color with the
BGCOLOR
or
BACKGROUND
attributes.
link
Specifies the color used to stroke the text for unvisited hypertext
links.
vlink
Specifies the color used to stroke the text for visited hypertext
links.
alink
Specifies the highlight color used to stroke the text for hypertext
links at the moment the user clicks on the link.
background
Specifies a URL for an image that will be used to tile the document
background.
Colors
are given in the
sRGB
color space as hexadecimal numbers (e.g.
COLOR="#C0FFC0"
),
or as one of 16 widely understood color names. These colors were
originally picked as being the standard 16 colors supported with the
Windows VGA palette.
Color names and sRGB values
Black = "#000000"
Green = "#008000"
Silver = "#C0C0C0"
Lime = "#00FF00"
Gray = "#808080"
Olive = "#808000"
White = "#FFFFFF"
Yellow = "#FFFF00"
Maroon = "#800000"
Navy = "#000080"
Red = "#FF0000"
Blue = "#0000FF"
Purple = "#800080"
Teal = "#008080"
Fuchsia = "#FF00FF"
Aqua = "#00FFFF"
Block and Text level elements
Most elements that can appear in the document body fall into one of
two groups: block level elements which cause paragraph breaks, and text
level elements which don't. Common block level elements include
H1
to
H6
(headers),
(paragraphs)
LI
(list items), and
HR
(horizontal rules). Common text level elements include
EM
and
FONT
(character
emphasis),
(hypertext links),
IMG
and
APPLET
(embedded objects) and
BR
(line
breaks). Note that block elements generally act as containers for text
level and other block level elements (excluding headings and address
elements), while text level elements can only contain other text level
elements. The exact model depends on the element.
Headings

align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED
H1
H2
H3
H4
H5
and
H6
are used for document headings. You
always need the start and end tags.
H1
elements are more
important than
H2
elements and so on, so that
H6
elements define the least important level of headings.
More important headings are generally rendered in a larger font than
less important ones. Use the optional
ALIGN
attribute to
set the text alignment within a heading, e.g.

... centered heading ...

The default is left alignment, but this can be overridden by an
enclosing
DIV
or
CENTER
element.
ADDRESS

The
ADDRESS
element requires start and end tags, and
specifies information such as authorship and contact details for the
current document. User agents should render the content with
paragraph-breaks before and after. Note that the content is restricted
to paragraphs, plain text and text-like elements as defined by the %text
entity.
Example:

Newsletter editor

J.R. Brown

8723 Buena Vista, Smallville, CT 01234

Tel: +1 (123) 456 7890

Block elements
paragraphs
The paragraph element requires a start tag, but the end tag can
always be omitted. Use the
ALIGN
attribute to set the text
alignment within a paragraph, e.g.

UL
unordered lists
These require start and end tags, and contain one or more
LI
elements representing individual list items.
OL
ordered (i.e. numbered) lists
These require start and end tags, and contain one or more
LI
elements representing individual list items.
DL
definition lists
These require start and end tags and contain
DT
elements that give the terms, and
DD
elements that give
corresponding definitions.
PRE
preformatted text
Requires start and end tags. These elements are rendered with a
monospaced font and preserve layout defined by whitespace and line
break characters.
DIV
document divisions
Requires start and end tags. It is used with the
ALIGN
attribute to set the text alignment of the block elements it contains.
ALIGN
can be one of
LEFT
CENTER
or
RIGHT
CENTER
text alignment
Requires start and end tags. It is used to center text lines
enclosed by the
CENTER
element. See
DIV
for a more general solution.
BLOCKQUOTE
quoted passage
Requires start and end tags. It is used to enclose extended
quotations and is typically rendered with indented margins.
FORM
fill-out forms
Requires start and end tags. This element is used to define
a fill-out form for processing by HTTP servers. The attributes
are
ACTION
METHOD
and
ENCTYPE
Form elements can't be nested.
ISINDEX
primitive HTML forms
Not a container, so the end tag is forbidden. This predates
FORM
and is used for simple kinds of forms which have a
single text input field, implied by this element. A single
ISINDEX
can appear in the document head or body.
HR
horizontal rules
Not a container, so the end tag is forbidden. attributes are
ALIGN
NOSHADE
SIZE
and
WIDTH
TABLE
can be nested
Requires start and end tags. Each table starts with an optional
CAPTION
followed by one or more
TR
elements
defining table rows. Each row has one or more cells defined by
TH
or
TD
elements. attributes for
TABLE
elements are
WIDTH
BORDER
CELLSPACING
and
CELLPADDING
Paragraphs

align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED
The
element is used to markup paragraphs. It is a
container and requires a start tag. The end tag is optional as it can
always be inferred by the parser. User agents should place paragraph
breaks before and after
elements. The rendering is user
agent dependent, but text is generally wrapped to fit the space
available.
Example:

This is the first paragraph.

This is the second paragraph.
Paragraphs are usually rendered flush left with a ragged right
margin. The
ALIGN
attribute can be used to explicitly
specify the horizontal alignment:
align=left
The paragraph is rendered flush left.
align=center
The paragraph is centered.
align=right
The paragraph is rendered flush right.
For example:

This is a centered paragraph.

and this is a flush right paragraph.
The default is left alignment, but this can be overridden by an
enclosing
DIV
or
CENTER
element.
Lists
List items can contain block and text level items, including
nested lists, although headings and address elements are excluded.
This limitation is defined via the %flow entity.
Unordered Lists

type (%ULStyle) #IMPLIED -- bullet style --
compact (compact) #IMPLIED -- reduced interitem spacing --

type (%LIStyle) #IMPLIED -- list item style --
Unordered lists take the form:

... first list item
... second list item
...

The
UL
element is used for unordered lists. Both start
and end tags are always needed. The
LI
element is used for
individual list items. The end tag for
LI
elements can
always be omitted. Note that
LI
elements can contain nested
lists. The
COMPACT
attribute can be used as a hint to the
user agent to render lists in a more compact style.
The
TYPE
attribute can be used to set the bullet style
on
UL
and
LI
elements. The permitted values
are "disc", "square" or "circle". The default generally depends on the
level of nesting for lists.
with

with

This list was chosen to cater for the original bullet shapes used by
Mosaic in 1993.
Ordered (i.e. numbered) Lists

type CDATA #IMPLIED -- numbering style --
start NUMBER #IMPLIED -- starting sequence number --
compact (compact) #IMPLIED -- reduced interitem spacing --

type CDATA #IMPLIED -- list item style --
value NUMBER #IMPLIED -- set sequence number --
Ordered (i.e. numbered) lists take the form:

... first list item
... second list item
...

