Those HTML Elements You Never Use πŸŒšπŸ•΅πŸΏ

vidova

VIDOVA.ai

Posted on April 11, 2022

Those HTML Elements You Never Use πŸŒšπŸ•΅πŸΏ

There are over a hundred elements in HTML, all of which can be applied to pieces of text to give them special meaning in a document. Most of us only know a few, like the <p>, <div>, and <body> elements…

But there are actually a bunch more hidden in the dark realms of the W3C reference. That’s why, in this article, I took the liberty of diving deep into the HTML documentation, to come out with a handy bag of elements that will improve your website in not one, but two very important ways: accessibility and SEO.

Press Ctrl+D to bookmark this article and easily come back to it when you need it. And with that said, let’s begin!

πŸ‘‰ <abbr> β€” Abbreviation

abbr

This elements represents both abbreviations (like Corporation ➟ Corp.) and acronyms (like Cascading Style Sheets ➟ CSS). Additionally, you can use its title attribute to write the full form of the word so that screen readers can read it and users can hover over it to read it.


πŸ‘‰ <ins> and <del> β€” Insert and Delete

ins

The <ins> and <del> elements represent a range of text that has been added or deleted to a document. You may have already seen these elements in the Github Pull Requests.


πŸ‘‰ <dfn>, <var>, <kbd>, <samp>, and <output> β€” Technical Elements

dfn

These are elements that represent special technically-oriented parts in a document, like definitions, variables, keystrokes, etc…


πŸ‘‰ <bdo> β€” Text Directionality

bdo

This element changes the directionality of text to make it render backwards. You can control its behavior using the dir attribute.

Although not its intended use, but it can reverse text using nothing but HTML!


πŸ‘‰ <mark> β€” Highlighting Text

mark

The purpose of this element is to highlight text like you would with a marker.


πŸ‘‰ <area> β€” Clickable Image Areas

area

You can use this element to make certain areas of your image behave like links!


πŸ‘‰ <dl>, <dd>, and <dt> β€” Description Lists

dl

You can use these elements to create a semantically-accurate description list where you define multiple terms in one block of text.


πŸ‘‰ <sup>and <sub>β€” Superscripts and Subscripts

The Pythagorean theorem is often expressed as the following equation: a2 + b2 = c2

With these two elements, you can add superscripts (like xΒ²) and subscripts (like xβ‚€) to your document.


πŸ‘‰ <figure> and <figcaption> β€” Labeled Images

figure

You can use <figure> to contain any element that you want, like an image for example. And then, you add <figcaption> as its last child, where you can add a block of text that describes what’s above it.


πŸ‘‰ <progress> and <meter>β€” Marking Progress

progress

This one allows you to create semantically-right progress-bar elements where you show how far an action is from being finished.


πŸ‘‰ <details> β€” Expandable Menus

details

You can use this element to create a native menu that has a title and can expand using a button. No JavaScript needed.


πŸ‘‰ <dialog> β€” Pop-up Dialogs

dialog

It’s possible to create semantically-accurate dialogs using this element. It doesn’t do much by itself, so you have to use CSS and JavaScript to add more functionality.


πŸ‘‰ <datalist>β€” Text Input Suggestions

Choose a flavor

This element lets you manually add text-input suggestions. You can add anything you want!


πŸ‘‰ <fieldset>β€” Grouping Form Elements

Choose your favorite monster: Kraken - Sasquatch - Mothman

Keep your forms tidy and more user-friendly by using the <fieldset>element.


πŸ‘‰ <object>β€” Embedding External Objects

object

With this amazing element, you can embed almost any file you want to your website! The most commonly supported files are PDFs, Youtube videos, etc…


πŸ‘‰ <noscript>β€” If JavaScript Is Disabled

CodePen doesn't work very well without JavaScript. We're all for progressive enhancement, but CodePen is a bit unique in that it's all about writing and showing front end code, including JavaScript. It's required to use most of the features of CodePen. Need to know how to enable it? Go here.

This element can be used to show some content when JavaScript is disabled by the browser. It’s very commonly used by websites that heavily depend on JavaScript, like Single Page Applications (SPAs).


If you found this guide useful, please don’t forget to bookmark it for future reference.

I make posts like this everyday, so please follow me to stay informed. ❀️

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πŸ’– πŸ’ͺ πŸ™… 🚩
vidova
VIDOVA.ai

Posted on April 11, 2022

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