Ask HN: Why isn't HTML more relevant outside of the web? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why isn't HTML more relevant outside of the web?

2 pointsWHA8m12 comments

'relevant' in terms of more popular and wide spread as a format.

XML (the superset of HTML) is used to create graphical interfaces in android applications... And there are currently many applications developed in electronjs for this same need: Develop graphical interfaces with HTML and CSS

Where do you draw the line, that it's actually written as HTML or that it uses HTML/DOM for rendering?

Most apps built with Electron, and similar, run with HTML (you can argue that it's mostly JS, but it's all rendered in the HTML DOM).

Many STB's and modern TV's run some kind of HTML/browser engine. Some graphics engines for TV broadcasts. Plenty of kiosks and digital signage.

Epub is just zipped html. In other words, html is everywhere, you just don't know it.

Interesting and yes, I didn't know. I haven't heard of ePub though. Apparently it's an open standard for ebooks. For those as unaware as me: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPUB

Like people might distribute HTML files on a CD-ROM or something?

If this is an intricate joke or something I'm sorry because I'm not well versed enough to get it :) Do we still use CD-ROMs? Do you mean the HTML format is as outdated as CD-ROMs?

I thought about HTML as a format for note taking or as an alternative for PDF. Stuff like that.

If you distribute HTML via http it is the web. If you distribute it some other way it is something else.

You can certainly take notes with HTML but it seems people would rather use markdown. So far as "alternative to PDF" I'd say SVG is based on similar capabilities (vector graphics.)

For either one of those cases people might use "the web" to store or deliver those HTML files.

Doesn't people want more formatting in their notes? I'm not talking about myself or HN crowd, but mainstream.

I don't really understand what you mean with the http and web stuff. I recently began downloading sites with the SingleFile Add-on for Firefox. I get a html file out of it. If I want to open it, I need something to render it. Which is my browser ,but could be something not web-related as well, couldn't it? Doesn't make it that a normal file format?

Where does HTML end and Javascript, SVG, and more interactive technologies begin?

It is normal for an HTML file to point to resources outside the HTML file, that is, even if it is an HTML file on your hard drive it might point to images, Javascripts, etc. on other servers.

It certainly is possible to draw a circle around an HTML document and put the resources into a ZIP file, that is

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPUB

I bring up the analogy with "CD Rom" because physical media are kinda on the outs today. There was the time I had to get a 30GB file somewhere overnight by the end of a sprint (I got DSL) and the people were shocked that I sent a Blu-Ray. Tell people that a USB thumb drive is a competitor for cloud storage for sharing files with friends and co-workers and they are absolutely scandalized.

In many countries HTML is the format of official documents. This is because both PDF and WORD are very proprietary and may contain american trickery.

This was kind of the starting point of my thought process. It's somewhat readable without rendering too. So I thought it'd be a really versatile alternative to a lot of other formats. But it doesn't seem relevant outside of the web. So that's where I came from..

Years ago I helped my work compile a documents CD which had a web menu with file links to "download" the files to your computer from the CD, it worked well.

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