LiveScript ==>
JavaScript
<language> (Formerly "LiveScript") Netscape's simple, cross-platform,
World-Wide Web scripting language, only very vaguely related to Java (which is a
Sun trademark). JavaScript is intimately tied to the World-Wide Web, and
currently runs in only three environments - as a server-side scripting language,
as an embedded language in server-parsed HTML, and as an embedded language run
in web browsers where it is the most important part of DHTML.
JavaScript has a simplified C-like syntax and is tightly integrated with the
browser Document Object Model. It is useful for implementing enhanced forms,
simple web database front-ends, and navigation enhancements. It is unusual in
that the scope of variables extends throughout the function in which they are
declared rather than the smallest enclosing block as in C.
JavaScript originated from Netscape and, for a time, only their products
supported it. Microsoft now supports a work-alike which they call JScript. The
resulting inconsistencies make it difficult to write JavaScript that behaves the
same in all browsers. This could be attributed to the slow progress of
JavaScript through the standards bodies.
JavaScript runs "100x" slower than C, as it is purely interpreted (Java runs
"10x" slower than C code). Netscape and allies say JavaScript is an "open
standard" in an effort to keep Microsoft from monopolising web software as they
have desktop software. Netscape and Sun have co-operated to enable Java and
JavaScript to exchange messages and data.
See also VBScript.
Usenet newsgroup: comp.lang.javascript.
Mailing List: <majordomo@obscure.org> ("subscribe javascript" in body).
(2003-04-28)
Nearby terms:
Java Open Language Toolkit « Java Remote Method
Protocol « Java Run-Time Environment « JavaScript
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