Should i learn html or xhtml? Confused.com!!

I'm just starting out but want to start out the right way.

Having read many posts on the forums i felt the consensus was that the best way was to hand code everything using xhtml for content and css for presentation,steering clear of dreamweaver.

I've now noticed a few posts saying that xhtml is not the way to go as it's not widely supported by browsers just yet and is more of a language for the future.So now i'm confused!

I've got a great book from the htmldog website- xhtml + css best practice,but i'm just a bit concerned that i might be getting a bit ahead of myself.
Should i learn some html first before diving into xhtml?
Is xhtml much harder to grasp for a newbie like me?

My target initially is to be able to produce simple brochure style sites,though i want them to look good visually and incorporate fluid/elastic layouts.

Any thoughts or advice would be much appreciated.
Thanks
Sean

I've been using XHTML for a couple of years now, and it's okay to use. It's the XML portion of XHTML that's not supported widely, I believe, so you can definitely use it and you won't run into problems for normal websites. CSS is the tricky part, however. You've got to think outside of the box when using CSS for complicated sites

There isn't a clear right answer to this question. You said:

I would say that's almost correct. Here's my slightly modified version:

• The best way is to hand code everything using (x)html Strict for content and css for presentation, steering clear of the design view in dreamweaver.

"(X)HTML" means "either XHTML or HTML". At the moment, there's really very little to choose between them. I won't go into the arguments here, but suffice to say I prefer HTML because XHTML has some potential pitfalls, and is harder to get right than HTML.

So I would choose whichever you prefer (but HTML might cause you less heartache).

In terms of the quality of your code, choosing a Strict doctype has a much greater effect. I use HTML 4.01 Strict.

Dreamweaver is a hybrid program, able to work in two radically different modes: design view and code view. Design view is the "drag-and-drop" mode that will mess up your code; code view is just a glorified text editor, albeit an expensive one! There's nothing wrong with using Dreamweaver; just avoid the design view.

Many thanks for your replies.

Sean

Wow, another nice post from Mike!

I've now written a detailed article on this subject.