Jeff Cochran wrote
It really shouldn't be there.
Hi Jeff.
While I value your version of the truth (and it does make some sense), I have to go with the law. And here it is - straight from W3C:
"<h1> is the HTML element for the first-level heading of a document:"
One can go on to read:
- If the document is basically stand-alone, for example Things to See and Do in Geneva, the top-level heading is probably the same as the title.
- If it is part of a collection, for example a section on Dogs in a collection of pages about pets, then the top level heading should assume a certain amount of context; just write <h1>Dogs</h1> while the title should work in any context: Dogs - Your Guide to Pets. (Which is why your version of it makes sense...)
Sitepoint's Ultimate CSS Reference (Page 46) says this about the H1:
"The h1 element is used to indicate the most important (or highest-level) heading on the page"
That being said, I like to think of a webpage, as just that - a page / a document. And accordingly, I try to use semantic headings in the same way one would outline a written document:
- h1 - title (of the page or document - I don't like the idea of content editor's being able to change this, so I place it in my skin - as the logo / header)
- h2 - main point (there can be several of these, and thus I use H2's for my container titles)
- h3 - sub points / sub headings
- p - content (obvious)
Sitepoint goes on to say, "A document's first heading should be an h1, followed by one or more h2 headings; each of these h2 headings can have a further series of h3 headings below them, and so on..."
I know you're not meant to plug other products on this site or in the forums, but from a referencing point of view, I owe it to the owners and publishers of the book to make reference to their site: www.sitepoint.com - a very good read / reference for those interested in CSS and HTML done properly.
Lastly, if you Google, "only 1 h1 per page" - you'll get a number of results saying pretty much the same thing.
Just my take on it.