| Extensible Hypertext Markup Language or XHTML is | | | | the burden of correcting poorly written HTML code in |
| a markup language used to format the content on | | | | web pages. The XML specification calls for stricter |
| web pages. It builds on the strengths of HTML by | | | | rules in writing code so XHTML compliant browsers |
| conforming to XML syntax. XML is important because | | | | would alert content developers with a fatal error. |
| it eases the automated processing of information on | | | | This will reduce the complexity of browsers |
| web pages by using standard XML tools. While HTML | | | | tremendously because they will no longer have to |
| processing tools are available, they tend to be | | | | correct author errors. It will also result in faster |
| custom solutions and can't guarantee compatibility | | | | rendering of web pages. |
| with all the HTML-based web pages out there. XML | | | | The XHTML 1.0 specification is only slightly different |
| was originally thought to redefine the nature of the | | | | from the pre-dominant HTML specification. XHTML |
| World Wide Web (WWW) due to the powerful | | | | mainly encourages developers to write HTML in a |
| possibilities of easily processing information in XML | | | | way that conforms to the stricter rules of XML. Due |
| pages. Unfortunately, the majority of content | | | | to the similarity between XHTML and HTML, it is |
| developers stuck with HTML despite its inherent | | | | hoped that developers will find it easy to transition |
| limitations and annoyances. XHTML was introduced to | | | | their websites to the XML way of doing things. W3C |
| bridge the gap between HTML and XML and make it | | | | XHTML is expected to painlessly transition the |
| easier to transition to an information rich world | | | | WWW to the future where searching, indexing and |
| powered by XML. | | | | parsing information will herald a new era of boosting |
| Since the XHTML standard is being developed under | | | | productivity by guaranteeing easy access to useful |
| the guidance of the World Wide Web Consortium | | | | and reliable information from the clutter of WWW. |
| (W3C), it is also known as W3C XHTML. The problem | | | | XHTML's benefit of introducing uniformity to |
| with HTML is that it is quite lenient when dealing with | | | | document structures is especially important to large |
| errors. Parsers (special programs that sift through | | | | organizations and businesses that have to deal with |
| information) and user agents (browsers) have gotten | | | | immense amounts of product information and |
| increasingly complex because they are tasked with | | | | customer databases. |