Difference Between Java and JavaScript
What is Java?
Java is an OOP (object-oriented programming) language which came to usage in 1995. Java was developed at sun microsystems which later acquired by Oracle. Programs or applications developed in Java will execute in a JVM (Java virtual machine) by which we can run the same program on multiple platforms and systems/devices etc. If we want to run Java program on the browser we need to use Java applets which are embedded as a plugin which is not suggested. So Java is mostly used for standalone applications or back-end development. Java was designed by James Gosling and its major implementation was OpenJDK.
What is JavaScript?
JavaScript is an object-oriented scripting language which allows you to create dynamic HTML pages with interactive effects within a webpage. It was available in the browser until Google chrome released its JavaScript engine as “node.js”. JavaScript allows you to process and maintain data within the browser. We able to use JavaScript across full stack development with help of node.js which helps frontend developers to handle backend logic and application programming interface without learning a new programming language. JavaScript was created by Brendan Eich at Netscape which came into existence in 1995. It runs on web-browser only and it is an interpreted programming language.
Head To Head Comparison Between Java vs JavaScript
Below are the Top 8 comparisons between Java vs JavaScript
Key Differences between Java and Java-Script:
Below is the list of points that describe the difference between Java and JavaScript
- Java has strongly typed language whereas JavaScript is loosely typed language i.e. we need to declare variables using set object before using them whereas in JavaScript we can use a variable in a flexible way.
- It is a compiled and interpreted programming language and executed on JVM which requires JDK and JRE whereas JavaScript is interpreted which is executed on a browser and it is plain text.
- Java is platform independent with bytecode whereas JavaScript code is written is based on browser compatibility as some code might work on specific versions of browsers and doesn’t work on different versions of the same browser.
- It has statically typed language whereas JavaScript is dynamically typed language as variables declared at compile time with the data type and JavaScript can accept different kinds of data types.
- In Java, we have the support of constructor whereas in JavaScript constructor is a function and no rules for constructors in JavaScript like in Java.
- Java is class-based programming language whereas JavaScript is prototype based although it has object-oriented programming abilities.
- JavaScript uses semicolons at end of certain lines whereas Java ends non-block statements with a semicolon.
- Java has an implicit class scope whereas JavaScript has the implicit global scope.
- JavaScript mostly deals with floating point data types whereas Java has support for different numeric data types
- Java has switch structure which accepts only constants whereas JavaScript also has switch structure which accepts any values.
- Java has the support of annotations on classes whereas JavaScript has decorators on same declarations with different semantics.
- JavaScript has support for closures where we can pass a function as an argument to another function whereas Java doesn’t have this support but can be achieved using an anonymous class.
- It has the support of Enum data type by which we can declare a set of constants whereas JavaScript doesn’t have set a constant declaration.
- Both Java and JavaScript languages are open source by inherently as we can edit or modify the actual code and use. Java achieves concurrency using thread based approach whereas JavaScript uses event-based mechanism.
- JavaScript has more popularity with respect to projects created in last 5 years on GitHub developer.
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Comparison Table Between Java vs JavaScript
Following is the comparison table between Java vs JavaScript
| Basis of Comparison | Java | JavaScript |
| OOPS | Java is an object-oriented programming language which uses objects to perform any actions based on relations between objects. | JavaScript is an object-oriented scripting language which uses objects similar to Java. |
| Running Platform | Java applications and programs run in JVM (Java virtual machine) which required installing JDK and JRE on a system. | JavaScript applications run on a web browser and no need of any initial setup. |
| Mobile applications | Old mobile applications are mostly written in Java and smartphone platforms like Symbian and Android also support Java | Using JavaScript we can develop mobile applications but there are few limitations as we need to use third-party tools like phone gap to convert it to native code which mobile OS/platform can execute. |
| Learning Curve | Java has extensive documentation, online sources, online forums, communities from which one can learn easily. If we want to build applications and programming we can learn Java. | JavaScript also has extensive documentation, online sources, online forums and communities by which one can learn easily as we can see its execution in the browser immediately. If we want to make websites or web applications we can learn JavaScript. |
| Compilation | Java programs are compiled and interpreted as it is a programming language. | Whereas JavaScript is interpreted as it is scripting language which is a plain text code. |
| Support | Java is supported by most of the operating systems as almost every operating system supports. | JavaScript is supported by most of the web browsers that come with different operating systems and developers can directly create scripts using JavaScript as it will be straightforward. |
| Syntax | Java language syntax is similar to C/C++ programming language. Java program will be in classes and objects. | JavaScript language syntax is similar to C language but naming conventions are similar to Java programming language. |
| Scope | Java is available almost everywhere and it is an independent programming language which can run on different operating systems. Java uses block-based scoping where variable goes out of scope once control comes out of a block. | JavaScript is mostly used on web browsers and rely on HTML and CSS due to which it is not available globally. JavaScript uses function-based scoping as the variable can be accessed in the function. |
Conclusion – Java vs JavaScript
Finally, it’s an overview of comparison between Java and JavaScript. I hope you will have a good understanding of both languages. It is good to learn both Java and JavaScript as we can become full stack developer if we mastered. As they are almost different languages, one will be used for most applications and backend programs whereas other will be used for making web applications, interactive effects/features using it which can run on different browsers.
