Hacker News Reader

Comment by ryao | Hacker News Reader

Calling EMCAScript JavaScript was a huge mistake that is still biting us.

OR alternatively, just not coming up with a better alternative name that ECMAScript. If there was a catchier alternative name that was less awkward to pronounce, people might more happily have switched over.

"JS" because of the .js file extension.

ECMAScript version history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECMAScript_version_history

"Java" is an island in Indonesia associated with coffee beans from the Dutch East Indies that Sun Microsystems named their portable software after.

Coffee production in Indonesia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_production_in_Indonesia... :

> Certain estates age a portion of their coffee for up to five years, normally in large burlap sacks, which are regularly aired, dusted, and flipped.

Here is a novel idea. Just pronounce ECMA as a 2 syllable word using classical Latin pronunciation. Ecma becomes just as catchy as Java when pronounced that way. For English speakers who do not know classical Latin, just read this:

Eck-Ma-Script

Here is Eck for those who do not know:

https://youtu.be/cqsDlZAK104

As for Ma, it is the second half of mama. That is actually /ɛkmɑskɹɪpt/ rather than /ekmaskɹɪpt/, but it is close enough.

I was under the impression that this was the pronounciation that sounded like a skin disease.

I miss rote ECMAScript as EMCAScript. ECMA does not sound like a skin disease to me. EMCA might though.

The pronunciation that I assumed (also suggested by other replies), eck-ma, sounds very close to how ‘eczema’ is pronounced in much of the world.

> Eck-Ma-Script

I thought this is how it was generally pronounced, it's at least what I say. (It still sounds like a skin disease though.) Is there some other more popular pronunciation?

That's anachronistic: it was called JavaScript long before the ECMA specification and the ECMAScript name appeared. That the JavaScript name is dumb is pretty much universally agreed on.

ECMAScript is what people who want to avoid Oracle’s trademark say. Being anachronistic is irrevelant as long as Oracle has the trademark.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com