The
OL
START
attribute can be used to
initialize the sequence number (by default it is initialized to 1).
You can set it later on with the
VALUE
attribute on
LI
elements. Both of these attributes expect integer
values. You can't indicate that numbering should be continued from a
previous list, or to skip missing values without giving an explicit
number.
The
COMPACT
attribute can be used as a hint to the user
agent to render lists in a more compact style. The
OL
TYPE
attribute allows you to set the numbering style for
list items:
Type
Numbering style
Arabic numbers
1, 2, 3, ...
lower alpha
a, b, c, ...
upper alpha
A, B, C, ...
lower roman
i, ii, iii, ...
upper roman
I, II, III, ...
Definition Lists

compact (compact) #IMPLIED -- more compact style --

Definition lists take the form:

term name: term definition
...

DT
elements can only act as containers for text level
elements, while
DD
elements can hold block level elements
as well, excluding headings and address elements.
For example:

Term 1: This is the definition of the first term.
Term 2: This is the definition of the second term.

which could be rendered as:
Term 1
This is the definition of the first term.
Term 2
This is the definition of the second term.
The
COMPACT
attribute can be used with the
DL
element as a hint to the user agent to render
lists in a more compact style.
DIR
and

compact (compact) #IMPLIED
These elements have been part of HTML from the early days. They are
intended for unordered lists similar to
UL
elements. User
agents are recommended to render
DIR
elements as
multicolumn directory lists, and
elements as single
column menu lists. In practice, Mosaic and most other user agents
have ignored this advice and instead render
DIR
and
in an identical way to
UL
elements.
Preformatted Text

width NUMBER #implied
The
PRE
element can be used to include preformatted
text. User agents render this in a fixed pitch font, preserving spacing
associated with white space characters such as space and newline
characters. Automatic word-wrap should be disabled within
PRE
elements.
Note that the SGML standard requires that the parser
remove a newline immediately following the start tag
or immediately preceding the end tag.
PRE
has the same content model as paragraphs,
excluding images and elements that produce changes in font size,
e.g.
IMG
BIG
SMALL
SUB
SUP
and
FONT
A few user agents support the
WIDTH
attribute. It
provides a hint to the user agent of the required width in characters.
The user agent can use this to select an appropriate font size or to
indent the content appropriately.
Here is an example of a
PRE
element; a verse from
Shelley (To a Skylark):


Higher still and higher
From the earth thou springest
Like a cloud of fire;
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.

which is rendered as:
Higher still and higher
From the earth thou springest
Like a cloud of fire;
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.
The horizontal tab character (encoded in Unicode, US ASCII and
ISO 8859-1 as decimal 9) should be interpreted as the smallest
non-zero number of spaces which will leave the number of characters
so far on the line as a multiple of 8. Its use is strongly discouraged
since it is common practice when editing to set the tab-spacing to other
values, leading to misaligned documents.
XMP
LISTING
and
PLAINTEXT

-- historical, non-conforming parsing mode where
the only markup signal is the end tag
in full
-->

]]>
These are obsolete tags for preformatted text that predate the
introduction of
PRE
. User agents may support these
for backwards compatibility. Authors should avoid using them in new
documents!
DIV
and
CENTER

align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED -- alignment of following text --

DIV
elements can be used to structure HTML documents as
a hierarchy of divisions. The
ALIGN
attribute can be used
to set the default horizontal alignment for elements within the content
of the
DIV
element. Its value is restricted to
LEFT
CENTER
or
RIGHT
, and is
defined in the same way as for the paragraph element

Note that because
DIV
is a block-like element it will
terminate an open
element. Other than this, user agents
are
not
expected to render paragraph breaks before and after
DIV
elements.
CENTER
is directly equivalent
to
DIV
with
ALIGN=CENTER
. Both
DIV
and
CENTER
require start and end tags.
CENTER
was introduced by Netscape before they added
support for the HTML 3.0
DIV
element. It is retained in
HTML 3.2 on account of its widespread deployment.
BLOCKQUOTE

This is used to enclose block quotations from other works.
Both the start and end tags are required. It is often rendered
indented, e.g.
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.
from "The Two Towers" by J.R.R. Tolkien.
FORM
-- as per HTTP specification
-->

action %URL #IMPLIED -- server-side form handler --
method (%HTTP-Method) GET -- see HTTP specification --
enctype %Content-Type; "application/x-www-form-urlencoded"
This is used to define an HTML form, and you can have more than one form
in the same document. Both the start and end tags are required. For very
simple forms, you can also use the
ISINDEX
element. Forms can contain a wide range of HTML markup including several
kinds of
form fields
such as single and multi-line
text fields, radio button groups, checkboxes, and menus.
action
This specifies a URL which is either used to post forms via email,
e.g.
action="mailto:foo@bar.com"
, or used to invoke a
server-side forms handler via HTTP, e.g.
action="http://www.acme.com/cgi-bin/register.pl"
method
When the action attribute specifies an HTTP server, the method
attribute determines which HTTP method will be used to send the form's
contents to the server. It can be either
GET
or
POST
, and defaults to
GET
enctype
This determines the mechanism used to encode the form's contents.
It defaults to
application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Further details on handling forms are given in RFC 1867.
HR
- horizontal rules
Horizontal rules may be used to indicate a change in topic.
In a speech based user agent, the rule could be rendered as a pause.

align (left|right|center) #IMPLIED
noshade (noshade) #IMPLIED
size %Pixels #IMPLIED
width %Length #IMPLIED
HR
elements are not containers so the end tag is forbidden.
The attributes are:
ALIGN
NOSHADE
SIZE
and
WIDTH
align
This determines whether the rule is placed at the left, center
or right of the space between the current left and right margins
for
align=left
align=center
or
align=right
respectively. By default, the rule is centered.
noshade
This attribute requests the user agent to render the rule in a
solid color rather than as the traditional two colour "groove".
size
This can be used to set the height of the rule in pixels.
width
This can be used to set the width of the rule in
pixels (e.g.
width=100
) or as the percentage between the
current left and right margins (e.g.
width="50%"
). The
default is 100%.
Tables
HTML 3.2 includes a widely deployed subset of the specification
given in
RFC 1942
and can be used to
markup tabular material or for layout purposes. Note that the latter
role typically causes problems when rending to speech or to text
only user agents.

