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Comment by wavesplash | Hacker News Reader

Under a 2 week deadline. I challenge you to do better.

Most likely he had been thinking about the project for some time. But the 10-days-execution story sounds much nicer

He was... kind of. My understanding is Eich had been thinking for a while about the idea of bringing a version of Scheme into the browser. He was lured to work for Netscape by the promise that yes, he could do this. Unfortunately the business decision came down that the language's syntax had to approximate Java. So the semantics of the language had probably been settled in his mind for quite some time, but the syntax change still makes the 10 days an impressive feat. (And also explains a lot of the weirdness in JavaScript -- you're writing code and expecting it to behave like a C-like, but you're actually kind of writing quasi-Scheme and you don't know it.)

I've spoken and written about the early days, e.g., here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX3ZABCdC38

Friends from SGI recruited me (second attempt) in March 1995, I joined in early April but in the server group. I thought a lot -- but worked too little due to server commitments -- during the month of April, about "the scripting language" which was suggested to be Scheme when I was being recruited, but which by the time I joined could not be Scheme, due to the impending Java deal between Netscape and Sun.

Java meant either no scripting language, or a kid-brother language, which meant C-like syntax, primitive vs. object types as in Java, and other unfortunate consequences.

When I transferred to the client group in early May, I had to produce a demo very quickly. I chose first class functions and (barefly there at first) prototypes as the building blocks. The rest is history.

So it sounds roughly one month of thinking and researching, then 10 days of coding?

That's what I wrote, yeah. With constraints going from "Come do Scheme!" to "make it look like Java" and even "feel like Java" because interop, via what we hoped would come, and did in Netscape 3, as a JS/Java bridge called LiveConnect.

The Belgium Post built a whole web app+service architecture on LiveConnect.

Think of LiveConnect as "Active Scripting" on MS's platform, which enabled Java components to be developed and glued together by JS.

Thanks!

I joined Netscape on April 3, 1995 but in the server team, due to a temporary requisition shortage. I worked on what would eventually become HTTP 1.1, which we wanted to be more like SPDY or HTTP 2. Therefore I had only spare time to think about what became JS, and I used it to study HyperTalk, Logo, and other languages, not just Scheme or Self.

I finally got transferred to the client team one whole month later, in early May. Then I had ten days to demo-day.

Why do you feel compelled to make up a story? Because it sounds nicer to you to denigrate my work, it seems.

Not that you need it or anything, but I'd like to thank you for your work on Javascript - without it I might never have gotten started with programming.

So, thank you very much for laying down the foundation for a whole generation of new programmers!

> Why do you feel compelled to make up a story? Because it sounds nicer to you to denigrate my work, it seems.

Because randos on the internet (especially business types) love to make stuff up in the name of puffery and deifying. Legends are rarely true.

Thank you for clarifying.

You are a business type?

Yes, sadly. I'm well aware of our capacity for bullshit and cargo-culting

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