{"id":2904,"date":"2019-10-19T12:07:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-19T12:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/?p=2904"},"modified":"2019-09-14T14:11:16","modified_gmt":"2019-09-14T14:11:16","slug":"whats-the-difference-between-java-and-javascript","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/javascript\/whats-the-difference-between-java-and-javascript\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s the Difference Between Java and JavaScript?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2>The Difference Between Java and JavaScript:<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>While their names seem to imply a connection (\u201cIs JavaScript a script in Java?\u201d), that\u2019s the biggest similarity.&nbsp;<strong>The two languages aren\u2019t related in any technical or significant way<\/strong>. As&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/stackoverflow.com\/questions\/245062\/whats-the-difference-between-javascript-and-java\">one Quora user<\/a>&nbsp;puts it:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\"><p>Javascript and Java \u201care similar like the words \u2018car\u2019 and \u2018carpet\u2019 are similar.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<h3>Why are the names so similar then?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The overlap (and resulting confusion) is intentional.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Java, created in 1990 by James A. Gosling, a computer scientist at Sun Microsystems, was already plenty popular by the time Netscape named its programming language JavaScript in late 1995.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Piggybacking off Java\u2019s popularity was as smart business move. As another Quora user theorizes, Netscape wanted \u201cto confuse the unwary into thinking it had something to do with Java, the buzzword of the day\u2014and it succeeded.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That explanation is a bit extreme and not totally accurate. The reality is that JavaScript, designed by Brendan Eich of Netscape, was initially called LiveScript, but&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20070916144913\/http:\/\/wp.netscape.com\/newsref\/pr\/newsrelease67.html\">a marketing agreement<\/a>&nbsp;(dare we call it a ploy?) between Netscape and Sun led Netscape to rename it JavaScript for co-branding purposes. At the time, Sun had agreed to let Netscape bundle its (then) leading browser with Java runtime. The name change was part of the deal.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since then, Java has arguably faded in popularity\u2014but JavaScript has decidedly\u2026not. You could say that JavaScript owes its rise to Java\u2019s name appeal. Not everyone would agree, I\u2019m guessing. But the main takeaway is this: Beyond naming convention, the two languages have little to nothing in common.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2>Java versus JavaScript: A Quick Comparison<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>OK, but let\u2019s say you want a little more detail on the differences between the two. Here\u2019s a quick:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Differences<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Java is a static \u201cobject-oriented\u201d programming language that works on multiple platforms. JavaScript is a dynamic programming language (or scripted language) that\u2019s used to make websites and applications dynamic. (Read our&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/skillcrush.com\/2012\/04\/05\/javascript\/\">JavaScript guide here<\/a>.)&nbsp;<\/li><li>Java is class-based. JavaScript is dynamic.&nbsp;<\/li><li>Java is a standalone language\u2014it likes its freedom. JavaScript is a little more emotionally co-dependent (but in a good way?), meaning that it works&nbsp;<em>with<\/em>&nbsp;HTML and CSS on web pages to create dynamic content.&nbsp;<\/li><li>In 2019, JavaScript is a must-learn for web developers because it\u2019s used pretty much any and everywhere, whereas Java is largely considered<a href=\"https:\/\/www.freelancinggig.com\/blog\/2018\/08\/29\/what-big-companies-still-code-in-java-do-major-corporations-still-use-java\/\">&nbsp;a \u201cprevious generation programming language\u201d<\/a>, though certainly plenty of sites still use it.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3>Similarities<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Like we said, there aren\u2019t many. But there are a few&nbsp;<em>very&nbsp;<\/em>surface-level overlaps:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Both Java and JavaScript are most often used in client-side applications<\/li><li>Both Java and JavaScript use the C syntax<\/li><li>JavaScript copies some Java naming conventions. This was done back to build that faux camaraderie we mentioned earlier<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2>Which Should You Learn?&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Again, this is like comparing apples to oranges, but if we had to choose? JavaScript.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/github.blog\/2018-11-15-state-of-the-octoverse-top-programming-languages\/\">According to GitHub<\/a>, as of 2018, there were \u201cmore repositories created in JavaScript than in any other language.\u201d GitHub also reported that JavaScript and Python are also growing in popularity year over year, especially compared to other languages like Ruby.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Don\u2019t get us wrong: Java is still widely used and very popular\u2014and there are loads of arguments for\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/codegym.cc\/groups\/posts\/why-should-you-learn-java\">why you should learn Java in 2019<\/a>. But JavaScript is an ideal starting point for beginners who are just getting interested in learning to code, especially those who\u2019d like to land a\u00a0front end web developer job\u00a0or go\u00a0full stack. Really, it\u2019s a skill that\u2019s versatile enough to apply to a bunch of tech-related roles \u2014 one that you\u2019ll find handy regardless of what sort of tech position you want to land.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In the end, though, it\u2019s hard to pick between two languages that couldn\u2019t be more different. So if you\u2019re really not sure, try considering your end goal and weighing the pros and cons of each.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Difference Between Java and JavaScript: While their names seem to imply a connection (\u201cIs JavaScript a script in Java?\u201d), that\u2019s the biggest similarity.&nbsp;The two languages aren\u2019t related in any technical or significant way. As&nbsp;one Quora user&nbsp;puts it: Javascript and Java \u201care similar like the words \u2018car\u2019 and \u2018carpet\u2019 are similar.\u201d Why are the names [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2905,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[77,12,14],"tags":[25,73,137],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Blog_java-vs-js.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7FQPL-KQ","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2904"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2904"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2904\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2906,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2904\/revisions\/2906"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/azoora.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}