Webmaster in a Nutshell, Third Edition

Chapter 3. HTML Reference

This section lists the tags and attributes in HTML 4.01.

Core Attributes

Prior to HTML Version 4, there were few attributes that could be used consistently for all HTML tags. HTML 4 changes this, defining a set of 16 core attributes that can be applied to almost all the tags in the language. For brevity, we list these core attributes in this section and spare you the redundancies in the table that follows:

class=name

Specify a style class controlling the appearance of the tag’s contents.

dir=dir

Specify the rendering direction for text, either left to right (ltr) or right to left (rtl).

id=name

Define a reference name for the tag that is unique in the document.

lang=language

Specify the human language for the tag’s contents with an ISO639 standard two-character name and optional dialect subcode.

onclick=applet

Specify an applet to be executed when the user clicks the mouse on the tag’s contents display area.

ondblclick=applet

Specify an applet to be executed when the user double-clicks the mouse button on the tag’s contents display area.

onkeydown=applet

Specify an applet to be executed when the user presses down on a key while the tag’s contents have input focus.

onkeypress=applet

Specify an applet to be executed when the user presses and releases a key while the tag’s contents have input focus.

onkeyup=applet

Specify an applet to be executed when the user releases a pressed key while the tag’s contents have input focus.

onmousedown ...