JavaScript History

JavaScript is a high-level programming language that was created by Brendan Eich in just 10 days in May 1995, while he was working at Netscape Communications Corporation. It was originally called Mocha, then renamed to LiveScript, and finally to JavaScript to ride on the success of Java.

JavaScript was initially designed to add interactivity and dynamic effects to web pages. Its first implementation was released in Netscape Navigator 2.0 in September 1995. The language quickly gained popularity among web developers, as it allowed them to create rich, interactive applications that ran in the browser.

In 1996, Microsoft created its own version of JavaScript called JScript, which was included in Internet Explorer 3.0. This led to a period of competition and fragmentation, as the two companies implemented different features and extensions to the language.

To address this issue, the European Computer Manufacturers Association (ECMA) formed a committee to standardize JavaScript. The first edition of the ECMAScript specification was released in 1997, which defined the core features of the language and provided a common standard for all implementations.

Since then, the language has evolved through several versions of the ECMAScript specification, with major updates in ES5 (2009), ES6 (2015), ES7 (2016), ES8 (2017), ES9 (2018), ES10 (2019), ES11 (2020), ES12 (2021), and ES13 (2022). Each new version adds new features and functionality to the language, while maintaining backwards compatibility with existing code.

Today, JavaScript is one of the most widely used programming languages in the world, and is used not only for web development, but also for server-side programming, desktop applications, and mobile app development. The popularity of JavaScript has led to the creation of many popular frameworks and libraries, such as React, Angular, Vue.js, Node.js, and jQuery, among others.