HTML5 - Web Page Structure
Footer Tag
The footer tag has been introduced in HTML5 for producing better page structure:
The Code:
<footer></footer>
Represents a footer for a section and can contain information about the author, copyright information, etc.
The footer element represents a footer for its nearest ancestor sectioning content or sectioning root element.
A footer typically contains information about its section such as who wrote it, links to related documents, copyright data, and the like.
When the footer element contains entire sections, they can present appendices, indexes, verbose license agreements, and other such content.
Contact information for the author or editor of a section belongs in an address element, possibly itself inside a footer.
Copyright information, date modified and other such data should be placed in paragraphs if included in a footer.
When the nearest ancestor sectioning content or sectioning root element is the body element, then it applies to the whole page.
The footer element is not sectioning content; it isn't used to introduce a new section.
Rule: Do not nest footers!
Examples:
Different ways to use the footer element:
<BODY>
<H1>Page title</H1>
<ARTICLE>
<H1>Article title</H1>
<VIDEO>
<P><A HREF="*.ogv">Download video</A>.</P>
</VIDEO>
<FOOTER> <!-- footer for article -->
<P>Published : date and time</P>
</FOOTER>
</ARTICLE>
<ARTICLE>
<H1>Article title</H1>
<P>Article information</P>
<P>Article information</P>
<FOOTER> <!-- footer for article -->
<P>Last Modified: date</P>
</FOOTER>
</ARTICLE>
<FOOTER> <!-- site wide footer -->
<NAV>
<P><A HREF="/credits.html">Credits</A>
<A HREF="/tos.html">Terms of Service</A>
<A HREF="/index.html">Blog Index</A></P>
</NAV>
<P>Copyright ? 2009 Gordon Freeman<br/>
Contact at: br@549.if</P>
</FOOTER>
</BODY>
Here is a page with two footers, one at the top and one at the bottom, with the same content:
<body>
<footer><a href="../">Back to index...</a></footer>
<hgroup>
<h1>Lorem ipsum</h1>
<h2>The ipsum of all lorems</h2>
</hgroup>
<p>A dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod
tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim
veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex
ea commodo consequat. </p>
<footer><a href="../">Back to index...</a></footer>
</body>
New Elements and Beginners
Some of the new tags used as shown below might make the body code of a basic HTML5 document easier to read.
This structure can be used instead of using class customized divisions .
<body>
<header></header>
<nav></nav>
<section class="main></section>
<footer></footer>
</body>
*Use of the new tags article, section, header, footer, hgroup, nav and aside is a matter of the taste or the need of the author.
The footer element accepts Global Attributes.
Note: some of these overlap in purpose.
For a complete list of New Elements visit W3.org