On this site you may see the language names ScriptEase, JavaScript, ECMAScript, and Cmm. It is easy to become confused by these conflicting names which all seem to refer to the same language (to make matters worse, "JavaScript" sounds remarkably like "Java", doesn't it?). These names generally do refer to the same thing, but the technically correct description is this: Nombas develops the ScriptEase product brand of scripting tools, which are all compatible with the JavaScript language and compliant with the ECMAScript language standard.
A quick history lesson will defuse this confusion:
A language is born...
In 1992 and 1993 Nombas developed a language named Cmm (for C minus minus, or "C without the hard stuff") for use as an embeddable scripting language, showing that it was possible to have a full-powered language that was simple enough to replace macro languages. Years later we would change the language name to ScriptEase, because Cmm was "too negative, and the letter 'C' scared people". Cmm was first released in a shareware product called CEnvi, which won awards and fame and is now available as ScriptEase:Desktop.
As seen on the web...
When Netscape's first commercial browsers were released we made a version of CEnvi that could handle short scripts embedded within web pages. By embedded scripts within the page we allowed the client side to handle processing, rather than making all dynamic interaction happen on the server. This brought immediate client-side interaction with the user. The advantages of client-side handling were made obvious by Nombas' "Espresso Pages", and Netscape soon began work on their own version, which they called LiveScript, and then renamed to JavaScript just before its final release. They chose the JavaScript name because, at that time, Java was very hot and it was hoped that the script language would gain from the name similarities. Within a few months JavaScript was used in about ten times as much web content as Java.
Now an international standard...
With Microsoft including JavaScript in their browser, under the name JScript, Netscape altering JavaScript with each browser release, and Nombas continuing it's support of (what we then called the) ScriptEase language for everything except browsers, language confusion quickly ensued. The ECMA standards body then took over and these companies, along with few others in the industry, created a standard language specification. By this time everyone agreed that "JavaScript" was a misleading and confusing name, and somehow we ended up calling the standard ECMScript (and we thought Cmm was a bad name!).
A rose by any other name...
JavaScript, JScript, ECMAScript, ScriptEase, or Cmm, whatever you want to call it, the balance of power and simplicity in this language have quickly made it the language of the web. And with Nombas' ScriptEase tools (compatible with JavaScript, compliant with ECMAScript) the benefits of this language are now available for all your computing needs, to make your job easier to perform, and to save you time and money.
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