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May 15, 2008

Google Doctype, an Encyclopedia for Web Developers

Google released Doctype (HTML version), an encyclopedia of the open web. "The open web is the web built on open standards: HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and more. The open web is a beautiful soup of barely compatible clients and servers. It comprises billions of pages, millions of users, and thousands of browser-based applications."

Google Doctype is an encyclopedia that can be edited by anyone who has a Google account and wants to keep it up-to-date or add new articles. The encyclopedia contains articles about web security, DOM manipulation, CSS, HTML best practices, references for HTML, DOM, CSS, complete with browser compatibility information. There's also previously-unreleased code used internally by Google that is now documented and available for anyone to use.

You could call it Wikipedia for web developers or cross-browser MSDN, but Google Doctype is a clear sign that Google wants to foster a community of developers and encourage building web application using open standards.


Mark Pilgrim, the author of "Dive into Python" and now a Googler, explains more about Google Doctype in the following interview:

7 comments:

  1. Doesn't load in Opera.
    Also compability chart doesn't include Opera by default.
    More interestingly Opera does support what IE7 doesn't.
    A small exsample,
    http://doctype.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/tests/css/properties/float-bogus-equals-none-reflection-test.html
    Fail at IE7 Pass at Opera 9.27
    For Opera's reponse
    http://my.opera.com/community/forums/topic.dml?id=232574

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  2. Browse Google Doctype doesn't load in Safari 1.3.2 on OS X 10.3.9

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  3. I think you should post these issues here.

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  4. Is it just me or anybody else finds the Javascript-based interface a complete absurdity when claiming "standards" ?!

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  5. I agree that the JavaScript interface is pretty weird and the permalinks are long and clumsy. Google uses a project called Documentation Reader. "Reading web-based developer documentation is different than browsing typical web pages. As a developer, you probably refer to key technical doc many times per day, and you want it well-organized, easy to navigate, and -- above all -- fast. We feel the same way. So, we built a fast, non-annoying documentation viewer that is specially tailored for reading technical documentation."

    Regarding Google Doctype, there's also a HTML interface.

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  6. i am agree that google Doesn't load in Opera.
    Also compability chart doesn't include Opera by default.
    permalinks are long and clumsy so not a good for web developers.

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  7. So I'm a newby web programmer. I designed my site totally without an doctype, but just created it so it looked how i wanted it to. I now realize that for it to get any type of google ranking, it needs a doctype. The problem lies in that no doctype will cause it to render as it did without a doctype.

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