Since its conception in the late 1980s, HyperText Markup Language (HTML) has persisted as a critical element in displaying web pages online. This ubiquitous programming language continues to offer a detailed framework for structuring the content we see and interact with on the web, allowing us to format text and multimedia components in plain-text code, which is simple enough to change when the need arises.
The Transformation of HTML
As is the case with nearly all programming languages, HTML has transformed to incorporate dozens of new features over the decades since its introduction, accommodating typical contemporary pressures such as community feedback/critique and the rapid growth of adjacent web development technologies. The results of this transformation are easily visible to us in the output of modern HTML code; for example, the most recent HTML iteration–HTML5, introduced in 2014–offers new, simple elements for embedding video and audio files, as well as much-needed improvements in mobile display and overall mobile functionality.
