A Brief History of JavaScript?

JavaScript is a text-based, object-oriented scripting language. JavaScript works on UI and server development. While HTML and CSS design a webpage, JavaScript makes the website interactive.

Brenden Eich developed JavaScript in 1995 for Netscape in ten days. JavaScript has been an ECMA (European Computer Manufacturers Association) standard since 1997. Mozilla started Firefox development using JavaScript after the acquisition of JavaScript by ECMA from Netscape.

Let us discuss this topic more.

What is JavaScript?

JavaScript is lightweight as it is only an interpreted script. The browser gets the code as text and executes the script from the text. JavaScript name came from Java Applets running on the browser by Netscape.

JavaScript follows dynamic typing. Therefore, programmers need not define the data type. As JavaScript has multi-paradigm features, JavaScript stands first among other languages. The multi-paradigm means both functional programming and object-oriented programming.

JavaScript is very popular in the IT industry due to its simplicity. A little coding knowledge can help you run JavaScript in the browser directly without any setup. Game development companies also use JavaScript.

Who Designed JavaScript?

JavaScript was first introduced in 1995 as a part of the Netscape Navigator 2.0 browser. It was initially used to add simple functionality to web pages, such as form validation and image rollovers.

In 1996, Netscape submitted JavaScript to the European Computer Manufacturers Association (ECMA) as a proposed standard, and it was standardized as ECMAScript. This standardization allowed other companies to create JavaScript engines and implement the language in their own products.

After Brenden Eich developed JavaScript in 1995, ECMA released a stable version in 2021. The very first name of JavaScript was ‘Mocha’. Next, the name changed to ‘LiveScript’ and then ‘JavaScript’. ECMA changed JavaScript to ECMAScript or ECMA 262. However, JavaScript is still JavaScript.

Netscape approached Brenden Eich to develop a speedy programming language than Java. Hence the business tactic named the language JavaScript. Everything was a dream of Mark Andreessen, the founder of ‘Netscape’ to build an interactive programming option.

JavaScript invention was a competition with Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. It was the right decision by Netscape to assign Brenden Eich to develop a new programming language as Brenden Eich was a Tech Worm who is a passionate programmer about creating his programming languages. Brenden Eich is also a co-founder of Mozilla.

During the JavaScript development time, whether to go for a new language was a conflicting decision. The reason for the conflict was Java’s progress at the same time.

ECMAScript 2 and ECMAScript 3 came up in 1998 and 1999. JQuery’s release was in 2005. ECMAScript 6 arrived in 2008. Organizations such as Facebook and Google started using JavaScript in 2016. Have to mention that real-time notifications are a gift from JavaScript for websites.

After the acquisition, ECMA has been adding new features to JavaScript. Even though JavaScript is outstanding, there are haters too. JavaScript had several drawbacks in the initial stage. These limitations were a profound question by techies.

Sun systems were the trademark of JavaScript. After its acquisition by Oracle, Oracle in the United States owns a JavaScript trademark.

Over the years, JavaScript has evolved and become more powerful, with the addition of new features such as object-oriented programming, regular expressions, and support for asynchronous programming. Today, JavaScript is used in a wide range of applications, including web development, mobile app development, and server-side programming.

Conclusion

JavaScript is a dynamic programming solution developed by Brenden Eich for Netscape. JavaScript features make websites interactive. Making the impossible possible is the factor that adds value to JavaScript above all other programming languages.