"align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED"

"valign (top|middle|bottom) #IMPLIED"

align %Where; #IMPLIED -- table position relative to window --
width %Length #IMPLIED -- table width relative to window --
border %Pixels #IMPLIED -- controls frame width around table --
cellspacing %Pixels #IMPLIED -- spacing between cells --
cellpadding %Pixels #IMPLIED -- spacing within cells --

align (top|bottom) #IMPLIED

%cell.halign; -- horizontal alignment in cells --
%cell.valign; -- vertical alignment in cells --

nowrap (nowrap) #IMPLIED -- suppress word wrap --
rowspan NUMBER 1 -- number of rows spanned by cell --
colspan NUMBER 1 -- number of cols spanned by cell --
%cell.halign; -- horizontal alignment in cells --
%cell.valign; -- vertical alignment in cells --
width %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested width for cell --
height %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested height for cell --
Tables take the general form:

...
...

... table caption ...
first cell	second cell

The attributes on
TABLE
are all optional. By default,
the table is rendered without a surrounding border. The table is
generally sized automatically to fit the contents, but you can also set
the table width using the
WIDTH
attribute.
BORDER
CELLSPACING
and
CELLPADDING
provide further control over the table's
appearence. Captions are rendered at the top or bottom of the table
depending on the
ALIGN
attribute.
Each table row is contained in a
TR
element, although
the end tag can always be omitted. Table cells are defined by
TD
elements for data and
TH
elements for
headers. Like
TR
, these are containers and can be given
without trailing end tags.
TH
and
TD
support
several attributes:
ALIGN
and
VALIGN
for
aligning cell content,
ROWSPAN
and
COLSPAN
for
cells which span more than one row or column. A cell can contain a wide
variety of other block and text level elements including form fields and
other tables.
The
TABLE
element always requires both start and end tags.
It supports the following attributes:
align
This takes one of the case insensitive values:
LEFT
CENTER
or
RIGHT
. It specifies the horizontal
placement of the table relative to the current left and right margins.
It defaults to left alignment, but this can be overridden by an
enclosing
DIV
or
CENTER
element.
width
In the absence of this attribute the table width is automatically
determined from the table contents. You can use the
WIDTH
attribute to set the table width to a fixed value in pixels (e.g.
WIDTH=212
) or as a percentage of the space between the
current left and right margins (e.g.
WIDTH="80%"
).
border
This attribute can be used to specify the width of the outer border
around the table to a given number of pixels (e.g.
BORDER=4
). The value can be set to zero to suppress the
border altogether. In the absence of this attribute the border should be
suppressed. Note that some browsers also accept
BORDER>
with the same semantics as
BORDER=1
cellspacing
In traditional desktop publishing software, adjacent table cells
share a common border. This is not the case in HTML. Each cell is given
its own border which is separated from the borders around neighboring
cells. This separation can be set in pixels using the
CELLSPACING
attribute, (e.g.
CELLSPACING=10
).
The same value also determines the separation between the table border
and the borders of the outermost cells.
cellpadding
This sets the padding in pixels between the border around each cell
and the cell's contents.
The
CAPTION
element has one attribute
ALIGN
which can be either
ALIGN=TOP
or
ALIGN=BOTTOM
This can be used to force the caption to be placed above the top or
below the bottom of the table respectively. Most user agents default to
placing the caption above the table.
CAPTION
always
requires both start and end tags. Captions are limited to plain text and
text-level elements as defined by the %text entity. Block level elements
are not permitted.
The
TR
or table row element requires a start tag, but
the end tag can always be left out.
TR
acts as a container
for table cells. It has two attributes:
align
Sets the default horizontal alignment of cell contents. It takes
one of the case insensitive values:
LEFT
CENTER
or
RIGHT
and plays the same role as the
ALIGN
attribute on paragraph elements.
valign
This can be used to set the default vertical alignment of cell
contents within each cell. It takes one of the case insensitive values:
TOP
MIDDLE
or
BOTTOM
to position
the cell contents at the top, middle or bottom of the cell respectively.
There are two elements for defining table cells.
TH
is
used for header cells and
TD
for data cells. This
distinction allows user agents to render header and data cells in
different fonts, and enables speech based browsers to do a better job.
The start tags for
TH
and
TD
are always needed
but the end tags can be left out. Table cells can have the following
attributes:
nowrap
The presence of this attribute disables automatic word wrap
within the contents of this cell (e.g.

).
This is equivalent to using the

entity for
non-breaking spaces within the content of the cell.
rowspan
This takes a positive integer value specifying the number of
rows spanned by this cell. It defaults to one.
colspan
This takes a positive integer value specifying the number of
columns spanned by this cell. It defaults to one.
align
Specifies the default horizontal alignment of cell
contents, and overrides the
ALIGN
attribute on the table
row. It takes the same values:
LEFT
CENTER
and
RIGHT
. If you don't specify an
ALIGN
attribute value on the cell, the default is left alignment for

