The standard modell uses 7 sizes from 1 (smallest) upto 7, the default size is 3. The header levels from <h1> downto <h6> use sizes from 7 -1 =6 for <h1> downto 7 -6 =1 for <h6> (smallest). Relative changes work from 3 -2 =1 (smallest) upto 3 +4 =7 .
The <font> tag is deprecated in transitional XHTML 1.0 and even invalid in strict XHTML 1.0. Use <big> and <small> for <font> size changes, although old browsers like OS/2 WebExplorer 1.1 may not support these tags. Generally browsers render <big> like <font size="+1"> and <small> like <font size="-1">. It's possible to nest <big> and <small> for accumulative size changes unlike <font> :
Lynx ignores <font>, but can use a different colour for <big> text. Lynx can also use different styles (e.g. colours and indentation) for different header levels <h1> downto <h6>. There should be one and only one <h1> in each document, (normally) at the top of the <body> corresponding to the <title>.
0 doesn't work, same effect as <h6>, <small><small>, size="-2", or size="1".
XHTML Font styles
There are many physical and content-based style tags in
XHTML 1.0, but unfortunately popular browsers don't support
all tags. The new HTML 4 tags
<del>,
<ins>,
<abbr>,
<acronym>, and
<q> have of course no effect in older browsers.
IE renders
<kbd> as monospaced+bold, other browsers
handle
<kbd> like
<tt>,
<samp>, or
<code>.
If combinations like
monospaced bold don't work on a OS/2 system, select font size
11 instead of 10 for Courier.
The most infamous of these tags is <del>, because it has no effect at all in old browsers. Some "diff-marked" W3C documents using <del> hold my personal invisible with many browsers record. Please add <s> to <del> if you must use it. Even OS/2 WebExplorer 1.1 knows <s>, but neither <strike> nor <del>.
The next infamous tag is Netscape 's <blink>. It's not part of any standard and therefore not shown below. Also not shown are styles like text-decoration: overline (not supported by Netscape 4.61 ) and text-decoration: underline. You can use <u> for underlined text, but note that <u> and <s> are deprecated in transitional XHTML 1.0 and invalid in strict XHTML 1.0.
WebExplorer doesn't support <sup> and <sub>, but can handle nested physical style tags. Lynx can use different styles for <sup> and <sub>, but does apparently not (yet) support nested physical styles. Depending on the environment (e.g. OS/2 text window vs. full screen ) <u> may not work with Lynx. In one tested Lynx 2.8.5 configuration <u>, <var>, <samp>, <kbd>, and <dfn> had no effect, <cite> was handled like <code>, as usual <em> was handled like <i>, and different colours were used for <code>, <strong>, <b>, <i>, and <tt>.
| mnemonic | tag(s) | similar | remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| bold | <b> | <strong> | |
| italic | <i> | <em> | emphasis |
| variable | <i><b> | <var> | often italic |
| citation | <i><b><tt> | <cite> | often italic |
| teletype | <tt> | <code> | often monospaced |
| sample | <tt><i> | <samp> | often monospaced |
| keyboard | <tt><b> | <kbd> | often monospaced |
| definition | <dfn> | often ignored | |
| insertion | <ins> | HTML 4 | |
| deletion | HTML 4, dubious | ||
| strike | | workaround | |
| underline | <u> | deprecated | |
| superscript | <sup><small><sub> <sub><b><small><i><sup><tt> | ||
|
Note that there is no | style | tag for reverse video. |
|---|
Of course you would use the new <span> tag with a style like background: black; color: white instead of weird table constructs to force reverse video. See also four screenshots (JPeG, 200 KB) of this table rendered by Netscape 2.02 (= 3.x), Netscape 4.61, Lynx 2.8.5, and WebEplorer 1.1h.
The new HTML 4 <q> tag is a variant of <blockquote> used for inline quotations. Unfortunately WebExplorer handles <q> and <blockquote> as identical block-level elements, but nobody really uses this OS/2 browser today except for compatibility tests. Modern browsers should or at least could render <q> content using quote marks corresponding to the language, e.g. “ ... ” , „ ... ” , or « ... » . For old browsers something like <i><q> could be used.
With Netscape 2.02 <i><q> is even better than explicit quote marks, because this browser doesn't know the entities “ , ” , and „. See also my table of "(un)supported by Netscape 2.02 " Windows 1252 characters.
 | <q lang="en"> |
 | <q lang="fr"> |
|---|---|---|---|
 | <q lang="de"> |
 | <q lang="es"> |
Last update: 20 Jun 2005 6:00 by F.Ellermann