ansaurus

Question

Is it wrong to place the <script> tag after the </body> tag?

Answer 1

+8 A:

It won't validate outside of the <body> or <head> tags. It also won't make much difference -- unless you're doing DOM manipulations that could break IE before the body element is fully loaded -- to putting it just before the closing </body>.

<html>
  ....
  <body>
     ....
     <script type="text/javascript" src="theJs.js"></script>
  </body>
</html>

Andy E 2010-06-14 13:53:09

Note that apps like YSlow will actually suggest that you do include your javascript at the end of the page. It may not speed up overall load time but it may load the relevant content first. Still, putting it just inside the </body> tag is best.

epalla 2010-06-14 16:12:04

@epalla: if you put the script right at the end of the body tag there's no other content left to load by the time it gets there, so there should be little difference between placing it outside or just inside. You then have the added benefit of your page still validating, which was the point I was trying to make in my answer.

Andy E 2010-06-14 16:19:25

Yep, I was agreeing with you since your answer is good. I just wanted to add that there is a reason for putting JS at the bottom of the page instead of in the head as we've done for a long time.

epalla 2010-06-14 16:34:59

Answer 2

+6 A:

Yes. Only comments and the end tag for the html element are allowed after the end tag for the body.

Browsers may perform error recovery, but you should never depend on that.

David Dorward 2010-06-14 13:55:32

Answer 3

A:

Yes. But if you do add the code outside it most likely will not be the end of the world since most browsers will fix it, but it is still a bad practice to get into.

Taylor Satula 2010-06-14 16:06:58

ansaurus

tags:

views:

answers:

Is it wrong to place the <script> tag after the </body> tag?

related questions