Changes

Recognizing the need for browser or ''client side'' intelligence Netscape began work on a scripting langauge that would enable web designers to imbed code into the HTML of web pages to provide features such as client side validation of user input, dynamic display of data and event driven functionality (for example performing local processing when a push button is pressed or data entered into a text field).

The scripting langauge developed at Netscape was originally called LiveScript. Perhaps in an effort to bask in the reflected glory of Sun Microsystem's Java programming language, LiveScript was later renamed JavaScript, though in reality it bears little or no resemblance to Sun's Java.

A disagreement between Netscape and Microsoft over licensing ultimately led Microsoft to reverse engineer JavaScript and create their own version called JScript. Inevitably differences between the two variants of the language quickly appeared and linger to this day,