JavaScript or Java

Java and JavaScript always get confused for obvious reasons. To start off the names will throw a person right off the bat. They could have come up with really different names for these programs when they started arguing over them.

The main difference is that Java can stand on its own while JavaScript must be placed inside an HTML document to function. Java is a much larger and more complicated language that creates "standalone" applications. A Java "applet" (so-called because it is a little application) is a fully contained program. JavaScript is text that is fed into a browser that can read it and then is enacted by the browser.

Another major difference is how the language is presented to the user when surfing the web. Java must be compiled into what is known as a "machine language" before it can be run on the Web. Basically what happens is after the programmer writes the Java program and checks it for errors, he or she hands the text over to another computer program that changes the text code into a smaller language. That smaller language is formatted so that it is seen by the computer as a set program with definite beginning and ending points. Nothing can be added to it and nothing can be subtracted without destroying the program.

JavaScript is text-based. It is written into an HTML document and it is run through a browser. You can alter it after it runs and run it again and again. Once the Java is compiled, it is set. Sure, you can go back to the original text and alter it, but then you need to compile again.

It is said that JavaScript’s main benefit is that it can be understood by the common human. I guess that depends on the common human. It is much easier and more robust than Java. It allows for fast creation of Web page events. JavaScript is a little more forgiving than Java. It allows more freedom in the creation of objects. Java is very rigid and requires all items to be denoted and spelled out. JavaScript allows you to call on an item that already exists, like the status bar or the browser itself, and play with just that part. JavaScript is geared to Web pages. Java is geared toward where it is needed most at the time.

A scripting language, script language or extension language is a programming language that controls a software application. "Scripts" are often treated as distinct from "programs", which execute independently from any other application. At the same time they are distinct from the core code of the application, which is usually written in a different language, and by being accessible to the end user they enable the behavior of the application to be adapted to the user's needs. Scripts are often, but not always, interpreted from the source code or "semi-compiled" to byte code which is interpreted, unlike the applications they are associated with, which are traditionally compiled to native machine code for the system on which they run. Scripting languages are nearly always embedded in the application with which they are associated.

The name "script" is derived from the written script of the performing arts, in which dialogue is set down to be spoken by human actors. Early script languages were often called batch languages or job control languages. Such early scripting languages were created to shorten the traditional edit-compile-link-run process.