There is nothing in your "explanation" that proves me wrong. No doubt you
use your own definition of similarity. Besides, I have referred to both ASP
and ASP .NET, and you have ignored that there is indeed JavaScript 2.0 which
implements several features of Netscape's ECMAScript Ed. 4 proposal,
although there is only a test implementation available (Epimetheus).
Epimetheus? It is gone 9 years ago after a few weeks of beta testing.
Maybe it's time to forget?
Note:
to not get lost in all these "...script":
JavaScript - refers to the client-side language used in Gecko
browsers.
JScript - refers to the language trademark reserved by Microsoft
Javascript - (small "s") refers to all set of _actual_ implementations
provided by current browsers as opposed to:
ECMAScript - that refers to language specifications issued by ECMA
International
Now:
Microsoft has developed JScript 7.0 (market name JScript.NET) as the
next step in ECMAScript evolution: class-based inheritance, strict
typing, encapsulation, import directives, interfaces, manual memory
management and all other regular toys no one C++'er can possibly
imaging his life without. They left a generous gap in version
numbering - with IE6 using JScript 5.6, and then JScript 7.0 right
away - in order to be able to release new client-side versions with
versions below 7: because in the wildest nightmare no one in Microsoft
management would assume such power as JScript.NET to be available for
client-side scripting. Web applications are getting real challenge to
Microsoft Office products even with the current language limitations,
so the main task of the management was and remains to keep client-side
scripting capabilities as weak as possible as long as doable.
This way JScript < 7.0 was never used server-side, and JScript >= 7.0
was never use client side. With the profound structural and functional
differences between client-side JScript <= 5.6 and JScript.NET (>=
7.0) referring to them as some overall similar things is completely
misleading. I personally never used the term "JScript" in reference to
both, you may scan my posts.
See also
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/e2h4yzx6.aspx
The other rivals did not contribute great into Javascript development
so the things were in deep stagnation for five years at least. Some
players spent these whole five years to make a descent script engine
and another 1.5 year to finally bring it in accordance with the year
1999 specs, so 6.5 - 7 years to produce a usable script engine. And by
"bring it in accordance" I don't mean to follow each and every dot and
comma in specs, I mean simply implement specified methods with more-or-
less specified results. No names, just to remind in what deep sh**
thing were.
It is not true that everything stopped completely. At the beginning of
this century Waldemar Horwat, who originally was in Netscape
Corporation and latter in Mozilla Foundation, started making drafts of
JavaScript 2.0, very similar by structure and capabilities to
Microsoft JScript.NET but intended right away for client-side as well
as for server-side deployment. Netscape and inheritedly Mozilla
Foundation are using their own version numbering, so with the version
number in use at that time 1.5 they also left a gap for intermediary
updates.
The project page URL long time linked in c.l.j. FAQ is still available
via WayBack Machine:
http://web.archive.org/web/20070713161258/http://www.mozilla.org/js/language/js20/
Unfortunately Waldemar Horwat left Mozilla Foundation at Summer of
2003 for his new position in Google, Inc. and ever since and for a few
years the project was completely abandoned.
The other rivals were completely silent all these years as I said,
struggling to implement even as little as it was spelled in old
ECMAScript 3rd. ed. The only exception was Macromedia/Adobe
ActionScript on Tamarin engine (Flash files) that had to develop in a
highly competitive environment all these years.
The recent - last 1.5 year - development is that first Brendan Eich
really started with "ECMAScript Edition 4", which is as I understand
the new project name instead of former "JavaScript 2.0". The project
page is at
http://www.ecmascript.org/
So by the end of 2007 we had Brendan Eich in Mozilla Foundation,
Waldemar Horwat in Google, Douglas Crockford in Yahoo! and the
appointed project manager in Microsoft (after Eric Lippert went out of
the deal the relevant department is short on widely recognizable
names, or maybe I'm just getting out of current bios). It resulted in
three camps over the battle for Javascript future:
1) "Refolution now!" represented by Mozilla Foundation
2) "As much as we can squeeze out of M$" represented by Google and
Yahoo!
3) "Get you lost all together and let us sell our Office" represented
by Microsoft
While positions 2) and 3) had some grounds for negotiations, 1) did
not go at all for 3) and all this resulted in 4th edition working
group collapse in November 2007, emotionally and rather picturally
described by Brendan Eich in his blog:
http://weblogs.mozillazine.org/roadmap/
The overall future of Javascript is rather cloudy now, especially with
possible changes in the camp 2) with Yahoo! currently considering the
acquisition proposal from Microsoft
http://yhoo.client.shareholder.com/press/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=291270
If the deal is cut (and it is well possible with the ongoing Yahoo!
troubles), one of first thing to be put on cold would be Yahoo!'s
Javascript modules for rich client-side applications. That leaves
Google alone in the camp 2)
Lucky the company is powerful enough to still negotiate out some
common improvement steps for client-side scripting: plus of course and
as always the end-users pressure.
In this situation I just hope that Brendan Eich (== Mozilla Foundation
JavaScript) will not attempt to go by brute force way so implementing
JavaScript 2.0 / ECMAScript 4th / whatever on Gecko alone plus making
it the default mode engine. The conditions are just not here yet IMO
for such actions. Whatever is not supported by IE6/7 is useless for
WWW developers - so one needs to negotiate however upsetting it would
be.
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