I've been hearing more and more about this lately, and today a coworker asked me if I could recommend using it or avoiding it in a new web site? I've done about a half hour of reading the MSDN documentation, and I'm more confused now than when I started.

Any advice from the experts?

The D in DHTML stands for "Dynamic". So DHTML = Dynamic HTML = stuff that changes on the fly using Javascript (if there's any other technology that does it besides Javascript, I'm not aware of it...and I'm not counting AJAX because AJAX is Javascript too.)

There really isn't much more to it than that. You just ran into the usual BS Baffles Brains routine, and you were smart enough to be thoroughly confused. Not your fault though; it's the disadvantage of intelligence.

VBScript could also provide the dynamic capabilities for DHTML.

And, CSS may be included in this (especially with the pseudoclasses like hover).

I'm not really sure that CSS would qualify, pseudoclasses or not. The HTML itself remains identical; the only difference is that CSS properties change (e.g. multi-tiered menus.)

VBScript...always meant to try it, never had the chance to.

First paragraph here seems to be happy with it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DHTML

Hmmm. Interesting.

http://www.yourhtmlsource.com/javasc...ml#WhatIsDHTML <-- I always preferred that definition, though. Makes more sense to me personally, since CSS by itself isn't dynamic.

This is maybe on of those situations where people argue about English instead of technology? I worked with somebody who refused to take advantage of css:hover because "that's scripting's job."

I think "DHTML" is a silly buzzword that needs to disappear. Probably the same goes for (x)html/css. You can do a lot without javascript, but eventually if you build enough web sites you'll have to get your hands dirty with the stuff. It seems like we have a million complicated-sounding terms to refer to the same basic thing.

So all this time I thought it was some other variant markup language and I've been cheating myself, saying I don't know it. The Microsoft documentation talks about behaviors inherent to tags like it's a foreign concept, but I guess it was just talking about the basics for people who don't know what a span is?

I only use dynamic drive and other "borrowed" DHTML scriptlets, since anything else is just overkill. If you want something unique and complicated, you're probably best off with AJAX or Flash

Pretty much, John. The MSDN has an annoying habit of making things sound much more complicated than they actually are.

Yes, it is Dynamic HTML. It is sort of like ajax, but it does not send requests to the server, and it is written in Javascript.

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

So all this time I thought it was some other variant markup language and I've been cheating myself, saying I don't know it. The Microsoft documentation talks about behaviors inherent to tags like it's a foreign concept, but I guess it was just talking about the basics for people who don't know what a span is?

That probably has to do with the age of the technology. There are a lot of assumptions.

Generally, DHTML is going to be plain old HTML + CSS + a scripting language. The scripting language is most often Javascript/ECMAScript but, many also use VBScript for IE, and with a browser pulgin, you could also have Perl, Python, Ruby, etc...

DHTML = (D=(CSS+javascript/vbscritp)+HTML)
if u find this confusing refer MSDN, to get more confused