and center alignment for

although you can override this with an
ALIGN
attribute on
the
TR
element.
valign
Specifies the default vertical alignment of cell
contents, overriding the
VALIGN
attribute on the table row.
It takes the same values:
TOP
MIDDLE
and
BOTTOM
. If you don't specify a VALIGN attribute value on
the cell, the default is middle although you can override this with a
VALIGN
attribute on the
TR
element.
width
Specifies the suggested width for a cell content in pixels
excluding the cell padding. This value will normally be
used except when it conflicts with the width requirements
for other cells in the same column.
height
Specifies the suggested height for a cell content in pixels
excluding the cell padding. This value will normally be
used except when it conflicts with the height requirements
for other cells in the same row.
Tables are commonly rendered in bas-relief, raised up with the outer
border as a bevel, and individual cells inset into this raised surface.
Borders around individual cells are only drawn if the cell has explicit
content. White space doesn't count for this purpose with the exception
of .
The algorithms used to automatically size tables should take
into account the minimum and maximum width requirements for each
cell. This is used to determine the minimum and maximum width
requirements for each column and hence for the table itself.
Cells spanning more than one column contribute to the
widths of each of the columns spanned. One approach is to evenly
apportion the cell's minimum and maximum width between these
columns, another is to weight the apportioning according to the
contributions from cells that don't span multiple columns.
For some user agents it may be necessary or desirable to break
text lines within words. In such cases a visual indication that this
has occurred is advised.
The minimum and maximum width of nested tables contribute to the
minimum and maximum width of the cell in which they occur. Once the
width requirements are known for the top level table, the column widths
for that table can be assigned. This allows the widths of nested tables
to be assigned and hence in turn the column widths of such tables.
If practical, all columns should be assigned at least their minimum
widths. It is suggested that any surplus space is then shared out
proportional to the difference between the minimum and maximum width
requirements of each column.
Note that pixel values for width and height refer to screen pixels, and
should be multiplied by an appropriate factor when rendering to very high
resolution devices such as laser printers. For instance if a user agent has
a display with 75 pixels per inch and is rendering to a laser printer with
600 dots per inch, then the pixel values given in HTML attributes should be
multiplied by a factor of 8.
Text level elements
These don't cause paragraph breaks. Text level elements
that define character styles can generally be nested. They can
contain other text level elements but not block level elements.
Font style elements
Phrase elements
Form Fields
The A (anchor) element
IMG - inline images
APPLET
(Java Applets)
FONT elements
BASEFONT elements
BR - line breaks
MAP - client-side image maps
Font style elements
These all require start and end tags, e.g.
This has some bold text.
Text level elements must be properly nested - the following
is in error:
This has some bold and italic text.
User agents should do their best to respect nested emphasis, e.g.
This has some bold and italic text.
Where the available fonts are restricted or for speech output, alternative
means should be used for rendering differences in emphasis.
TT
teletype or monospaced text
italic text style
bold text style
underlined text style
STRIKE
strike-through text style
BIG
places text in a large font
SMALL
places text in a small font
SUB
places text in subscript style
SUP
places text in superscript style
Note: future revisions to HTML may be phase out STRIKE
in favor of the more concise "S" tag from HTML 3.0.
Phrase Elements
These all require start and end tags, e.g.
This has some emphasized text.
EM
basic emphasis typically rendered in an italic font
STRONG
strong emphasis typically rendered in a bold font
DFN
defining instance of the enclosed term
CODE
used for extracts from program code
SAMP
used for sample output from programs, and scripts etc.
KBD
used for text to be typed by the user
VAR
used for variables or arguments to commands
CITE
used for citations or references to other sources
Form fields
INPUT
SELECT
and
TEXTAREA
are only allowed within
FORM
elements.
INPUT
can
be used for a variety of form fields including single line text fields,
password fields, checkboxes, radio buttons, submit and reset buttons,
hidden fields, file upload, and image buttons.
SELECT
elements are used for single or
multiple choice menus.
TEXTAREA
elements are used to define multi-line text fields. The content of the
element is used to initialize the field.
INPUT
text fields, radio buttons, check boxes, ...
INPUT
elements are not containers and so the end tag is
forbidden.

type %InputType TEXT -- what kind of widget is needed --
name CDATA #IMPLIED -- required for all but submit and reset --
value CDATA #IMPLIED -- required for radio and checkboxes --
checked (checked) #IMPLIED -- for radio buttons and check boxes --
size CDATA #IMPLIED -- specific to each type of field --
maxlength NUMBER #IMPLIED
src %URL #IMPLIED -- for fields with background images --
align %IAlign #IMPLIED -- vertical or horizontal alignment --
type
Used to set the type of input field:
type=text
(the default)
A single line text field whose visible size can be set using the
size
attribute, e.g.
size=40
for a 40 character wide field. Users should be able to type more than
this limit though with the text scrolling through the field to keep the
input cursor in view. You can enforce an upper limit on the number of
characters that can be entered with the
maxlength
attribute. The
name
attribute is used to name the field,
while the
value
attribute can be used
to initialize the text string shown in the field when the document is
first loaded.

type=password
This is like type=text, but echoes characters using a character
like * to hide the text from prying eyes when entering passwords.
You can use
size
and
maxlength
attributes to control
the visible and maximum length exactly as per
regular text fields.

type=checkbox
Used for simple Boolean attributes, or for attributes that can take
multiple values at the same time. The latter is represented by several
checkbox fields with the same
name
and
a different
value
attribute. Each checked
checkbox generates a separate name/value pair in the submitted data, even
if this results in duplicate names. Use the
checked
attribute to initialize
the checkbox to its checked state.

type=radio
Used for attributes which can take a single value from a set of
alternatives. Each radio button field in the group should be given the
same
name
. Radio buttons require an explicit
value
attribute. Only the checked radio
button in the group generates a name/value pair in the submitted data. One
radio button in each group should be initially checked using the
checked
attribute.

type=submit
This defines a button that users can click to submit the form's
contents to the server. The button's label is set from the
value
attribute. If the
name
attribute is given then the submit button's name/value pair will be
included in the submitted data. You can include several submit buttons
in the form. See
type=image
for graphical submit buttons.

type=image
This is used for graphical submit buttons rendered by an image
rather than a text string. The URL for the image is specified with the
src
attribute. The image alignment can
be specified with the
align
attribute. In this respect, graphical submit buttons are treated
identically to
IMG
elements, so you can
set align to left, right, top, middle or bottom. The x and y values of
the location clicked are passed to the server: In the submitted data,
image fields are included as two name/value pairs. The names are derived
by taking the name of the field and appending ".x" for the x value, and
".y" for the y value.

Now choose a point on the map:

Note
: image fields typically cause problems for text-only and
speech-based user agents!
type=reset
This defines a button that users can click to reset form fields
to their initial state when the document was first loaded. You can
set the label by providing a
value
attribute. Reset buttons are never sent as part of the form's contents.

type=file
This provides a means for users to attach a file to the form's
contents. It is generally rendered by text field and an associated
button which when clicked invokes a file browser to select a file
name. The file name can also be entered directly in the text field.
Just like type=text you can use the
size
attribute to set the visible width of this field in average character
widths. You can set an upper limit to the length of file names using the
maxlength
attribute. Some user agents
support the ability to restrict the kinds of files to those
matching a comma separated list of MIME content types given with
the
ACCEPT
attribute e.g.
accept="image/*"
restricts files to images. Further information can be found in
RFC 1867

type=hidden
These fields should not be rendered and provide a means for servers
to store state information with a form. This will be passed back to the
server when the form is submitted, using the name/value pair defined by
the corresponding attributes. This is a work around for the statelessness
of HTTP. Another approach is to use HTTP "
".

