dynamic hypertext markup language (DHTML)

Dynamic HypertextMarkup Language (DHTML) is a combination of various elements from HTML 4.0 and JavaScript or other scripting languages. With DHTML, web pages can be changed dynamically without accessing the server. This is the case, for example, with the animation of texts or graphics.

DHTML is used, for example, for text explanations that appear when the mouse cursor is moved over a link, or for graphics that change when the mouse cursor is moved. The changes are generated within the loaded web page, the time-consuming access to the server is omitted.

DHTML is based on the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), the Cascading Style Sheets( CSS), which serve as style sheets for the browser, and the Document Object Model( DOM), which forms the interface for the scripting languages. The dynamics in the representations are achieved via scripting languages that access the HTML code. These can be JavaScript or Visual Basic Script.