XHTML DTD

The XHTML standard defines three Document Type Definitions.

The most common is the XHTML Transitional.

The <!DOCTYPE> is Mandatory

An XHTML document consists of three main parts:

the DOCTYPE
the Head
the Body

The basic document structure is:

<!DOCTYPE ...>
<html>
<head>
<title>... </title>
</head>
<body> ... </body>
</html>

The DOCTYPE declaration should always be the first line in an XHTML document.

An XHTML Example

This is a simple (minimal) XHTML document:

<!DOCTYPE html
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<title>simple document</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>a simple paragraph</p>
</body>
</html>

The DOCTYPE declaration defines the document type:

<!DOCTYPE html
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">

The rest of the document looks like HTML:

<html>
<head>
<title>simple document</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>a simple paragraph</p>
</body>
</html>

The 3 Document Type Definitions

DTD specifies the syntax of a web page in SGML.
DTD is used by SGML applications, such as HTML, to specify rules that apply to the markup of documents of a particular type, including a set of element and entity declarations.
XHTML is specified in an SGML document type definition or 'DTD'.
An XHTML DTD describes in precise, computer-readable language the allowed syntax and grammar of XHTML markup.

There are currently 3 XHTML document types:

STRICT
TRANSITIONAL
FRAMESET

XHTML 1.0 specifies three XML document types that correspond to three DTDs: Strict, Transitional, and Frameset.

XHTML 1.0 Strict

<!DOCTYPE html
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" 
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">

Use this when you want really clean markup, free of presentational clutter. Use this together with Cascading Style Sheets.

XHTML 1.0 Transitional

<!DOCTYPE html
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

Use this when you need to take advantage of HTML's presentational features and when you want to support browsers that don't understand Cascading Style Sheets.

XHTML 1.0 Frameset

<!DOCTYPE html
PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Frameset//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-frameset.dtd">

Use this when you want to use HTML Frames to partition the browser window into two or more frames.

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