Google has praised Microsoft’s contribution to the HTML 5 discussion, as the two companies find rare common ground.

In a post to the WHATWG Blog, which provides a forum for web developers to discuss the evolution of the standard, Google’s HTML 5 evangelist Mark Pilgrim thanked Microsoft’s Adrian Bateman for his contribution to the debate.

“On August 7, 2009, Adrian Bateman did what no man or woman had ever done before: he gave substantive feedback on the current editor’s draft of HTML5 on behalf of Microsoft. His feedback was detailed and well-reasoned, and it spawned much discussion,” Pilgrim wrote.

“As you might expect, much of the discussion since August 7 has been driven by Microsoft’s feedback. After five years of virtual silence, nobody wants to miss the opportunity to engage with a representative of the world’s still-dominant browser,” he concludes.

HTML 5 is the next generation of the hypertext mark up language used to create content on the web. However, despite its importance Microsoft has remained stubbornly outside of the conversation until Bateman weighed in with his opinions.

In a wide-ranging post, Bateman endorsed the use of the video and audio tags in the standard, allowing browsers to play this content without requiring plug-ins. This came as something of a surprise, given that Internet Explorer 8 remains the only major browser not to support the tags.

However, it’s already been decided that HTML 5 will not specify a video and audio codec within its specification – after the major browser makers couldn’t agree on which codec to ship.

ANI