HTML5: Will It Oust Flash And Reinvent The Web?

April 30th, 2010 by K. T. Bradford

At the end of November 2009, Google unveiled Chrome OS, an operating system based on its homegrown browser. Among the more unusual features of the OS was that Google intends it to be completely web-based. No local apps, save for the browser itself, and no traditional local storage. When asked how users would access their software, data, and media when they weren’t connected, the answer was both simple and complex: HTML5.

When Apple announced that the iPad wouldn’t support Flash, consumers wondered how they’d use the tablet to watch online video. The answer again: HTML5.

The term began to take on mythical proportions as a magical cure-all, but unless you’re a web designer, developer, or programmer, exactly what HTML5 is and how it improves the web experience likely remains a mystery. It’s time to clear things up.

What is HTML5?

HTML5 is the latest version of the core language that drives the backbone of the Internet. Invisible to most users, HTML code tells browsers how to display the text and graphical elements of websites. In theory, the code designers and developers use adheres to standards set forth by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The current set of standards in use is HTML 4.01, and it’s been more than ten years since the tags, definitions, and attributes of that standard were updated. HTML5 is the next generation of that language.

The two main goals in updating the specification are to fix bugs, fill in the holes left by HTML 4.01, and “add new features to address the needs of authors and users on the web today,” according to HTML5 editor Ian Hickson. As a standards developer for Google, he notes that the web is a very different place than it was when HTML was last revised.

This revision is ongoing, though the majority of modern browsers can recognize HTML5 tags, and the specification is nearing W3C recommendation. Some of the websites you visit may already use some of the code, but it’s unlikely you’ll notice the difference. Popular sites such as CNN.com, ESPN.com, and NPR.org, among many others, use HTML5 tags for their video or audio players alongside Flash. If users visit from a Flash-enabled browser or device, media will load in the Flash player. If they visit from a device that can’t handle Flash, they’ll see the same video, just served differently in the background. “The goal is to make it invisible to [users],” said Jennifer Kyrnin, an About.com guide to web design/HTML.

So if HTML has always been behind every web page, what does the fifth revision bring to the party that makes non-Flash video and downloadable web apps possible?