The HTML5 Hubbub

I sat down with our front end development team (affectionately known as the FEDs around these parts) to discuss the rise of HTML5, and cut through the hype to find out what actually matters.

Listen to the conversation

Andy Van Oostrum interviews ISITE Design front end developers Christoph Saxe, Petra Gregorova, Paul Farning and Will Moore.

Why should I care about HTML5?

ISITE Design Front End Developer Christoph Saxe leads an agency brown bag session on HTML5

According to our front end development team, “HTML5 is a nerd concern.” We can accomplish most things today on the web without HTML5, but to date, websites could be considered “one giant hack” based on original thinking and non-semantic markup. HTML5 is an evolutionary framework to support the way developers and site designers are actually using the web today.

New Tags

How has HTML5 evolved from HTML 4 and XHTML? HTML5 introduces an additional set of “tags” that add semantic value to what has historically been used done with a series of div elements. For example, HTML5 introduces nav, video, header and footer tags, not only for the site itself, but for content objects within a page.

This tag clarity opens up the door to improved web accessibility, and opportunities for search engines to skip irrelevant page content, and do a better job with the index. With that said, most of the noise coming out of the HTML5 camp gravitates around the video tag, and specifically the implications of playing video on the iPhone and iPad.

So Does HTML5 Replace Flash?

ISITE Design team members discuss Flash and HTML5 at the brown bag.

Apple’s mobile devices do not support Adobe’s Flash technology – the current de facto method for delivering video over the web. Apple’s mobile devices do however support HTML5’s video tag, allowing you to embed video directly into your web page or app without using Flash.

HTML5 dips directly into the water of the “flash player,” and offers opportunities for light transitions and page animations that we might achieve with JavaScript today, but by no means does HTML 5 replace the complex and graceful user experiences that can be designed in flash.

Where we might back a flash object with HTML yesterday (to render on a phone, or browser without flash installed), we could very well back an HTML5 object with Flash tomorrow to support those devices that have not caught up to the standard.

At the end of the day, there is still a role for CSS3, HTML5, Flash, and JavaScript.

Mobile

HTML5 can help bring web applications to mobile devices. Many smartphones available today run a web browser based on the WebKit rendering engine which already supports many of HTML5’s features. The balance of support for these features may even be greater in the mobile landscape than on the desktop.

This means we can use the technologies we already know and love for building websites and use them to create mobile applications which function across many different device manufacturers and operating systems rather than building and maintaining separate versions of applications written specifically for each platform.

Some of the important features include expanded form input types that can trigger smarter software touch keyboards and local storage which allows an application to load with a data connection once and be usable when a signal is not available. And let’s not forget the ability to embed multimedia and video into the mobile experience.

This isn’t to say that you can’t have a great mobile web presence without HTML5. HTML4 and XHTML1.1 work just fine for delivering most content. It’s really the presentation layer (CSS) that dictates how it will render. HTML5 does have an advantage in regards to applications.

What else?

We’re already starting to see mainstream sites adopt the new standard. HootSuite recently re-launched its site on HTML5, touting “unique features like geo-search and drag & drop, plus improve performance with quicker tabs and streams.”

Additional sites using HTML5 today include:

At the end of the day, HTML5 is here to stay. While many of its benefits may not be immediately realized, those coding with the new standard will find themselves in a much better position to adapt to new opportunities over the next few years.

So... the email newsletter tagline says "Download the Podcast." Where, exactly? Because the Insight page that's linked by the newsletter tagline only offers a Flash player for listening on the desktop site. The Flash player is ironic, in itself, given the topic of the article.

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on June 27, 2010.

So many things to say about this topic. First, as you mentioned, Flash isn't going anywhere. Despite the fact that HTML5 will try to take a bite out of Flash's dominance as a video dispersion method, flash/flex has a lot more to offer than simple web-based interaction and media streaming. It's an model for interaction both traditional and experiential. Secondly, don't hold your breath feeling like HTML5 will solve any issues. Look at how long it's taken HTML to come out with video tags and the like. Only about 8 years behind the curve guys, well done. The problem with HTML5 is the same as with any community based standard, too many cooks in the kitchen. While I'm happy to have HTML5 as an alternative and will definitely use it, anyone who thinks it will solve any problems (besides slicker interaction and easier media consumption on the iProducts) just haven't been paying attention to the details.

Submitted by @studionumber9 (not verified) on June 29, 2010.

Great comments Steve. The iPad/Apple have certainly amplified the hype. And point taken anonymous@gmail.com. Our newsletter call to action could have set expectations better. Thanks for reading! Jeff Cram ISITE Design

Submitted by Jeff C (not verified) on June 29, 2010.