5 ms·
The name "JavaScript" was silly to begin with, just a way to make the buzzword "Java" more popular. Let's call it WebScript and move on.
by thw_9a83c 1y ago
The name "JavaScript" was silly to begin with, just a way to make the buzzword "Java" more popular. Let's call it WebScript and move on.
- RandallBrown 1y agoKinda the other way around right? Java was a popular language at the time so Brendan Eich picked that as part of the name to make his new language more popular.
- thw_9a83c 1y agoMaybe. However, he wouldn't have been allowed to choose the name "JavaScript" if Netscape and Sun hadn't been in a business partnership. So my point is still valid. It was just a random ride on the Java wave.
- padjo 1y agoPretty sure Brendan Eich had nothing to do with the name JavaScript. That was a name cooked up by the marketing department.
- uncircle 1y agoThat is correct: in Brendan's own words: https://youtu.be/XOmhtfTrRxc?si=5J7LrNIaNo-_GNf7&t=99 https://youtu.be/XOmhtfTrRxc?si=5J7LrNIaNo-_GNf7&t=99 (starts at 1:39)
- px43 1y agoHow about EichScript, or ES for short :-D
- TZubiri 1y agoSure, let me just rename all of my file extensions and parsers to .ws and then handle the collisions with websockets paths and then revert it all back to how it was before I touched anything
- thw_9a83c 1y agoSo you think that Oracle must receive $200k, and that's the only way you can keep the legacy `.js` extension for your files.
- gertop 1y agoThe money isn't going to Oracle. It will be going to Deno's lawyers and, to a smaller extent, the US government.
- yk 1y agoSounds really like a development environment problem, I mean if you can't handle that your language suddenly changes it's name in a not backward compatible fashion, how do you ever stand a chance to handle leap seconds correctly?
- whatevaa 1y agoIs this sarcastic? Hard to tell. Most code doesn't need to handle leap seconds at all.
- riazrizvi 1y agoWhy not “JS”? Then we can all take sides in a religious war on whether it’s pronounced jay-ess, jayce, juss, or jess?
- hnlmorg 1y agoJS would be hard to trademark now because there’s so many other services using JS as part of their trademark. There’s also already quite a few companies who’ve already registered JS as a trademark. You also couldn’t call it Jscript because Microsoft owns the trademark there. EMCAScript is the most practical from a legal standpoint, but that name sucks badly.
- moralestapia 1y agoYeah, but that's what is needed. An un-trademark-eable term.
- hnlmorg 1y agoWhat you need is the opposite: a trademarked name but one where a community-managed nonprofit foundation owns. That’s how other languages (eg Perl and Python) manage their assets. And the ecosystem is better for it.
- moralestapia 1y ago>Perl >Python >And the ecosystem is better for it. AHAHAHAHAHH
- hnlmorg 1y agoI take it form your reply that you either misunderstood my comment or you think the constant threat of litigation from Oracle is a good thing. Either way, you come off as incredibly naïve.
- FearNotDaniel 1y agoIt’s pronounced gay-ess. Just like GIF.
- mattmaroon 1y agoIt does seem that rebranding would just fix the problem. I don’t really understand why the name is worth fighting over.
- serial_dev 1y agoDidn’t we try that experiment already with ECMAScript? Have you met anyone using it? Me neither. I can’t wait for the “well actually” comments.
- yesco 1y agoI'm not even sure how to correctly say ECMAScript out loud.
- MathMonkeyMan 1y agoee-see-ehm-ay-skript? It's ECK-mah-script.
- mattmaroon 1y agoI actually still thought that was the official name, but I never call it that. But really, what does it matter? Is Oracle suing people over the term JavaScript? Even if so, can’t they just use the correct term and the rest of us can call it JavaScript? I guess I just really don’t understand why this is a good use of my donations rather than, say, feeding the hungry, and I don’t mean that to disparage any tech related not for profits or issues.
- zenmac 1y agoWe can also call it ECMAScript. I always try to refer to it as ES instead of JS in professional coding context.
- paxys 1y agoIf there's a name even stupider than JavaScript it's ECMAScript.
- thw_9a83c 1y agoApparently people don't like the name "ECMA" because it's too close to "Eczema" which is a nasty dry/itchy skin problem. And I agree, because I have it too.
- hnlmorg 1y agoIronically EczemaScript is still a better name than ECMAScript.
- marcosdumay 1y agoIt looks too much like "Acme" so it gets confused as a joke about cartoons. It looks too much like "acne", that is a too common skin problem, and it looks too much like "eczema" that is a rarer nasty-looking skin problem. Whoever created that name should get a prize. Anyway, the community not adopting that brand doesn't mean one can't rebrand JS.
- wiseowise 1y ago> And I agree, because I have it too. Eczema or ECMaScript?
- ModernMech 1y ago"The most important thing in the programming language is the name. A language will not succeed without a good name. I have recently invented a very good name and now I am looking for a suitable language." - Donald Knuth Javascript was never a good name and if they weren't the defacto option to program the web, they would have never made it. I don't know why deno is so eager to get hold of the JS trademark when they have the perfect unencumbered name right there: denolang.
- serial_dev 1y agoThey don’t want to get hold of the trademark, they want to cancel it altogether. IMO it’s an important distinction
- tengbretson 1y agoAparently it is fine if you take an existing, trademarked language name and just add `Script` to the end of it. Obviously we should just call it JavaScriptScript.