Short answer: No. XML is now king of the hill. However, knowing XHTML will help you make a smooth transition to XML.

David Essex, ITworld.com
August 14, 2000

Programming in the Web's Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is more akin to the mundane chores of typesetting than the mystical art of code slinging. The HTML tags that control elements like headlines, indents, and colors on Webpages are a relatively simple code that even journalists and English majors can be taught to use. It's a way to mark up pages of text, not a full-fledged programming language.

This simplicity may be the biggest driver of the explosion in Web content. "Part of the reason the Web grew so fast was that HTML was pretty easy to produce," says Janet Daly, a spokesperson for the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the Web's governing body. Popular browsers deviated from standards and were pretty forgiving, and editing tools like SoftQuad Software's HoTMetaL and Microsoft's FrontPage automated most of the process anyway.

Familiarity with HTML quickly became a useful but decidedly secondary skill for Web developers who concentrated on thornier challenges like Java or Perl programming. But some people still write HTML for a living. Such HTML specialists must be wondering about the long-term value of their skills in an industry that is quickly adopting Extensible Markup Language (XML), a set of rules for building customized markup languages. XML, widely regarded as HTML's successor, makes it easy for business-to-business networks and other like-minded communities to share richly styled and interactive documents while retaining data compatibility in ways currently difficult or impossible with HTML. XML has become a vital element in most e-commerce development efforts.

Given this, is there a future for HTML? The word from HTML experts like Daly is a slightly qualified yes. The key is to learn XHTML (Extensible HTML), a transitional standard expressly designed to bring HTML into the XML world.

'X' marks the spot
XHTML 1.0, adopted by a W3C committee in January, is "a reformulation of HTML 4 [the latest HTML standard] in XML," says Daly, herself a longtime HTML writer. XHTML will work with popular browsers, such as Microsoft Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator, and is backward compatible with HTML. That means existing HTML pages can be reused in sites that adopt XHTML.

For current HTML programmers, the ticket to XHTML is strict adherence to the HTML 4 standard. (Technically, the W3C issues "recommendations," but they're regarded as standards nonetheless.) Many who code by hand have heretofore gotten away with such sloppiness as leaving out terminating tags. Such shortcuts are verboten in XHTML. Programmers who use automated editing tools to validate their HTML code will be better able to conform, Daly says.

Vendor adoption of XHTML is spotty right now because the standard is so new, but Daly says that XHTML will inevitably spread because there are no real alternatives. Allaire's HomeSite 4.5 HTML editor supports it, as does XMetaL 2.0, the XML-development tool from SoftQuad. "There are certainly announced sites that are converting to XHTML," Daly says.

The next version of the standard, XHTML 1.1, will add the ability to separate XHTML code into modules, allowing the language to run on wireless devices, such as cellular phones and personal digital assistants -- the Web's next platform. Version 1.1 is critical to the HTML community because the standard for displaying Webpages on wireless devices, Wireless Markup Language (WML), does not map to HTML, according to Daly. The working group began work on a final draft for XHTML 1.1 in February.

A familiar learning curve
XHTML training appears to be mirroring that of HTML, with books, seminars, online tutorials, and courses sprouting up quickly. As with HTML, self-education through viewing source code or reading books and online tutorials is common. Universities and IT training companies are also beginning to offer XHTML courses, Navarro says. Daly says experienced HTML writers will find the learning curve to be slight.

Should rank beginners still start with HTML? "As a job candidate or freelancer, I would certainly recommend going with XHTML," says Ann Navarro, a coauthor of the new standard and chief operating officer of the HTML Writers Guild, a nonprofit group that offers XHTML courses online. "There are a billion HTML pages out there," agrees Daly. "There's always going to be a need for XHTML skills."

SoftQuad product manager John Turnbull isn't as sanguine, saying the need for people to write HTML source code was already declining with the rise in popularity of automated Web-development tools, which he claims can generally output reliable HTML code. That trend will continue with the advent of HTML-producing scripts in the databases that power e-commerce and business-to-business sites, Turnbull says.

A technical recruiter in Indianapolis agrees that demand for HTML skills has fallen. "A year to 18 months ago people were advertising for those kind of people -- they're not doing that anymore," says Keith Sims of Management Recruiters International. "Most of my clients that are looking to do straight HTML are training someone in-house." Three years ago, HTML writers were hired right out of college for $40,000 a year; today, he says, experienced people average $14 to $15 an hour.

HTML skills are still much needed at certain companies, though. Pharmaceutical maker Eli Lilly uses the humble Windows Notepad text-editing utility to write the HTML for its thousands of Webpages, Sims says. That's a lot of HTML work -- and that's one of the most dreaded assignments for area IT professionals, he jokes. The best Web-development jobs are instead going to people for whom HTML is only a complement to their more hotly demanded Java and SQL programming skills.

Meanwhile, hiring managers are increasingly naming XML among the "nice-to-haves" on candidates' resumes, though it isn't yet a requirement. "XML is definitely becoming one of the most sought-after skill sets," Sims says. "Most of the fast-moving e-commerce companies are taking hold of this right away."

Turnbull is adamant that to keep their skills current, HTML writers must study XML even if they're taking XHTML courses. "XML is important because it allows a group of people who have their own vocabulary to make models of documents," Trumbull says. "What they [HTML writers] should do is get familiar with the XML idea" -- an idea, he says, that's more about developing models for sharing common data than about using a fixed language to display pages a certain way, which is what HTML does. As a higher-level language for modeling documents, XML may require a conceptual shift that's easier for object-oriented programmers than for HTML writers, but the shift is still worth taking. "If they don't take the leap out of HTML, they're going to be in trouble," Turnbull says.

Sims says the choice is between taking risks on new opportunities, and warily trying to preserve what you had in the past. HTML writers who invest only in XHTML training are merely bridging the gap, settling for less while XML talent grabs the bigger prize. "The only way to make money in IT is to be there first," he says.

Перепечатка материала ITworld.com