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I think you two are getting overly hyped up over what is, at the end of the day, a matter of preference about which technologies you like better.

galvanash,
Yes, javascript promises to lower the barrier to entry for app development. But you've said alot of things I disagree with. Like static typing...it does have a use (though whether you benefit from it is a different matter), it explicitly limits the number of states a variable may hold and helps catch errors at compile time.

In some languages, string concatenation and arithmetic addition are separate operators to help resolve the ambiguity, but javascript depends on inferred typing.
var a = x.foo() + 'x'; // what is a?

For this reason, I'd argue javascript is a poor choice for mission critical applications like those at NASA. There are more problems, like the inability to define proper "classes", which make javascript both slower and less error proof. Again, maybe you prefer not to use classes and find the prototype substitute good enough for you. But whether it's an enhancement or restriction of the language depends on your point of view - it's a matter of opinion.


Also, we've build other languages on top of javascript because browsers don't give us much choice, not because it particularly makes sense to do so otherwise.

Nelson,

You are right that no single language is good for everything. But you must accept that portability is very important and useful to many developers and users, they should be able to write once, run anywhere without needing to rewrite it again... You can dismiss portability for yourself, but it really doesn't make sense to dismiss the utility for others.

Edited 2012-09-14 06:41 UTC