Well, unless the language is JavaScript...

I beg to differ ;)

Javascript, when disregarding the DOM-interfaces, is in fact quite an elegant little language. Functions are first order objects, which means that you have a lot of functional programming goodness like currying and whatnot at your fingertips. This makes it very easy to write event-handlers, or event-handler generators, or in some (esoteric) cases generators for event-handler generators ('twas a rather exotic script, I must admit). Great fun!

Then again, when you do regard javascript in conjunction with browser-dependent DOM-tree hell, you have a point. As long as the browser-makers don't agree on a standard API, the usefulness of the language is seriously reduced. I hope, and believe, that when sensible browser-makers start to dominate the market (and they are gaining), we will get a de facto standard, and this problem will go away.

All in all, Javascript is IMHO a tool of enormous potential, though it is still in it's teens. I hope it develops :)

I hope, and believe, that when sensible browser-makers start to dominate the market (and they are gaining), we will get a de facto standard, and this problem will go away.

Well, you probably won't even have to wait that long. I have found that over the last few years, (for example) starting with the first incarnations of Mozilla and MSIE5.5, that it's actually quite easy to make quite complex code in Javascript that just works across browsers — thus, without using any browser specific code. It really is a lot better already than it used to be in the 3.x/4.x days.

Yep. It's a shame M$ chose C# and not JScript.Net as their "flagship" language. Double shame they don't even give it reasonable support in Visual Studio.

Jenda


We'd like to help you learn to help yourself Look around you, all you see are sympathetic eyes Stroll around the grounds until you feel at home    -- P. Simon in Mrs. Robinson

/J