Ask HN: Does HTML5 excite you? Why or why not?

[brlewis]

Please tell what perspective you're coming from: designer, programmer or both.

[simonw]

As a client- and server-side developer I'm extremely excited about HTML5. For the first time in a decade, browsers are getting new capabilities! HTML 5 is much more than just new tags - we're talking offline support, concurrency with web workers, canvas, geolocation, native audio and video, WebSockets, a supported method of making cross-domain API calls...

HTML 5 is clearly aiming to bring the open web platform up to par with desktop APIs. I expect many desktop applications to be developed using HTML5+CSS+JavaScript within just a few years.

And even if that doesn't spike your interest, there's the critically important role the HTML 5 spec pays in standardising what we already have. It's ridiculous that XMLHttpRequest, one of the most useful modern browser APIs, has no spec - every browser implements it by reverse engineering the others, who in turn reverse engineered IE (which is closed source, so who knows if they got it right?). HTML5 fixes that. It also specifies things like innerHTML, ContentEditable, the execution order for script files, all that DOM level 0 stuff that never made it in to an official spec.

Finally, HTML5 specifies a formal error model for HTML for the first time. This means it will actually be possible to implement a new browser from scratch without having to spend years reverse engineering the behaviour of IE and friends when faced with invalid markup.

I'm amazed to see so many web developers unexcited by HTML 5. This is the first time our core platform has seen any serious evolution since HTML4.01 was published in 1999!

As for browser support, it's happening right now. If you develop for the iPhone / mobile WebKit stuff most of the above features are sitting there waiting for you to use them. Try this page in your iPhone for example:

http://simonwillison.net/static/2009/navigator.geolocation.h...

Even IE is catching up - IE8 supported a bunch of HTML5 concepts (key/value based storage, cross document messaging, hashchange event and more) and IE9 is set to support even more.

HTML 5 is the most exciting thing to happen to web development in a very long time.

[Semiapies]

None of these things require HTML 5, and all of the worthwhile things had workable implementations before HTML 5.

Formal specifications for things that had de facto cross-browser support for multiple browser generations are nice, but not amazing.

"This is the first time our core platform has seen any serious evolution since HTML4.01 was published in 1999!"

And that's just simply untrue, but oh, well.

"I'm amazed to see so many web developers unexcited by HTML 5. This is the first time our core platform has seen any serious evolution since HTML4.01 was published in 1999!"

And I'm boggled to see such giddy fanboyism modded up so high.

[nimbupani]

As a front-end developer and designer, I agree. HTML 5 allows you to imagine the web as a platform rather than as a bunch of webpages.

[bprater]

Could someone link to the error model spec? I hadn't heard of this and my Google-fu isn't picking anything up.

[sixpoint8]

Front End developer and graphic designer (xHTML/CSS/Design) HTML5 makes me cry inside, part of me died when HTML5 gained browser support. To me, HTML5 is all about GIT'R'DONE; it's an evolution, an odd growth on the body of HTML4, rather than setting a newer, better foundation. :(

[jacobolus]

The only plausible alternative that anyone ever set forward is complete stagnation.... I’m hard pressed to call that preferable, especially if we’re talking about “foundations”. Be sure to notice that browsers still haven’t finished implementing HTML 4 and CSS 2, more than a decade after their specification. Also notice that when you say you write "XHTML", your code is almost certainly not being treated as XML by browsers.

[amoeba]

This is the exact opposite of how I see HTML5.

[simonw]

Did you ever actually try running a site using proper XHTML? I ran my blog like that (serving the correct content type to non-IE browsers) for a few years and found it to be a ton of hassle for absolutely no benefit.

[fefiuoqeiu9]

blackhat. web sockets and cross-document messaging thrill me like midget porn never could.

[tlrobinson]

I'm excited... but it's not enough. What we should really have is a standardized low-level byte code interpreter, allowing a variety of languages and great performance. Basically what Java promised but didn't really deliver.

[Andys]

Programmer here. Canvas tag excites me because for years the desktop programmer in me has wanted simple pixel addressing so that I could implement my own full-featured input/form controls, such as a grid control.

[mquiche]

programmer. offline storage, sql storage, canvas, and web workers are very interesting.

[boucher]

Almost all of the HTML features in HTML5 are boring and barely useful. The rest, basically, <video> and <audio> are crippled.

The useful parts of HTML5 are the new JavaScript APIs (which arguably don't really belong). Unfortunately many important ones are missing, and of the ones which are present many are incomplete or broken.

[JMiao]

not to mention <audio> being awful in mobile safari.

