aloitustagin

Aloitustagi, in Finnish often used as aloitustagi or aloitustagin in the genitive form, refers to the opening tag of an element in markup languages such as HTML and XML. The term is used to describe the portion that begins an element, specifying its name and any attributes, before the element’s content is defined.

An opening tag starts with a less-than symbol, followed by the element name and optional attributes, and ends with a greater-than symbol. It marks the beginning of an element, whereas the corresponding closing tag, written as </element>, marks its end. The opening tag together with its closing tag defines the element’s content and boundaries.

Self-closing, or empty, elements can be expressed with a self-closing tag such as <tag ... /> to indicate that no separate closing tag is needed. In XML and XHTML, this syntax is standard for empty elements. In HTML5, many elements are void (for example, <br> or <img>) and do not require a closing tag, making the opening tag effectively complete on its own.

Differences between HTML and XML affect how aloittustagin is interpreted. HTML’s parsing rules are generally lenient, with tag names usually treated case-insensitively and certain attributes being boolean. XML, by contrast, is case-sensitive, and every opening tag must have a corresponding closing tag or be written as a self-closing tag.

Understanding the aloittustagin is essential for reading and editing markup, as it defines element boundaries, attributes, and the document’s structural hierarchy.