name
Used to define the property name that will be used to identify this
field's content when it is submitted to the server.
value
Used to initialize the field, or to provide a textual label for
submit and reset buttons.
checked
The presence of this attribute is used to initialize checkboxes and
radio buttons to their checked state.
size
Used to set the visible size of text fields to a given number of
average character widths, e.g.
size=20
maxlength
Sets the maximum number of characters permitted in a text field.
src
Specifies a URL for the image to use with a graphical submit button.
align
Used to specify image alignment for graphical submit buttons.
It is defined just like the
IMG
align
attribute and takes one of the values:
top
middle
bottom
left
or
right
, defaulting
to
bottom
SELECT
menus

name CDATA #REQUIRED
size NUMBER #IMPLIED
multiple (multiple) #IMPLIED

selected (selected) #IMPLIED
value CDATA #IMPLIED -- defaults to element content --
SELECT
is used to define select one from many or many
from many menus.
SELECT
elements require start and end tags
and contain one or more
OPTION
elements that define menu
items. One from many menus are generally rendered as drop-down menus
while many from many menus are generally shown as list boxes.
Example:

SELECT
attributes:
name
This specifies a property name that is used to identify the menu
choice when the form is submitted to the server. Each selected option
results in a property name/value pair being included as part of the
form's contents.
size
This sets the number of visible choices for many from many menus.
multiple
The presence of this attribute signifies that the users can make
multiple selections. By default only one selection is allowed.
OPTION
attributes:
selected
When this attribute is present, the option is selected when the
document is initially loaded. It is an error for more than one option
to be so selected for one from many menus.
value
Specifies the property value to be used when submitting the form's
content. This is combined with the property name as given by the name
attribute of the parent
SELECT
element.
TEXTAREA
multi-line text fields

name CDATA #REQUIRED
rows NUMBER #REQUIRED
cols NUMBER #REQUIRED
TEXTAREA
elements require start and end tags. The
content of the element is restricted to text and character entities. It
is used to initialize the text that is shown when the document is first
loaded.
Example:
<br>Your address here ...<br>
It is recommended that user agents canonicalize line endings to
CR, LF (ASCII decimal 13, 10) when submitting the field's contents.
The character set for submitted data should be ISO Latin-1, unless
the server has previously indicated that it can support alternative
character sets.
name
This specifies a property name that is used to identify the textarea
field when the form is submitted to the server.
rows
Specifies the number of visible text lines. Users should be able
to enter more lines that this, so user agents should provide some
means to scroll through the contents of the textarea field when the
contents extend beyond the visible area.
cols
Specifies the visible width in average character widths. Users should
be able to enter longer lines that this, so user agents should provide
some means to scroll through the contents of the textarea field when the
contents extend beyond the visible area. User agents may wrap visible text
lines to keep long lines visible without the need for scrolling.
Special Text level Elements
(Anchor),
IMG
APPLET
FONT
BASEFONT
BR
and
MAP
The A (anchor) element

name CDATA #IMPLIED -- named link end --
href %URL #IMPLIED -- URL for linked resource --
rel CDATA #IMPLIED -- forward link types --
rev CDATA #IMPLIED -- reverse link types --
title CDATA #IMPLIED -- advisory title string --
Anchors can't be nested and always require start and end tags.
They are used to define hypertext links and also to define
named locations for use as targets for hypertext links, e.g.
The way to happiness.
and also to define named locations for use as targets for hypertext
links, e.g.

545 Tech Square - Hacker's Paradise

name
This should be a string defining unique name for the scope of the
current HTML document.
NAME
is used to associate a name
with this part of a document for use with URLs that target a named
section of a document.
href
Specifies a URL acting as a network address for the linked resource.
This could be another HTML document, a PDF file or an image etc.
rel
The forward relationship also known as the "link type". It can be
used to determine to how to deal with the linked resource when printing
out a collection of linked resources.
rev
This defines a reverse relationship. A link from document A to
document B with
REV=relation
expresses the same
relationship as a link from B to A with
REL=relation
REV=made
is sometimes used to identify the document author,
either the author's email address with a mailto URL, or a link to the
author's home page.
title
An advisory title for the linked resource.
IMG
- inline images

src %URL #REQUIRED -- URL of image to embed --
alt CDATA #IMPLIED -- for display in place of image --
align %IAlign #IMPLIED -- vertical or horizontal alignment --
height %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested height in pixels --
width %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested width in pixels --
border %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested link border width --
hspace %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested horizontal gutter --
vspace %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested vertical gutter --
usemap %URL #IMPLIED -- use client-side image map --
ismap (ismap) #IMPLIED -- use server image map --
Used to insert images.
IMG
is an empty element and so
the end tag is forbidden. Images can be positioned vertically relative
to the current textline or floated to the left or right. See
BR
with the
CLEAR
attribute for control
over textflow.
e.g.
Grand Canyon
IMG
elements support the following attributes:
src
This attribute is required for every
IMG
element. It
specifies a URL for the image resource, for instance a GIF, JPEG or PNG
image file.
alt
This is used to provide a text description of the image and
is vital for interoperability with speech-based and text only
user agents.
align
This specifies how the image is positioned relative to the current
textline in which it occurs:
align=top
positions the top of the image
with the top of the current text line. User agents vary in how they
interpret this. Some only take into account what has occurred on the
text line prior to the IMG element and ignore what happens after it.
align=middle
aligns the middle of the image with the baseline for the
current textline.
align=bottom
is the default and aligns the bottom of the image with the baseline.
align=left
floats the image to the current left margin, temporarily changing
this margin, so that subsequent text is flowed along the image's
righthand side. The rendering depends on whether there is any left
aligned text or images that appear earlier than the current image in the
markup. Such text (but not images) generally forces left aligned images
to wrap to a new line, with the subsequent text continuing on the former
line.
align=right
floats the image to the current right margin, temporarily changing
this margin, so that subsequent text is flowed along the image's
lefthand side. The rendering depends on whether there is any right
aligned text or images that appear earlier than the current image in the
markup. Such text (but not images) generally forces right aligned images
to wrap to a new line, with the subsequent text continuing on the former
line.
Note that some browsers introduce spurious spacing with multiple left
or right aligned images. As a result authors can't depend on this being
the same for browsers from different vendors. See
BR
for ways to control text flow.
width
Specifies the intended width of the image in pixels. When given
together with the height, this allows user agents to reserve screen
space for the image before the image data has arrived over the network.
height
Specifies the intended height of the image in pixels. When given
together with the width, this allows user agents to reserve screen space
for the image before the image data has arrived over the network.
border
When the
IMG
element appears as part of a hypertext
link, the user agent will generally indicate this by drawing a colored
border (typically blue) around the image. This attribute can be used to
set the width of this border in pixels. Use
border=0
to
suppress the border altogether. User agents are recommended to provide
additional cues that the image is clickable, e.g. by changing the mouse
pointer.
hspace
This can be used to provide white space to the immediate left and
right of the image. The
HSPACE
attribute sets the width of
this white space in pixels. By default
HSPACE
is a small
non-zero number.
vspace
This can be used to provide white space above and below the image
The
VSPACE
attribute sets the height of this white space
in pixels. By default
VSPACE
is a small non-zero number.
usemap
This can be used to give a URL fragment identifier for a client-side
image map defined with the
MAP
element.
ismap
When the
IMG
element is part of a hypertext link, and
the user clicks on the image, the
ISMAP
attribute causes
the location to be passed to the server. This mechanism causes problems
for text-only and speech-based user agents. Whenever its possible to
do so use the
MAP
element instead.
Here is an example of how you use
ISMAP

