Structure and basic possibilities of the electronic textbook (ET) “Study HTML” developed at RTU are described. Results of using this book during two years to tutor the subject “Web application development” are considered. The results of comparative analysis of about 100 electronic textbooks available in Internet are considered and basic requirements to universal ET are formulated. The architecture of Web-based electronic textbook developed at RTU and basic functions for each of four user categories (student, tutor and administrator) are described.