Foundation HTML5 with CSS3

Chapter 4

Figure 4-23. Deleted text is displayed with a strikethrough, and inserted text is underlined

Required Attributes

There are no attributes required for the del and ins elements.

Optional Attributes

 cite: The URL of a document featuring information on why the change was made

 datetime: The date and/or time the change to the document was made

As covered earlier in this chapter (see the time element), there are strict rules dictating

the format of machine-readable dates and times in a datetime attribute. You can find

much more detailed information in the HTML5 specification:

w3.org/TR/html5/common-microsyntaxes.html#dates-and-times

Offset Text: i, b, u, and s

In the days of yore, before CSS was widely adopted, a number of elements existed in HTML strictly for

styling text: i for italic, b for bold, u for underline, and s for strikethrough. None of these elements carried

any additional meaning or imparted any real semantic value to their contents; they only affected visual

presentation.

Yet they were still sometimes useful, even after CSS came to the fore and authors learned to eschew

presentational markup. Sometimes you really do just want to style some text in an italicized font without

adding any deeper emphasis. Sometimes bold text is only bold, not important. In a noble effort to avoid all

outdated, presentational markup, some authors resort to things like <span class="bold">, which just

completely misses the point.

HTML5 has resurrected these presentational elements and imbued them with new meaning. They’re still

essentially stylistic, but with their newfound sense of purpose they’re no longer semantically worthless.

The i, b, u, and s elements now represent offset text; a word or phrase that is different from the

surrounding text for a reason. Even so, you should only use these elements when they really are the most

appropriate for the content, and when a more meaningful element would add more meaning than you

intend.

The i element represents a word or phrase in an alternate voice, such as a few words in a foreign

language, a taxonomic or technical name, or a character’s inner monologue. This text is typically styled in

an italic font, but doesn’t warrant the greater stress or emphasis that the em element would apply.

<p>As the saying goes, <i lang="la">Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?</i></p>