The location clicked is passed to the server as follows. The user
agent derives a new URL from the URL specified by the
HREF
attribute by appending `?' the x coordinate `,' and the y coordinate of
the location in pixels. The link is then followed using the new URL. For
instance, if the user clicked at at the location x=10, y=27 then the
derived URL will be:
/cgibin/navbar.map?10,27
. It
is generally a good idea to suppress the border and use graphical idioms
to indicate that the image is clickable.
Note that pixel values refer to screen pixels, and should be
multiplied by an appropriate factor when rendering to very high
resolution devices such as laser printers. For instance if a
user agent has a display with 75 pixels per inch and is rendering
to a laser printer with 600 dots per inch, then the pixel values
given in HTML attributes should be multiplied by a factor of 8.
APPLET
(Java Applets)

codebase %URL #IMPLIED -- code base --
code CDATA #REQUIRED -- class file --
alt CDATA #IMPLIED -- for display in place of applet --
name CDATA #IMPLIED -- applet name --
width %Pixels #REQUIRED -- suggested width in pixels --
height %Pixels #REQUIRED -- suggested height in pixels --
align %IAlign #IMPLIED -- vertical or horizontal alignment --
hspace %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested horizontal gutter --
vspace %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested vertical gutter --

name NMTOKEN #REQUIRED -- The name of the parameter --
value CDATA #IMPLIED -- The value of the parameter --
Requires start and end tags. This element is supported by all Java
enabled browsers. It allows you to embed a Java applet into HTML
documents.
APPLET
uses associated
PARAM
elements to pass parameters to the
applet. Following the
PARAM
elements, the content of
APPLET
elements should be used to provide an alternative to
the applet for user agents that don't support Java. It is restricted to
text-level markup as defined by the
%text
entity in
the DTD. Java-compatible browsers ignore this extra HTML code. You can
use it to show a snapshot of the applet running, with text explaining
what the applet does. Other possibilities for this area are a link to a
page that is more useful for the Java-ignorant browser, or text that
taunts the user for not having a Java-compatible browser.
Here is a simple example of a Java applet:

Java applet that draws animated bubbles.

Here is another one using a
PARAM
element:

Java applet that plays a welcoming sound.

codebase =
codebaseURL
This optional attribute specifies the base URL of the applet --
the directory or folder that contains the applet's code.
If this attribute is not specified,
then the document's URL is used.
code =
appletFile
This required attribute gives the name of the file
that contains the applet's compiled Applet subclass.
This file is relative to the base URL of the applet.
It cannot be absolute.
alt =
alternateText
This optional attribute specifies any text
that should be displayed
if the browser understands the APPLET tag
but can't run Java applets.
name =
appletInstanceName
This optional attribute specifies a name for the applet instance,
which makes it possible for applets on the same page
to find (and communicate with) each other.
width =
pixels
height =
pixels
These required attributes give the initial width and height
(in pixels) of the applet display area,
not counting any windows or dialogs that the applet brings up.
align =
alignment
This attribute specifies the alignment of the applet.
This attribute is defined in exactly the same way
as the
IMG
element.
The permitted values are:
top
middle
bottom
left
and
right
The default is
bottom
vspace =
pixels
hspace =
pixels
These optional attributes specify the number of pixels above and
below the applet (
VSPACE
) and on each side of the
applet (
HSPACE
). They're treated the same way as the
IMG
element's
VSPACE
and
HSPACE
attributes.
The
PARAM
element is used to pass named
parameters to applet:
appletParameter
VALUE =
value
PARAM
elements are the only way to specify applet-specific
parameters. Applets read user-specified values for parameters with the
getParameter()
method.
name =
applet parameter name
value =
parameter value
SGML character entities such as
é
and
¹
are expanded before the parameter value is passed to the applet.
To include an & character use
&
Note: PARAM elements should be placed at the start of the
content for the APPLET element. This is not specified as part of the
DTD due to technicalities with SGML mixed content models.
FONT

size CDATA #IMPLIED -- [+]nn e.g. size="+1", size=4 --
color CDATA #IMPLIED -- #RRGGBB in hex, e.g. red: color="#FF0000" --
Requires start and end tags. This allows you to change the font size
and/or color for the enclosed text. The attributes are:
SIZE
and
COLOR
. Font sizes are given in terms of a scalar range
defined by the user agent with no direct mapping to point sizes etc.
The
FONT
element may be phased out in future revisions
to HTML.
size
This sets the font size for the contents of the font element. You
can set size to an integer ranging from 1 to 7 for an absolute font
size, or specify a relative font size with a signed integer value, e.g.
size="+1"
or
size="-2"
. This is mapped to an
absolute font size by adding the current base font size as set by the
BASEFONT
element (see below).
color
Used to set the color to stroke the text. Colors are given as RGB
in hexadecimal notation or as one of 16 widely understood
color names
defined as per the BGCOLOR attribute
on the
BODY
element.
Some user agents also support a
FACE
attribute which
accepts a comma separated list of font names in order of preference.
This is used to search for an installed font with the corresponding
name.
FACE
is not part of HTML 3.2.
The following shows the effects of setting font to absolute sizes:
size=1
size=2
size=3
size=4
size=5
size=6
size=7
The following shows the effect of relative font sizes using
a base font size of 3:
size=-4
size=-3
size=-2
size=-1
size=+1
size=+2
size=+3
size=+4
The same thing with a base font size of 6:
size=-4
size=-3
size=-2
size=-1
size=+1
size=+2
size=+3
size=+4
BASEFONT

