HTML and CSS Reference
In-Depth Information
ment, “HTML5: A technical specification for web developers,” which is more concise and
easier to read.
The specifications are similar in many respects, but you'll find considerable differences.
For example, the HTML Living Standard specification includes several APIs that are pub-
lished as completely separate specifications by the W3C, such as Microdata, Web Stor-
age, and Web Workers. For the latest differences between the specifications, see “Is this
HTML5?” in the HTML Living Standard specification at
http://mng.bz/PraC
.
In this chapter, we treat the APIs that exist in the HTML Living Standard as “part of
HTML5 itself” and any APIs outside of that specification as separate. As you progress in
the topic, you'll see that we're much less concerned about the differences and treat any
of the new specifications as “HTML5.” For further discussion of the differences between
the WHATWG and W3C versions as well as the differences in approach between the
WHATWG and W3C themselves, see
appendix A
.
In the next section, we'll take a look at the DOM APIs currently included in the HTML5
specification itself.
1.3. The HTML5 DOM APIs
DOM APIs exist for nearly everything in HTML5. In fact, many have been around for a
long time but have never been defined in the HTML specification itself. These include fea-
tures that enable you to get a DOM element by its ID attribute and that allow you to ma-
nipulate form element values. All of this is included in HTML5 and the specification also
defines new DOM APIs for developing advanced applications, many of which aren't at all
associated with HTML elements.
This section provides an overview of the new DOM APIs in HTML5:
• 2D Canvas
• Audio and Video
• Drag and Drop
• Cross-document Messaging
• Server-sent Events
