Some have [embraced it](https://radar.oreilly.com/2009/05/google-bets-big-on-html-5.html), some have [discarded it](https://ishtml5readyyet.com/) as too far in the future, and some have [abandoned a misused friend](https://mezzoblue.com/archives/2009/04/20/switched/) in favor of an old flame in preparation. Whatever side of the debate you're on, you've most likely heard all the blogging chatter surrounding the "new hotness" that is **HTML5**. It's everywhere, it's coming, and you want to know everything you can before it's old news. Things like jQuery plugins, formatting techniques, and design trends change very quickly throughout the Web community. And for the most part we've all accepted that some of the things we learn today can be obsolete tomorrow, but that's the nature of our industry. When looking for some stability, we can usually turn to the code itself as it tends to stay unchanged for a long time (relatively speaking). So when something comes along and changes our code, it's a big deal; and there are going to be some growing pains we'll have to work through. Luckily, rumor has it, that we have [once less change to worry about](https://www.zeldman.com/2009/07/02/xhtml-wtf/). In this article, I'm hoping to give you some tips and insight into HTML5 to help ease the inevitable pain that comes with transitioning to a slightly different syntax. **Welcome to HTML5**.