Web standards are rules and guidelines established by the world wide web consortium (w3c) developed to promote consistency in the design code which makes up a web page. simply it is the guideline for the markup language which determines how a web page displays in a visitor’s browser window. currently five standards have been officially implemented. most of them come from w3 consortium .
- HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language )
this is the first ever standard to emerge from w3 , is widely used on the web. it is the most common tool for designing web pages, which is usually considered as the backbone of the www. using HTML structuring elements (tags) , text documents interpreted by browsers can display their contents according to specified formats.
- XML (extensible Markup Language )
this is like HTML and support most of the fixed set of elements contained in HTML 4.0 , it allows the coder to customize new tag elements according either to a pre-set DTD (Document Type Definition ) or to one that can be personally defined . XML is much more flexible than HTML and is totally future oriented. XML is the standard through which the web’s full potential can be achieved
- CSS (Cascading Style Sheet )
. CSS is a mechanism through which changes in appearance and positions can be assigned to HTML or XML elements . simply by declaring specific styles to them. the overall appearance of entire sites can be so defined with the use of CSS, allowing it to be remodelled in a matter of seconds. this standard was brought forward by the w3c to create a simpler and more structured world wide web.
- DOM (Document Object Model )
this allows a scripting language to exert its full power and interactive capabilities on a web page . it is a platform that allows programs and scripts to dynamically access and update the content , structure and style of web documents .
- ECMAScript (the standardized version of JavaScript)
the main use of ECMAScript is to manipulate objects in a web document that are specified by the DOM . through it, elements can be manipulated, moved , or have some properties changed , allowing web developers to implement such effects as animated text and graphic rollovers .