<p> or <br>?

[jax502]

Just curious...let's say we have an article that consists of multiple paragraphs,
but the style is consistent throughout. Is it advisable to just enclose the whole article in one <p></p>? and use <br>'s for every paragraph?such as:

<p class="content"> blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah<br>
<br>
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah</p>

or use <p></p> for each paragraph:
<p class="content">blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah</p>
<p class="content">blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah</p>

Both will achieve the same result but I'm just curious which one is the most correct way of doing it. Is it just a matter of one's preference?

[Hierophant]

Neither is technically wrong but the second example is probably the best way to do it. If most or all of your paragraphs are going to be content though, I would assign the CSS to the <P> tag itself. This can be overriden later with specialty classes for other paragraph types.

[jax502]

Neither is technically wrong but the second example is probably the best way to do it. If most or all of your paragraphs are going to be content though, I would assign the CSS to the <P> tag itself. This can be overriden later with specialty classes for other paragraph types.

Thanks Mr. Luke!

[vgarcia]

Neither is technically wrong but the second example is probably the best way to do it. If most or all of your paragraphs are going to be content though, I would assign the CSS to the <P> tag itself. This can be overriden later with specialty classes for other paragraph types.

Not only that, you can also use :first-line and :first-letter CSS pseudo-classes with <p>, which you can't do with <br />.

[r937]

Not only that, you can also use :first-line and :first-letter CSS pseudo-classes with <p>, which you can't do with <br />.

Actually, this will work just fine in any version 5+ browser:

p {
  text-indent: 1em;
}

You don't need the :first-line selector for that.

[Paul O'B]

Hi,

If you are using 2 <br> tags together just to make space between your text then I would consider that incorrect. If its a paragraph then use the <p> tag on each paragraph.

If you use the <p> tag then the space between can be controlled exactly and easily by using CSS to control the margins on the <p> element (as already mentioned above).

Not only that - it looks so much neater as well

Paul

[vgarcia]

Actually, this will work just fine in any version 5+ browser:

p {
  text-indent: 1em;
}

You don't need the :first-line selector for that.

Yeah, but can you do this without adding a bunch of HTML to get the same effect?

p {
  font-size: 80%;
  color: #666;
}
p:first-line {
  font-weight: bold;
  color: #000;
}
p:first-letter {
  font-size: 200%;
}

These should work in IE 5.5+ by the way, in addition to the usual cadre of "good" browsers like Mozilla or Opera.