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==History of HTML==
===Origins===
In 1980, physicist [[Tim Berners-Lee]], who was an independent contractor at [[CERN]], proposed and prototyped [[ENQUIRE]], a  system for CERN researchers to use and share documents. In 1989, Berners-Lee and CERN data systems engineer [[Robert Cailliau]] each submitted separate proposals for an [[Internet]]-based [[hypertext]] system providing similar functionality. The following year, they collaborated on a joint proposal, the WorldWideWeb (W3) project,<ref>Tim Berners-Lee, "Information Management: A Proposal." CERN (March 1989, May 1990).  http://www.w3.org/History/1989/proposal.html</ref>
which was accepted by CERN.

===First specifications===
The first publicly available description of HTML was a document called ''HTML Tags'', first mentioned on the Internet by Berners-Lee in late 1991.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.w3.org/History/19921103-hypertext/hypertext/WWW/MarkUp/Tags.html|title=HTML Tags|publisher=World Wide Web Consortium|accessdate=2007-04-08}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-talk/1991SepOct/0003.html|title=First mention of HTML Tags on the www-talk mailing list|publisher=World Wide Web Consortium|date=[[1991-10-29]]|accessdate=2007-04-08}}</ref> It describes 22 elements comprising the initial, relatively simple design of HTML. Thirteen of these elements still exist in HTML 4.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html401-19991224/index/elements|title=Index of elements in HTML 4|publisher=World Wide Web Consortium|date=[[1999-12-24]]|accessdate=2007-04-08}}</ref>

Berners-Lee considered HTML to be, at the time, an application of [[SGML]], but it was not formally defined as such until the mid-1993 publication, by the [[Internet Engineering Task Force|IETF]], of the first proposal for an HTML specification: Berners-Lee and [[Dan Connolly]]'s "Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)" Internet-Draft, which included an SGML [[Document Type Definition]] to define the grammar.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/www-talk/1991NovDec/0020.html|title=Re: SGML/HTML docs, X Browser (archived www-talk mailing list post)|author=Tim Berners-Lee|date=[[1991-12-09]]|accessdate=2007-06-16|quote=SGML is very general. HTML is a specific application of the SGML basic syntax applied to hypertext documents with simple structure.}}</ref> The draft expired after six months, but was notable for its acknowledgment of the [[Mosaic (web browser)|NCSA Mosaic]] browser's custom tag for embedding in-line images, reflecting the IETF's philosophy of basing standards on successful prototypes.<ref name="raymond">{{cite book|url=http://www.faqs.org/docs/artu/|chapterurl=http://www.faqs.org/docs/artu/ietf_process.html|title=[[The Art of Unix Programming]]|last=Raymond|first=Eric|chapter=IETF and the RFC Standards Process|quote=In IETF tradition, standards have to arise from experience with a working prototype implementation â€” but once they become standards, code that does not conform to them is considered broken and mercilessly scrapped. â€¦Internet-Drafts are not specifications, and software implementers and vendors are specifically barred from claiming compliance with them as if they were specifications. Internet-Drafts are focal points for discussion, usually in a working groupâ€¦ Once an Internet-Draft has been published with an RFC number, it is a specification to which implementers may claim conformance. It is expected that the authors of the RFC and the community at large will begin correcting the specification with field experience.}}</ref> Similarly, Dave Raggett's competing Internet-Draft, "HTML+ (Hypertext Markup Format)", from late 1993, suggested standardizing already-implemented features like tables and fill-out forms.<ref name="html+">{{cite web|url=https://datatracker.ietf.org/public/idindex.cgi?command=id_detail&id=789|title=HTML+ Internet-Draft - Abstract|quote=Browser writers are experimenting with extensions to HTML and it is now appropriate to draw these ideas together into a revised document format. The new format is designed to allow a gradual roll over from HTML, adding features like tables, captioned figures and fill-out forms for querying remote databases or mailing questionnaires.}}</ref>

