1. History

  2. In the beginning...

    1962
    The Internet is first proposed
    1965
    Two computers are successfully connected over the telephone system
    1969
    ARPANET, later Internet, is created
    1989
    The World Wide Web is created by Tim Berners-Lee
    1990
    The first web browser, WorldWideWeb

  3. The first browsers

    1992
    Mosaic, the first browser with inline image capabilities
    1994
    The first version of Netscape
    1996
    Netscape 2, the first browser with JavaScript (created by Brendan Eich)
    1996
    Netscape 3 and JavaScript 1.1

  4. DHTML

    1997
    Internet Explorer 4 and Netscape Navigator 4, each with clashing DOMs, both trumpeting DHTML
    • IE: document.all['mydiv']
    • NN: document.layers['mydiv']

    Code forking!

  5. Standards

    1998
    The W3C publishes a DOM Level 1 recommendation
    The Web Standards Project is formed to encourage browser vendors to support standards

  6. Standards

    1999
    Internet Explorer 5, finally supporting most of the W3C DOM whilst maintaining backwards compatibility with the proprietary IE4 DOM
    2000
    DOM Level 2 recommendation released by the W3C

  7. Support

    2002
    NN6, Mozilla, IE6 and Opera 7 all support the W3C DOM
    2003
    Apple releases Safari which supports the W3C DOM
    2004
    Firefox version 1.0 is released, supporting the W3C DOM

  8. Support

    Today
    Better cross-browser support for the DOM than for CSS.
    Steeper learning curve, but less tweaking for browsers.

  9. Next...

    JavaScript syntax