The hypertext link was the whole reason for the Web in the first place.
Combining a comprehensive addressing system (which we now know as URLs)
with a simple method for pointing one resource to another was the
foundation on which the Web was built. The early architects, however, had a much broader vision for how linking would take
place. They envisioned links as more than simple anchors that shine a
bright blue color and wait for users to click. Links, they believed, could also
add information to a document. This information wouldn't necessarily be displayed as
part of the document, but would add information to the content, thereby
making the document smarter.
You know, for example, how to add comments and keywords to an HTML document for search
engines. Think about how the <meta> tag is used to accomplish this
important function. This is, in essence, another way of linking information
to your document. You could similarly add information to a document by adding a <meta>
tag that specified who the author of the document was. A smart browser could offer a button that simply said
"Mail Author" if the information was present. We could do away with the mailto references on our pages and let the browser handle it.
But the draft
doesn't stop there. It includes new syntax for the <link>
tag, which can be
used to attach stylesheets to your HTML pages. In an ideal world, you'd be
able to use as many <link> tags as you wanted, and even
specify which
stylesheet you'd want used with which media - cell phones, televisions, and
24-bit, high-res monitors could all get their own. A simple, built-in
conditional HTML system.
The draft also covers relative linking, as well as two-way links. You can
read all about those in the document itself.
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