After the HTML and HTML+ drafts expired in early 1994, the IETF created an HTML Working Group, which in 1995 completed "HTML 2.0", the first HTML specification intended to be treated as a standard against which future implementations should be based.<ref name="raymond"/> Published as [[Request for Comments]] 1996, HTML 2.0 included ideas from the HTML and HTML+ drafts.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1866.txt|title=RFC 1866: Hypertext Markup Language - 2.0 - Acknowledgments|publisher=Internet Engineering Task Force|date=[[2005-09-22]]|accessdate=2007-06-16|quote=Since 1993, a wide variety of Internet participants have contributed to the evolution of HTML, which has included the addition of in-line images introduced by the NCSA Mosaic software for WWW. Dave Raggett played an important role in deriving the forms material from the HTML+ specification. Dan Connolly and Karen Olson Muldrow rewrote the HTML Specification in 1994. The document was then edited by the HTML working group as a whole, with updates being made by Eric Schieler, Mike Knezovich, and Eric W. Sink at Spyglass, Inc. Finally, Roy Fielding restructured the entire draft into its current form.}}</ref> There was no "HTML 1.0"; the 2.0 designation was intended to distinguish the new edition from previous drafts.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1866.txt|title=RFC 1866: Hypertext Markup Language - 2.0 - Introduction|publisher=Internet Engineering Task Force|date=[[2005-09-22]]|accessdate=2007-06-16|quote=This document thus defines an HTML 2.0 (to distinguish it from the previous informal specifications). Future (generally upwardly compatible) versions of HTML with new features will be released with higher version numbers.}}</ref>

Further development under the auspices of the IETF was stalled by competing interests. Since 1996, the HTML specifications have been maintained, with input from commercial software vendors, by the [[World Wide Web Consortium]] (W3C).<ref name="raggett"/> However, in 2000, HTML also became an international standard ([[International Organization for Standardization|ISO]]/[[International Electrotechnical Commission|IEC]] 15445:2000). The last HTML specification published by the W3C is the HTML 4.01 Recommendation, published in late 1999. Its issues and errors were last acknowledged by errata published in 2001.

===Version history of the standard===
{{Html series}}
====HTML version timeline====
; November 1995 : [http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1866 HTML 2.0] was published as IETF RFC 1866. Supplemental [[Request For Comments|RFC]]s added capabilities:
:* November 1995: RFC 1867 (form-based file upload)
:* May 1996: RFC 1942 (tables)
:* August 1996: RFC 1980 (client-side image maps)
:* January 1997: RFC 2070 ([[internationalization and localization|internationalization]])
:In June 2000, all of these were declared obsolete/historic by RFC 2854.

; January 1997 : [http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html32 HTML 3.2] was published as a [[W3C Recommendation]]. It was the first version developed and standardized exclusively by the W3C, as the IETF had closed its HTML Working Group in September 1997.<ref>{{cite web
|url=http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/HTML-WG/
|title=IETF HTML WG
|accessdate=2007-06-16
|quote=NOTE: This working group is closed}}</ref>
:HTML 3.2 dropped math formulas entirely, reconciled overlap among various proprietary extensions, and adopted most of Netscape's visual markup tags. Netscape's [[blink element]] and Microsoft's [[marquee element]] were omitted due to a mutual agreement between the two companies.<ref name="raggett"/> The ability to include mathematical formulas in HTML wasn't standardized until years later in [[MathML]].

; December 1997 : [http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40-971218/ HTML 4.0] was published as a W3C Recommendation. It offers three "flavors":
:* Strict, in which deprecated elements are forbidden,
:* Transitional, in which deprecated elements are allowed,
:* Frameset, in which mostly only [[Framing (World Wide Web)|frame]] related elements are allowed;
:Initially code-named "Cougar",<ref name="engelfriet">{{cite web
|url=http://htmlhelp.com/reference/wilbur/intro.html
|title=Introduction to Wilbur
|author=Arnoud Engelfriet
|publisher=Web Design Group
|accessdate=2007-06-16}}</ref> HTML 4.0 adopted many browser-specific element types and attributes, but at the same time sought to phase out Netscape's visual markup features by marking them as [[deprecation|deprecated]] in favor of style sheets.

; April 1998 : [http://www.w3.org/TR/1998/REC-html40-19980424/ HTML 4.0] was reissued with minor edits without incrementing the version number.

; December 1999 : [http://www.w3.org/TR/html401 HTML 4.01] was published as a W3C Recommendation. It offers the same three flavors as HTML 4.0, and its last [http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/html4-updates/errata errata] were published [[May 12]], [[2001]].