[decadentcactus]

Mostly a programmer, and not really. To be honest I would be much happier with better CSS capabilities (better syntax, variables) than video tags and whatnot. I'm not against it obviously, but probably won't be rushing out to learn all the new features.

[brlewis]

OK, so what about what the new elements do for CSS? Won't style sheets be more portable now that we have <aside>, <article>, etc.?

[Semiapies]

Yes, I'd be much more interested in better CSS, solving layout problems, etc., then adding every tag someone can throw into a hat.

[joshsharp]

Programmer. I think it's great that we're extending the semantics of what we have now, but we're going in the wrong direction. I agree really strongly with John Allsopp that we shouldn't be extending the number of elements available - we should be creating a framework for extensible semantics (using attributes or the like):

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/semanticsinhtml5

Though I agree that canvas, audio and video tags, and web workers are great additions.

[stan_rogers]

I have to disagree here. It is the common document elements that represent the greatest improvement, in that they will provide accessibility cues that classed divs never can. It's all well and good for us to gripe (or crow) about what can and cannot be done with the element collection already in hand (in HTML 4.01 and in XHTML), but when it comes right down to it, we have no way of semantically differentiating the various parts of a document. Attributes within HTML or the implied extensibility of XHTML are not really solutions here, since even with namespaces and custom DTDs there is no way to indicate to a user agent the ACTUAL significance of any given class of span or div within the document context. A convention is NOT a standard.

HTML 5 (and its X counterpart) should mark an enormous shift in the usability and discoverability of web pages for users of assistive technologies, for indexers and cataloggers, and so forth. <canvas> doesn't turn me on nearly as much as <header>, <section>, <aside> and <footer> do.

[prodigal_erik]

Programmer here. HTML 5 is dominated by scripting, which I think we will regret. Marked up data is easily manipulated and repurposed, but arbitrary code has very few uses other than executing it, which is mostly why script-heavy documents tend to be trainwrecks in accessibility and search.

And I desperately hope there's going to be a more usable and declarative schema for HTML 5 than "anything is valid if you carry out this long parsing procedure and it says it's valid".

[Semiapies]

Both.

I haven't seen anything exciting about it. It doesn't let me do anything significant that I couldn't with existing technology. It's just the New Style.

[farmerwu]

When I first started thinking about it and studying it, I found it downright exciting. So much potential. But as with most thing the devil is in the details. And we just don't have enough details yet. So much could change between now and when it actually gets implemented that it may turn out to be a big disappointment.

[jacobolus]

> we just don't have enough details yet

What do you mean we don't have enough details?http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/

> So much could change

Like what?

[elliottkember]

Developer here - it definitely excites me. But I'd much rather see full, compatible CSS2.1 support first - and then CSS3!

I just can't help but think that this will fragment things a little bit further. I hope it won't, but I don't know whether we can expect all browsers to implement HTML5 at the same time.

[fauigerzigerk]

I'm excited about many of the new features. However, the move away from XML syntax is a disastrous and utterly pointless decision.

Also, I wish they had taken the opportunity to rid the world of the massive failure that is CSS and replace it with a layout system that makes simple things simple.

[rimantas]

1) Nobody moved away from XML syntax. You can still use it if you want. 2) In most cases XML syntax is pointelss. 3) HTML5 has nothing to do with CSS, and CSS is doing fine, far from being "massive failure".

[protomyth]

Programmer - No The idea that we are stuck with javascript instead of a VM is sad.

[simonw]

Not sure what you mean by that... V8 for example is a virtual machine that runs JavaScript.

[Tichy]

JavaScript is a VM.

[zackattack]

why is this insightful comment downvoted?

[walesmd]

Both.

Nope. It just bloats what we already have in xHTML 1.1. Sure, I can throw a header or section tag around a block, but I still have to use divs. It's just another level I need to indent at this point in time.

[henriklied]

Sorry, which new features do you imagine available in XHTML 1.1 that aren't there in HTML 4.01?

Let me help you count: Zero.

HTML5 is very little about e.g. the HEADER element, and much more about the underlying support for other features, such as geolocation, native sound and video, crossdomain XMLHTTPRequest, offline support and (yes,) much more.

[bugs]

Both; and no it doesn't excite me in the least because of such a slow adoption rate of new browsers.

[enomar]

Programmer. I'm excited about async scripts and cross document messaging for sure...

[aw3c2]

I was excited about standards on the audio and video formats. Since that has been cancelled HTML5 has no advantages over my current love XHTML. Both programmer and designer but both are just hobbies and my sites are mostly static (and I hate Javascript).

[cmelbye]

Programmer. OMG, WEBSOCKET!