XHTML 1.0 Transitional VS HTML 5?

[Faisal]

Which one should I use, which one is better/more powerful? I'm currently using XHTML but I'm still quite interested in going for HTML 5, is it worth it? Which is better recognized by browsers?

[Smifis]

Ah yes, the big question.

I still used xhtml strict myself but I'm considerin gusing html5 for the ipad/ipod usability, as well and the built in video support.

However, for now, xHTML suits me and is widely supported, and in conjunction with CSS and some javascript, is extreamly powerful. HTML 5 will have it's time in my opinion but not until it is fully supported by all browsers.

[Faisal]

Gotcha, I guess I'll stick with it for now :D.

[Peter]

XHTML is useless as a standard and HTML5 is the way forwards. It's easier to just use HTML 4.01 Strict if you want to use a more current strict doctype.

[Smifis]

html always seemed too messy to me, xhtml is a lot nicer imo, html5 is the next thing on my list though

[heavywater]

html is a messy as the coder. :p

[Smifis]

I code it the same as xhtml but without the self closing on <br /> etc...

But i mean when trying to read other people's code, capitals and all the horrible stuff. :(

[heavywater]

I always self close breaks now, just tell myself it's nicer. :D

But yeah, I hate reading other people's code at the best of times. :lol:

[benzeman]

I use xhtml ATM because ie has mucked up HTML 5 support. I know you can use JavaScript but I'm not having any issues with xhtml features so why sacrifice compatability?

Wait till all the major browsers do HTML 5 well before using it in mainstream but try learning it because, given a few years to mature, HTML 5 is going to be very powerful :)

[andyn]

You can't really use HTML5 at the moment if you want your site to be accessible, there are a lot of browsers out there which don't support many/all of the features.

xhtml transitional is the norm still, really.

Really it depends what you are trying to do with the site though. If you want something to show off snazzy features and don't care if 10-20% of visitors can't use all of them then go with HTML5. Or if you want something likely to be used by a wide audience go for the established standards.

I'd love to use HTML5 tech for the aria site, but it's not really a commercially viable option at present, there is still a small but significant percentage out there using IE6 unfortunately, and our visitors tend to be more 'tech savvy' than the average (e.g we have more visitors using firefox than IE which is v. unusual) so other sites probably have it worse.

[Faisal]

Google uses HTML5 afaik, they seem to have their page working well.

[andyn]

Google uses HTML5 afaik, they seem to have their page working well.

'Their Page?' :P. They have rather a lot of them, beyond the google search engine homepage. They use some html 5, for example they are gradually transitioning google mail towards HTML5.

Google, like a lot of very large sites, implement code which means you get a different set of functionality depending on which browser the visitor is using. This is fine, if like google you have an army of oompa-loompas working on the site. If you're a single developer or a small team, it's a serious investment of manpower.

But even then their compatibility is not 100%, I find that the merchant centre dashboard for example doesn't really play ball with IE8, the layout is broken/odd.

Also, 'HTML5' is a massively misunderstood term. It's not really a single markup language specification like (eg) HTML 4 was - or at least it's come to be used for a much wider group of related technologies such as CSS3, HTML video, etc.

Apart from anything else, the standard isn't even finalised yet. It's still at working draft stage with the W3C, with the next big milestone being May this year, when it should finally move from being a draft to a standard.

[heavywater]

Surprised nobody has mentioned Modernizr.

[andyn]

Surprised nobody has mentioned Modernizr.

Well, I sort of did, indirectly :P. Modernizr is good, but it's yet another javascript library you have to work with and maintain, on top of Jquery and any other you might already require. So it adds bloat and complexity, which might be fine for some projects but it obfuscates the code further and flies in the face of the KISS principle. For some projects it's fine, but it's far from a silver bullet.

[Smifis]

I'm still waiting for CSS3 to be fully supported...

[benzeman]

I'm still waiting for CSS3 to be fully supported...

Same. Having 3 rules for rounding corners is not good!