; May 2000 : [https://www.cs.tcd.ie/15445/15445.HTML ISO/IEC 15445:2000] ("[[International Organization for Standardization|ISO]] HTML", based on HTML 4.01 Strict) was published as an ISO/IEC international standard.

As of mid-2008, HTML 4.01 and ISO/IEC 15445:2000 are the most recent versions of HTML. Development of the parallel, XML-based language XHTML occupied the W3C's HTML Working Group through the early and mid-2000s.

=====Drafts=====
; October 1991 : ''[http://www.w3.org/History/19921103-hypertext/hypertext/WWW/MarkUp/Tags.html HTML Tags]'', an informal CERN document listing twelve HTML tags, was first mentioned in public. The list was updated in November 1992.

; July 1993 : [http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/draft-ietf-iiir-html-01.txt Hypertext Markup Language] was published by the [[Internet Engineering Task Force|IETF]] as an Internet-Draft (a rough proposal for a standard). It expired in January 1994.

; November 1993 : HTML+ was published by the IETF as an Internet-Draft and was a competing proposal to the Hypertext Markup Language draft. It expired in May 1994.

; April 1995<!--published April 1995 but authored March 1995--> : [http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/html3/ HTML 3.0] was proposed as a standard to the IETF, but the proposal expired five months later without further action. It included many of the capabilities that were in Raggett's HTML+ proposal, such as support for tables, text flow around figures, and the display of complex mathematical formulas.<ref>{{cite web
|url=http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/html3/CoverPage
|title=HyperText Markup Language Specification Version 3.0
|accessdate=2007-06-16}}</ref>
A demonstration appeared in W3C's own [[Arena (web browser)|Arena browser]]. HTML 3.0 did not succeed for several reasons. The pace of browser development, as well as the number of interested parties, had outstripped the resources of the IETF.<ref name="raggett">{{cite book|first=Dave|last=Raggett|title=Raggett on HTML 4|year=1998|url=http://www.w3.org/People/Raggett/book4/ch02.html|accessdate=2007-07-09}}</ref> Netscape continued to introduce HTML elements that specified the visual appearance of documents,<ref>{{cite web
|url=http://wp.netscape.com/assist/net_sites/html_extensions_3.html
|title=Extensions to HTML 3.0
|publisher=Netscape
|quote=Netscape remains committed to supporting HTML 3.0. To that end, we've gone ahead and implemented several of the more stable proposals, in expectation that they will be approved. â€¦In addition, we've also added several new areas of HTML functionality to Netscape Navigator that are not currently in the HTML 3.0 specification. We think they belong there, and as part of the standards process, we are proposing them for inclusion.}}</ref> contrary to the goals of the newly-formed W3C, which sought to limit HTML to describing logical structure.<ref>[http://www.w3.org/Press/CSS2 Press Release: W3C Publishes Public Draft of CSS2<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Microsoft, a newcomer at the time, played to all sides by creating its own tags, implementing Netscape's elements for compatibility, and supporting W3C features such as Cascading Style Sheets.<ref name="raggett" />

; January 2008 : [http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/ HTML 5] was published as a Working Draft by the W3C.

====XHTML versions====
{{main|XHTML}}
XHTML is a separate language that began as a reformulation of HTML 4.01 using XML 1.0. It continues to be developed:
* [http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/ XHTML 1.0], published [[January 26]], [[2000]] as a W3C Recommendation, later revised and republished [[August 1]], [[2002]]. It offers the same three flavors as HTML 4.0 and 4.01, reformulated in XML, with minor restrictions.
* [http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml11/ XHTML 1.1], published [[May 31]], [[2001]] as a W3C Recommendation. It is based on XHTML 1.0 Strict, but includes minor changes, can be customized, and is reformulated using modules from [http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml-modularization Modularization of XHTML], which was published [[April 10]], [[2001]] as a W3C Recommendation.
* [http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml2/ XHTML 2.0] is still a W3C Working Draft. XHTML 2.0 is incompatible with XHTML 1.x and, therefore, would be more accurate to characterize as an XHTML-inspired new language than an update to XHTML 1.x.
* XHTML 5, which is an update to XHTML 1.x, is being defined alongside [[HTML 5]] in the [http://www.w3.org/html/wg/html5/ HTML 5 draft].
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