Web Design in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition

Name

div

Synopsis

    <div>...</div>

Attributes

Core (id, class, style, title), Internationalization, Events

Deprecated attributes

align="center|left|right"

By marking a section of text as a div and giving it a name using id or class attributes, you are essentially creating a custom HTML element. In this example, a heading and a list are enclosed in a div identified as “sidebar.”

<div id="sidebar">        <h1>List of links</h1>
        <ul>
            <li>Resource 1</li>
            <li>Resource 2</li>
            <li>Resource 3</li>
        </ul></div>

Because a div is a block-level element, its contents will start on a new line (even text not contained within other block-level elements). Otherwise, div elements have no inherent presentation qualities of their own.

The div really shines when used in conjunction with Cascading Style Sheets. Once you’ve marked up and named a div, you can apply styles to all of its contents or treat it as a box that can be positioned on the page, for instance, to form a new text column. A div may also be called on by script, applet, or other processing by user agents.