Your explanation was concise and easily understood by a total beginner, and “thingie thingie parsnips” satisfied a need I hadn’t known I had, namely: the mental image of Baldrick writing code.

Thank you very much indeed.

Got it from HTML Doctor.

http://html5doctor.com/the-section-element/

I’ve so far resisted HTML5 because from what I’ve read it seems quite convoluted… but I know I need to.

Firstly, thanks for putting the article together, no pun intended but I had a question on your last example:

<section>
<h1>Articles about llamas</h1>

<article>
<h2>The daily llama: buddhism and South American camelids</h2>
<p>blah blah</p>
</article>

<article>
<h2>Shh! Do not alarm a llama</h2>
<p>blah blah</p>
</article>

</section>

I would argue this example of a section could also be article as well. This section is specific (to llamas), independent and self contained. It *could* be syndicated.

This is the problem in my opinion with <article> and <section>, you can find examples where the two tags overlap hence it lacks clear definition.

In my view <section>s should clearly define portions of seperate TYPES of content. The example you’ve used again lends itself more to what I would think of an <article> because of the duplicate type/format of markup.

I could make a similar argument for <section> and <div> too albeit it wouldn’t be as strong, but I would argue it.

I also agree with the other comments too – that HTML5 has been spec’d for web commentry at its core – news, blogs, forums etc. What about ecommerce? – Yes these websites could “fit” the mold, but at this stage it doesn’t seem progressive to be well… progressive?, or maybe a better way of putting it is equally considered. This is such a huge portion of the www?

Based on that argument, I also think <item> would be more appropriate than <article>. It’s more encompassing.

The pont is – if you’re looking for some element to wrap stuff, *purely* so you can apply styling, then use a div.