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What exactly IS Javascript?

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Dec 01.2005

Hi!

I must’ve read the first 2 or 3 primers about Javascript, but I still haven’t grasped the basic concept of what Javascript actually is. Could somebody please tell me what it is, when and why we would use it?

From what I’ve read, it seems like HTML, but a lot more complicated. That’s why I’ve been wondering what it really is, as it makes no sense to me as to why anybody would choose Javascript over HTML if they were the same.

I appreciate any help I can get. Thank you. ?

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@KorDec 01.2005 — http://www.howtocreate.co.uk/tutorials/index.php?tut=0&part=2

Furthermore, if you are interested in the history of Javascript language:

  • - What we are calling now Javascript is in fact a combination of ECMAScript

    and DOM . ECMAScript is, on its turn, an attempt to standardize both Netscape's JavaScript and IE's JScript .


  • - Back in the past, note that Netscape's JavaScript was originally called LiveScript (used in NS.2 browsers). In 1995 Netscape and Sun agreed to co-operate in order to diminish the monoply of Microsoft web software. So that LiveScript was renamed Javascript for the next Netscape's browser (NS.3) and was modified a little bit to be able to exchange information and data with Java applications.


    • So that there is no real resemblance between Java and Javascript, except the name used as a "brand" name, following the real succes of Java language at that time.

    Speaking about the speed of the execution, Javascript runs about "10x" slower that Java. Comapared with C++, Java is also "10x" slower.

    Now it is intersting to folow a derived language, EaseScript, which was an ancestor of LiveScript. EaseScript (formely named CEnvi or "Espresso", then C-- ) was the first "open language", and it was created by Nombas in 1992. In 2004 some of the Nombas products (EaseScript amongst) were aquired by a subsidiary of Openwave Systems Inc . EaseScript and the related tools are used now mainly for PDAs and smart phones browsers and it is no longer "open language"
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