Best replacement for font tag in html

Question

Since the font tag in HTML is being deprecated in HTML5 (and I understand why) is there a clean solution for applying certain attributes and styles to only portions of a paragraph text? I'm using JavaScript to parse an XML file that relies on the fact that the font tag allows portions of wrapping text to be formatted using class-based CSS. I realize the "anchor" (a) tag could also be used for this purpose, but that way seems very backwards and unnatural.

EDIT

When I asked this question (a couple years ago now) I was failing to understand that every DOM element falls into a display category, the two primary categories being:

• block - insists on taking up its own row
• inline - falls in line with other inline elements or text

HTML offers two generic container elements, each of which by default adheres to one of these display values; div for block display, and span for inline display.

The span element is the perfect way to designate a certain chunk of text and give it a unique style or ID because you can wrap it around part of a larger paragraph without breaking the selected contents into a new row.

Answer 1

The span tag would be the best way.

Although inline CSS is typically not recommended, here is an example:

<p>
This is my <span style="font-weight:bold">paragraph</span>.
</p>

span and div are similar, but the div tag is a block element, so it will cause line-breaks. span is an inline tag that can be used inline with your text.

Answer 2

HTML:

<span class="yourstyle">
Text in your style
</span>

CSS:

.yourstyle {
            color: red;
           }

Answer 3

you could use a <span> tag

<p>here is your paragraph text and it goes on and on and on..... and now 
lets start some <span>formatted text.</span> here is another<span>section 
of formatted text</span> here is unformatted text<p>

you can either do inline styles such as <span style="color: #000000; font-family: calibri, arial, helvetica;"> or you can just apply a class to your span, like <span class="textformat1" and <span class="textformat2">. then just apply different css rules based on the class.

.textformat1 {
    color: red;
}
.textformat2 {
    color: blue;
}

hope this helps

Answer 4

Always use css files to hold your code which will be considered "universal" for each element you set. When you want to set for a specific, lets say <span> element. You would do just as Adam Plocher said above, use the style="" attribute for the <span>element.