size CDATA #IMPLIED -- e.g. size=4, defaults to 3 --
Used to set the base font size.
BASEFONT
is an empty
element so the end tag is forbidden. The
SIZE
attribute is
an integer value ranging from 1 to 7. The base font size applies to the
normal and preformatted text but not to headings, except where these are
modified using the
FONT
element with a relative font size.
BR
Used to force a line break. This is an empty element so the end tag
is forbidden. The
CLEAR
attribute can be used to move down
past floating images on either margin.
CLEAR=LEFT>
moves down past floating images on the left
margin,

does the same for floating
images on the right margin, while

does
the same for such images on both left and right margins.
MAP
The
MAP
element provides a mechanism for client-side
image maps. These can be placed in the same document or grouped in a
separate document although this isn't yet widely supported. The
MAP
element requires start and end tags. It contains one or
more
AREA
elements that specify hotzones on the associated
image and bind these hotzones to URLs.

name CDATA #REQUIRED

shape %SHAPE rect
coords %COORDS #IMPLIED -- defines coordinates for shape --
href %URL #IMPLIED -- this region acts as hypertext link --
nohref (nohref) #IMPLIED -- this region has no action --
alt CDATA #REQUIRED -- needed for non-graphical user agents --
Here is a simple example for a graphical navigational toolbar:

The
MAP
element has one attribute
NAME
which is used to associate a name with a map. This is then used by the
USEMAP
attribute on the
IMG
element to
reference the map via a URL fragment identifier. Note that the value of
the
NAME
attribute is case sensitive.
The
AREA
element is an empty element and so the end tag
is forbidden. It takes the following attributes:
SHAPE
COORDS
HREF
NOHREF
and
ALT
. The
SHAPE
and
COORDS
attributes define a region on the image. If the
SHAPE
attribute is omitted,
SHAPE="RECT"
is assumed.
shape=rect coords="
left-x
top-y
right-x
bottom-y
shape=circle coords="
center-x
center-y
radius
shape=poly
coords="
...
Where
and
are measured in pixels from the left/top
of the associated image. If
and
values are given with a
percent sign as a suffix, the values should be interpreted as percentages
of the image's width and height, respectively. For example:
SHAPE=RECT COORDS="0, 0, 50%, 100%"
The
HREF
attribute gives a URL for the target of the
hypertext link. The
NOHREF
attribute is used when you want
to define a region that doesn't act as a hotzone. This is useful when
you want to cut a hole in an underlying region acting as a hotzone.
If two or more regions overlap, the region defined first in the map
definition takes precedence over subsequent regions. This means that
AREA
elements with
NOHREF
should generally be
placed before ones with the
HREF
attribute.
The
ALT
attribute is used to provide text labels which
can be displayed in the status line as the mouse or other pointing
device is moved over hotzones, or for constructing a textual menu for
non-graphical user agents. Authors are
strongly recommended
to
provide meaningful
ALT
attributes to support
interoperability with speech-based or text-only user agents.
Sample SGML Open Catalog for HTML 3.2
This can be used with an SGML parser like nsgmls to verify that
files conform to the HTML 3.2 DTD. It assumes that the DTD has been
saved as the file "HTML32.dtd" and that the Latin-1 entities are
in the file "ISOlat1.ent".
-- html32.soc: catalog for parsing HTML 3.2 documents --
SGMLDECL "HTML32.dcl"
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2 Final//EN" HTML32.dtd
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2 Draft//EN" HTML32.dtd
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN" HTML32.dtd
PUBLIC "ISO 8879-1986//ENTITIES Added Latin 1//EN//HTML" ISOlat1.ent
SGML Declaration for HTML 3.2
This uses the 8 bit ISO Latin-1 character set. The size limits on
properties like literals and tag names have been considerably increased
from their HTML 2.0 values, but it is recommended that user agents avoid
imposing arbitrary length limits.
--
SGML Declaration for HyperText Markup Language version 3.2

With support for ISO Latin-1 and increased limits
for tag and literal lengths etc.
--

CHARSET
BASESET "ISO 646:1983//CHARSET
International Reference Version
(IRV)//ESC 2/5 4/0"
DESCSET 0 9 UNUSED
9 2 9
11 2 UNUSED
13 1 13
14 18 UNUSED
32 95 32
127 1 UNUSED
BASESET "ISO Registration Number 100//CHARSET
ECMA-94 Right Part of
Latin Alphabet Nr. 1//ESC 2/13 4/1"
DESCSET 128 32 UNUSED
160 96 32

CAPACITY SGMLREF
TOTALCAP 200000
GRPCAP 150000
ENTCAP 150000

SCOPE DOCUMENT
SYNTAX
SHUNCHAR CONTROLS 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 127
BASESET "ISO 646:1983//CHARSET
International Reference Version
(IRV)//ESC 2/5 4/0"
DESCSET 0 128 0

FUNCTION
RE 13
RS 10
SPACE 32
TAB SEPCHAR 9

NAMING LCNMSTRT ""
UCNMSTRT ""
LCNMCHAR ".-"
UCNMCHAR ".-"
NAMECASE GENERAL YES
ENTITY NO
DELIM GENERAL SGMLREF
SHORTREF SGMLREF
NAMES SGMLREF
QUANTITY SGMLREF
ATTSPLEN 65536
LITLEN 65536
NAMELEN 65536
PILEN 65536
TAGLVL 100
TAGLEN 65536
GRPGTCNT 150
GRPCNT 64

FEATURES
MINIMIZE
DATATAG NO
OMITTAG YES
RANK NO
SHORTTAG YES
LINK
SIMPLE NO
IMPLICIT NO
EXPLICIT NO
OTHER
CONCUR NO
SUBDOC NO
FORMAL YES
APPINFO NONE
HTML 3.2 Document Type Definition

"-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2 Final//EN"

-- Typical usage:

...

