Keeping in step with the mission and goals of the W3C, HTML continues to be an evolving technology. Indeed, since the early days of the Web, HTML has seen some major changes in both its infrastructure and its implementation. Given the explosive growth of the Web in general and the tremendous (did someone say infinite?) range of applications that are being Web enabled, HTML has needed to keep pace with these changes to deliver on its goal to be a primary vehicle for the successful implementation of all of the Web’s promises.

Along the way, the W3C has presented various recommendations and related initiatives and work on HTML and HTML-related standards. From early tag standards to the now recent pairing and collaboration with HXTML, there is much you should be aware of in terms of how HTML has developed and how that development has been spearheaded by the W3C in many cases.

The history of HTML has gone through four basic iterations over the past several years. They are

All databases, including those that you create with SQL Server, are made up of specific components. Some of these (such as tables and indexes) will be discussed in the chapters of this project; however, for this chapter you should at least have a cursory understanding of what each component is and how it functions in relation to the other database components.

Tables
Perhaps the quintessential database components, tables are the information repositories where all of your data is stored. All databases should have at least one table, and each table will consist of columns and rows, which are defined in the following sections.

Columns
Columns contain specific information that, when taken collectively, comprise a complete table. Each column has specific attributes assigned to it.

When you installed SQL Server, you also installed several databases by default. Although some of them are more important than others, they all serve some function and can assist you as you move through your own projects. Some of them —and this is critical— absolutely should not be altered; otherwise, you run the risk of doing serious damage to your SQL Server installation and the data stored within your individual databases! That said, the following sections will take you through each of these installed databases so you will know what each one does (and so you will know which ones not to mess with).

1. If it’s not already running, start the SQL Server Enterprise Manager.
2. Expand the Databases node.
3. Although you’ll learn about the individual database components a bit later in this chapter, go ahead and expand one of the individual database nodes so you can see how the components are presented.

 Now that you have the default databases accessible and on your screen, take a closer look at each one.

• Master. The master database is the keeper of a great deal of administrative and functional control information for your entire SQL Server. That said, there is very little reason for you to change the values contained therein. (As a matter of fact, you probably shouldn’t touch this database unless you have a very good reason.) Important administrative functionality, such as storing all user login IDs; specific system configuration settings; names, information, and the location of each database contained within the server; and the initialization configurations of SQL Server, is kept within the master database. So again, unless you’ve got a good reason… leave it alone.
• Tempdb. The tempdb database houses temporary information (not surprising, given its name) for not only the queries you execute, but for SQL Server itself, because various transactions and processes are executed within the application. You can use the tempdb database to temporarily store information for your procedures. This is fine as long as you remember that as soon as the database refreshes itself, the data stored within tempdb will be lost. I’ll talk more about tempdb later in this chapter and in other chapters. For now, though, recognize its general functionality and usefulness as a temporary data storage location. It is also used extensively with SQL Server’s Data Transformation Services.
• Model. The model database is useful because you can indeed "model" your databases (and the specific components within them) so that they all share a uniform structure. For example, if you wanted every database on your SQL Server to contain a specific table, you could include this information with the model database. Note, however, that this only works for new databases that are created.
• Northwind. If you’ve worked with Microsoft Access, you are undoubtedly familiar with the Northwind sample database. (You already accessed it to run some of the query examples in the third project, when you worked with the Database Results Wizard, a feature of FrontPage.) Although you can manipulate or alter the Northwind database to your heart’s content, it’s probably a good idea to leave it alone so you have a reference database to fall back on in case you run into trouble in other areas of SQL Server, or you need to test a query or procedure on a predefined set of data (the information contained with the Northwind database) as opposed to your actual live data.
• Pubs. Another sample database, the pubs database is based on a fictitious publishing company. Like the Northwind sample database, you can alter this any way you want, but it might be useful to leave it fairly unchanged so you can use it as a data reference.
• Msdb. Like the master database, you probably should not alter the msdb database. Used to control the functioning of various processes within SQL Server, any change in this database could have adverse results on other critical function areas of your server.

Clearly, the worldwide scope of the W3C—with member organizations and offices located throughout the world—demands that the Consortium have a well-defined focus if it is to succeed and help develop the Web to its full potential. Fortunately, this is indeed the case; the mission and vision of the W3C are clearly defined. Although the Consortium’s mission and vision are described in more specific detail on their Web site (and in various supporting documents), their own seven-point summary serves as a neat capstone to the organization’s central goals.

1)    Providing universal access. With the growing popularity (and functionality) of access devices such as Web-enabled cell phones and PDAs, it seems that people want access to the Web regardless of their location. As a result of this increasing push for Web access on demand, the W3C has a primary goal to not only encourage this (universal) access initiative, but also to help ensure that you have equal access to the Web and the information it contains, regardless of what access device you are using, where you are physically located, what culture you belong to, or even your physical or mental ability.

2)    Enhancing the meaning of information. This article was written specifically for "human consumption"; in other words, it was written in a language that was intended for human beings to read and understand. But what if the information contained in this article could be manipulated so that computers—free of human interaction—could understand it too, and in turn present the findings of their "reading" for quicker manipulation? This is the goal of the W3C’s push toward the "semantic Web" and the additional languages—RDF, XML, and so on—being developed to aid in this process. The idea is to make it easier to exchange and manipulate information in potentially faster and more efficient ways than just using plain text. (In the process, this will aid in the primary goal of universal access.)

The Text Alignment Attribute
HTML includes an align attribute that allows you to do some basic text alignment in your Web pages. As with everything else, the best way to see this attribute in action is to look at a code example.

<p align="left">This text is left aligned.</p> <p align="center">This text is center aligned.</p> <p align="right">This text is right aligned.</p>

The <p> tag simply puts a paragraph break between each line.