HTML5

Semantics

Sections and outlines in HTML5

A look at the new outlining and sectioning element in HTML5: <section>, <article>, <nav>, <header>, <footer>, <aside> and <hgroup>.

Using HTML5 audio and video

The <audio> and <video> elements embed and allow the manipution of new multimedia content.

Forms in HTML5

A look at improvements to web forms in HTML5: the constraint validation API, several new attributes, new values for the <input> attribute type and the new <output> element.

New semantic elements

Beside sections, media and forms elements, numerous new elements, like <mark>, <figure>, <figcaption>, <data>, <time>, <output>, <progress>, or <meter>, increasing the amount of valid HTML5 elements.

Improvement in <iframe>

Using the sandbox, seamless, and srcdoc attributes, authors can now precise the level of security and the wished rendering of an <iframe> element.

MathML

Allows to directly embed mathematical formulas.

Introduction to HTML5

This article introduces how to indicate to the problem that you are using HTML5 in your web design or web application.

HTML5-compliant parser

The parser, which turns the bytes of an HTML document into a DOM,  has been extended and defines precisely the behavior to have in all case, even facing invalid HTML, leading a to far more predictability and interoperability between HTML5-compliant browsers.

Connectivity

Web Sockets

Allows to create a permanent connection between the page and the server and to exchange non-HTML data through that mean.

Server-sent events

Allows a server to push events to client, rather than the classical paradigm where the server could send data only in response to a client 's request.

WebRTC

This technology, where RTC stands for Real-Time Communication, allow to connect to other people and control videoconferencing directly in the browser, without the need for a plugin or an external application.

Offline & storage

Offline resources: the application cache

Firefox fully supports the HTML5 offline resource specification. Most others have offline resource support at some level.

Online and offline events

Firefox 3 supports WHATWG online and offline events, which let applications and extensions detect whether or not there's an active Internet connection, as well as to detect when the connection goes up and down.

WHATWG client-side session and persistent storage (aka DOM Storage)

Client-side session and persistent storage allows web applications to store structured data on the client side.

IndexedDB

Is a web standard for the storage of significant amounts of structured data in the browser and for high performance searches on this data using indexes.

Using files from web applications

Support for the new HTML5 File API has been added to Gecko, making it possible for web applications to access local files selected by the user. This includes support for selecting multiple files using the <input> of type file HTML element's new multiple attribute. There also is FileReader.

Multimedia

Using HTML5 audio and video

The <audio> and <video> elements embed and allow the manipution of new multimedia content.

WebRTC

This technology, where RTC stands for Real-Time Communication, allow to connect to other people and control videoconferencing directly in the browser, without the need for a plugin or an external application.

Using the Camera API

Allows to use, manipulate and store an image from the computer's camera.

3D, graphics & effects

Canvas Tutorial

Learn about the new <canvas> element and how to draw graphs and other objects in Firefox

HTML5 text API for <canvas> elements

The HTML5 text API is now supported by <canvas> elements.

WebGL

WebGL brings 3D graphics to the Web by introducing an API that closely conforms to OpenGL ES 2.0 that can be used in HTML5 <canvas> elements.

SVG

An XML-based format of vectorial images that can directly be embdedded in the HTML.

Performance & integration

Web Workers

Allows to delegate JavaScript evaluation to background threads, allowing these activities to prevent slowing down interactive events.

XMLHttpRequest Level 2

Allows to fetch asynchronously some parts of the page, allowing it to be display dynamic content, varying according the time and user actions. This is the technology behind Ajax.

JIT-compiling JavaScript engines

The new generation of JavaScript engines are much more powerful , leading to greater performance.

History API

Allows the manipulation of the browser history. This is especially useful for pages loading interactively new information.

The contentEditable attribute: transform your website to a wiki!

HTML5 has standardized the contentEditable attribute. Learn more about this feature.

Drag and drop

The HTML5 drag and drop API allows support for dragging and dropping items within and between web sites. This also provides a simpler API for use by extensions and Mozilla-based applications.

Focus management in HTML

The new HTML5 activeElement and hasFocus attributes are supported.

Web-based protocol handlers

You can now register web applications as protocol handlers using the navigator.registerProtocolHandler() method.

requestAnimationFrame

Allows to control animations rendering to obtain optimal performance.

Fullscreen API

Controls the usage of the whole screen for a Web page or application, without the browser UI displayed.

Pointer Lock API

Allows to lock the pointer to the content, so games and similar application don't lose the focus when the pointer reaches the window limit.

Online and offline events

In order to build a good offline-capable web application, you need to know when your application is actually offline. Incidentally, you also need to know when your application has returned to an online status again.

Device access

Using the Camera API

Allows to use, manipulate and store an image from the computer's camera.

Touch events

Handlers to react to events created by a user pressing touch screens.

Using geolocation

Let browsers obtaining the position of the user.

Detecting device orientation

Let get the information when the device on which runs the browser change orientation. This can be used as an input device (e.g. to make games that react to the position of the device) or to adapt the layout of a page to the orientation of the screen (portrait or landscape).

Pointer Lock API

Allows to lock the pointer to the content, so games and similar application don't lose the focus when the pointer reaches the window limit.

Styling

CSS has been extended to be able to style elements in a much more complex way. This is often referred as CSS3, though CSS is not a monolitic specification anymore and the different modules are not all at level 3: some are at level 1 and some at level 4, with all the intermediate levels covered.

New background styling features

It is know possible to put a shadow to a box, using box-shadow and multiple backgrounds can be set.

More fancy borders

Not only it is now possible to use images to style borders, using border-image and its associated longhand properties, but rounded borders are supported via the border-radius property.

Animating your style

Using CSS Transitions to animate between different states or using CSS Animations to animate parts of the page without a trigerring event, you can know control mobile elements on your page.

Typography improvement

Authors have better control to reach better typography. They can control text-overflow and hyphenation, but also can a shadow to it or control more precisely its decorations. Custom typeface can be downloaded and applied thanks to the new @font-face at-rule.

New presentational layouts

In order to improve the flexibility of designs, two new layouts have been added: the CSS multi-column layout, and the CSS flexible box layout.