--

-- meaning a MIME content type, as per RFC1521
-->

-- as per HTTP specification
-->

-- The term URL means a CDATA attribute
whose value is a Uniform Resource Locator,
See RFC1808 (June 95) and RFC1738 (Dec 94).
-->

]]>

"ISO 8879-1986//ENTITIES Added Latin 1//EN//HTML">
%ISOlat1;

size CDATA #IMPLIED -- [+]nn e.g. size="+1", size=4 --
color CDATA #IMPLIED -- #RRGGBB in hex, e.g. red: color="#FF0000" --

size CDATA #IMPLIED -- e.g. size=3 --

clear (left|all|right|none) none -- control of text flow --

bgcolor %color #IMPLIED
text %color #IMPLIED
link %color #IMPLIED
vlink %color #IMPLIED
alink %color #IMPLIED
">

background %URL #IMPLIED -- texture tile for document background --
%body-color-attrs; -- bgcolor, text, link, vlink, alink --

align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED -- alignment of following text --

name CDATA #IMPLIED -- named link end --
href %URL #IMPLIED -- URL for linked resource --
rel CDATA #IMPLIED -- forward link types --
rev CDATA #IMPLIED -- reverse link types --
title CDATA #IMPLIED -- advisory title string --

name CDATA #IMPLIED

-- See Internet Draft: draft-ietf-html-relrev-00.txt
LINK has been part of HTML since the early days
although few browsers as yet take advantage of it.

Relationship values can be used in principle:

a) for document specific toolbars/menus when used
with the LINK element in the document head:
b) to link to a separate style sheet
c) to make a link to a script
d) by stylesheets to control how collections of
html nodes are rendered into printed documents
e) to make a link to a printable version of this document
e.g. a postscript or pdf version
-->

href %URL #IMPLIED -- URL for linked resource --
rel %Types #IMPLIED -- forward link types --
rev %Types #IMPLIED -- reverse link types --
title CDATA #IMPLIED -- advisory title string --

codebase %URL #IMPLIED -- code base --
code CDATA #REQUIRED -- class file --
alt CDATA #IMPLIED -- for display in place of applet --
name CDATA #IMPLIED -- applet name --
width %Pixels #REQUIRED -- suggested width in pixels --
height %Pixels #REQUIRED -- suggested height in pixels --
align %IAlign #IMPLIED -- vertical or horizontal alignment --
hspace %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested horizontal gutter --
vspace %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested vertical gutter --

name NMTOKEN #REQUIRED -- The name of the parameter --
value CDATA #IMPLIED -- The value of the parameter --

align (left|right|center) #IMPLIED
noshade (noshade) #IMPLIED
size %Pixels #IMPLIED
width %Length #IMPLIED

align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED

width NUMBER #implied -- is this widely supported? --

-- historical, non-conforming parsing mode where
the only markup signal is the end tag
in full
-->

]]>

compact (compact) #IMPLIED -- more compact style --

type %OLStyle #IMPLIED -- numbering style --
start NUMBER #IMPLIED -- starting sequence number --
compact (compact) #IMPLIED -- reduced interitem spacing --

type (%ULStyle) #IMPLIED -- bullet style --
compact (compact) #IMPLIED -- reduced interitem spacing --

compact (compact) #IMPLIED
compact (compact) #IMPLIED

type %LIStyle #IMPLIED -- list item style --
value NUMBER #IMPLIED -- reset sequence number --

action %URL #IMPLIED -- server-side form handler --
method (%HTTP-Method) GET -- see HTTP specification --
enctype %Content-Type; "application/x-www-form-urlencoded"

name CDATA #REQUIRED
size NUMBER #IMPLIED
multiple (multiple) #IMPLIED

selected (selected) #IMPLIED
value CDATA #IMPLIED -- defaults to element content --

name CDATA #REQUIRED
rows NUMBER #REQUIRED
cols NUMBER #REQUIRED

"align (left|center|right) #IMPLIED"

"valign (top|middle|bottom) #IMPLIED"

align (top|bottom) #IMPLIED

%cell.halign; -- horizontal alignment in cells --
%cell.valign; -- vertical alignment in cells --

nowrap (nowrap) #IMPLIED -- suppress word wrap --
rowspan NUMBER 1 -- number of rows spanned by cell --
colspan NUMBER 1 -- number of cols spanned by cell --
%cell.halign; -- horizontal alignment in cell --
%cell.valign; -- vertical alignment in cell --
width %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested width for cell --
height %Pixels #IMPLIED -- suggested height for cell --

-- The TITLE element is not considered part of the flow of text.
It should be displayed, for example as the page header or
window title.
-->

prompt CDATA #IMPLIED -- prompt message -->

href %URL #REQUIRED

http-equiv NAME #IMPLIED -- HTTP response header name --
name NAME #IMPLIED -- metainformation name --
content CDATA #REQUIRED -- associated information --

]]>

%version.attr;
Character Entities for ISO Latin-1

Table of printable Latin-1 Character codes
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank the members of the W3C HTML Editorial
Review Board, members of the W3C staff, and the many other people who
have contributed to this specification.
Further Reading
The World Wide Web Consortium
Further information on W3C activities and pointers to the
status of work on HTML and HTTP etc. can be found at
Further information on HTML in particular can be found at
HTML 2.0 (RFC1866)
By Tim Berners-Lee and Dan Connolly, November 1995.
Defines the Hypertext Markup Language Specification Version 2.0.
Available from
ftp://ds.internic.net/rfc/rfc1866.txt
Form-based File Upload in HTML (RFC1867)
By E. Nebel and L. Masinter, November 1995. Describes extensions to
HTML 2.0 (RFC1866) to support file upload from HTML forms.
Available from
ftp://ds.internic.net/rfc/rfc1867.txt
HTML Tables (RFC1942)
By Dave Raggett, May 1996. This defines the HTML table model. It is a superset
of the table model defined by HTML 3.2.
Available from
ftp://ds.internic.net/rfc/rfc1942.txt
or as a W3C working draft at
A Lexical Analyzer for HTML and Basic SGML
By Dan Connolly, June 1996. Describes lexical considerations for parsing
HTML documents. Available from
The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP)
Further information of HTTP can be found at:
A Standard Default Color Space for the Internet - sRGB
By Michael Stokes, Mathew Anderson, Srinivasan Chandrasekar and Ricardo
Motta, November 1996. Available from:
This provides a precise definition for RGB that allows sRGB images
to be reproduced accurately on different platforms and media under varying
ambient lighting conditions.
W3C
MIT
INRIA
Keio
), All Rights Reserved. W3C
liability,
trademark
document
use
and
software
licensing
rules apply.