History of Javascript

Javascript was initially developed as a language to handle browser validations and nothing more but who knew Javascript will grow and gradually become one of the best programming languages to ever exist. We will take a look at the long and exciting journey of Javascript that has made it a programming language that powers the web today.

Javascript has established its legacy and received the award for the “most commonly used programming language” for the 7th continuous year. Javascript has captured the majority of the web development market and has built almost 95.2% of websites that currently exist on the internet. Major brands like YouTube and Google maps have trusted Javascript as the most reliable platform for their websites and applications.

So, let’s not beat around the bush now and move forward to discuss why and when Javascript was created.

If you are somebody who is planning on gaining expertise in Javascript programming, knowing the history of the language will help you better understand it. This will allow you to figure out its pros and cons since the very inception of the platform. As we talk about the evolution of the language, you can evaluate its features with your working needs.

Netscape communications gave birth to Javascript in 1995. Netscape initially developed Javascript for its personal usage as a scripting language that can be used for Netscape’s flagship web browser which was called the Netscape Navigator. At that time, Javascript wasn’t even called Javascript, it was named LiveScript and later updated to javascript to be positioned as a companion of the famous Java language. But it is to be noted that Javascript wasn’t much similar to the Java language besides some similarities in their syntaxes.

Brandan Eich was the lead programmer that developed Javascript and soon after its launch, many browsers started using Javascript, but Javascript was still not considered an excellent programming language in most parts of its history. People’s hesitation towards accepting Javascript was likely because of its notable performance glitches and some security concerns but it soon became the only option available to developers and almost all browsers used it.

In the past times, Javascript had no regulations or standards to fulfill. So to standardize the platform, Javascript 1.1 was handed over to ECMA, which is the European Computer Manufacturers Association in the year of 1997. ECMA went on to set up a technical committee that was only concerned about standardizing Javascript by providing it with a standard syntax and some general semantics, providing a vendor-neutral language and a cross-platform.

ECMA did some standardization changes with Javascript and made it ready to be industrialized. There were three major parts that constituted Javascript and they were:

Browser Object Model – BOM is what allows programmers to easily manipulate the browsers. Developers using the Browser Object Model have access to all the browser features and can make changes or manipulate them.
Core- This basically encompasses the syntax, the operators, and other basic statements.
Document Object Model – DOM is what is rendered to the client or the user side. This is rendered by the browser in the form of nodes and then displayed on the client-side.

Fortunately, Javascript might have had a bumpy start in the past, but sooner or later it proved its usefulness by being widely accepted by developers for its over-the-top interface and viable technology.

Importance of Javascript in today’s world

Traveling a journey from a not-so-good scripting language to a full-blown programming language, Javascript has managed to scale heights. Github reports are another reliable source to judge Javascript’s popularity and acceptability. According to Github reports, there are much more Javascript code repositories than of any other programming language and these numbers are not stopping to rise any time soon.

To match up with the web development need of coders, Javascript developed frameworks and libraries like Angular, React, Vue, and much more. These libraries allow developers to develop complicated websites in a limited time that too with minimal errors. Additionally, users can also create interactive mobile applications using Javascript. One of the major distinguishing factors of Javascript in today’s times is also its ability to allow users to share code within the mobile and web-worlds.

Having the most active community of programmers, Javascript has maintained a stable position by updating its platform with new releases and updated tools every once in a while. It is a noticeable fact that the Javascript standard is itself a very evolving document that introduces alterations and updates quite frequently. Javascript features transpilers and preprocessors of almost all types, they even have programs that can compile entirely new languages using Javascript. Many new operating systems which are yet to be launched are trusting Javascript for their full-fledged development, which signifies that Javascript has an amazing future waiting ahead.

One major issue that can possibly hinder Javascript’s future growth is the growing competition and variety of choices available in the market. But Javascript has taken care of eliminating competition by an extended plan to introduce new web components and adding new things to the Javascript world. So, all in all, no matter how many programming languages come and go, Javascript is not trading its position to anybody in many years to come.

Summary

As we read in this blog, Javascript has a very rich and exciting yet bumpy journey. Disregarding its initial image as merely a Java companion, Javascript surely has much more to it.

Well-established companies that too in the technical field blindfolded trust Javascript. To name a few huge companies that have repeatedly supplanted Javascript are Adobe, Microsoft( in VBScript as well as Silverlight), and surprisingly, even Google. Javascript has no plans to end this list any time soon.

Javascript has set up such a high standard for programming languages and this is not just because of it being the first in the field but because of its features. It is an open-source, standardized, and well-framed language that is well-suited for building dynamic and engaging web applications.