HTML Attributes

Attributes provide additional information about HTML elements.

  • HTML elements can have attributes
  • Attributes provide additional information about an element
  • Attributes are always specified in the start tag
  • Attributes come in name/value pairs like: name="value"

The href Attribute

HTML links are defined with the <a> tag. The link address is specified in the href attribute:

<a href="http://coderdojomallow.com">This is a link</a>
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You will learn more about links and the <a> tag later in this tutorial.

Size Attributes

HTML images are defined with the <img> tag.

The filename of the source (src), and the size of the image (width and height) are all provided as attributes:

<img src="CoderDojoMallow.jpg" width="104" height="142">
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The image size is specified in pixels: width="104" means 104 screen pixels wide.

You will learn more about images and the <img> tag later in this tutorial.

Alt Attribute

The alt attribute specifies an alternative text to be used, when an HTML element cannot be displayed.

The value of the attribute can be read by "screen readers". This way, someone "listening" to the webpage, i.e. a blind person, can "hear" the element.

<img src="CoderDojoMallow.jpg" alt="CoderDojo Mallow" width="104" height="142">
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Attribute Reference

A full list of HTML attributes can be found here.